BOOK/A TABLE - A Simple Supper

When I’m fed up with take-out options (and delivery fees!) and don’t crave anything in particular, but still feel the need to be fed, I start freezer-diving, sifting through the bergs of various meats to see what’s available for supper. Following the selection of a worthy protein, I then try to utilize one of the cookbooks lining our kitchen shelves to find a recipe that features ingredients we already have on hand. 

In these last-minute instances, I don’t want to run out to the grocery store of course or make anything overly complicated: chicken breasts from the freezer and my good old reliable Barbara Pym Cookbook won a recent round.

I ended up making fragrant Chicken Tarragon, served with a side of canned lentils, and unboxed some Jell-O chocolate pudding for a finish. It was as simple as you’d suppose, and oh-so-tasty.

The lentils can be prepared with a bit of simmered white wine or broth, garlic, and a bay leaf thrown in, but if you have time and the inclination, try these gorgeous Lentilles du Puy. Should you wish to think outside of the Jell-O box, look to this Mousse au Chocolat.

From Barbara Pym’s Excellent Women, Mrs. Bone speaks most vividly of The Dominion of the Birds, that apocalyptic scenario where our avian friends end up ruling the roost: “I very much fear it may come to that...I eat as many birds as possible,” said Mrs. Bone when we were sitting down to roast chicken. “I have them sent from Harrods or Fortnum’s, and I sometimes go and look at them in the cold meats department. They do them up very prettily with aspic jelly and decorations. At least we can eat our enemies.”

Chew on that. Delicious!

 

 
Chicken with Tarragon
Ingredients
One chicken, cut into 8 pieces (I just used two chicken breasts)
3 tablespoons butter or oil
One small onion, chopped
One tablespoon flour
One glass white wine
Half cup chicken stock
Finely chopped tarragon leaves to taste (dried worked out well)
Salt and pepper to taste

Method
Sauteed chicken pieces in butter or oil until lightly browned. Removed to a platter and keep warm period in the same pan, sauteed chopped onion, stir in flour, and cook 2 to 3 minutes. Add wine, stock, tarragon, and seasonings. Cook to reduce somewhat. Return chicken pieces to pan, cover, and simmer in sauce 20 minutes. To serve, place chicken pieces on a platter and pour sauce over.

Mousse au Chocolat

If you've ever seen Rosemary's Baby, one lesson well learned is never have Ruth Gordon over for dinner! Apart from noxious tannis root, I'm not sure exactly what was in the "Chocolate Mouse" she served dear Rosemary, but here is a wonderful recipe for Mousse au Chocolat from Julia Child's The French Chef cooking show that will have your guests shrieking for entirely different, far more appealing reasons. It's darkly delicious, quite wonderful and can be made the night before serving your guests and frozen--but I think just chilling it the day of your affair is even better. Get the ingredients in order and measured ahead of time and have your selection of proper pots and pans prepared before diving in as you'll need many of them to make this marvelous mousse and will want everything at the ready. When it came time to whisk the yolk mixture in the bowl over the pot of hot water, I did that by hand (whisking away for about 15 minutes until reaching what I felt was the right "thick and creamy" consistency), but for the rest of it, I confess I spared myself the workout, instead relying on my KitchenAid mixer for assistance, alternating beater and whisk attachments!

Mousse au Chocolat
Adapted from Julia Child's The French Chef, my comments in italics
Serves 6

Ingredients
6 oz. semisweet chocolate, cut into small chunks--perhaps even use the morsels instead
1/4 cup dark rum or orange liqueur--I used both!
4 eggs separated
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup strong coffee--use what you have and let it sit for a while to find its strength
8 tbsp. softened butter, cut into chunks
1/4 tsp. cream of tartar
Pinch of fine salt--try sea salt
1/2 cup heavy cream--although this recipe calls for a piped rosette of cream to top the mousse, the already luxuriant dessert hardly needs it!

Method
Combine chocolate and rum in a small pot; nestle it inside a larger pot filled partway with boiling water. Cover smaller pot and set aside to let melt.

Beat egg yolks in another small pot until pale and frothy. Combine sugar and coffee in another pot; cook over medium heat until dissolved, 5-6 minutes. Pour into yolks in a stream, while whisking; set aside. Pour water into a large pot to a depth of 2" and heat over medium-low heat until hot but not simmering. (This amount of water is important as eventually I almost submerged my eggs when nestling the pot in the next step!)

Nestle pot containing yolk mixture over pot and cook, whisking vigorously, until thick and creamy, 8-9 minutes. 

(I found this took more like 15 minutes.) 

Transfer yolk mixture to a clean bowl; beat with an electric mixer until cool, about 5 minutes. (KitchenAid to the rescue again!)

Uncover chocolate mixture and stir; add butter and whisk until smooth. Fold chocolate-butter mixture into yolk mixture; set aside.

Beat egg whites in a bowl until just frothy. Add cream of tartar and salt; beat to stiff peaks. Stir one-fourth of the egg whites into chocolate-yolk mixture; gently fold in the rest. Spoon mousse into 6 serving cups or dishes. Cover and chill until set.

Here's what I didn't do, in anticipation of reveling in the sheer chocolate itself. Beat cream to stiff peaks; transfer to a pastry bag with a star tip. Pipe a rosette of cream onto each mousse.