Chicken Breasts Chasseur

I met renowned French chef Alain Sailhac at The French Culinary Institute and we got along rather well, so he came to my apartment a number of years ago to help me properly prepare Sole Meunière for what I intended to be a fine dinner party.

P.S. A disaster. 

Perhaps it is better to say the dish came out fine, but the evening hardly went as swimmingly as I’d hoped. More recently, I tried his recipe for Chicken Breasts Chasseur. This was done all by myself, and I had an infinitely more enjoyable evening. I love this dish elegantly composed of tarragon, shallots, and cognac because it’s impressive and yet not too complicated.

Butchers don’t seem to carry veal bones these days, and veal stock or veal demi-glace is all but non-existent. I subbed half mushroom stock and beef stock to make up the veal stock in the recipe. 

I suggest serving your chasseur with roasted potatoes and a simply dressed green salad!

Chicken Breasts Chasseur (Supremes de Volaille Chasseur)*
Ingredients
4 bone-in chicken breasts with skin (6 ounces each)
Salt and freshly ground pepper
2 teaspoons olive oil
1 medium carrot, chopped
1/2 cup chopped onions
2 cups brown veal stock (I used half mushroom stock and half Better Than Bouillon beef stock)
2 cups sliced button mushrooms
2 shallots, minced
2 tablespoons cognac
1/2 cup dry white wine
2 tablespoons chopped fresh tarragon

Directions
Preheat the oven to 350 F.

Season the chicken with the salt and pepper. Warm 1 teaspoon of the oil in a large nonstick saute pan over medium heat. Carefully, lay the chicken breasts, skin side down, in the pan. Sear for 3 minutes, or until the skin has nicely browned. Transfer the chicken, skin side up, to a nonstick jelly-roll pan. Reserve the saute pan.

Bake the chicken for 20 minutes, or until the juices run clear when the chicken is pierced with a knife.

While the chicken is cooking, remove most of the fat from the saute pan. Add the carrots and onions to the pan. Saute over medium heat for 3 minutes, or until the vegetables begin to caramelize. Add the stock and raise the heat to high. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to medium. Simmer for 10 minutes, or until the liquid has reduced by half. Strain through a fine sieve into a small bowl; skim off any fat that rises to the surface.

Warm the remaining 1 teaspoon oil in a medium saute pan over medium heat. Add the mushrooms and shallots. Saute for 5 minutes, or until the mushrooms are golden. Season with the salt. Remove the pan from the heat and add the cognac. Carefully ignite the cognac with a long match. Allow the flame to burn out, then add the wine. Return the pan to the heat.

Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce the heat to medium and simmer for 10 minutes, or until the liquid has reduced by half. Add the reserved stock and simmer for 5 minutes, or until the sauce is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Stir in the tarragon. Taste and adjust the seasoning.

Remove the skin from the chicken breasts. Carefully cut the breast meat from the breast bone and then cut each breast, on the diagonal, into 2 pieces. Place a divided chicken in the center of each of 4 warm dinner plates.

*Recipe courtesy of The French Culinary Institute’s Salute to Healthy Cooking by Alain Sailhac, Jacques Pepin, Andre Soltner, International Culinary Center, Jacques Torres

BOOK/A TABLE - Cassoulet

One evening, a number of years ago, after we’d knocked back practically a barrel of bourbon, my friend took it upon himself to read Ernest Hemingway’s The Short and Happy Life of Francis Macomber to us. Despite the title, there was nothing short about it; he read for what felt like hours. (Just imagine: a massive breath or a pause for another sip of Maker’s Mark to add dramatic effect as he turned each weighted page with a licked index finger.)

Frankly, I hadn’t much cared for Hemingway at that point, and this soliloquy damned near put an end to my interest in him entirely until I read A Moveable Feast—here was the extraordinary life of Hemingway himself, part of the Lost Generation in 20’s Paris! And eating his way through all of it!

Among the oysters and white wine (and Zelda and Gertrude Stein, of course), there was also cassoulet, the hearty dish of white beans, duck, and sausage. While the creation of cassoulet is attributed to Carcassonne in the region of Languedoc, Hemingway spotted it on a bistro menu in Montparnasse.

Cassoulet is a slow process of braising meat and aromatics (taking nearly as long to make as it takes to have The Short and Happy Life of Francis Macomber read to you), but well worth it. I also think it’s essential to then let your cassoulet sit overnight before heating it up again in the oven to serve.

Rest assured, when I laid this sumptous pot on the dinner table for some friends recently, I had everyone’s attention.

My favorite version is here, but you might like Julia Child’s epic foray, Jacques Pepin's “quick version” or a simpler chicken variation here, which is more like a fricassee.

As Hemingway wrote to a friend in 1950, “If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.”

Do enjoy!

