Pistachio Chicken with Figs and Lemon

There are plenty of pistachio chicken recipes floating around, but none like this. Rather than simply coating or “crusting” some chicken with chopped nuts and calling it good, we’re going to create an incredibly flavorful pistachio butter (figs, onion, lemon, herbs, pistachio) and slather that all over some bone-in chicken. The meat will roast atop some veggies – olives, figs, onions, carrots – which act both as rack and sponge, as they will absorb that delicious salty chicken fat and become honestly one of the most delicious things. I love to serve this with Israeli cous cous and flatbread to soak up all that goodness.

If this is up your alley, you should also check out my Mississippi Chicken, Chicken Marbella and Basque Chicken recipes. They all have my heart.

What is Pistachio Chicken?

Pistachio chicken might be the perfect dinner recipe for pistachio lovers. Nay, IT IS THE PERFECT DINNER RECIPE FOR PISTACHIO LOVERS.

Many dishes that bear a similar name offer little more than a way to make a pistachio-crusted baked chicken. That is a delicious thing to do, no doubt, however we are going to really amplify the opportunity for flavor that pistachios naturally provide by whipping them into an unbelievably delicious paste/butter of sorts that gets slathered all over some bone-in dark meat chicken pieces.

We want the fat from those dark meat pieces to drip down into the veggies (that act as a roasting rack). This simple move takes a relatively ordinary cast of characters into award worthy territory in a hurry, let me tell you.

Why do we love this Pistachio Chicken so much?

I love the way the fat renders out of the roasting chicken and drips down into the veggies, also mixing in with the bits of pistachio butter that will inevitable fall off during cooking (this is good). The flavor that we get in the end is really something. Bright from the lemon, sweet from the figs, salty and briny from the olives. The requisite allium magic is present and accounted for as well (thanks garlic and onion), and OF COURSE – the roasted pistachios are truly making themselves known in every single savory bite.

Pistachio Chicken RECIPE Ingredients

Pistachios: If you’re a pistachio lover like me, this recipe is absolutely a must-try. They’re just the most delicious little nuts and they’re also really good for you, too. So there’s that.

Chicken: You must use bone-in dark meat for this recipe to be as delicious as I’m telling you it is. Boneless white meat just won’t hit the same, and it won’t render enough drippings to cook the veggies the way we want it to – to combine with the pistachio butter into a rich sauce. That won’t work with dry meat. That said, you can use thighs, leg quarters and/or drumsticks as you please. Whatever you like.

Figs: These get second billing because to me, they make the dish. That pop of perfect sweetness they lend to the whole flavor profile is just other worldly (like, food of the gods-good) and they plump up and sort of oven fry in the chicken fat. I know, I know. It’s almost too much.

Olives: The sweetness of the figs is beautifully tempered by the salty brine of the olives. Just a real match made in Mediterranean heaven, you know? You should really use as many as you like.

The Veggies: This is also a flexible thing, but I like the combo of onion (3/4 of a medium yellow, to be exact – the other 1/4 goes in the pistachio paste), carrots, and celery. Garlic is also a major player here, as we’ll add a couple of cloves to the paste as well, along with the pistachio gremolata that finishes the dish.

The Gremolata: Gremolata is literally just chopped parsley, garlic, and lemon zest and in this version, we’ll add some chopped pistachios as well. Such a bright and fresh way to punctuate a great dish if you ask me.

Lemon: We’ll use the zest of a lemon in the gremolata (see above) and the juice of about half (more if you LOVE lemon) in the pistachio paste.

How to Make this Easy Pistachio Chicken Recipe

Pistachio chicken, or at least my version of it, is a wildly flavorful main course that comes with the healthy bonus of roasted vegetables baked right in. This is how it goes: We’ll brown off some bone-in skin-on chicken pieces (you can really do this with whatever pieces you like), and then a mess of tasty veggies + figs + olives + oregano and we’ll lay those under the chicken in the pan. Side note – I love how vegetables can act almost as a roasting rack of sorts, elevating the meat while also really absorbing and soaking up all of the delicious salty drippings from the chicken.

That is quite literally my favorite part of the whole show here. I don’t think it’s possible to exaggerate or overstate just how delicious those veggies become. The olives and figs, most notably.

Anywho, we’ll transform this into pistachio chicken by creating an extremely savory and flavorful fresh pistachio butter.

A cup of shelled pistachios go in the bowl of a food processor, followed by 1/4 of an onion, 2 garlic cloves, 4 dried figs, a few olives, and a teaspoon of oregano. I like to season it with salt and pepper and then add the juice of about half a lemon. Give it a blitz until you’ve got a chunky paste and taste for seasoning. You can adjust the ingredients to suit your preferences, no problem at all there. Then, I like to add about 1/3 to 1/2 a cup of water to the mix, to make it nice and spreadable.

This pistachio paste gets slathered all over the chicken pieces and then we’ll lay a piece of foil over top before sending it into the oven to roast for about 25 minutes. The foil comes off then, and it will finish cooking for about 20 more minutes or until the chicken is done. The cooked time really just depends on the pieces you decided to use. Large pieces like lead quarters and breasts will take a bit longer, but if you use smaller pieces like drumsticks and wings and thighs, then it won’t take quite as long.

Print