Eating While Traveling: Microwaved Tagine

A tagine is a North African stoneware cooking vessel with a conical lid. I've been considering purchasing one and was unable to resist when I saw this microwave miniature version called the "Stone Wave" at Walgreens.

I bought the tagine when I was getting ready to go on a trip and would need to prepare my meals using the usual hotel microwave and refrigerator. I imagined cooking with the tagine would at least make my meals a little more interesting than the usual microwaved bowl of food.

In my hotel room, I made a tomato and chicken tagine and served it with a microwaved sweet potato. The resulting dish tasted better than just microwaving the ingredients in a bowl. The lid seems to let just the right amount of steam escape to concentrate the sauce to deepen flavors, yet keep the dish moist. The addition of a high quality olive oil provided a warm savory flavor to the tangy and velvety tomato sauce.

Microwave Chicken and Tomato Tagine

Ingredients:

1/2 tomato, diced

1/2 organic chicken breast, diced

1 teaspoon olive oil

1 squirt of water from sports bottle (hay, I was traveling)

Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Place half of the tomatoes in the tagine. Then place the chicken in the dish and top with remaining tomatoes. Add the remaining ingredients.
2. Place lid on "Stone Wave" and place in microwave. It is helpful if you have a microwave safe plate under it as it has the tendency to boil over a bit. Microwave on high for about 5 minutes, depending on the power of your microwave. Serve with microwaved sweet potatoes. Serves 1 small portion.

I am considering buying this larger version from William Sonoma to use at home so that I can make enough for my whole family at once. But the smaller Stone Wave version worked perfectly to feed just me safe meals while I stayed in a hotel.
How do you deal with your food allergies when traveling?