Sluttishly Savoury: Cheaty Coronation Chicken

Real coronation chicken is a bit of a palaver. There's poaching the chicken, chopping the onions, simmering the sauce. It may be royal wedding silly season, and we may want to stuff our chops with the best sandwich filler IN THE WORLD, but that doesn't mean we want to spend all day doing it.

This is a cheat's version. It's even cheatier than Delia's, although I must credit the use of curry paste rather than curry powder to her (curry paste doesn't require cooking to taste delicious - genius). It's lighter tasting than the original recipe, although if you don't like the sour notes in creme fraiche you could switch for the same amount of the more traditional mayonnaise. Like the original, I don't bother with any of that raisin and almond malarkey, but if you wanted to throw a few in there's nothing stopping you.

You would poach a whole chicken if you wanted to be authentic, but if you're thrifty then just use some leftovers from a roast, or go to M&S and buy it ready cooked if you're shamelessly lazy. If you do the latter, then you won't even need to get a saucepan out to make this recipe. Now that's what I call cheaty.

Cheaty Coronation Chicken (serves 4)

You'll need:

• A handful of dried apricots (about 10)
• 400g cooked chicken meat
• 250ml creme fraiche
• 1tbsp curry paste (I used Patak's Madras)
• Juice of half a lemon

Make it!

• Put the kettle on. Pour the boiling water over the apricots and leave to soak for 20 minutes. You might as well make yourself a cup of tea while you're at it.
• Slice the chicken into bite sized pieces.
• After 20 minutes or so, whizz the soaked apricots to a paste in a blender or food processor.
• Stir together the creme fraiche, curry paste, lemon juice and apricots. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
• Coat the chicken pieces in the sauce.
• Serve as the filling for a doorstep sandwich, or with some green salad.