Barbecue Pulled Chicken Sliders

Heaven comes in 360 degrees of bread, chicken & saucy goodness.

I had quite a bit of home-made barbecue sauce left from my pork ribs recipe and I was still in my American diner food phase. For the record, there are tons of things you can do with BBQ sauce. It goes with everything! While grocery shopping this week I was basically looking out for something to recycle my sauce in. I found bagels and really fresh pita bread, but eventually settled on mini burger buns. Which gave me the idea to made some pulled chicken sliders. I had most of the stuff at home, so this is really is star leftover dish and even though there were many elements, it really took no time to put together. Didn't think pulled chicken was possible in less than 20mins? Read on below, and you'll become a believer of this delicious sweet and savoury sandwich.



Serves 4
4 mini burger buns
400gms chicken
2 cups BBQ sauce
4 slices cheese
4 eggs
4 cloves of garlic, grated
4 tbsp butter
2 onions finely sliced
Salt & pepper to taste

Boil the chicken in water with some salt added. Once cooked and cooled, shred the chicken. Save the water as this is now chicken stock and makes an excellent base for gravies. I usually freeze it in an ice cube tray and use it to flavour practically anything.

In a sauce pan, add the shredded chicken with the BBQ sauce. Cook for 5-10mins till chicken is thoroughly coated. if the sauce is too thick, use some of the leftover chicken stock to loosen it up.

Now comes the best part, assembling the slider. I toasted the buns with some garlic butter. Just melt butter in a pan and add the grated garlic. Cut the buns in half and place on the melted butter and get it nice and toasty. Once fairly brown, remove from pan. In the same pan, fry the eggs sunny side up. I love a half fry eggs, but for those fussy about the runny yolk, skip the egg all together.



To plate up, place some finely sliced onions on the base bun. Now add good spoonful of the shredded chicken. Place a slice of cheese on top of the chicken and then top off with the fried egg. You can eat the slider open faced as is, or place the top bun and dig in! The slider is extremely juicy and will have a lot of goodness oozing out, so make sure you have plenty of tissues at hand.



I served my sliders with some traditional fries and a potato salad. I admit I got a little carried away with the potatoes, but my brother wanted fries, and I wanted a potato salad.

For the potato salad, just mix up all these ingredients:
1cup baby potatoes, boiled and peeled
1/2 cup yoghurt
1/4 cup tahini sauce
 Juice of 1/2 a lemon
Salt, pepper & chilli flakes to taste
1tsp sumac (optional)



Trust me, don't skip on the salad. Its a perfect balance to the tangy slider. And you can also serve it cold straight out of the fridge. How cool is that? (pun intended)

Honey Sesame Chicken

There is this restaurant called PF Changs. You may have comes across it if you've travelled abroad. In my eyes, it can do no wrong. It makes lip smacking chinese food and one of my favourite dishes is the honey sesame chicken.



Its the most amazing combination of sweet and tangy. I can pop these like pop corn! Makes for an amazing starter. I've tried to rip off PF Chang's dish here. I know I come close, and if I don't, this chicken is still pretty good. I'll leave it up to you to decide though.



Serves 4:

300gms boneless chicken breasts cut into cubes
1 cup cornflour
Salt & pepper to taste
5 cloves of minced garlic
3 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp honey
3 tbsp vinegar, preferably rice wine or cider vinegar
2 tbsp ketchup
1/2 tbsp sesame oil



Heat oil in a large saucepan. In a large bowl, season chicken with salt & pepper. Add in cornflour and toss to combine. Cook chicken in pan till fully cooked and golden brown.

Set another saucepan on low heat. Add in the rest of the ingredients & stir. Add the chicken & cook for 2-3mins or till all the pieces are evenly coated.



Sprinkle some sesame seeds or spring onions and serve with noodles.

Chicken, Spinach & Mushroom Risotto

 A good risotto for me trumps pasta any day. Its come to become one of my favourite italian dishes. I would also consider it a special occasion dish. It does need a lot of attention while cooking. Which is why I though it perfect to treat my mom to a fabulous risotto on Mothers day.

Risotto is a dish thats become associated with high end restaurants, but really its the epitome of italian home cooking. Every italian boy will tell you that his mama's risotto is the perfect comfort food. Its a one pan family meal that is so nutritious and packed with tons of flavour.



I chanced upon some affordable arborio rice in my recent trip to Goa. So my recipe today is as authentic as it gets. Ofcourse if you don't have arborio rice, you can use any starchy short grained rice. I've added chicken, spinach & mushrooms because that is what I had in hand. But really you can add any combination of veggies or meat. Its a perfect dish to use up leftover veggies or meat.



For a vegan version check out this recipe

Serves 4:

1 tbsp butter
4 cloves of garlic finely chopped
1/2 cup white wine
2 cups arborio rice (you can use any starchy short grained rice as a replacement)
1 litre chicken stock
1 cup chicken
1 cup mushrooms
2 cups spinach
Salt & pepper to taste
Parmesan cheese (optional)
4-5 basil leaves (optional)

In a heavy based pan, melt some butter. Add in the garlic and sauté till translucent. Add the rice and stir so the butter coats the rice thoroughly. Add in the white wine and simmer till it reduces.

