Make Dinner Party Fave Chicken Marbella

Chicken Marbella is dead-easy slam-dunk dinner party entrée that will have every guest who tries it begging for the recipe. We kid you not.

CULT RECIPE ALERT | Summer is dinner party season for us. Since early June, we’ve invited friends over for supper at least once a week. We manage this despite busy schedules by sticking to a few proven menus. First-time visitors, for example, invariably tuck into our number-one-favourite no-brainer entrée: Chicken Marbella, which usually results in their asking for the recipe. If you’ve ever made or been served Marbella, you already know the impact its exceptional flavour can have on all who take a bite.

Chicken Marbella (pronounced mar-BAY-ya) is the perfect party food for logistical reasons: it can be prepared long in advance, served hot or at room temp, on its own or on a bed of rice or noodles. It is also dead easy to make. But all these plusses would add up to a big, fat zero if Marbella didn’t deliver on taste: its vaguely Spanish/Moroccan flavourings (ingredients include prunes, capers and green olives) make it a show-stopping taste bud-popping novelty dish.

Chicken Marbella’s popularity (and now cult status) originated with The Silver Palate Cookbook, a compilation of recipes from the hottest gourmet takeout shop/eatery in Manhattan in the 1980s, The Silver Palate, where Chicken Marbella reigned supreme.

How To Make Marbella

There are a gazillion interpretations of The Silver Palate’s Chicken Marbella recipe online (CLICK HERE for the recipe), but I like Recipe Without A Cause Kitchen Rebel’s yummy take on it, pictured above. Like me, the Rebel’s got no time for marinating the meat overnight, and like me the Rebel now knows that skipping this step does not compromise the outcome of the dish or keep people from eating themselves “into a coma.” Trust me, this could happen because Chicken Marbella is just that good. —C. Rule

Order The Silver Palate Cookbook at chapters.indigo.ca; CLICK HERE to visit Recipe Without A Cause

Photo: Recipe Without A Cause