This weekend I cooked three things, a cassoulet, Breton chicken and a chicken and chickpea tagine. We ate some of the cassoulet for our Sunday lunch. Perfect for a chilly November Sunday, especially becuase I had already cooked it on Saturday which meant we could have a very indulgent Sunday morning in bed, followed by a big walk in Epping Forest in the autumn sunshine to work up and appetite before coming home and re-heating it in the oven and steaming some greens to accompany it. Perfect, on-the-day-effortless entertaining in my book, and more time to relax and chat to our guests. Cooking these three dishes is such synergistic nirvana as you won't believe. From the chicken carcass you get to make a great stock for the cassoulet and tagine, and possibly have some left over for a soup in the week. The chicken tagine meat is cooked evenly as it is all the bone-in meat and the breast meat in the Breton Chicken cooks very quickly you just stir-fry the diced breast with some pancetta and leeks. I'll post the three recipes forthwith. Hunter’s Chicken Stew, or Poullet Chasseur According the that veritable mine of online information, Wikipedia, a sauce chasseur or hunter’s sauce was invented by Phillipe de Mornay, of Mornay sauce fame, as well as Béchamel, Lyonnaise and Porto sauce fame, so it’s in good company. It is, apparently a “compound brown sauce” that includes mushrooms and shallots. Its name alludes to more traditional pairings with venison, rabbit and other game meats, with the eponymous hunter providing the mushrooms for the sauce along with whatever meat he has obtained from his day in the forest. Chicken chasseur became very popular in England as standard bistro fare and became so naff that it required rescuing by Simon Hopkinson in The Prawn Cocktail Years. My recipe below has a lot more sauce about it, as I can never understand why someone wouldn’t want lots of lovely unctuous, mushroomy sauce with their gently stewed, falling-off-the-bone chicken, and of course to soak up the mounds of buttery cous cous or mashed potato or whatever comfort carbs you wish to pair with this beautiful dish. Cook this in a nice big casserole dish, the wider the better as it is easier to brown the meat and vegetables and means less washing up. I actually cooked this in my big tagine as it is the largest lidded pot my kitchen possesses. Serves 4
Joint the chicken, so that you have 2 drumsticks and 2 thighs and whole two breasts and season well with salt and pepper. Reserve the wings and carcass for stock. Add the butter and in a medium heat, gently brown the chicken pieces in a large casserole or stew pot. Do this in batches if necessary so that the pot is never crowded. This should take no more than a few minutes. When chicken pieces are a lovely golden colour, remove the chicken pieces with a slotted spoon. To the pan add more butter necessary and add the shallots/onions. Cook for ten minutes, turning frequently so that they are nicely browned at the edges. Add the garlic the mushrooms and cook for a further three minutes. While the onions are cooking, make up the sauce: In a jug combine the stock and the wine and the other flavourings and stir well to mix. Then when the mushrooms and garlic are cooked return the chicken pieces to the pot and pour over the sauce. Slowly bring to a bubble and then put in the oven and cook for 1½ hours. Fry the bacon until browned at the edges and add to the casserole for the last ½ hour of cooking. When the time is up beat together the reserved butter with a tablesppon of flour and slowly beat in a couple of tablespoons of thesauce from the casserole. Then pour this mixture over the sauce and stir through to thicken. After this time your chicken should be coming off the bone, if not cook for a little longer. Serve with mountains of buttered green beans and your choice of mashed potato or cous cous. * Tiim's tip: As the breast pieces were cooked whole, they shouldn’t be dry as they can sometimes be when cooked with bone-in chicken joints. |
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