I am not in the habit of bringing viral TikTok recipes here. It is a safe space, away from digestive biscuits submerged in yoghurt masquerading as cheesecake, baked oats, or sugary instant coffee whipped up like foam (if you don’t know what I’m talking about, ignorance is bliss). No, here we are in the realm of tried-and-tested vintage recipes.

So why am I letting marry me chicken into this sacred place? For the uninitiated, it first popped up a decade ago on an American food website called Delish, but it became the most-searched recipe on the New York Times in 2023. It’s a simple concept: chicken cooked in a creamy, tomatoey sauce that is so delicious that the person to whom you serve it will get down on one knee. Alternative versions sprang up like weeds: marry me pasta, marry me shrimp, gnocchi, chickpeas, meatballs, salmon… Gluten-free versions, vegan versions, crockpot, one pot, air fryer.

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I was initially unconvinced that chicken in tomato sauce held much promise, and certainly not enough to make someone want to spend the next 20 Christmases with someone else’s Uncle Jim and his questionable views. When it comes to cookery, I can be a bit of a neophobe – but I quickly learnt that there is nothing new here, and that’s what makes marry me chicken so charming.

What I discovered was that it is, at its heart, a very........

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