Paleo Moroccan Chicken Stew – Moroccan spiced veggies with shredded chicken and chopped dates | Dairy Free + Paleo
Spring.
I can almost taste it. Flowers are blooming. Birds are singing. The clouds are parting….at least for a time. We’re almost there, but not quite yet.
The last remnants of winter are lingering including the winter blues that hit me hard this year. I’d love to pretend that I’m not phased by petty things like the weather, but the truth is that the general lack of sunshine has reaaaaally gotten to me these past couple of months. Shoutout to Mike for staying patient with me no matter how crazy I get. There are just so many grey, miserable days of not leaving the house that I can take before I start to lose it. I haven’t quite reached ‘here’s Johnny‘ Shining levels, but it hasn’t been pretty.
I think it’s safe to say that I am indeed solar powered. It shouldn’t really be a surprise to me seeing as how I grew up in a city with an average of 301 sunny days a year.
But like I said – we’re not quite there yet with the weather which means that I’m trying to take it easy until we’re in the clear – starting with our food and this one pot Moroccan Chicken Stew.
You do need to pull out the blender at some point to whizz up a quick onion/garlic/ginger paste so maybe it’s not completely one pot but I promise it’s still simple enough! Once all your veggies are prepped and ready to go it’s a simple process of sautéing and stirring before covering the pot and letting all the flavours blend together. Bonus if you like leftovers because this just gets even more flavourful over time.
Traditionally a dish like this would be served over couscous which normally contains gluten so I recommend serving this over rice/cauliflower rice.
And on that note I think I’ll just wrap this up now because I keep having to remove my cat from the keyboard here that she’s trying to settle down on. If I don’t finish up soon she’s going to end up changing settings on my computer that I won’t know how to fix.
Enjoy!
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One Pot Moroccan Chicken Stew
Paleo Moroccan Chicken Stew - Moroccan spiced veggies with shredded chicken and chopped dates | Dairy Free + Paleo
Ingredients
- 4 chicken breasts, boneless, skinless
- salt & pepper, for seasoning the chicken breasts
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 2 white onions, slice one onion and roughly chop the second onion
- 1 28 ounce can crushed tomatoes, preferably fire roasted
- 1 inch fresh ginger (about 1 tablespoon), chopped
- 3 cloves garlic
- 1 teaspoon turmeric powder
- 1 tablespoon cumin powder
- 1 tablespoon coriander powder
- 2 teaspoon cinnamon powder
- 3 medium carrots (about 6 inches long), peeled and diced
- 2 1/2 cups chicken stock (600 ml), aim for a lower sodium stock
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar or use coconut sugar for paleo
- 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
- 1 cup medjool dates (100 grams), seeds removed and chopped into small pieces
Instructions
- Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a large cooking pot on a medium high heat. Season the chicken breasts with salt and pepper. When the oil is simmering add the chicken to the bottom of the pot and brown the breasts, aa couple minutes of cooking on each side. The chicken doesn't need to be fully cooked through at this point since you'll be cooking it more later.
- Once browned, remove the chicken from the pot and place on a paper towel lined plate. Turn off the heat for a few minutes as you make the puree in the next step.
- Place the roughly chopped onion, tomatoes, ginger and garlic in a blender and blend into a puree. Set aside.
- Add the remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil in the same pot you were using before and bring to a medium high heat. When the oil starts to simmer add the sliced onions and fry until softened, about 5 minutes.
- Add the spices ( turmeric, cumin, coriander cinnamon) and continue to fry the onions another minute before adding the puree mixture. Keep sautéing the onions another 3 minutes. Add the blended onion/tomato mixture to the pot.
- Return the chicken to the dish and add the carrots, chicken stock, sugar and vinegar. Bring to a simmer, cover the pot with a fitted lid and let stew for at least 30 minutes.
- Remove the chicken from the pot. Add the chopped dates and stir to mix in well. On a cutting board or plate use a couple of forks to shred the chicken into bite sized pieces. Stir the chicken back in. Taste and season with salt as needed.
- Serve over rice or cauliflower rice (if you want a paleo meal) and enjoy!
Charlene says
This was a lovely recipe. Came across it because I thawed some chicken cubes and did not know what to do with them! Subbed carrots with sweet potatoes since I ran out of carrots and came out lovely. Found me a new recipe. 10/10 thanks!
