Pollo al Ajillo (Garlic Chicken)

Variations

• Sherry version: Use Spanish sherry instead of white wine for deeper flavor.
• With potatoes: Griddle thin potato slices (patatas) alongside.
• Spicier: Add more dried chili.
• Herbed: Add rosemary and thyme.

Tips

• Fry the garlic low and slow for aroma, but don't burn it — burnt garlic turns bitter.
• Brown the chicken well for the best flavor.
• After the wine goes in, scrape the pan to dissolve the browned bits into the sauce.
• The sauce is rich — baguette is a must.
• The garlic goes in before the meat because the oil is the dish. Cooking oils says of this dish's sibling that in aglio e olio and gambas al ajillo the oil "is the sauce, not the cooking medium" — which is why they use extra-virgin and keep it at medium heat or below. Five tablespoons for 600g of chicken is not a frying quantity; it is the quantity you would use to make a sauce. So the first three minutes are an infusion, not a base: you are moving the garlic's aroma, which is fat-soluble, into the fat you are going to eat.
• And that is where this dish parts from gambas al ajillo. A prawn cooks in two minutes, so the oil never has to leave low heat — the garlic sits in it from start to finish. Chicken has to brown, which means the pan must go up to a temperature the garlic cannot survive; that is the one extra step this recipe has and the sister dish does not. The Spanish answer is simple: lift the golden garlic out with a slotted spoon before the heat goes up, and return it at the end with the wine. It is not in the method above, and it is the single thing most likely to rescue a batch.
• Why burnt garlic is bitter rather than merely dark. Blooming spices sorts garlic by heat: gentle and it is sweet and nutty, browned it is deep, past that it is acrid, and the same guide notes that garlic and ginger burn much faster than onion. Sliced garlic is low in water and high in sugars, so it goes from golden to bitter in seconds rather than minutes. Watch the colour, not the clock.
• The wine is doing two jobs. It lifts the fond — the browned residue that browning calls the point of searing at all — and it reduces into what little liquid the dish has. Cooking alcohol is worth reading on the first of them: simmering does not drive all the alcohol off, so give it a real minute or two of bubbling rather than a splash and straight to the plate.