-
1
Place the beef, fresh pork, and salted pork in a very large pot. Cover generously with cold water — starting in cold water is essential to a clear broth. Bring slowly to a simmer, skimming any foam that rises. Drain the soaked chickpeas and white beans and add them to the pot. Maintain a gentle simmer. The broth is ready to proceed when it is clear and the legumes have begun to soften, after approximately 1 hour.
-
2
After 1 hour from the start, add the whole chicken, chouriço, and morcela to the pot. Continue at a steady, gentle simmer. The smoked sausages will season the broth; taste and adjust salt now, bearing in mind the sausages will give more as they cook. The pot is ready to move to the vegetable stage when the chicken is just cooked through and the chickpeas yield without resistance — approximately 1 hour more.
-
3
This is where the dish lives or dies. Add the vegetables in strict order of density: turnip first, then carrot and potato, then couve last. Each addition should follow the previous by 5–10 minutes, so that no vegetable is overcooked. The alheira goes in only in the final 20 minutes of this stage — it bursts easily and requires gentle heat and brief cooking. The dish is done when every vegetable is fully tender but still holds its shape, and the alheira is heated through without having split.
-
4
Ladle off a generous quantity of broth and reserve it separately. Bring the reserved broth to a boil in a separate saucepan and cook the rice or small pasta in it until tender and the liquid is absorbed. The broth should smell deeply savoury and faintly smoky from the sausages.
-
5
Serve in sequence: first the broth with the rice or pasta as a soup course. Then arrange the meats, sliced or portioned, and the vegetables together on a large platter. Bring olive oil, coarse mustard, and broa to the table alongside.