Chicken Cacciatore (Poacher's Chicken)

This dish requires very little preparation, apart from minor shopping and chopping, but will win you brownlow votes, like an out of contract former prodigy and club champion*. If it all goes pear shaped you can always do a runner..

u need

1 medium brown onion, diced finely
about 1kg chicken pieces, thighs and drumsticks are best. tip: trim the fat from the thighs
1 clove garlic minced
handful basil
handful parsley
handful of black olives
3 or 4 anchovies soaked in milk and drained (little flavour bombs, soak them to draw out the salt)
olive oil
sea salt/freshly ground black pepper
2 tbsp white wine vinegar or apple cider vinegar
400g tin of good italian tomatoes peeled
1 cup chicken stock, preferably home made or good store packaged
1 - 2 tsp sugar
if u can get your hands on it: an italian baking dish

1. season then brown the chicken pieces in olive oil in a heavy pan
2. set aside and keep warm, by preheating the oven to 180deg C and sticking the chicken in a dish and into the warming oven
3. fry the onion and garlic over medium heat in the oil and juices for 5 minutes
4. add the vinegar and stock, or vinegar and a little white wine and stock, reduce on high heat for a couple of minutes
5. add tomatoes, herbs, salt - pepper, and sugar to taste. Be careful of the salt, some packaged stocks can be quite salty
6. simmer the sauce for 10 minutes while u pour a glass or oversee a try/goal
7. pour sauce over the chicken in the baking dish, mix thru and cook covered for 1 hour
8. to finish off, set aside the chicken on a warm serving plate and simmer the sauce to reduce it, add the olives, drained anchovies, a few more herbies and return it to the reserved chicken. Or for a quick snap at goal, add your olives and anchovies and just serve it all up in the dish.

* Ben Cousins West Coast c 2005?