Poulet Chasseur

Cooking is about frame of mind for me. I like to connect to real or imagined origins of a dish. The name for this dish translates to "Hunter's Chicken". I imagine a hunter, with what he has in his pack and what he's found in the woods, cooking over a fire. Simple, flavorful, ok, I just don't know where he got the chicken!

1 Tbsp olive oil

1 Tbsp (½ oz/14gr) butter

1 chicken, cup up into pieces

1 onion (6oz/170g), chopped

2 garlic cloves, minced

7-8 oz mushrooms, thick slice

3/4 cup red wine (be generous)

2 Tbsps tomato paste

2 springs of thyme

2 cups chicken stock

1. Heat the oil and the butter in a large lidded casserole. Season the chicken, then fry for about 5 minutes on each side until golden brown. Remove and set aside.
2. Add the onion to the pan and fry for about 5 minutes, until soft. 
3. Add the garlic, cook for 1 minute, then add the mushrooms, cook for 2 minutes or until the mushrooms 'sweat', then add the wine. 
4. Stir in the tomato paste. Let the sauce simmer and reduce for about 5 minutes, then stir in the thyme and pour over the stock. 
5. Slip the chicken back into the pan, then cover and simmer on a low heat for about 1 hour, whereupon the chicken will be very tender. The chicken will be ready when the internal temperature of the breasts reaches 165°F. 
6. Remove the chicken from the pan and keep warm. Rapidly boil down the sauce until it's syrupy and the flavour has concentrated, about 10 minutes. Put the chicken legs back into the sauce and serve.

Poulet à la bière avec herbes de Provence (Chicken cooked with beer and herbes de Provence)

A lovely single-pot meal (unless you make some sort of pilaf to go with it, although a slice of crusty bread works just as well). It's simple, delicious, and kind of impressive in a rustic sort of way. When serving, I always slice up the meat and ladle some of the richly flavoured cooking juices over it.

1 chicken cut into pieces
2 cups stout or dark beer
3 carrots, cut into cut into chunks
2 potatoes, cut into chunks
1 white onion, cut into thick slices
2 tsps Herbes de Provence seasoning
1 tsp sea salt
Pepper
2 stems fresh thyme
2 stems fresh oregano
1 Tbsp olive oil

1. Massage the chicken pieces with olive oil and cover with herbes de Provence and salt.
2. Arrange the onions, carrots, and potatoes in a baking dish and lightly season with more herbes de Provence and salt&pepper. Place the chicken amongst the vegetables with the stems of fresh thyme and oregano tucked in between.
3. Pour in the beer - don't worry about it washing off the herbs, the olive oil should make them stick. Cover and bake for 45 minutes at 450°F. 
4. Remove the lid and continue baking for 15 minutes to let the chicken brown on top.
5. The chicken will be ready when the internal temperature of the breasts reaches 165°F. You could also service with rice or quinoa pilaf.

Roast Chicken with Savoury Apple Mash

3 to 4 (1lb before coring) quartered and cored apples
2 (1 lb before coring) peeled and quartered onions
½ to 1 whole head garlic, cloves peeled
2 sprigs fresh rosemary
2 sprigs thyme
1 tsp rosemary powder
1 generous pinch of salt and pepper
½ cup apple cider vinegar
4 lbs whole chicken
¼ cup (2oz/58gr) butter

1. Preheat the oven to 400°F.
2. Toss the apples, onions, garlic, rosemary and thyme together in a roasting pan large enough to hold the chicken. Pour in the cider vinegar. 
3. Season chicken well with salt, pepper and rosemary powder and rest it on top of the apple mixture, on its left side. Put the butter as a block on top of the chicken and put in the oven; roast for 15 minutes and turn onto its back; roast another 15 minutes and turn onto its right side; Turn onto its breast and roast 30 minutes; turn onto its back and roast until the skin browns and the internal temperature of the breast is 165°F, about another 10 minutes.
4. Let the chicken rest about 10 minutes. Meanwhile, scoop out the apple, onion and garlic, leaving the juices behind to serve separately. Either use the coarse setting on a food mill or mash roughly, to push down the skins and herb stems and push up the delicious savoury/sweet apple and onion garlic and drippings blend. Scoop up the top part and discard the skins. Carve the bird, spoon some of the broth over it, and serve with the mashed apple mixture. 

The beginning of a sauce obsession - Caraway and Cream Sauce

Cook's Illustrated has an awesome Web site with amazing recipes. It's turned me on to sauces in a big way. I figure it would be great for a bistro - cooking the chicken ahead of time, a quick fry in a pan to liven it up, plate it, and drizzle with sauce. The following is a sauce inspired by one of theirs. I have made it to use with the recipe for Chicken Cutlets, but it could just as easily be made for a whole chicken cut into pieces and grilled as below.

