This is a good winter/comfort food dish and your home will smell delicious while it cooks. The leftover broth and veggies are delicious as soup or pureed into a sauce for pasta and the chicken remainders are excellent in salads, wraps and stir fries. This is a work horse of a dish in the sense that you will eat it as a main course but the leftovers will multi-purpose into several other meals which is both practical and economical.
This could also be made the day in advance and used for both appetizer and main course for a dinner party - following the Peking duck method of using everything you have. I would serve the broth as a clear soup for the appetizer. I would then grill some chicken thighs with coriander and cumin and serve them along with the poached meat on couscous, having first pureed the vegetables into a sauce for the dish, perhaps with the addition of a little cream. That and a salad would be delicious. But that's just me.
Most people use only the peel from preserved lemons which they finely chop but, for stews at least, I like to add the whole thing;I like the fragrance that the lemon imparts to the broth.
1 whole chicken, organic if possible
1 preserved lemon, halved
3-5 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
2-3 shallots, peeled and halved lengthwise
2 turnips, peeled and chunked into bite-sized pieces
3 carrots, ditto
2 parsnips, ditto
1 eggplant, cut into bite sized pieces
1 zucchini, cut into bite sized pieces
leaves from half a bunch of coriander
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp ground cumin
1 thumb ginger
1 large pinch saffron threads
1 whole Jalapeño pepper *
Salt
1 tsp olive oil
Water
1 cup couscous
Place a large stockpot over medium heat and add the oil, the ground coriander, ground cumin, ginger, saffron, shallots and garlic. Cook for a few minutes, stirring often, until the spices are fragrant and the shallot is starting to become translucent.
Lower the heat, add the chicken (which you have salted inside and out) to the pot and nestle the vegetables, the Jalapeño, the coriander leaves and the two preserved lemon halves around it.
Add enough water to the pot so that the chicken is just covered - I used 5 cups but this will very much depend on the size of your pan and the size of your chicken. Reduce the heat, cover the pan and cook for 60 to 90 minutes until the chicken is fully poached (again, this depends on size). Check every 30 minutes or so to check the level of the liquid in the pan and add more water if needed to keep the chicken covered.
Once the chicken is fully cooked, taste the poaching liquid and adjust salt if needed. Remove the chicken gingerly from the pan onto a cutting board, trying to leave as much stock in the pot as possible.
Place the couscous in a bowl, cover with 1 and 1/3 cups of the boiling broth from the stock pot, mix once and cover with a plate. Leave for 5 minutes while you deal with the chicken.
The skin over the chicken breasts with slide right off so remove it and carve the breasts thinly. Set the pieces aside. Cut off legs and wings and set them aside. Remove the 2 lemon halves, the garlic and the jalapeño from the stock pot.
Remove the saucer from the couscous and fluff it with a fork. Place it on a large serving platter.
Top with chicken pieces and the vegetables, roughly drained from the broth with a slotted spoon. Top with some chopped coriander leaves if desired. Decant the remaining broth into a jug and serve separately so people can add as little or as much as they like to their dish.
I tend to set the table with deep soup dishes for this dish, as well as both soup spoons and forks, as some people add a tiny bit of broth to their dish to act as a sauce of sorts and some people drown their couscous, chicken and vegetables with broth and eat it like a stew. No judgment here as it is yummy either way. A small dish of harissa on the side is a nice touch, as would olives be in the dish. They are often added to dishes with preserved lemon but I hate them.
* I am aware that Serrano or Baklouti pepper would taste more authentic with these flavors but Jalapeno was what I had to hand and I made due. What I was looking for was a bit of subtle heat to the broth and it provided it. Authenticity may have been slightly compromised but culinary standards were maintained.
Inspiration recipe, here.