Chicken Croquettes with Tomato sauce

This recipe is an altered version of a croquette recipe. The sauce is tailored for the dish, as sage and tarragon go well together for a cicken dish, and the lemon in the croquettes is supposed to compliment this.

450g potatoes, diced
2tbsp milk
200g chicken, finely sliced
3 eggs
rind of 1 lemon, finely grated
120g breadcrumbs
2 spring onions, finely chopped
salt and pepper to taste
Vegetable oil, for deep fat frying

1tbsp olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
400g can of chopped tomatoes
2tbsp tomato puree
1tbsp sage, chopped
1tbsp tarragon, chopped
salt and pepper to taste



Step 1
Boil the potatoes for 25 minutes, or until tender. Drain the potatoes and return to the pan on a low heat to ensure that all excess water evaporates. Mash the potatoes with the milk and two of the eggs. Season with the salt and pepper, and mix in the chicken, lemon rind, and spring onions. Chill for at least 1 hour n the fridge.

Step 2
Meanwhile prepare the sauce by heating the oil in a saucepan and adding the onions, frying for 5 minutes until softened. Add the tomates and the puree and stir and simmer the sauce for 15 minutes. Season with salt and pepper, before serving add the sage and tarragon and warm through for a minute.

Step 3
Remove the potato mixture from the fridge and divide into roughly equal sized portions. Shape each portion into a sausage shape then, having beaten the last egg,dip the potato mixture into the egg then the breadcrumbs.

Step 4
Heat the vegetable oil in a saucepan, deep-fat fryer, or a deep bottomed frying pan, until a cube of bread dropped in it sinks, rises and sizzles in 10 seconds. Deep fry the croquettes for 5 minutes or until golden and crisp, serve immediately with the sauce.

This recipe is flexible in terms of sauce and ingredients for the croquette. I used chicken, but you could also use turkey, or ham, or vegetables. If using ham you could change the sauce to a cheesy one to better fit with the ingredients. This could be an excellent use of leftovers from christmas dinner, as you could have the potatoes mashed, add in the turkey, and you could then finely slice brussel sprouts to replace the spring onions, and serve with cranberry sauce instead of a tomato based sauce.

Toad in the Hole with Mustard and Spring Onion Mash and Onion Gravy

Toad in the hole is a classic dish that goes well with mashed potato. When the batter is cooked to perfection it's just so crisp on the outside and light on the inside, but it needs a hot oven.

6 pork sausages
1tbsp oil

for the batter
75g plain flour
1 large egg
75ml milk
55ml water
salt and pepper to season

for the gravy
2 large onions, sliced
2 tsp oil
1tsp caster sugar
1/2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1tsp mustard
1tbsp plain flour
425ml vegetable stock
salt and pepper to season

for the potato
4 large potatoes, peeled and cubed
25g butter
50-100ml milk
2tsp wholegrain mustard
2 spring onions, finely chopped
50g double Gloucester cheese


Step 1
Sieve the flour into a large bowl, then make a well in the centre of the flour for the egg. Add the egg, and salt and pepper to season, and beat into the flour. As you mix the egg and flour, slowly add the milk and the water to the mixture, making sure to whisk the flour from around the edges until the batter has a smooth consistency. Cover with cling film, and leave to rest.

Step 2
Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 220°C place the sliced onions in a bowl with one teaspoon of the oil and sugar, then mix gently to coat the onions before spreading on a baking tray. Arrange the sausages in a roasting tin and place the onions on a high shelf in the oven and the sausages on a lower shelf. After 10 minutes remove the sausages, after another 5 remove the onions. Heat the sausages on the hob and add the tablespoon of oil if there's not much fat in the pan. When the tin is really hot and the oil is searing hot quickly pour in the batter and return to the hot oven, on the highest shelf, for 30 minutes.

Step 3
Add the Worcestershire sauce and mustard to the stock, then add the onions and remaining oil to a saucepan and stir in the plain flour using a wooden spoon. Stir it in, on a medium heat, until it starts getting too thick, then switch to a whisk and slowly add the stock, whisking until the liquid is smooth. Turn up the heat and simmer for 5 minutes.

Step 4
Meanwhile boil the cubed potatoes until par-boiled then drain. Add the butter and mash with a masher, then slowly add the milk and mix well with a fork until the potato is the desired texture, a more creamy mash will need more milk. Then add the mustard and spring onions and mix into the mash before spooning the mixture into a small oven-proof dish and topping with the cheese. Place this into the oven with the toad in the hole for 15 minutes.

For a slight variation on the dish add chives to the batter in step 1. For a more flavoursome gravy you can drain off the fat from the sausages and use it in the gravy, use in place of the an equivalent amount of oil, in step 4, so as to not make the gravy too fatty. You can use any cheese on the mash instead of the double Gloucester, but the colour of it looks really striking against the white of the mash.

Chicken with Potato Dumplings

This is a recipe I found in a book, but I'm using a slightly different version of it. The original version called for chicken breasts, whilst I am using chicken drumsticks. I've also added the carrot and celery and changed the herb from tarragon to thyme.

1 onion, chopped
300ml chicken stock
120ml white wine
10 small-medium chicken drumsticks
200ml double cream
1 tbsp fresh thyme
3 large carrots, thinly sliced
2 sticks celery, roughly chopped
salt and pepper to season
Potato Dumplings
3 small, or 2 medium potatoes, boiled and mashed
175g suet
115g self-raising flour
50ml water
2tbsp mixed fresh herbs
salt and pepper to season

Step 1
In a deep-sided frying pan place the onion, stock wine and chicken. Bring to a simmer, and leave covered for 15 minutes.

Step 2
Remove the Chicken from the stock, then strain the stock and discard the onions. Reduce the stock, by about a third, on a high heat before lowering the temperature to simmer. Add the thyme and the cream and simmer until thickened. Stir in the chicken and season with salt and pepper

Step 3
Boil some water with the carrots, and simmer for 5 minutes. Preheat the oven to 190°C. Add to the chicken and sauce, then spoon the mixture into a 1L ovenproof dish. Mix the solid dumpling ingredients, then stir in the water, using your fingertips, to make a soft dough. divide up the dough into balls and place on top of the chicken mixture before placing uncovered in the oven to bake for 30 minutes.

This produces a really nice chicken dish, and because of the cream is very rich. Due to the cooking  of the sauce after the reduction I found that it was a bit too thick, and my solution was to make up a quick sauce with some more chicken stock, a bit of the thick sauce, salt and pepper, and a touch more thyme. It turned out really well though, and balanced out the sauce in the main dish. The potato dumplings are quite filling, so with the carrots you may have all the vegetables you need, or you may want to, like me, add something like peas on the side.

Roasted Garlic and Rosemary Potatoes

A slight variation of the classic roast potato

3-4 medium potatoes
2 garlic cloves, crushed
2 medium sprigs of rosemary
vegetable oil
20g salted butter


Step 1
Peel and chop the potatoes, place into slightly salted boiling water until par-boiled. Drain the potatoes well and return to the pan, adding the butter a lid before shaking vigorously for 3 seconds.

Step 2
Meanwhile heat the vegetable oil in a roasting dish in the oven at about 220°C . Turn out the potatoes into the roasting dish and place into the oven for about 40-50 minutes. Check regularly on the potatoes to turn them to ensure they get coated with oil and that they get crispy all over. About halfway through the cooking time add the rosemary and garlic.


This recipe is a great variation of the classic roast potato and well worth trying out. The rosemary in them makes them a great accompaniment to dishes involving lamb and ham/gammon.