How to Cook Chicken Afritada

My knowledge about the history of many Afritada variants might be limited. But I know a few that could interest you.

• Did you know that it goes way back to the Spanish Colonial era?
• Did you know that Afritada came from the Spanish word Frita, which means fried in English?

The word implies that any meat you will cook for an Afritada recipe will always be fried before cooking it with tomato sauce.

Although the dish is quite common, especially the chicken variant, I always thought that Afritada was only cooked during special occasions.

Back when I was a kid, I remember eating them only on Fiestas or on occasions when my mom is energetic enough to cook for an hour for a meal.

I didn’t even know how is it called; I just remembered how it smelled.

Surprisingly, the viand that I thought was difficult to make was not so difficult after all.

Fast-forward today, with the recipe I learned, I will also impart to you. You and I can now enjoy the dish whenever, wherever, as long as the ingredients are available.

If another Afritada variant cooked with Bangus or Milkfish might interest you, check out the recipe HERE.

There’s just a tip I want to share with you before we go to our kitchen and start cooking.

How to Cook Potatoes and Carrots for Chicken Afritada

*It is just a personal tip. It is not an end all be all advice to cook these vegetables.

In general, while cooking with potatoes and carrots, two things can happen: either you finish with half-cooked vegetables or overcooked ones.

Half-cooked carrots are still palatable in this dish.

So what about potatoes? Aside from the fact that humans can’t properly digest starches coming from uncooked and probably half-cooked potatoes, I wouldn’t say I like eating cubes of crunchy potatoes either.

So, unless you’re a Pro, you can’t know if the Potato and Carrot are cooked just by looking at them.

Provided you’ve followed the procedure below in our Chicken Afritada recipe card, which is simmering the potatoes and carrots for fifteen minutes, but still unsure, then here is a tip for you:

• With a regular stainless spoon or cooking spatula and enough pushing pressure from your hand, pick any Potato and Carrot in the pot and slice through them using the said utensils. Again, emphasizing the Potato, it is still not cooked if you find it hard to half it.

In my experience cooking Chicken Afritadas this way, once more, fifteen minutes is my go-to simmering time with potatoes and carrots in it.

Kitchen Tools Needed

• Frying pan
• Cooking pot with cover
• Cooking spoon and spatula
• Chopping board and knife
• Measuring spoons and cup
• A stove

Now that we are all set, let's go and check the recipe and instructions.