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Mains Turkish

Chicken and mushroom sauté

Browned chicken, fried mushrooms, peppers and tomatoes cooked together in one pan for an easy weeknight dinner, ready in 50 minutes.

Prep
15 min
Cook
35 min
Serves
4
Difficulty
Easy

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Button mushroom Button mushroom

Tavuk sote, a quick sauté of chicken with peppers and tomatoes, is one of Turkey's best-loved weeknight dinners, and adding mushrooms makes the sauce much richer and more satisfying. The trick is to brown each ingredient in turn in the same pan: the golden layer the chicken and mushrooms leave behind melts into the tomatoes and flavours the sauce.

Thighs give a juicier, more forgiving dish, while breasts are leaner; take care not to overcook breast meat, but always make sure the chicken is cooked right through.

Servings 4

Ingredients

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For the sauté

To serve

Method

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  1. Cut the chicken into 3 cm pieces and pat dry with kitchen paper. Wipe and quarter the mushrooms, slice the onion and peppers, and peel and dice the tomatoes. Wash any knife and board that touched raw chicken in hot soapy water before using them for the vegetables.

    ~15 min

  2. Heat 2 tbsp of the olive oil in a large frying pan over a high heat. Brown the chicken in two batches without crowding the pan, for 6–8 minutes in total until golden on all sides, then lift onto a plate.

    ~8 min

  3. Add the butter to the same pan, then the mushrooms. They'll release their liquid first; keep frying over a medium-high heat for 5–6 minutes until it has evaporated and the edges are browned.

    ~6 min

  4. Add the rest of the olive oil, the onion and the peppers. Cook over a medium heat for 5–6 minutes until the onion is soft and the peppers have wilted slightly, then stir in the garlic for 30 seconds.

    ~6 min

  5. Stir in the tomato paste and fry for a minute until fragrant. Add the tomatoes, salt, pepper, oregano and chilli flakes and cook for 4 minutes until the tomatoes break down and the sauce thickens.

    ~5 min

  6. Return the chicken and any juices from the plate to the pan. Cover and cook over a medium-low heat for 8 minutes. Cut the thickest piece in half: there should be no pink and the juices should run clear; if you have a thermometer, it should read at least 74 °C in the centre. Give it a few more minutes if needed.

    ~8 min

  7. Take off the heat, scatter with parsley and serve hot with rice or bulgur pilaf.

    ~2 min

Enjoy!

The mushroom in this recipe

Button mushroom
Button mushroom Agaricus bisporus

About this species Grow it at home Fresh mushrooms

Mushroom swaps

  • Chestnut mushroom
    Chestnut mushroom Agaricus bisporusGives a darker, more aromatic sauce; cook it the same way.
  • Oyster mushroom
    Oyster mushroom Pleurotus ostreatusTear into strips and shorten the frying time by 2 minutes.
  • Shiitake
    Shiitake Lentinula edodesDiscard the tough stalks; it gives the sauce a deeper, meatier flavour.

Tips

  • Pat the chicken dry and don't crowd the pan, or it will steam instead of browning.
  • If your tomatoes aren't very juicy, add 100 ml hot water to the sauce.
  • Wash anything that touched raw chicken before using it for the vegetables.

Storage

Refrigerate within 2 hours of cooking; keeps in an airtight container in the fridge for 2 days. Reheat once only, in a pan, until piping hot all the way through.

Read our guide to storing mushrooms →

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Kitchen guides

Before you cook: clean, store, dry

How to clean mushroomsPractical ways to clean everything from button mushrooms to morels without waterlogging them or ruining their texture. How to store mushroomsHow to keep fresh, cooked, frozen and dried mushrooms at their best — and how to tell when they’ve gone bad. How to dry mushroomsA step-by-step guide to drying mushrooms at home in the oven, in a dehydrator or on a string — and how to store and rehydrate them.