Baked Chicken Thighs

I have a wonderful recipe for you today, but otherwise, am totally uninspired. I’m staring at the computer for about half an hour now and can’t come up with anything that’s worth writing. Totally blank. I keep starting to write some sentences, which I immediately delete. Must be I am still not totally fit. I spent my weekend throwing up, due to a gastric flu, and am still a bit weak. I “love” these kind of diseases the children keep bringing home from kindergarten, I get them all.

In September I even got a children’s disease called hand foot syndrome (not sure is the right term in English, but I hope). The pediatrician told me grown-ups will not get it or if they do they’ll not have any symptoms, they’ll just transmit the disease to other children. My children, thank God, only had mild symptoms. Needless to say I got everything: 3 days fever, pustules on the hands and feet, so bad I couldn’t even walk or hold something in the hand, swollen throat and several weeks later, when I had already forgotten everything, I noticed that I am about to lose 5 fingernails. That was a long process, they started coming out at the root of the nail and it took about two months until I could finally cut them off. I spent all this time having bandages on various fingers and with black nail polish to hide the totally disgusting nails.

So it seems that I did find something to write in the end, hopefully this will not put you off food. This recipe is really good and really worth a try.

I bake chicken thighs this way on a regular basis. It is quick, delicious and both my kids love them, which is not something I can brag about very often. I always bake potatoes and onions together with the chicken, but I alternate the vegetables, depending on what I have at home or what is in season. You can use fennel (like in the picture), but I actually prefer bell peppers or carrots.

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Baked Chicken Thighs

Prep time:  15 mins

Cook time:  50 mins

Total time:  1 hour 5 mins

Serves: 4

Ingredients

• 6 whole chicken thighs
• 6 medium potatoes
• 4 medium onions
• 1 fennel or 2 red bell peppers or 4 medium carrots
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• salt and pepper
• sweet paprika
• rosemary

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven: 230 degrees Celsius/ 450 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Wash, dry and halve the chicken thighs at the joint, then place them on a lightly greased baking tray.
3. Mix together 2 tablespoons olive oil, salt, pepper, sweet paprika and rosemary in a small bowl. Smear the chicken thighs all over with this mixture. Put the chicken in the hot oven and bake for 10 minutes.
4. In the meantime, peel and cut the potatoes and the onions into wedges. The onion wedges should be a bit smaller than the potato wedges. Cut the vegetables into chunks or wedges as well. Place everything in a large bowl, add the remaining tablespoon of olive oil and more salt, pepper, sweet paprika and rosemary. Mix everything very well.
5. Arrange the vegetables on the tray around the chicken and bake everything for 30 to 40 minutes, basting about 2-3 times in between, until the vegetables are soft and the chicken juices run clear. Pierce the chicken thigh in the thickest part, there should be no more blood coming out, just clear juices.

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