Persian Chicken Stew with Apples (Khoresh e-sib)

I love Persian food.  If I could eat one type of cuisine for the rest of my life, I really think I would pick Persian cooking over any other.  However, despite my love for the food I've always shied away from making Persian dishes - I thought that they would be very difficult to make and would require cartloads of ingredients that I didn't already have in my kitchen.  For years I would just visit Persian restaurants for the occasional indulgence and was too intimidated to do the cooking myself.

This all changed recently when I came across a wonderful cookbook by Najmieh Batmanglij.  She makes Persian cooking so accessible and breaks everything down so easily.  I wish I had bought this book earlier!

This is the first recipe I try out of this book (because this stew is my husband's favorite) and I will definitely be making many more.

This apple stew is truly scrumptious - it calls for few ingredients and is quite easy to make.  Moreover, as an added bonus you'll find that this is quite light and is very healthy too - many stews are heavy and are too rich thus leaving one in a food coma but this is quite the opposite - it's perfect!  My only complaint is that cooking time is rather long (patience was never my strong-suit) but really all you have to do is throw a few ingredients in a dutch oven and enjoy the fantastic aroma that is filling your kitchen.  This recipe calls for minimal manual labor, I promise.

Ingredients: (I wanted to make a smaller quantity than in the book so I altered the quantities accordingly)

2 large onions, sliced

1 lb chicken, cut into bite-sized pieces

3 tablespoons oil

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1/4 tsp ground cinnamon

1/5 cup yellow split peas (rinsed thoroughly)

1/2 tablespoon tomato paste

1.5 tablespoons sugar (I used brown sugar)

1.5 tablespoons white vinegar

1/4 tsp ground saffron.  Dissolve this in 1 tablespoon hot water

2.5 tart cooking apples which have been peeled, cored and diced into bite-sized pieces 

NOTE: I used granny smith apples and they were great as they are quite sour and work wonderfully in savory dishes.

Method:
1. In a dutch oven heat 2 tablespoons of oil.  Add the onions and sauté until translucent.
2. Add the chicken, salt, pepper, and cinnamon.  Cook until the chicken has become slightly browned.
3. Add 1.5 cups of water to the dish.  Cover and lower the heat.  Let cook for half an hour (keep checking on the dish though to make sure it doesn't need extra water and isn't burning).
4. Add the split peas, tomato paste, sugar, vinegar and saffron.  Cover and cook on a low heat for another half an hour.
5. In the meantime, heat one tablespoon oil (less if you prefer) in a pan and sauté the apples for about ten minutes or until they are golden brown.
6. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
7. Transfer the stew to an ovenproof casserole.  Add the apples on top.  Cover the casserole and let the stew bake for about 45 minutes.

Serves 2 very hungry people (we had enough leftovers to feed another person or two)

From Najmieh Batmanglij's New Food of Life: Ancient Persian and Modern Iranian Cooking and Ceremonies. 

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