Sagey chicken recipe

This is a family recipe, adapted from a dish my Mum used to make. It’s quite forgiving – quantities don’t have to be precise, and most importantly, my children will eat it happily! It's also quick to prepare, and then you just bung it in the oven, so it's ideal for when you have guests or manic children who need entertaining. Ideally, the chicken should marinade for at least 4 hours, but it’s still pretty good if you forget to start early enough...

To serve 4:

4 chicken breasts

6 sage leaves

5 generous tbsps of olive oil

3 generous tbsps of lemon juice

A couple of cloves of garlic, chopped or crushed

Salt & pepper

To marinade the chicken, mix together the oil and lemon juice in an oven-proof dish, add the chopped garlic and the sage leaves. Season with salt & pepper, then add the chicken and mix it so that the chicken is well covered. If the chicken breasts are quite large, I usually slice them into two or three smaller pieces, so that they soak up the marinade better. (If you're being frugal, this is also a good trick for making 3 breasts feed 4 people. It also makes it easier to dish out smaller portions onto children's plates). Put the whole lot in the fridge for a few hours.

Pre-heat the oven to approx 190°C (fan 170°C). Stir the chicken in the marinade, then simply put the dish in the oven for about 40 minutes. Check it after 25 minutes or so, and cover with foil for the remaining time if it looks as if it’s going to burn on top. You can also turn the chicken pieces at this point.

I normally serve it with couscous, and some fresh veg. The couscous works really well if you stir-fry some carrots with a shallot, some garlic and a handful of pine-nuts or munchy-seeds, and mix that in with it. The whole thing is also delicious cold as a salad, if you chop the chicken up once it’s cold and toss it in a bowl with the couscous – a very versatile recipe!