Freezing Chicken With 40 Cloves Of Garlic

Our answer

Nigella's Chicken With 40 Cloves Of Garlic (from KITCHEN) cooks chicken thighs with vermouth and garlic cloves. The garlic mellows in the oven to become sticky and sweet and the soft garlic is squeezed from the outer skin, to serve alongside the chicken.

We would not make the dish in advance to reheat for a special occasion as the crisp chicken skin will soften on cooling and never regains its crunch on reheating. There is also a risk that the chicken dries out slightly on reheating. The chicken cooks for 1½ hours but during this time needs no attention, so leaves you free to do other things. To save time, the chicken can be browned a day in advance and the dish assembled in the casserole, then covered and refrigerated. Put the uncovered pan on the stove on a medium heat for 5 minutes to warm through before transferring it to the hot oven to cook. Leftovers can be refrigerated for up to 3 days or frozen. We would suggest removing the meat of the chicken from the bones (discard the skin or not, as you prefer) and squeezing the soft garlic from the garlic skins and putting them in separate airtight containers. Chill as quickly as possible and within 2 hours of cooking. Freeze for up to 3 months. Defrost overnight in the fridge and reheat the chicken and garlic in a microwave or reheat the chicken in a saucepan, with a little chicken stock, until piping hot all the way through.