Chicken
Chicken thighs with the skin on and the bone in are the most underrated type of chicken. They are just perfect. Great for a weeknight dinner, but also fab for when you’ve got friends coming round as you chuck them in the oven and really don’t have to think about them for 45 minutes. If the skin is golden and crispy and comes away easily when you lift it, you’re good.

If you can only find chicken breasts, or skin off and bone out chicken thighs, don’t panic. Cut them up into cubes, and either pan fry until golden or stick them on a skewer and you can do them under the grill. Soak the skewers in water first to stop them catching fire, or those metal skewers are v handy to have.

This dish would also be lovely with salmon, sea bream fillets or pan fried lamb chops. If you do it with lamb chops, I highly recommend switching the dollop of yoghurt for a dollop of humous. So so good! Add a smattering of pomegranate seeds and sub the parsley for coriander. That would be mega.

The warm salad
This make a very generous amount of the salad so depending on how hungry you are it could also serve for lunch for two people the next day, and that way you’re cooking once and eating twice. I’m never cross when I have leftovers and when you’re making something like this I just think it makes sense to make a little too much. It will keep happily in the fridge for a couple of days. As good room temp as it is warm. (Nothing tastes amazing fridge cold, but room temp is normally v good). For lunch the next day stir through a little pesto and top with a handful of rocket leaves and a few toasted walnuts or pine nuts for some crunch.

If you’re only making the bulgur wheat salad and don’t want to have it with the chicken, or you are cooking in two trays - do everything the same, it’s super easy and I tend to cover the baking tray with tin foil after I’ve added the stock. If you’re only doing the bulgur wheat you can get the whole thing done in less than 30 mins. Roast the veg for 15 mins, and then cook the bulgur wheat in the stock for a further 15 mins.

Vegetables
This is such a good salad. I love it and have it in so many various forms. I love roasted aubergine (it does need a generous glug of oil if you want it to be soft and squidgy, which you definitely do). Courgette would also be lovely in this, as would roasted sweet potato cut into cubes . The more vegetables you add the further this salad will go.

Make this salad without the chicken and it’s a gorgeous vegetarian salad. Use vegetable stock and it’s a winner.

Stock
I almost never have fresh chicken stock unless I’ve had roast chicken at the weekend and I have time to make a lovely stock. Stock cubes are absolutely fine, more than fine, they are great. For certain things fresh stock, the kind you buy in the meat section of the supermarket, really does make a huge difference and I will tell you in those cases! Always get organic if you go down that route. But for the bulgur wheat we just need an added layer of flavour from the stock cube.

Herbs
I’ve used parsley, but basil, coriander, chopped spring onions would all be lovely too. Fresh is always preferable over dried as we want the freshness the herbs bring to the dish which dried herbs have been zapped of. There’s a time and a place for them but this is not it. Unless you wanted to sprinkle some on top of the chicken thighs before they go in the oven.

Garlic
Oh my goodness I know what you’re thinking. Margie there are 5 cloves of garlic in this recipe! And well yes there are. Firstly, I love garlic and I cant apologise for that. But second of all don’t panic the 3 cloves that get roasted in the oven will be gentle and mellow and the remaining garlic is in the garlic butter, and well, we can’t have garlic butter without garlic. But it’s cooked and loses the harshness of raw garlic. If you dont like garlic or this is too much, simply leave it out. A melted butter and parsley sauce is delicious, especially if you let the butter brown a little before adding the parsley. Gorgeous! Make sure whoever you go to bed with eats the same as you and your garlicky-ness will cancel each other out.