Adapted from The classic layered potjie as described by Tony Jackman, Daily Maverick, “Potjiekos 101”

Chicken and apricot potjie

An established dish converted to shelf-stable ingredients. Every substitution is documented below.

How long it keeps

About 6 months, set by Apricots (dried).

Indicative, for planning a build before you buy. The answer for a pack you already own is the best before date printed on it, and that only holds if it has been stored as the label says.

Serves
4
Burners
1
Pans
1
Water
0.3 L
Active
15 min
Total
55 min

Ingredients

A potjie is a round, three-legged cast iron pot, and potjiekos is what is cooked in it: South Africa’s stew of the open fire. Tony Jackman traces it, in the Daily Maverick, to the Voortrekkers, who “used their three-legged cast iron pots to cook in at the end of the day’s trek”, and notes that it was largely forgotten until “in the 1980s, South Africans rediscovered the potjie in a big way”, with competitions in every small town.

The rules of the revival were strict. Meat at the bottom, then onions, then vegetables, then potatoes on top, each in its layer, and: “You never stirred your potjie during its two to three hours of cooking.” The sauce went in “from the edge of the pot; not too much”, and the lid stayed on. The point is that each layer cooks in the steam of the one below and keeps its own texture and taste, instead of the whole pot becoming one stew.

Jackman himself thinks the old rigidity was overdone, and this version breaks the biggest rule, the time, because tins do not need it. The substitutions explain why. But it keeps the layers and keeps the spoon out, which is what stops tinned food turning to mush.

Use very little heat. A potjie with this little liquid, left unstirred, will burn on the bottom if the fire underneath is too strong. A few coals under the pot and none on the lid, and you should hear a gentle bubble, not a sizzle.

  1. Set the pot over a small bed of embers. Heat the oil, add the dried onion and cook for two minutes, then the garlic, ginger, cumin, cinnamon, turmeric and chilli for one minute more.
  2. Layer, in this order: the drained chicken in large pieces; the drained carrots and chickpeas; the apricots, torn in half; and the drained potatoes, halved, on top.
  3. Mix the tomatoes with the crumbled stock cube and 150 ml of water. Pour it in gently at the edge of the pot, not over the top.
  4. Lid on. Cook 35 to 40 minutes over the low embers without stirring or lifting the lid. Add a coal or two under the pot if the bubbling stops, and take some away if it starts to smell of toasting.
  5. Serve by digging straight down with a big spoon, so each plate gets every layer.

On one burner: the lowest possible flame, ideally with a heat diffuser under the pot, for 30 minutes.

Serve with bread, or with damper.

Serves 4.

What this was adapted from

The classic layered potjie as described by Tony Jackman, Daily Maverick, “Potjiekos 101”: meat browned in oil over moderate coals, then onions, then vegetables such as carrots or pumpkin, then potatoes on top, a little sauce poured in at the edge, lid on, and never stirred or lifted for two to three hours

  • fresh stewing meat, browned and cooked for two to three hours → tinned chicken

    This is the big difference, and it is worth being clear about. The long cook exists to make tough meat tender. Tinned chicken is already cooked, so the pot needs forty minutes, not three hours. What survives is the layering, which matters even more with tins, because tinned chicken and potatoes break up if you stir them.

  • fresh carrots, pumpkin and baby potatoes → tinned carrots, chickpeas and tinned new potatoes

    Tinned vegetables are already soft, so they go in to heat through and take on the sauce rather than to cook.

  • stock or wine → tinned tomatoes and stock, with dried apricots and warm spice

    The flavouring is our choice, not a tradition we are claiming. Jackman argues the potjie suits more than one style of cooking, and dried fruit with cumin, ginger and cinnamon gives a cupboard pot the sweetness and depth that a long braise would otherwise build.