For the chicken

2 to 3 Tbsps vegetable oil

1 whole chicken cut into pieces (either 4 or 8)

1. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium heat.
2. Pat chicken thighs dry.
3. Add chicken pieces to the skillet, smooth side down; cook for 5-7 minutes without moving, and then turn over when the chicken easily releases from the pan on its own. Cook until the juices run clear, an additional 7-10 minutes, depending on the thickness of the chicken piece.
4. Set the chicken aside and keep warm.
5. Remove all but 1 Tbsp of oil and immediately start to cook the shallot as per below.

For the sauce

1 Tbsp oil
2 medium shallots, minced

OPTIONAL: 1 Belgian endive or 5 large Romaine lettuce leaves, cut cross-wise, in thin strips

2 Tbsps apple cider vinegar

1 tsp caraway seeds

½ cup beef stock

½ cup heavy cream or crème fraîche

1 tsp Dijon mustard

Salt and pepper, to taste

1. Set the skillet over medium heat. Add the shallots (and leaves if using) and sauté until softened, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the caraway seeds and continue cooking until the shallots are lightly browned, an extra 1 to 2 minutes.
2. Add the cider vinegar and bring to boil, scraping up any browned bits from the bottom of the skillet with a wooden spoon (remember, browned bits = flavor!).
3. Add the stock and cream; bring to a boil, stirring occasionally, until slightly thickened and reduced to a generous ½ cup, about 5 minutes. Stir in the Dijon mustard; season to taste with salt and pepper. Add the chicken pieces, spoon over the sauce and cook together another 5 minutes or until internal temperature of the breasts reaches 165°F. .
4. OR: Spoon the sauce over chicken cutlets and serve immediately.

 Originally published Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Chicken Curry

My cooking snobbery prevented me from posting this recipe earlier, and all that means is that I haven't made it as often as it deserves to be made. I am ashamed. And yet glad to have finally gotten over my snobbery and recorded this fine recipe.

2 Tbsps. flour
1 tsp salt
½ tsp cayenne pepper
1 chicken, cut up into 8 pieces
2 Tbsps mild flavoured vegetable oil
1 Tbsp generic curry powder
1 onion, sliced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup chicken broth
⅓ cup raisins OR candied ginger
1½ Tbsps tomato paste
garnish - chopped fresh cilantro
garnish - plain yogurt

1. Cut up your chicken into 8 pieces and remove the skin.
2. In a paper or plastic bag, mix together the flour, salt and cayenne pepper. Add the chicken and shake well to coat.
3. Meanwhile, heat the oil in a large pan over medium-high heat.
4. Dump the chicken and any remaining flour into the pan and cook until browned. Remove from the pan and set aside.
5. Add the onion and garlic to the pan, adding a little more oil if necessary, and cook for 2 minutes.  Add the curry powder and toss to coat then add the broth, raisins, and tomato paste (it doesn't matter if the onion is completely cooked). 
6. Return the chicken to the pan and simmer for 20 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through and the meat thermometre registers 165°F or juices run clear.
7. If necessary, remove the chicken and cook down the sauce to the desired thickness.
8. Garnish with cilantro and a dollop of plain yogurt.
9. Serve over the rice.

The foundation of goodness - Chicken Stock

This is a recipe I've not spent a lot of time researching because I really liked the results the first go 'round. It's from Steven Raichlen's High-Flavor, Low-Fat Chicken - a most unromantic title for any book, but I'm willing to overlook it even if it's just for this recipe.

I've made chicken stock before, either from just boiling some roast chicken carcass or saving the excess liquid from Poule-au-Pot, but when I made this stock, I was amazed at the wonderful flavour and, yes, the wonderful aroma with which it perfumes the air. And, as Raichlen mentions in his book, it's a great way of using scraps. I was saving chicken backs in the freezer from when I cut up a chicken for pieces, just for such an occasion. I love being thrifty like this, and learned that I can be even more so. Raichlen recommends saving vegetable scraps to use in the making, also just kept in the freezer, which I will do next time - everything just gets strained away when the stock is done anyway, so vegetable heels etc will do just fine, so long as they are clean. In the recipe below, it mentions cutting sizes etc, but that's just to give an idea of the best size to extract flavour. I also discovered that it's best to remove the skin from the chicken because it produces so much fat I would just skim off afterwards.