(Not So) Quickie Cassoulet 2016

As much as I like to linger in the kitchen, I simply didn't have much time this year to make a languorous celebratory cassoulet and thereby mark the seventh anniversary of my blog, eveningswithpeter.com! I couldn't help but think of Arlene Dahl's culinary epic No Time for Cooking as I set out to make Jacques Pepin's 30-Minute Cassoulet. I'll be perfectly frank--it didn't work out, at first. Entre nous, and with all due respect to the great chef, Pepin's cassoulet was more like a 90-minute 30-Minute Cassoulet. As presented, the recipe made little sense and nothing was fully cooked at the 30-minute mark. Was the Le Creuset skillet I used at fault? Was it not roomy enough for all the ingredients? I can't say for sure but after I fiddled with it for an additional hour, my cassoulet ended up being quite tasty. This may be served straightaway but the most important thing I've learned about cassoulet over the years--let it cool before sticking it in the refrigerator overnight and then reheating the next day to release the full flavor.

Let's go through this together, shall we?

1) Everything mostly goes into the pan in parts, starting with browning the ham (rolled shoulder ham a.k.a. daisy ham or Boston Butt) and Italian sausage and then cook covered for 7-8 minutes. Fine.

2) Add bratwurst, mushrooms, onion, garlic, thyme and bay, cook for another 5-6 minutes. Add canned cannellini beans, tomato, water (only a mere 1/2 cup!) and pepper to things, return to boil then reduce for 5 minutes.

And that's it.

So what to do with a bowl of under-cooked nothing with next to no soupy-like liquid for dipping a grilled, olive oil-slathered slice of country bread? I removed the bratwurst and mushrooms from the pale disaster in a skillet and browned them in a separate pan with the onions. I added two cups of water and a porcini mushroom cube and some tomato juice (from the can of already diced tomatoes I used) to make stock. The bratwurst mixture went back in to the skillet. I let this simmer for about a half hour (toward the end, uncovered) to reduce the liquid.

About here it began to resemble cassoulet--and cooked at that! The lesson here? Flip this recipe around a bit and remember it is not a race to achieve a great cassoulet--cook onions and mushrooms first and brown all the meat! Double the amount of liquid at least and simmer down! Let all the ingredients cordially greet one another in the refrigerator overnight and served with grilled country bread!

Do enjoy and thanks to folks for reading eveningswithpeter.com!

A Vegetarian French Country Supper

In honor of my third year of blogging, I made another cassoulet in reminiscence of my first post. This version was vegetarian--in fact the dinner I pulled together was mostly compiled by epicurious.com and neglected any meat. My guests hardly noticed!

I find it such a meditation and very satisfying to set a beautiful table--I was so happy with this one. The last few weeks had been hectic and as my schedule was calming down, I found relief and respite in blissful out of pocket time, some days in advance, to create an appropriate setting for a Vegetarian French Country Supper. It took about three wonderful, solitary hours of creation to figure out, as I sorted through our things and considered what was going to be served, while listening to the soundtrack I had arranged to score the evening for inspiration.

This menu I found online thrilled me, as I imagined a picnic somewhere in a secluded wood.

Waddling ducks and strutting roosters played their parts in the brass fixture and napkin pattern outfitting our bread warmer alongside a few bottles of sturdy red wine.


Other curious carved wooden birds flocked about!



Bodum glass canisters filled with herbs such as ground mustard and chives anchored the table as the centerpiece, with an old paint-by-numbers woodsy scene underneath. Footed bowls with flour and eggs added farm-felt rustic touches while the birds looked on.

Place settings furthered the woodland country feel, in green-and-white checkered picnic napkins with a pine cone on each plate, antique British silverware, and water glasses colorfully embossed with curly vines and flowers. Amber Patrician Depression glass plates made amiable companions amidst the thicket of tall wooden Scandinavian candle holders.



Individual zucchini, lemon and ricotta galettes became a singular time saving tart created from ready made crust. Golden and gorgeous, isn't it? We dug in with abandon and I at least made it without a lot of fuss.

Baguettes glazed with honey butter were perfect for dipping into the cassoulet...


And here we are after the addition of toasted bread crumbs on top of the main event, our cassoulet!

I couldn't bear the thought of making the Milk-and-Dark Chocolate Mousse Cake suggested to finish out the menu--between the chocolate genoise cake and mousses it is practically an all day affair when tightrope walking across compromised counter space in a New York apartment. But it hardly felt like settling when it came to more quickly made Crepes Suzette from an issue of Food And Wine via master Jacques Pepin.

Behold the once flaming, now subdued Crepes Suzette resting in the hush of candlelight before the knives were quite bared to devour the dessert dappled with apricot jam, orange zest and butter!


Click here for the link to a Vegetarian French Country Supper from epicurious.com.

Thank you for reading Evenings With Peter! Happy Anniversary and do enjoy!

Soundtrack: Duke Ellington: The Great London Concerts; A Table For Two; McCoy Tyner, Nights of Ballads & Blues; Lounge Jazz, HMV Collection; Dexter Gordon, Ballads.