Food and movies

I just saw Julie & Julia.  Delightful film - not great but very enjoyable. Meryl Streep - up in my favourite women list with Isabel Allende and Ingrid Bergman - has real fun with one of the two lead characters. Point is, however, not the film but the food. Food is my greatest sensual pleasure - OK, second greatest - and the hallmark of a great film about food is that it makes me itch to go and cook. Julie & Julia is a fine celebration of cooking and eating. Of course, the masterpiece in this genre is the glorious Babette's Feast.  Anyway, here's one of my favourite easy but unusual recipes for chicken, You've got to love, or even be obsessed with, garlic, though. The original version of this comes from Elisabeth Luard's good but patchy European Peasant Cookery.

Garlic Chicken

6 heads of garlic

1 free range chicken, giblets removed

Sprigs of thyme or rosemary and parsley

Glass of dry white wine

Olive oil

Seasoning

A little flour.

You need a large casserole dish with a good lid.

Take the outer peel off the the garlic and separate out the cloves but do not peel off the papery covering on each clove. Line the bottom of the casserole dish with the whole cloves. Lay on the herbs - you can use others but avoid tarragon, which is wonderful with chicken but will swamp the flavour here.

Lay the whole chicken on top of the garlic and herbs. Pour over enough olive oil to cover the garlic and herbs (maybe about 300 ml). Pour over a glass of white wine, Season with pepper and salt

Put on the lid. Mix a little flour (about 2 tablespoons) with some water to make a smooth, fairly stiff paste. Seal the lid with this paste.

Put in a medium oven - 150ºC for about 1.5 hours

Serve with basmati rice - I like a simple pilau - and good bread to mop up the juices. Suck the buttery sweetness out of the whole garlic cloves. Don't eat this the day before an important business meeting.