Algerian Tli Tli B'djedj - Pasta With Chicken!

Um Safia's Note:

This is our family recipe for the very traditional Algerian dish tli tli. You can make tli tli with chicken or meat - the meat recipe is slightly different & I will post it later. You can use any tiny pasta for this but traditionally homemade tli til pasta OR orzo / bird's tongue that is used. My kids love it when I use the tiny stars or shells also. Traditionally we steam the pasta for this but you can cook it for 4 minutes or so in plenty of lighty salted water before adding the sauce - the pasta needs to absorb quite a bit of the sauce so keep it undercooked..

• Total Time: 1 hrs 45 mins
• Prep Time: 15 mins
• Cook Time: 1 hrs 30 mins

Ingredients:

Servings: 6

• 1 whole chicken (or 6-8 pieces bone-in chicken)
• ¾-1 cup canned chick-peas
• 2 tablespoons ghee or 2 tablespoons butter or 2 tablespoons oil
• ¼ teaspoon black pepper
• ½-¾ teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon tomato puree , concentrate
• 2 onions
• 1 -2 garlic clove , minced
• ½ teaspoon ras el hanout spice mix
• salt
• 3 -4 eggs
• 500 g orzo pasta (or homemade tli tli )
• 1 chicken stock cube
• olive oil or sunflower oil

Directions:

1. Cut chicken up into serving sizes (6-8 pieces)
2. Brown in a large pan with the ghee, finely chopped onions, cinnamon, ras el hanout & pepper. Add 1 cup water & cook for 10 minutes
3. Add chick peas & add enough water to cover. tomato puree & the stock cube.
4. Cover & cook on medium heat for 1 hour & a half in a pan or 40 mins in the pressure cooker on med-high. If cooking in a pan, you may need to add a little extra water.
5. Whilst the sauce is cooking, prepare the pasta & eggs.
6. Hard boil the eggs, then peel & cut into halves.
7. In a bowl, mix the pasta with 1/2 cup water & a tiny bit of olive or sunflower oil. Place in a steamer & steam for 15 minutes. Remove from steamer & separate the pasta with a little water.
8. Put the pasta in a large pan & slowly spoon in a little sauce at a time until the pasta is fully cooked & the sauce has been absorbed nicely - the pasta should be moist with a little sauce coating it - not dry.
9. Place pasta in a large dish / platter & top with the chicken pieces, egg halves & a some more sauce.
10. Serve immediately with a green salad & crusty bread.

Reviews

[Chef Els]

Good! We enjoyed it very much.I liked the boiled eggs with it,I did however use only 1/2 lbs. of orzo and 4 chickentighs the rest I did just like the recipe called for and we both enjoyed it alot,will fix it regular,thank you for sharing.

[MeriemDZ]

This was very simple to make and I followed the recipe as posted. My Algerian husband loved it. I will absolutely make this again!