Stop Being so Spineless!

I hate jointing chickies.  When I use chicken shears it makes my hands hurt.  I think I suffer from mild carpal tunnel syndrome or RSI or harden the f**k up or something, so the cutting action hurts me.  But I also don’t like only buying chicken joints as a. they’re more expensive and b. it’s that whole ‘use the whole animal’ issue I’ve got going on.  So I ordered two chickies from F&B and asked if they’d joint them into breasts and marylands for me.  Due to my unhappy jointing history I also know that when you joint a chickie you’re left with almost the entire back unused.  So I asked them to keep this for me thinking I’d use it for stock or to give to the doggies as a treat.

Too good to give away...

When I picked up my order and brought it home I noticed HOW MUCH delicious meat was left on the chickies’ spines! I couldn’t waste it by giving it to the doggies or using it for stock (besides, I already had lots of stock from a roast chickie the week before) so I decided to channel my inner Indian and use it to make a delicious Biryani.  Indians use meat with bones a lot in their cooking (so Pushpesh Pant tells me) not the sanitized, boneless bits of meat for them, like we get in the local Indian takeaway.

For the doggies!

When I weighed up the left overs there was over a kilo there! So I set to cutting the actual meatless bones off (and giving those to the doggies – they didn’t complain) and chopping up the rest into bits of meat with the bones still intact, this also included the wings, which had been cut off the breast (will have to ask them to leave them on next time).  I’m not sure how many of you are privy to the oysters which lurk on the back of the chicken, like little nuggets of chicken goodness, to be dug out of a roast when no-one’s looking, but they’re there and they’re delicious.

So, with the meat cut up I used Pushpesh’s Lucknow Biryani recipe which was rich with cardamom, cinnamon, cloves and cumin.  Made up the chickie curry mixture, cooked up some rice then layered it in a large pot pouring over milk soaked saffron as I went.  In the oven for half an hour then I took it out to rest while I fed the family mussels for a starter.  Himself declared he didn’t like mussels, but I told him to eat them anyway, and he did, and decided he liked them.

After a wee while I served up the Biryani with yoghurt and pickles.  It was delicious! The fam were not sold on the bones but humoured me and said they enjoyed it bones and all.  To be honest, picking bits of bone out before I can eat isn’t high on my list either, so I did it all before I started eating, which made it easier.  After we’d cleaned up and I was ready to serve lunches Himself asked me to pick the chicken off the bones for his lunchbox (for ease of office eating) I told him he was dreaming if he thought I would and didn’t.

The Biryani was duly taken for lunch, apparently lots of office and school comments on aroma and taste (aroma from the office – “ooh that smells delicious!” and taste from the Wee Girls friends – sharers are carers).

So use a little backbone in your life. You won’t regret it (and you’ll smugly feel the smugness of not wasting a bit of your chick.)