Galinha de cabidela

As tradition built it

Galinha de cabidela

Serves 4 . 50 to 75 minutes, plus preparation

Ingredients

• 1, about 2kg whole chicken, jointed
• 1 cup (about 240ml) chicken blood
• 3 tbsp vinegar
• 2 lime
• 4 cloves garlic
• 2, chopped onion
• 1 tbsp, chopped coriander
• 1 tbsp, chopped spring onion
• 2 leaves bay leaf
• 2, ripe, chopped tomato
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• to taste rice, to serve
• to taste boiled potatoes, to serve

Method

1. Collect the chicken's blood in a bowl with vinegar and whisk immediately to stop it clotting.
2. Joint the whole chicken and clean it with lime and boiling water.
3. Season with garlic, onion, coriander, spring onion, bay leaf, tomato and olive oil, and simmer forty to sixty minutes until tender.
4. Lower the heat and stir in the reserved blood and vinegar gradually over ten to fifteen minutes until the sauce thickens, taking real care not to let it split.
5. Serve with rice and boiled potatoes.

Notes

The dish traces to Portugal but is now embedded specifically in the repertoire of Pernambuco, Paraíba and Rio Grande do Norte.

What a modern chef changes

An emulsion finished off the heat

Method

1. Hold the finished braising liquid at a controlled, gentle heat, well below a simmer.
2. Whisk the blood-vinegar mixture in slowly off the direct heat entirely, finishing the emulsion the way a careful cook finishes a hollandaise rather than a stew.
3. Strain the finished sauce through a chinois to a genuine gloss before it goes back over the chicken.