The recipe prepared for this week's assignment is from Class 22, Part 2:
The recipe this week did not require a lot of prep or pans or fancy ingredients. It was just plain and simple French farmhouse cooking at its best.
It called for a chicken, cut into parts...which means I went to the store and just selected the parts we liked for the recipe (no one here is going to eat wings and necks and backs, etc., for example).
After browning the chicken in a small amount of olive oil, 20 cloves of garlic were added with one cup of dry white wine. Yep, you read that correctly TWENTY cloves of garlic, I did not mistakenly write 20 for 2 or something along those lines. Simmering the chicken and garlic for five minutes, adding a bunch of slivered sage, and the whole pot was ready for a 30 minute stay, uncovered in a 375 degree oven.
After 30 minutes, the lid was placed on the pot, and another 10 minutes cooking made mine completely done. The chicken was tender, moist, and flavorful with a hint of garlic (really, the garlic cooks down to a mild taste) and sage. After the chicken was cooked and set aside to keep warm, the liquid is reduced to half, creating a wonderful wine/garlic/sage sauce to spoon over the chicken. It was also very tasty.
The best compliment I can think to share is that Mark said, "This is so good...I would eat this once a week." Mark's a beef and pork guy, so once a week for a chicken dish is high praise indeed.
The dish seemed fairly rich, with the sauce, and all, so I just served it with a cheddar biscuit and a fresh spinach salad with dried blueberries and freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano...Mark poured a glass of the wine I used, and dinner was served.
Very easy. I would make this again definitely. (Note: while I left the skin on for browning and cooking, I don't really care for chicken skin, so I removed that on my portion and it tasted lovely that way, very clean and fresh.)
Everyone is having a bit of fun suggesting we post this, that, or the other of a week. It was suggested that we all post our recipe/book holders so that we could see what everyone uses to hold their recipe and/or book each week while they cook. Hmmm...I don't really have anything like that, and what you see here, is just how unprofessionally my kitchen is run on a daily basis...I just plop the chicken decor from the countertop on the book and it works fairly well. I can't wait to see everyone else's holders as on the member exchange they were discussing stainless steel and Lucite and this fancy thing and that fancy thing, and I thought, "I think I will just remain silent on my method..." until they decided to post it all! Now you know...this Whisk chick uses a chick and her chicks!
If you would like to see how the other Whisk Wednesday members fared in this class, click here, and then on the Whisk Wednesdays connect to individual bloggers, or better yet, come and join us! Shari has the ingredients posted on her site at the click, so while we can't post the recipe instructions, you can at least look at the ingredients, and I bet you can figure out a lot of it from there.
The Next Assignment
• Class 22, Part 3:
Cailles à la Normande (Quail with cream and Apples) pages 212-213 {You can substitute Partridge if you like.}
