A week or so ago, jwa and I were outside surveying the garden and we noticed we had about 40 tomatoes (a mix of Early Girls and Romas) that had all ripened at once. Seriously. Something needed to be done and be done fast.

Enter Provencal Tomato Sauce. Wow — so tomatoey and garlicky. Make a batch or two and enjoy a little bit now and a little bit later from the freezer. I found this sauce to be so rich and intensely tomato flavored, I even added a little vegetable stock to thin it out just a bit.

We had some over some plain store bought gnocchi. Wonderful. The rest will be enjoyed over some linguine one night, once the weather is chilly again.

Provencal Oven-Roasted Tomato Sauce
Recipe adapted from Gourmet magazine
olive oil for brushing pans
1 head garlic
4 pounds vine-ripened red tomatoes
1 tbsp fresh rosemary leaves
1 tbsp fresh thyme leaves
3 tbsp fresh orange juice, or to taste (I used the juice from 1 medium orange)
Optional: 1/4 cup vegetable stock

The garden tomato bounty

Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. and lightly brush 2 shallow baking pans with oil. Now, if this temperature is too high for your oven (read: if it’s not spotlessly clean, it’ll smoke), do it at 425 degrees and just increase the cook time about 5-10 minutes. How do I know this works? Let’s just say I will be cleaning the oven soon…

Separate garlic head into cloves, discarding loose papery outer skin but keeping skin intact on cloves, and wrap in foil, crimping seams to seal tightly. Cut tomatoes into 1/2-inch-thick slices and arrange in one layer in baking pans. Sprinkle 2 teaspoons each of rosemary and thyme evenly over tomatoes and season with salt and pepper.

Put foil-wrapped garlic in one of baking pans with tomatoes and roast garlic and tomatoes in upper and lower thirds of oven, switching position of pans halfway through roasting, about 35 minutes total, or until garlic is tender and tomatoes are slightly charred. There will be tomato shrinkage — that’s okay. Unwrap garlic and cool slightly.

Peel skins from each clove and force pulp with warm tomatoes and herbs through a food mill fitted with small disk into a bowl. Another option is to use a hand-held blender and puree it that way. The blender will leave little bits of tomato skin, skin but I didn’t mind that at all. It builds character.

Finely chop remaining teaspoon rosemary and remaining teaspoon thyme and stir into sauce with orange juice. If it’s a bit thick, this is where you an add a little vegetable stock. Season sauce with salt and pepper and reheat if necessary. Sauce keeps, covered and chilled, 4 days or, frozen, 4 months. To reheat, simmer sauce over low heat and reseason with orange juice, salt, and pepper.

Like I mentioned above, I served this sauce with gnocchi and sauteed zucchini. It made great lunches for both jwa and I to bring to work.

When I first came across this event hosted at Champaign Taste I knew I wanted to participate for many reasons:

1. She (Lisa, not Julia Child) has a cat that looks like one of my cats
2. I fondly remember watching Julia Child with my mom on the weekends
3. does a person really need a reason to make a meal inspired by Julia Child?

So, I started my research. I knew I wanted to make chicken…but what kind of chicken? During my research I came across this article in the New York Times from 1987. It was written by Julia and is entitled, “The Most Interesting Recipe I’ve Clipped.” Well, hell, if a recipe is good enough for Julia Child to clip and expand upon, then it’s good enough for me. Plus, it’s really a one-pot dish — that’s always a bonus.

I added a couple of things to the original recipe — browning the chicken, mushrooms, garlic and fresh tarragon while taking away a few others — most of the cream and the egg yolks. I also only used two big, split chicken breasts (with skin and bone), as there were only two of us eating the meal. I served the waterzooi with slices of a French baguette…oh, okay, I also put some Boursin cheese out. Fine. But only because it was something that Julia probably would have done too. Yeah.

Waterzooi of Chicken
Julia Child
2 medium carrots
1 medium onion
2 tender ribs of celery
10 button mushrooms, sliced
1 medium-sized leek, white and tender green parts only
4 cloves of garlic, sliced into mini-matchsticks
1/2 tsp dried tarragon
Salt and freshly ground pepper
2 tbsp olive oil
2 bone-in, skin on chicken breasts
1/4 cup + 1 1/4 cup dry white wine
1 1/2 cups chicken broth (or more)
1/4 cup heavy cream
1 tsp cornstarch
3 tbsp minced fresh tarragon
1 tbsp fresh parsley

Trim and wash the vegetables and cut them into julienne matchsticks. Toss them in a large mixing bowl with the tarragon and a sprinkling of salt and pepper.