Sarah Nevins says
Yay! So glad you enjoyed it – thanks so much for taking time to come back and let me know what you thought of it!
Stella Soon says
Dish was so yummy! I’ll be making this on rotation. I used thighs for preference. Next time I’ll tweak it to 1 tsp cinnamon, my kid doesn’t really like that spice. I will also use more stock next time for a runnier sauce (I only used 1 cup this time around). I also added 2 handfuls of spinach for more veggies. Thank you for sharing this delicious recipe.
Sarah Nevins says
So glad you enjoyed it! Thanks so much for coming back to leave a review!
Elle says
So good! Use six smaller chicken breasts instead of four, I think this is better since they cook faster and I can regulate the internal temp better. Also, it was a bit too sweet with the dates and sugar, so next time I would only do the dates. I let the chicken simmer in the sauce for only about 15 to 20 minutes (it was done cooking) and then took it out and out and added the dates. I really recommend adding the dates while the stew is still on the heat, it lets them cook down a bit and evenly distribute the flavor! All it needs is like five minutes! Would totally make again!!
Sarah Nevins says
Yay! So glad you enjoyed this! Thanks so much for coming back with your review & suggestions!
Axel says
This cam out super good, so so yummy, I really recommend this. Was below away how flavoursome this came out. I added a bit of chilly powder with the spices to get some heat into it and so instead of cooking the chicken in the sauce at the end I fully cooked the chicken in the pan and then added them in the end as bite-size pieces. Also added some parsley at the end to give it a bit of nice green colour. Thanks for the recipe 😁
Sarah Nevins says
Thanks Axel – I’m so glad you enjoyed it so much! Can’t ever go wrong added a little extra spice to a recipe. Thanks so much for coming back to leave a review!
Janie says
Made this interesting recipe and was surprised at how sweet it was (not what I expected!). I added hot spicy peppers and garlic in olive oil (DeLallo brand) and saved the pot of stew. I personally would not add any sugar if I ever make this again. It makes it overly sweet! Served with garlic Naan bread and a kale salad. Will freeze the rest for a hearty winter meal.
Sarah Nevins says
Fair enough! The dates can be pretty sweet – you can also sub them out with dried apricots. They’re still sweet, but not as much so
Shannon Becker says
I used no sugar and a combo of dried Turkish Apricots and raisins (master COVID substituter here 🙂 and it turned out great!
Sarah Nevins says
Ooh – apricots would be lovely in this! So glad you enjoyed it – thanks so much for coming back to let me know what you thought!
Shelly says
This meal was great. My husband and kids loved it. We use chicken thighs instead of chicken breast but it still works great. I will change it up on occasion and use extra firm tofu instead of the chicken. Everyone loves it.
Sarah says
Thanks Shelly!
Laurel says
You mention letting the onions cook with paste for 3 minutes immediately after adding the spices and cooking for a minute. No paste is mentioned in the ingredients unless your talking about the tomatoe/onion purée. But it was mentioned to add that after cooking the onions and paste for 3 minutes. Am I missing something?
Sarah says
Hi Laurel! Sorry about that – my wording there is probably a little confusing. In the second line of ingredients you’re advised to blend the tomato, garlic & ginger into a ‘watery paste’. That being said ‘puree’ is probably a better word for it.
So just to be clear: the onion, tomatoes, ginger and garlic are blended into a puree and then that puree is later added to your spices and fried onion.
Also – you’re working with two onions here: One is roughly chopped and blended into a puree and one onion is sliced and fried in slices.
Hopefully that makes sense now!
Brian says
Absolutely beautiful meal, very tasty. Thank you very much for posting this recipe, I shall make it again for sure.
Sarah says
I’m so glad you enjoyed it! Thanks Brian!
CT says
Taste really good! I add some chili powder into this recipe feels like I’m in Morocco
Sarah says
So glad you like it!
S. Morton says
What could I use instead of the can of tomatoes? I’ve been told by my Dr. to try going Paleo and avoid nightshade vegetables, which is tomatoes. Any suggestions?
Sarah says
I’m not really sure what would be a quick substitute here as the tomatoes make up a large part of the recipe. I found this article with a few suggestions for replacing tomatoes – I think based on what they recommend sweet potato or pumpkin puree would be the closest thing http://vegetalion.blogspot.co.uk/2010/11/how-to-replace-nightshades-part-4.html You could try leaving it out altogether
Hope that helps!