This is from Family Circle Home Entertaining published by Albany Books in 1980. With chapters such as ‘Wine Sense’, Giving a Cheese and Wine Party’ and ‘A Wedding Buffet Planned at Home’ it offers everything necessary for one to entertain on a large scale and if this sample recipe is anything to go by it also offers everything necessary to make sure that your guests will think twice before accepting an invitation to future soirees.
Rosy Baked Chicken
4 chicken joints
1 small (200g) can sliced pineappleSauce
50g margarine
1x15ml spoon plain flour
2x15ml spoons tomato ketchup
2x5ml spoons dry mustard
1×2.5ml spoon salt
Pepper
1x5ml spoon Worcestershire sauce
1x15ml spoon vinegar1 (200g) pack frozen peas
1x10ml spoon cornflour
1. Remove skins from chicken joints. Wipe joints with kitchen paper and place in a large roasting tin.
2. Drain pineapple, reserving syrup in a small basin. Chop pineapple.
3. Place margarine in a basin and beat until soft and creamy. Beat in remaining sauce ingredients and half of chopped pineapple.
4. Spread mixture evenly over chicken joints. Pour pineapple syrup over and sprinkle with remaining chopped pineapple; cover with foil, If possible , leave in fridge until ready to set in oven.
5. Remove the foil and place on shelf just above centre of oven. Set oven control to moderate (190°C/ 375°F/ Gas Mark 5) and bake for one hour. Ten minutes before end of cooking time , cook peas, as directed on pack. Place chicken joints on warmed serving dish and keep hot whilst making gravy. Blend cornflour with a little water and stir into juices left in roasting tin. Cook gently for 3 minutes; pour over chicken joints. Arrange cooked, drained peas on a dish around chicken or serve separately.
How this looked before cooking:
After cooking:
Notes
- I used butter instead of marg
- I made half the amount, and used thighs and drumsticks as I couldn’t get joints
- I didn’t have the peas, and omitted the gravy as I couldn’t find cornflour
- Pre-cooking the resemblance to puke was uncanny.
- The juices left in the dish afterwards were really offputting, and the leftovers that I removed from the fridge the next day were encased in an orange lump of solidified fat. Mmmmm.
Conclusion
Despite smelling like a nice barbeque whilst in the oven, it tasted a little weird, and the coating didn’t really adhere to the meat well at all. I think it would have been much nicer had the skin remained on. The combination of butter and ketchup and pineapple is not quite to my taste, it’s a little sweet. Overall this wasn’t particularly nice, the coating didn’t compliment the chicken, and my general feeling was that I was eating some nice chicken which was being spoiled by an odd sauce. I suspect that if cooked at a higher heat, with the skin on it may have a) looked more like the photo, and b) tasted alright.
I’m afraid both photos make me feel a bit queasy. That bright orange :****( can we take some sort of action against pineapple canners? Or at least people who suggest using them in anything but fruit salads…
Surely a thigh/drumstick counts as a “joint”? “Joints” are just bits that have been cut off at a joint, right? Am I totally wrong?!
Looks to me like this would have been better if it had been cooked for long enough/at a high enough temp to for the sauce to caramelise and stick to/permeate the chicken.
I have come to the conclusion that most people who write baked chicken recipes are liars, in the same way that people who write recipes which says ‘sweat the onion for 5- 10 minutes until soft’ are liars (i.e. IT TAKES MUCH LONGER.)
Remember when you came to dinner and I made wings and they took AAAAGES? Same situation. Interestingly, the barbecue sauce I used that night was v similar to this although it contained tomato paste and brown sugar (instead of ketchup) and lots of black pepper and chilli powder.
sarah, you are right about joints.
alix, was the pineapple in SYRUP or juice (in fact, can you still get pineapple in syrup?)? but yeah, sounds like it needs a higher temp, 220 maybe? to get some caramelisation going…
Can you veto all future recipes with a) tinned pineapple and b) tinned sweetcorn for the good of my health? Thanks.
I have no problem with that – I am personally totally repulsed by the idea of either now.
Mmmm, imagine a tinned sweetcorn and pineapple macaroni cheese. EW, no don’t. What a mistake.
I remember this from the time, my Auntie used to cook it when we went to stay and I even have it written down in my ancient recipe book!
I tried cooking it a while ago, and it didn’t live up to my memory at all. (I had really enjoyed it as a teenager) Much much sweeter than I remember.
Great blog
Nonetheless – a bravery award is due for the attempt, Alix. The VCBT’s raison d’etre is such research – what to revive, what to re-bury.
Salada, you make it sound like the VCBT team are a bunch of culinary graverobbers!
I was thinking archaeological treasures, or trash. However, cremation might be better than burial for that chicken’n'pineapple recipe.
It’s a shame to see this getting a poor revue. My grandma always used to make it for special occasions, and has remained a family favourite all these years. I found this site by googling for the recipe, as I wanted to make it for my other half… hope he likes it more than the rest of you oops!
I am so surprised by the negative reviews! My Mother use to make this for the family in the 80′s and I loved it then. I still love it now! I only put 1 tsp of dried mustard in mine. I do cook it at a high temperature so that it is a little caramelised.
i have made this dish for the last 30 plus year and we love it. I do it in a slow cooker all day and add fresh ginger I am doing it again tonight for a dinner party so I hope they like it. Its funny I just thought I would look it up so I was suprized to see it on the internet still.