Wash and dry the chicken, then salt and pepper it a little on each side. Heat the olive oil in a dutch oven (or big stove-top casserole) and brown the chicken on each side — about 4 minutes total.

Remove the chicken from the pan and set aside. Add the mushrooms to the pot and sauté over medium heat until just starting to color and soften. Deglaze the pan with 1/4 cup of wine and let the wine absorb into the mushrooms a bit. Remove the mushrooms from the pan and set aside with the chicken.

Now, start layering the pot in the following order: one half of the vegetables, the browned chicken breasts and mushrooms and then the remaining vegetables. Pour in the wine and enough chicken broth to barely cover the chicken.

Bring the pot to the simmer, covered, and cook slowly 25 to 30 minutes or until the chicken pieces are tender and, when pierced, the juices run clear.

Remove the chicken and keep warm with foil. Turn up the heat and reduce the sauce for about 5 minutes. Blend the cream and cornstarch in a small mixing bowl and add the mixture into the sauce. Continue to cook for about 2 more minutes. Taste and adjust any seasonings.

Add the chicken back into the sauce and garnish with the fresh tarragon and parsley. Spoon into bowls and marvel at the amazing flavor. Seriously, this was so good. But, should I have expected any less given the source?

On the side
We had some crusty French bread and Julia’s Haricots Verts au Maitre Hotel — or green beans tossed with butter, lemon juice and parsley. This is from the cookbook, The French Chef Cookbook.

Haricots Verts au Maitre Hotel
Julia Child
1 lb fresh green beans, washed right before using
1 tbsp kosher salt
boiling water
1 tbsp butter
lemon juice
1 tbsp minced parsley

Snap ends off of beans and boil in salted water, uncovered, for 8 minutes. When done, drain and run cold water over the beans. When ready to serve, toss the beans in a sauce pan over moderate heat to evaporate any remaining liquid. Add the butter, salt and pepper and toss until the butter is melted and the beans are reheated — about 2 minutes. Toss again with a squeeze of lemon juice and the parsley. Serve immediately.

Thanks again to Lisa at Champaign Taste for creating and hosting this event! And, happy birthday Julia!

This month’s Sugar High Friday is hosted by Chocolate in Context and the theme is — wait for it — chocolate. But, ha, not just any chocolate, raw chocolate — “an unrefined cacao product, such as cacao beans, cacao nibs, cocoa butter, or cocoa powder.” After some thought, I chose nibs, as I thought they would be easy to find. However, the store I was completely sure would have nibs (Pasta Works) did not. So sad. And I didn’t really feel like trudging over to Zupan’s searching for nibs.

*Sigh*

I was nibless.

But, I did have a box of cocoa powder in the cabinet. So, that’s what I used. I also utilized some crushed almonds as a coating. About half in the powder and half in the almonds. Everyone’s happy. Especially me because these are delicious.

The flavor is smooth, rich and cool. And oh so good. Definitely use Meyer lemons. All tarty sweet, no bitterness. The combination with the dark chocolate and hint of thyme flavor is out of this world. I upped the lemon juice content on advice from the Epicurious reviews and decreased the cream. I found the ganache smooth and very easy to work with. This is the first time I’ve ever made truffles and I have to say, I can’t wait to make some more!

Meyer Lemon & Thyme Truffles
Adapted from Bon Appétit magazine.
1 cup heavy whipping cream
9 ounces high–quality bittersweet chocolate chopped
1 1/2 tsp fresh thyme leaves
3 tbsp fresh Meyer lemon juice (this will be about 1 lemon)
1 tsp Meyer lemon peel zest (yellow part only)
cocoa nibs (broken up into small pieces or cocoa powder or chopped almonds (or a combination)

Bring the cream and thyme to simmer in heavy small saucepan.

Let sit for 15 minutes, then bring back to barely simmering, remove from heat and strain the hot cream over the chocolate pieces.

My extremely “foodie” mix of Trader Joe’s bittersweet chips and pieces of Dagoba 50-something% chocolate

Add the zest and juice and stir until all the chocolate is melted.

