Recipe for chicken with wild mushrooms, pumpkin, rice and sage butter

meIf the butter is too strenuous, skip it – it’s still a good dish. Start with Italian salami if you like and finish with Italian dessert wine or cheese and ripe pears.

Hours

Preparation time: 10 minutes, plus 15 minutes of soaking

Cooking time: 45 minutes

Serve

four

Ingridients

• 10 g of dried forest mushrooms
• 500 ml of chicken broth
• 170 g of basmati rice
• 1 onion, chopped
• 125 g chestnuts, thickly sliced
• 8 chicken thighs, skin nicely trimmed
• 345 g pumpkin or butter gourd, seedless and cut into large pieces or rings
• olive oil, for dripping

For sage butter

• 75 g butter at room temperature
• 6 sage leaves, finely chopped
• 1 small clove of garlic, grated into a puree

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 190C / 180C fan * / gas mark 5.
2. Soak the mushrooms in 75 ml of freshly boiled water for 15 minutes.
3. To prepare the butter, mash it with sage and garlic, shape the logs, wrap in cling film and refrigerate.
4. Drain the wild mushrooms and add the irrigation liquid to the chicken broth. Wash the rice in a colander under the tap until the water becomes clear.
5. Place the onion and all the mushrooms in a 30-inch pan or shallow pot (a wide bottom is very important) and sprinkle over the rice (it may not seem like much, but it expands, no worries).
6. Add the chicken thighs (skin side up) and pumpkin on top. Drizzle with a little olive oil and season. Bring the broth to a boil and carefully pour it into the chicken circle.
7. Bake for 45 minutes until the meat is nice and golden yellow and the stock is absorbed. Place the sage butter rings on the chicken thighs, let them melt and serve.

Diana’s conversions may differ slightly from the standard ones