I've also included the instructions for chicken broth at the end. I haven't tried this, but plan on it, soon.

3 1⁄2 to 4 lbs chicken backs, wings, necks, or the carcass from a large roast chicken

1 large onion, quartered with skin

1 leek (6oz/170gr) trimmed, washed, and cut into 1-inch pieces

3 carrots (6oz/170g) cut into 1-inch pieces

3 stalks celery, cut into 1-inch pieces

1 head of garlic, cut in half

Water enough to cover everything in your pot

4 large parsley sprigs or parsley stems

4 fresh thyme sprigs or 1 teaspoon dried thyme

2 bay leaves

10 peppercorns

2 allspice berries 

1. Remove the skin and any lumps of fat from the chicken pieces (unless you want lots of schmaltz floating on the surface of your stock). Rinse the chicken pieces well.
2. Place all the ingredients for the stock in a large stockpot with enough water to cover the chicken. Bring the stock to a boil and skim off any foam that rises to the surface. Lower the heat and gently simmer the stock until well flavored, 2 to 3 hours. Add cold water as necessary to keep the chicken covered. Skim the stock often, especially if you've added water because the cold water brings the fat to the top. It's also very important to only bring the stock to a boil once; any boiling after that will cause the fat to emulsify and make the stock cloudy.
3. Strain the stock into a clean container and let cool to room temperature. I've transfered them to 1-cup containers and froze most of it. Stock will keep four to five days in the refrigerator and for several months in the freezer.

Note: For an extra-clear stock, pour the stock through a strainer lined with paper towels.

Yield: Makes 10 to 12 cups

Chicken Broth Variation:

1. Chicken broth is richer and meatier than chicken stock. Use it for soups and sauces.
2. Prepare the preceding recipe, substituting a 3 1⁄2 to 4 lb chicken for the bones. Wash the chicken and remove any lumps of fat. (For a leaner broth, remove the skin, too.) Simmer the chicken for 1 hour, skimming the stock often. At this point the broth is ready. The chicken meat can be pulled off the bones and used for salads.

Yield: Makes 10 to 12 cups

Poulet au Paprika

It's always such a pleasure when I discover that a negative prejudice I have about food is wrong. I've never had anything against paprika, but it always seemed like an afterthought kind of seasoning that I often wondered what it's use was. That is, until I tried Laura's Poulet au Paprika. It creates such a smooth blend of flavours, all couched in this noticeable taste of paprika. I strongly recommend exploring different types of paprika each time you make this recipe. And I'm fairly confident that you will want to make it again and again.

The original recipe required only chicken thighs, but the cooking instructions are the same as cooking a whole chicken in pieces that I just did that, and it turned out wonderfully.

1 whole chicken cut in 6 to 8 pieces

1 pinch salt and pepper

1 Tbsp bacon drippings or oil

1 red pepper, julienned

1 onion, sliced

half of a small fennel bulb, finely chopped

1 Tbsp hot or sweet Hungarian paprika (or try with other types of paprika)

1 clove garlic, minced

1⁄2 cup white wine

1 tomato (6 to 7oz) roughly chopped

1 bay leaf

2 Tbsps crème fraîche

garnish with a wedge of lemon

1. Season the chicken with salt and pepper. Heat the fat in a sauté pan and, working in batches, brown the meat on all sides, 5 to 8 minutes per side. Remove and set aside.
2. Drain off all but a tablespoon of fat from the pan.
3. Lower the heat and add the julienned pepper, onion, fennel, and paprika. Cook until soft, but not coloured, about 12 minutes, adding the garlic for the final minute.
4. Deglaze the pan with the wine. Add the tomatoes and bay leaf. Season with salt and pepper.
5. Put the chicken back in. Cover the pan, and cook, turning the meat occasionally, until tender, about 30 minutes or until breasts register 165°F on a meat thermometre.
6. Remove the chicken to a serving platter and cover with foil to keep warm.
7. Turn up the heat under the sauce and boil down to sauce consistency. Turn off the heat, stir through the cream, check the seasonings (including the paprika, adding more if you like), then pour over the chicken, and serve with wedge of lemon. Squeeze lemon before eating if desired.

