Coronation Chicken

I still make the original Coronation chicken from the Constance Spry cookery book. We have it on Boxing Day and is a family favourite.

Even the carnivores in our family don't eat chicken. Those poor unnatural creatures, bred to grow so fast that their legs collapse. A short life full of pain - with many not surviving even those 42 days.

Thanks for your input Hetty. I buy free-range, grain fed chickens from my butcher.

kittylester, well done - but you're in the minority.

I too went back to the original Constance Spry recipe this year which I used to use when I had my catering business. A bit of a faff, but worthwhile as it is much more delicate than just “”curried mayonnaise”. I sprinkled toasted flaked almonds and chopped fresh coriander on top.
I did however search in vain for a rice salad to complement it - many had too many ingredients or flavours or were just bland so I devised one with cardamom seeds, cucumber , chopped apricots and pomegranate seeds with a lemon, honey and oil dressing. I was pleased with the result- fresh, slightly crunchy, and slightly eastern .

Like Kitty, I buy only organic chicken, which means free-range and grain fed. Similarly all the beef I buy is from 'Pasture for Life' registered farms, the rest from organic or close to PfL standards. A movement that only started about 5 years ago but has grown rapidly and fast, so change is coming.

I have a recipe for an 'iced curried chicken'', very similar to Coronation Chicken but for the real Coronation, I looked the original recipe up online and used that. Followed by sherry trifle.

You’re not alone kitty. I’ve never made coronation chicken either.

I’ve never made coronation chicken. Like others here, I buy free range grain fed from my butcher. The lamb comes from local fields, the beef from over the hills in Yorkshire. I don’t buy pork, I helped out on a pig farm in my early teens. The pigs had shelter alongside open fields. Lovely animals, I find the way they’re ‘farmed’ distressing

We only buy organic chicken and eggs.

Although we can recreate the meal, Coronation Chicken, we can't recreate the significance it had at the time in early post war Britain. Nowadays ordinary people can eat it daily in one form or another,should they so wish, but in the early 1950s it was in the words of a 2017 New Statesman article headline.

[ Quote]"The reason chicken is a popular British food? Because we started factory farming. In the 1950s, chicken was seen as an elite food and was expensive".

Every time we have a food question, the holier than thou brigade always have to get stuck in. Not everyone can afford to eat organic free-range chicken. Some are struggling and on a tight budget where, unfortunately, they have to settle for what they can afford. And the OP just asked for people's favourite recipes, not a lecture.

Another one who only buys organic outdoor local chicken (although indoor this winter with bird flu, it was still barn raised and corn fed). Also we're fortunate to have proper butchers who sell outdoor grass fed beef, grazed on water meadows and increasing the biodiversity there. And sheep fed on sugar beet tops, fertilizing as they go. Like Iam I find pork, although outdoor raised around here, hard to accept as they're too clever. But I can't give up bacon!!

I would love to know a good recipe for Coronation Chicken which isn't too complicated. Somehow, Hellmans, mango chutney and tomato ketchup with a few sultanas chucked in is too easy and feels like cheating. Is there an in between one?

Sorry Blondiescot I do realise I am indeed fortunate to live outside the big cities so have access to good butchers. Back when I could only afford cheap water injected supermarket chicken I didn't buy it as it was such a rip off. Semi-vegetarianism was a necessity not a life choice.

kittylester

Thanks for your input Hetty. I buy free-range, grain fed chickens from my butcher.

😄😄

As a child growing up in the 50’s, I lived on a smallholding where my dad kept pigs and poultry.

Believe me, we very, very rarely ate chicken. Plenty of eggs in our diet, but the only time we had chicken was when dad killed an old hen that was past laying. It would be too old to roast, so it was boiled chicken with white sauce.

Juicy, sooo tasty, absolutely no comparison to chickens nowadays, free range, organic, whatever.

They never reach old age and suitable to boil now. Wonder what dad would think to it all?

🐔

Tomato ketchup and sultanas! That’s not Coronation chicken. There’s only one proper recipe and that’s in the Constance Spry Cookery Book. CS and Rosemary Hume invented it especially for the late Queen’s Coronation. It also gives a recipe for the rice salad to serve with it.

I’m still waiting for a good recipe. 😄😄

kitty I bet you had roast chicken yesterday like me

I would love to know a good recipe for Coronation Chicken which isn't too complicated. Somehow, Hellmans, mango chutney and tomato ketchup with a few sultanas chucked in is too easy and feels like cheating
With all respect, that sounds disgusting! I would not allow tomato ketchup and “a few sultanas” anywhere near my CC sauce!
I admit, I did use Hellmans, although back in the 70’s and 80’s I would have made my own mayonnaise too, using the leftover egg whites for meringue, Eton Mess for the use of!

Ladyleftfieldlover

Tomato ketchup and sultanas! That’s not Coronation chicken. There’s only one proper recipe and that’s in the Constance Spry Cookery Book. CS and Rosemary Hume invented it especially for the late Queen’s Coronation. It also gives a recipe for the rice salad to serve with it.

I agre although I find their Rice Salad underwhelming and now that we have easier access to spices than in past years feel justified in developing new ideas.

All supermarkets sell ready made Coronation Chicken ready to spread !!! Saves a lot of faff, Just saying !!

Had a look at the Constance Spry recipe. Easy peasy - might go with that. If I feel like it.

I use mayonnaise, vindaloo curry paste to taste, mango chutney and a little lemon juice. It’s always been well received and was first to go at cricket teas.

How did you guess we had roast chicken, WWM2? You must be psychic.

And, I'd quite like some more recipes please!