A new recipe- Herbaceous challenge

On the foodlovers NZ website, there is a forum all about cooking. One of the contributors wanted to start a weekly food challenge, where an ingredient is chosen, and those interested have to cook a dish that they have never made before, using that ingredient.

I was keen to join in, and was nominated to choose the 2nd week's ingredient.

Given the glut of herbs in my garden at the moment, I chose fresh herbs as the challenge ingredient. Savory or sweet, however you wanted to use them... entirely up to the cook.

So then to do something myself.

I have a recipe in my folder that I cut out of a magazine quite some time back, and so decided this was a great time to try it.

Boursin Chicken.

This involved deboning a chicken, which is then spread with a paste of spinach, peas, basil, parsley, garlic, breadcrumbs, boursin cheese, lemon zest and ground fennel seeds. This then has salami laid over it, followed by chargrilled red capsicum. the chicken is rolled up and wrapped with streaky bacon before being roasted.

I was missing the boursin cheese, but the recipe suggested substituting feta, garlic and fresh thyme, all of which I did have. The salami was a venison pepperoni we picked up today at the Kumeu show, and tasted great.

To accompany the chicken, and include another herb into the meal, I made a sour cream and chives potato bake, using a basic white sauce to which I added sour cream and chives. Partly cooked sliced potatoes were added, topped with a little mozzarella, and baked till golden and bubbling.

All of us enjoyed this meal, and it was very satisfying to use some of the herbs that are growing so well at the moment.

Rating 4/5 - missed a perfect 5 as the ratio of chicken to stuffing was uneven, due to using a whole chicken, which clearly does not have an even distribution of meat along it. Will look for a genetically modified chicken next time, or use chicken breasts sliced and laid out flat.