Now the tricky bit. Use the chicken stock one ladle at a time. Add one ladle of stock in the rice and stir. The rice must completely absorb the broth before ladling another spoonful. Stir gently after each addition. About halfway through, add the mushrooms, spinach and chicken. Since these dont take too long to cook, we add them towards the end. Repeat the ladling step till all the broth is absorbed by the rice and its cooked. Once you start adding the broth the risotto usually takes 20-30mins to cook. Add in salt & pepper and your risotto is ready!



Traditionally a risotto is served with Parmigiano Reggiano, but enough with the fancy. I've served mine with regular cheddar cheese. Garnish with some basil or chives and serve with a glass of white wine.



Note: Italians like their rice al dente, which means the rice has a little bite. But I'm indian and I like my rice fluffy and well cooked. You can cook it to your preference.

Tip: You can also add some cream or milk towards the end of the cooking process. This makes the dish rich an creamy.

The Ultimate Roast Chicken

Roast Chicken is the perfect community dish. It reminds me of so many Sundays where we would just sit around one big chicken & devour it.
My idea of cooking is one that requires minimum effort but produces beautiful dishes. So when you talk to me about Roast Chicken, I can't be bothered to truss or baste the chicken. My only requirement to a perfect roast chicken is that it be moist and juicy & I think this is where most recipes get it wrong.

This recipe that I'm sharing today is a combination of bits from Gordon Ramsay, Heston Blumenthal & my very own Shrey Kamerkar's recipe.  Follow this recipe and I promised you a fail safe juicy, moist & tender roast chicken - one which takes minimal effort with finger licking results.

This is a special occasion dish nonetheless and needs some advance prep time (1 day prior).



Quantities enough for one whole chicken 

For the chicken:
1ltr brine or salt water
1 ltr Buttermilk

For the stuffing:
1 cup sausgaes
1 tsp Mustard
1 tsp HP sauce
1 tbsp worcestershire
3 cloves garlic
1 cup mushrooms
1 cup cheese
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp thyme
a few leaves of fresh basil
1 tbsp Butter
Salt & pepper to taste
1 large potato

For the outer flavouring of the chicken:
1 cup butter
2 tbsp paprika or chilli powder
Salt & pepper to taste

Wash the chicken throughly in water. In a large pot, add cold water and salt. For every 2 cups of water, add 1 tablespoon of salt. Immerse the chicken in this salted water and let it refrigerate for atleast 6 hours. This technique is called brining. Brining is a very neat trick which ensures you get a juicy chicken everytime. Brining makes the meat moist by hydrating the cells of the chicken's tissue before cooking. It locks in all the lovely juices and flavour and will give you a fabulous juicy chicken once the meat is cooked.

After 6-10hours, remove the chicken from the brine and throw out the water. In the same pot, now add in the buttermilk. Soak the chicken in buttermilk and refrigerate overnight. The buttermilk works to cleanse and tenderise the chicken.

To make the stuffing:

Chop up the sausages to tiny bits. In a pan, add a tablespoon of butter followed by sausages, mushrooms and the garlic. Sautee for 2-3 mins. Add in the mustard, HP & worcestershire sauce. Add in the seasonings i.e. oregano, thyme, basil, salt and pepper. Turn off the heat and add in shredded cheese. Set aside and let it cool.

Preheat the oven to 250 degrees Celsius.

Remove the chicken from the fridge and throw out the butter milk mixture. Rinse the chicken well to remove the buttermilk from the inner crevices. Stuff the inside of the chicken with the stuffing mixture. Do not over stuff. Add enough stuffing to fill out the chicken, not to spill over. Add the whole, large potato at the end. The potato acts as a stopper. It will let the chicken hold its shape and also prevent the stuffing from falling out.



Rub the outside of the chicken with butter and paprika. Sprinkle salt and pepper. Place on a baking dish.



Add half a cup of water around the chicken in the baking dish. Cover with aluminium foil. The aluminium foil will help the chicken steam in its own juices, making it even more flavourful. Before placing in the oven, reduce temperature to 150 degrees Celsius.  Roast for 1 hour.

You may think that 150 degrees is too low a temperature to cook the chicken, and you are right. But cooking the chicken at a higher temperature initially will result in drying it out. You want to slowly cook the chicken and gradually raise its temperature. At the last 10 mins of the cooking process we will blast out the heat to its maximum setting. This will give the chicken a nice golden colour and will crisp up the skin.

After an hour, raise the temperature to 200 degrees. Remove the chicken from the oven, spread a blob of butter around the top and skin, re-seal with foil and put it back in the oven. Bake for another 30mins-45mins until the chicken is fully cooked. To test if the chicken is cooked, Insert a knife at the thickest part of the chicken (usually the breast), and touch the knife to your lip. If the knife feels hot, it means the chicken is cooked.

Now turn your oven to the maximum heat setting. Remove the foil from the dish. Add a generous amount of butter on the chicken and put it back into the oven for 10 mins.

Remove from oven and let it sit for half an hour before chopping it up. At this point I also add in spring onions around the chicken as it soaks up all the beautiful juices in the dish.



To serve, scoop out the stuffing in a bowl. In another bowl, pour all the baking juices from the baking dish. For those of you who don't know how to cut up a whole chicken, follow this video

Serve up pieces of chicken with a bowl of the stuffing and roasting juices on the side.

I wasn't kidding about my chicken...look how juicy that is!

Tip: Once you've carved and chopped up the chicken, preserve the leftover bones. These are packed with flavour and make a killer stock when boiled with water.