Baked Chicken and Rice with Lemons and Olives

This is an easy one-pot chicken dinner with rice, lemon and olives that comes together easily and is mostly hands-off, so you can pour yourself an apéro while it’s in the oven.  Serves 4:

Baked Chicken and Rice with Lemons and Olives

• 4 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs (about 1½ pounds)
• Salt and black pepper
• 2 teaspoons dried oregano
• Crushed red pepper
• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 lemons
• 1 cup pitted Castelvetrano or Kalamata olives, smashed and roughly chopped
• 6 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 medium shallot or ½ medium onion, minced
• 1 cup long-grain white rice
• 2 cups chicken broth
• ¼ cup roughly chopped fresh parsley, for serving

Heat the oven to 400°F (200°C). Pat the chicken thighs dry. Season the chicken with 1 teaspoon each salt, pepper and dried oregano and a pinch of crushed red pepper.

Place a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat and add oil. Let the oil heat up for a few minutes. Add chicken to the pot, skin side down, and cook undisturbed until the thighs release from the bottom of the pot, about 5 minutes. Remove from the pot and set aside.

While the chicken is cooking, cut 1 lemon into 1/8” thick slices. Add to the pot you were cooking the chicken in and cook until caramelized and softened, about 2 minutes. Remove from the pot and set aside.

Reduce the heat to medium-low and add the olives, garlic, shallot and 1 teaspoon each salt, pepper and dried oregano to the pot. Cook until garlic is fragrant, 2 to 3 minutes. Turn the heat up to high, add the broth to the pot, scraping browned bits from the bottom of the pan, add the rice and stir to combine. Bring to a boil, about 5 minutes.

Remove the pot from heat, put the cooked lemon slices on top of the rice, then add the chicken, skin side up. Cover the pot and put into the oven. Bake until the rice and chicken are fully cooked, 25 to 30 minutes. Serve topped with fresh parsley and a squeeze of lemon juice and enjoy!

My verdict:

This was really good and pretty easy — one pot, a plate and a cutting board. If chicken thighs aren’t your thing, sub some skin-on breasts, or even a whole cut up chicken—maybe up the rice and broth for a whole bird.

The rice is the winner here with the chicken, olives and lemon giving it an amazing flavor. If you wanted leftover rice, you could just double the amount of rice and broth. I ran out of broth and used half broth and half water and it was fine. The lemons need to be sliced very thin and cooked until they’re soft and brown, otherwise they’ll be bitter. I might try slicing some preserved lemons the next time.