Marinade For Chicken And Fennel Traybake

Our answer

Nigella's Chicken Traybake With Bitter Orange And Fennel (from SIMPLY NIGELLA) coats the chicken thighs and slices of fresh fennel in a citrussy marinade. The marinade includes cold-pressed rapeseed oil or extra virgin olive oil and the oil is the equivalent of about 1 tablespoon per person. The oil helps to carry the flavours of the fennel seeds, mustard and citrus zest onto the other ingredients. Some oil is also needed to prevent the fresh fennel from burning and sticking to the baking sheet.

During cooking the oil will tend to settle in the bottom of the baking sheet and you could eat the chicken and fennel without the sauce, replacing it with a quick spritz of extra Seville orange juice (or the orange/lemon juice combination). Removing the skin from the chicken after cooking but before eating will also reduce the fat content of the dish. So we suspect that the actual oil that would be consumed can be best reduced this way. However if you have to reduce the amount of oil in the marinade then reduce it to 60ml/4 tablespoons but no less. You will need to be more careful to make sure that the marinade is really well distributed about the bag, as there is less of it. You could also omit drizzling extra oil over the ingredients before roasting but keep an eye on the fennel as it cooks, so that it doesn't burn around the edges or dry out.