Almaz’s Ethiopian Doro Wat (Chicken Curry) inspired by Cutting for Stone

Almaz’s Ethiopian Doro Wat (Chicken Curry) inspired by Cutting for Stone

Nina Gallant

Provided by: Taste Editors

1 hr total 0 mins prep Full Screen

servings

Recipe and excerpt courtesy of "The Book Club Cookbook, Revised Edition: Recipes and Food for Thought from Your Book Club’s Favorite Books and Authors" by Judy Gelman & Vicki Levy Krupp, 2012. Published by Tarcher an imprint of Penguin.

Abraham Verghese writes: In "Cutting for Stone", Hema, a doctor at Missing, arrives in Ethiopia after a monthlong absence and sends Gebrew, the watchman at Missing, to a restaurant to bring back doro wat, which she has been craving. The stoic cook at Missing Hospital would have regularly made this dish and fed it to the twins. This Ethiopian curry is eaten with in-jera, the pancake-like bread. The key to making this dish is berbere, a spice mixture that includes chile peppers, pepper, ginger, cloves, coriander, allspice, rue berries, and ajwain. Berbere is a key ingredient for so many curries (wot) in Ethiopia.

Ingredients

• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 2 cups chopped onion
• 1 medium (4-pound) chicken, skin and fat removed, washed, dried, and cut into large pieces
• 2 tablespoons garlic paste (pureed garlic), or more to taste
• 4 tablespoons berbere (ore if you like it to be five-alarm!)
• 1 tomato, chopped
• 2 cups hot water
• 1 teaspoon salt
• Butter (optional)
• Hard-cooked eggs (optional)

Directions

• In a deep skillet, heat oil. Then add onions, and lightly sauté until onions are soft. Add chicken pieces and garlic paste, and cook until the chicken is lightly browned. Add the berbere, stirring so that all pieces of the chicken are coated. Add tomato and stir again.
• Pour in water, bring mixture to a boil, and add salt. Simmer over low heat until the meat is well cooked, approximately 30-45 minutes, depending on the size of the chicken pieces (or until juices run clear when you cut between the leg and the thigh). (In Ethiopia, they say that the woman who loves her husband cooks it slowly so that each piece is tender and the gravy is thick.) You may add a pat of butter and/or hard-cooked eggs during the last five minutes of cooking, if desired.
• 
  NOTE: Berbere can be purchased online and at local specialty and gourmet food stores.

• Filed under:
• Chicken,
• Spice,
• Onion,
• Ethiopian,
• Braising,
• 1 hour,
• Dairy Free,
• Main Dish,
• Dinner

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Comments

[waabh]

12:04 AM on 12/17/2012

the picture doesn't look anything like the traditional dish - called doro wot (in Ethiopia) or tsebi derho (in Eritrea).

[waabh]

11:52 PM on 12/16/2012

Whoever Almaz is, she obviously has no idea how the traditional dish is made.
The main aspect of the dish in Ethiopia and Eritrea is plenty of onions sautéed in butter (the traditional butter infused with herbs and onions, but modern cooks prefer olive oil instead), then
the red pepper chili paste is added to the mix and cooked for at least 30-45 minutes while adding small drops of water (so that it doesn't stick to the pot) - this is the reason even though the dish is made with a very generous helping of chili, it doesn't burn your tongue too much when you eat it, the chilli paste has to be cooked in oil for an extended period of time to give that amazing chilli taste without burning your tongues
then in some cases small amount of crushed tomato is added to thicken the paste, some cooks prefer to skip this step
afterwards the chicken pieces are added and the heat reduced to simmer
you then cook the chicken in the sauce for over 1 hour while making sure that it is not sticking

I would only add water to the mix if you feel that it the bottom might be getting sticky. otherwise the dish doesn't need a lot of water because you don't want the sauce to be runny, it has to be thick and chunky with the onions and tomato.

[stevi]

01:21 AM on 01/23/2013

I was just thinking the same thing. I used to have some Ethiopian neighbors and they would spend a whole day just making the berbere and making sure the injura starter was perfect and creating the spiced butter. Then they were ready to make the Doro Wat and it was exactly as you said onions and about a 1\4 cup of spiced butter and cooking and carmelizing the berbere. I was lucky to learn a lot about Ethiopia and their fine cuisine. The wonderful smells in that kitchen were like heaven.

[Cantinflas]

12:20 PM on 12/14/2012

It would appear that harissa or some other spicy blend could be substituted for the berbere. Any thoughts?

[cardiaccare]

11:54 AM on 05/15/2012

I don't know about the recipe, but the book was so good!

[ceeenbee]

02:08 PM on 10/13/2012

You ate the book? ;~)

[Eth007]

09:59 PM on 03/01/2012

You are kidding. Aren’t you? Don’t call it doro wat. Give it another name. This got nothing to do with Ethiopia.

[Rambling Ruminations]

01:36 PM on 04/06/2012

Can you link us to a more authentic recipe? :)

[mayers]

01:47 PM on 06/08/2012

I was in Ethiopia and I sat on the floor and watched a native family make this and this recipe is very similar to what they did - minus the injera. Maybe different regions have different recipes, I was in the Awash valley.

[DL Brumalia]

05:50 PM on 12/21/2012

Years ago, I was in an authentic Ethiopian restaurant in Berkeley...the food was stellar...I never wanted to leave.