Ingredients
Chicken
- 1.5 kgfree-range chicken, skinned and jointed into 12 pieces
- 2limes, juiced
- 1 tspsalt
Wat
- 1.5 kgred onions, minced almost to a paste
- 200 gniter kibbeh
- 6–8 tbspberbere
- 6garlic cloves, crushed
- 1thumb ginger, grated
- 1 tspground korarima
- ½ tspground fenugreek
- ¼ tspground nutmeg
- 800 mlwater
- salt
To finish
- 6–12eggs, hard-boiled and peeled
- injera, to serve
- 250 gayib (fresh curd cheese), to serve
Directions
- Rub the chicken with the lime juice and salt, leave 20 minutes, then rinse and dry. The skin is always removed; a classic wat carries no chicken skin.
- Mince the onions as finely as you possibly can, almost to a paste. This is the most laborious part of the dish and the entire body of the sauce depends on it.
- Cook the onions in a dry heavy pot over medium-low heat with no fat and no water at all, stirring every few minutes for 45 minutes to an hour. They weep, then dry, then collapse into a soft rust-coloured mass. If the pot catches slightly, scrape it up and keep going.
- Add half the niter kibbeh with the garlic and ginger and cook 5 minutes until fragrant.
- Stir in the berbere and cook it slowly for 15 minutes, splashing in water whenever it sticks, until the raw chilli smell gives way to a sweet roasted one and the paste turns dark brick and slick with oil.
- Add the water in three additions, letting each be absorbed before the next, and simmer 20 minutes into a thick, glossy sauce.
- Slide in the chicken, turn to coat, cover and cook very gently for 45–60 minutes, turning the pieces every 15 minutes, until the meat leaves the bone at a touch.
- Prick the eggs all over with a fork and add them for the final 15–20 minutes so they take on colour and heat through.
- Off the heat stir in the remaining niter kibbeh with the korarima, fenugreek and nutmeg, and rest at least 20 minutes.
- Serve on injera with ayib and more injera alongside, one piece of chicken and one egg per guest.
Technique
- The dry onion cook is not optional and cannot be shortened by adding oil. Fat introduced early stops the onions breaking down and the sauce stays thin and grainy.
- Doro wat is a sauce dish. The correct final texture holds a ridge when a spoon is drawn through it and shows a rim of red butter around the edge of the pot.
- Twelve pieces of chicken and twelve eggs are traditional at feasts, and doro wat is the dish that breaks the Orthodox fast at Fasika and Genna.
- The quality of the berbere decides the dish. If it still tastes harsh at the end, it needed longer frying in step five.
Substitutions
- No niter kibbeh: melt 200 g butter over the lowest heat with onion, garlic, ginger, fenugreek, cardamom and turmeric for 20 minutes and strain. Plain butter works but the wat loses its perfume.
Variations
- Doro alicha, the mild turmeric-and-ginger version with no berbere, cooked for children and the chilli-shy.
- Key wat, the same method built on beef, is the everyday weekday stew.
History
The national dish: chicken jointed into twelve pieces for the apostles with a hard-boiled egg, over onions cooked down dry before butter is added.
Frequently asked questions
What is Doro wat?
Doro wat is a soup & stew from Ethiopia: chicken slow-stewed in berbere and spiced butter with hard-boiled eggs. The national dish: chicken jointed into twelve pieces for the apostles with a hard-boiled egg, over onions cooked down dry before butter is added.
How long does Doro wat take to make?
Doro wat takes 45 min of preparation and 2 hr 30 min of cooking. The recipe makes 6 servings. It is rated hard to make.
What can I substitute in Doro wat?
Yes, within limits. No niter kibbeh: melt 200 g butter over the lowest heat with onion, garlic, ginger, fenugreek, cardamom and turmeric for 20 minutes and strain. Plain butter works but the wat loses its perfume.
What is the most important thing to get right in Doro wat?
Mince the onions as finely as you possibly can, almost to a paste. This is the most laborious part of the dish and the entire body of the sauce depends on it.
