Moroccan Chicken with rice

While I was living in Houston, I found this amazing Moroccan restaurant called Saffron. I went there several times and fell in love with this one chicken dish they had. After moving to Alabama, I realized there is nary a Moroccan dish to be found, so I had to make it my self. I did a little research on flavors and spices in Moroccan cuisine and after some trial and error, have come up with this one. I have to admit that I am seriously proud of it!  I made it this evening for the first time in months. Even though the taste is exotic and tingling on your taste buds, all of the ingredients are things that most people have in the house most of the time.   
I buy whole chickens and cut them up for this. It is tremendously less expensive and everyone can get what they like (I like dark meat, but my husband loves white meat, for instance). 


Makes 8 servings
Prep time: 20 minutes (or more if you need to cut up a chicken)
Cook time: 1 hour, 20 minutes
Cost: about $5.00 or $0.63 per serving

1/2 sweet onion, chopped

handful of dried cranberries

3 cloves of garlic, crushed

1 apple (I use gala since they cook down so nicely), cored, peeled and diced

1 can of LeSur Baby Peas, NOT drained

1 1/2 cups white rice

1 cup broth (I used beef because I had some open and it added a great flavor, very round)

1 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. allspice

1/2 tsp. cumin

dash of cardamon

2 tablespoons of honey

salt and pepper

1 whole chicken, cut up

Preheat oven to 375. Dissolve honey into the broth. Mix everything (except chicken) together. Lay chicken on top of rice mixture and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Bake covered for 1 hour. Uncover and cook another 20 minutes.

The spices are pretty heavy in this dish, which is the way I like it. However, for a dish with a little less kick in the mouth, reduce the amount of spices by about 1/3 or increase the amount of rice and liquid.