Tart Chicken

Another delicious chicken recipe from Laura Calder. The first time I made this I forgot to strain the sauce at the end and to add to last tablespoon of butter, and it was still delicious with the tomato chunks all the same.
August 2017 - I've made a few amendments to reflect how I make this. Namely it is the description for the vinegar reduction as well as added element in reducing the sauce at the end, before incorporating the knob of butter. It makes it more syrupy and gooey. :)

1 chicken (3-1/2 pounds/1.6 kg) cut into six-to-eight pieces

Salt and pepper

1 Tbsp (14gr) butter + plus another for finishing

1 Tbsp mild vegetable oil

6 cloves garlic, peeled

1 cup white wine vinegar

1 cup chicken stock

1 bay leaf

1 sprig thyme

1 Tbsp. tomato paste

4 medium tomatoes, roughly chopped

2 good handfuls of chopped fresh parsley

1. Season the chicken pieces with salt and pepper. Melt 1 spoonful of the butter in a sauté pan with a drizzle of oil to prevent it burning, and brown the chicken (don't use non-stick or you won't get the rich fond to form). You’re not cooking the chicken here, just making the skin crisp and giving it colour and flavour. Four to five minutes per side is about right, depending on the cooking temperature, which should be medium high or more. Set aside the chicken.
2. Lower the temperature and let the pan cool a bit to avoid burning the garlic, then cook 5 minutes. Deglaze the pan with the vinegar and boil down by half, about 10 minutes (you'll know when the sound changes and you can run a wooden spoon along the bottom and it leaves a trail because the liquid has thickened). 
3. Return the chicken to the pan, and pour the stock over. Add the herbs, tomato paste, and the tomatoes. Cover and simmer until the meat is cooked, about half an hour (with a meat thermometer the white meat should read 165F and the brown 180). Remove the chicken to a dish and keep warm.
4. Strain the liquid into a saucepan, pressing to get all the juices through, then using a wooden spoon to strain as much matter from the veg as possible. Boil the liquid to reduce again until you get a nice syrup (wooden spoon trick again. Whisk in the last spoonful of butter, and pour over the chicken. Sprinkle over the parsley, and serve.

One of my favourites - Butter Roasted Chicken

I love roasts, and in particular roast chicken. I think my favourite part is the crispy, golden skin. Roasted with butter, it becomes crispy/sticky, and the taste of herbs infused in the flesh is complemented by a lovely gravy that naturally form, in which the onion and potatoes cook. There are loads of variations possible with the herbs and, even, with the veg.

1 chicken, about 3 pounds

a few sprigs of rosemary and thyme and a few Bay leaves

(other herbs could be tarragon, lavender, parsley etc)

1 generous pinch salt and pepper

1/4 cup (2oz/58gr) butter
2 onions, thickly sliced
4-5 potatoes, thickly sliced

1. Heat the oven to 400°F. 
2. Separate the onion rings and toss them along with the potatoes in the bottom of a roasting pan.
3. Stuff the chicken with the herbs and truss it. Season all over with salt and pepper. Set the chicken in the roasting pan on its left leg, and set the butter on top.
4. Bake 15 minutes. Turn the bird onto its right leg for 15 minutes. Turn on its back for 15 minutes. Finally, set it upright and continue cooking until done, about 1/2 an hour more or until the juices run clear. Remember to baste the bird constantly as it roasts. It is done when the juices at the leg run clear and the breast should read 165-170F.

Herbed Chicken Saute

Yes, another wonderful recipe from Laura Calder. The first time I made this I used parsley with some dill, and Ben didn't seem to like it as much, but I did. I figured it was probably that the herbs were subtle flavours, and my Ben tends to like stronger flavours (although he has an amazing palate). The second time I made it was with tarragon and parsley, and Ben, Susan and Diyan loved it. It was also a confirmation that following through with each step is very important. I think the first time I made it I didn't brown the chicken at a high enough temperature (the time was the same, but the result was different). Browning is where loads of flavour comes from, so why skip this step?

The one thing was the cooking time - the last 15 minutes may be a bit too long. I checked about half-way through with a thermometer and immediately pulled it off the heat because it was way over.

1/4 cup (2oz/58gr) butter or vegetable oil
1 chicken (about 3 pounds) cut into eight
salt and pepper to season
½ cup dry white wine
4 Tbsps chopped, fresh herbs (such as thyme, rosemary, parsley, chives, dill, tarragon, chervil or coriander)
Half a lemon, for seasoning

1. Melt the butter in a sauté pan. Season the chicken pieces with salt and pepper, and brown well on all sides, 5 minutes, working in batches if necessary. Remove the chicken. Deglaze the pan with the wine, scraping up the good bits from the bottom. Put the chicken back in the pan, cover, and cook gently for 15 minutes.
2. Sprinkle in the herbs, cover, and continue cooking until the chicken is tender, 15 minutes more, or until white meat reaches 165F and dark meat 180F. Remove the chicken to a serving dish and allow to rest while boiling the pan juices down, if necessary. Check the seasoning, adding a squirt of lemon if you like. Serve.

