Nigel Slater's griddled chicken and aubergine stacks

So, as briefly mentioned in a previous post, we've treated ourselves to a George Foreman grill. A teensy-tiny one for our teensy-tiny kitchen, and also because I wasn't entirely sure we'd use it and thought we should at least get a cheap one that wasn't going to be a complete pain to store. I'd used my parents' while house-sitting and found it handy for cooking chicken breasts to go in a salad, and could see a few things we'd use it for, but there's always a risk with kitchen gadgets and I don't have space or money for big mistakes!

It's now in use almost every day. Partly, it's because it's summer, and simple griddled meat and veg are so appealing right now. But it also cooks steak well, quickly, and my homemade burgers in three minutes flat. And bacon for weekend breakfasts with a lot less faff then doing it in the proper grill. 

This recipe is one we've been doing for years. When I  met my husband, he had a large scrapbook of recipes his mother had typed and printed out for him when he left home to go to uni. In the back he'd stuck other recipes - pulled out of newspapers, mostly - that he liked the look of. Since we've been together we've supplemented it with other things pulled out of newspapers, and it's in constant use alongside my recipe file. It's a lot easier, because you can just stick things in, rather than writing them out again. But it's also now getting full.

This recipe has been typed out, but in a different font to all the others, so I think perhaps it's one he copied out himself. It says it's a Nigel Slater, and the version we have certainly reads like him, but I can't find it anywhere online, or in our books, and don't have the scrapbook with me, so the version below is the one I have in my head. 

Anyway, it's delicious and healthy and yummy. Using a griddle plan, as we used to, works well but is a bit of a faff as it takes so long and the kitchen fills up with smoke. But worth it. Using a George Foreman, though, makes it much, much easier.

Ingredients for two people

For the stacks:

Two chicken breasts

An aubergine, cut, ideally, into four slices, but I often end up getting six out of a big supermarket aubergine.

Pesto - about two tbsps.

For the tomato accompaniment

Four to six normal sized tomatoes

A few basil leaves

A shallot, or half a small onion

Olive oil

Grill the chicken breasts for about six minutes a side if you're using a griddle pan, or six minutes in total if you're using a double sided grill. Check they're cooked through, and put them aside to keep them warm.

Then griddle the slices of aubergine, for three minutes a side on the griddle pan, and three minutes in total in the grill - until done and yummy looking. If you're using a teensy-tiny George Foreman and cut six slices rather than four, you'll need to do this in two batches.

Spread one side of each of your aubergine pieces with pesto, and stack, making a sandwich with the chicken breast.

To make the accompaniment, while the chicken is griddling, dice your onion/shallot and soften it in a little olive oil, and dice your tomatoes. Then, while the last slice of aubergine is doing it's thing, warm the tomatoes through in the pan, and tear the basil leaves on top.

We have this with hunks of fresh bread to mop up the juices from the tomatoes. The bread below is the central slice from our home-made breadmaker bread, which why there's a strange dent where the paddle was.