Averted Fiasco à la Poule au pot

Laura Calder is fallible! I made her Poule au pot, and part of the recipe calls for 12 onions... TWELVE! I almost blindly followed my Hestia's directions and halted before it was too late, researched Poule au pot on other sites and saw that it must have been an error (although Martha Stewart does list 8 leeks in her recipe). I also put in 11 whole pepper corns instead of ground pepper. I'm not sure if that made a difference or not, but it turned out really yummy. Ben said it was 'scrummy'; he's cute when he's enthusiastic about my food so I let that one slide...
NOTE - this is also a good way of making some lightweight chicken stock; just save the cooking liquid you don't use when serving.

1 3-pound/1.5 kg chicken

Enough chicken stock to cover (about 8 cups)

1 bay leaf

1 sprig thyme

1 sprig tarragon

Salt (lots)

11 peppercorns

6 cloves garlic peeled

2 large leeks or 4 small, cleaned, trimmed and thickly sliced (18oz/510gr)

2 onions, peeled

4 carrots, scraped and cut into chunks

3 celery stalks, cut into finger lengths

1 small turnip, sliced

3 parsnips, scraped and sliced

1. Lay a large piece of cheesecloth onto a work surface and put the chicken breast-side down onto it. Gather up the edges and tie them with the kitchen string. Put the chicken into the pot, breast-side up and pour over chicken stock. Bring to a boil. Skim off the foam that rises until no more forms, about half an hour.
2. While chicken boils, assemble 1 bay leaf, large sprig thyme, sprig tarragon, lots of salt, 11 peppercorns, prepare garlic and leeks, and set aside. Prepare rest of vegetables and keep aside until next step. NOTE, don't cut the veg too big - they won't cook quickly enough.
3. When chicken has boiled for 30 mins, add the bay leaf, thyme, tarragon, salt, peppercorns, along with the garlic and leeks. Turn the chicken, breast side down. Cover, and simmer very gently about 20 minutes more. Add the remaining vegetables, turn the chicken breast side up, and continue cooking until the juices in the chicken run clear and the vegetables are tender, about 20 minutes longer. When removing from cheese cloth, be careful; the chicken will be so tender it pulls apart easily. Serve pieces of chicken and vegetables with some broth pooled around.

Tarragon Chicken

Ok, so I've made another Laura Calder recipe. So what? And no, I'm not defensive about it... much. I might as well admit it, I think she's great and I will likely be making a lot of her recipes. It's actually really unusual for me to glom onto one food writer, but, well, there you go! I have!

I tried, for the first time, her Tarragon Chicken recipe, but I altered it without considering the alterations. I used skinned and boned chicken breasts I'd cut into chunks because I wanted more of a stir-fry kind of dish. Well, I overcooked the chicken, although the sauce turned out very nicely. I can still use skinless and boneless chicken breasts, I just have to make sure I use the right cooking techniques for it before applying the sauce.

NOTE: If using CHICKEN BREASTS, follow the instructions for sautéeing chicken breasts and make the sauce as directed. Do not cook in the liquid for 30 minutes - cook breasts using the sauté method and make the sauce to pour on top.

1 Tbsp (1⁄2 oz/14gr) butter

1 Tbsp vegetable oil

1 chicken (about 3 pounds/1.4 kg), cut into 8 pieces

Salt and pepper

1⁄2 cup chicken stock

3⁄4 cup dry white wine

1 shallot, minced

1 cup crème fraîche

1⁄2 cup chopped fresh tarragon

Lemon juice to taste

1. Melt the butter with the oil in a large skillet over quite high heat. Season the chicken pieces and fry in batches until well browned, about 5 minutes per side.
2. Put all the chicken back in the pan, add the chicken stock and reduce the heat to medium. Cover and cook until tender, about 30 minutes - the internal temperature of the breast should read 165F. Remove the chicken to a plate and keep warm.
3. Keep cooking the leftover juices and reduce until sticky - the correct moment of reduction can be heard, it's like making ghee, just listen to the sauce and when the sound changes, wait a few seconds longer and it's ready.
4. Add the shallot and wine and reduce to a thickish sauce, about 5 minutes. Add the cream and half the tarragon. Boil down again until it thickens into a sauce, about 3 to 5 minutes.
5. Season the sauce with salt, pepper, and lemon juice. Put the chicken pieces back in, turning to coat, then transfer to a platter. Pour the sauce over the chicken, joyfully scatter over the remaining tarragon, and serve.