Refrigerate for at least 3 hours, until ganache is firm enough to work with. Use a small ice cream scoop (you can also use a tablespoon or two spoons, and shape little balls of chocolate.

Roll the truffles in the broken nibs, crushed almonds or cocoa powder. Try to touch the truffles as little as possible, trying to use mostly just your fingers (your fingers are cooler than your palm). Place on a parchment lined sheet to store.

I found it helpful to do half, then stick the ganache back in the fridge for about 15 minutes.

Store the truffles in the fridge, on parchment paper, in a covered container. To serve, let sit at room temperature for a little bit before eating. Or not. Seriously, these are really good no matter what, I’m sure.

Thanks again to Chocolate in Context and The Domestic Goddess, the originator of the SHF event. Now, what to do with those extra lemons, as I bought three at the store. Hmmm, I think there will be a Meyer Lemon Drop with my name on it tonight after work!

This month’s Weekend Cookbook Challenge — #14, for those keeping track — is all about salads. This event is also being guest hosted by running with tweezers.

The cookbook that I chose is Donna Hay Modern Classics Book I, which is probably one of the most beautiful cookbooks I own. It’s paperback but the pictures, oh the pictures. I want to eat the pages. Well, okay, not really, but wow, she makes everything look so good

I was especially lured by the photo of the niçoise salad on page 53. “Okay”, I said to myself. “That’s what I’m making.” And so I did.

Niçoise Salad
This serves 4 — easily halved to serve 2
12 baby new potatoes, halved
10 oz green beans, trimmed and halved
14 oz ahi tuna steaks
olive oil for brushing
5 oz baby spinach leaves
2 tomatoes, sliced into wedges
2/3 cup black olives, halved (I used niçoise olives!)
salt & pepper
2 hard boiled eggs, quartered

Dressing
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
2 tbsp sherry or red wine vinegar
2 tsp dijon mustard
1 tbsp chopped flat leaf parsley
salt & pepper

Place the potatoes in a saucepan of boiling water and cook for 5 minutes or until almost soft. Add the beans and cook for 2 more minutes, until the beans and potatoes are tender.

Drain and cool under running cold water.

Next, brush the tuna with a little olive oil and sprinkle with some salt and pepper. Grill (outdoors or on a grill pan inside) for 1-2 minutes on each side, or until the tuna is seared nicely but still rare inside. Set aside for five minutes and then slice.

To make the dressing, place the oil, vinegar, mustard, parsley, in a bowl with a little salt and pepper. Whisk to combine. Taste and adjust salt and pepper as needed.

Place the spinach, tomatoes, olives, potatoes, beans, eggs slices and dressing in a big bowl. Toss to combine. Then, place the tuna slices on top, along with the egg quarters. Serve immediately.

I also toasted up some baguette slices with a little olive oil and garlic and had those on the side with some leftover hummus. It was especially good to place some of the tuna slices on a hummus-topped bread.

Thanks again to Weekend Cookbook Challenge, Running with Tweezers and Donna Hay!

***

Do you love Firefly? Then you must go buy this. jwa’s hopefully buying a copy and bringing it home from work tomorrow night. Oh and speaking of all things Joss, I have it on pretty good authority that the Buffy Singalong is coming to Portland the 4th weekend of June (Friday and Saturday nights). Dates will be officially announced March 15th.

***

One more unfood-related item. We just saw Act a Lady at Portland Center Stage. If you can get to it before it closes, your really should. It was so funny! An accordion! Men dressing as ladies! Fancy-Paris talk! Ghosts!

This was also the first time we were at their new space in The Pearl. I really like it.

Whew. This is a very long recipe with lots of ingredients and images, so hang in there! I did indeed make this from my newest cookbook, The Girl and the Fig Cookbook, for Weekend Cookbook Challenge 13. Wherein, you make a recipe out of your newest cookbook.

I also wanted to mention the interestingness (not a word — I know!) of using cocoa powder and cinnamon in the sauce — almost like a mole. I think it worked really well and gave the coq au vin a lot of complexity. Oh, and this is a two-bottle of wine recipe. In fact, you’ll be about 1/4 cup short of wine at the end — no biggie — just use what you have left.

For the chicken, instead of the legs and thighs combination listed in the recipe, I used 4 legs and 2 breasts, both with bones and skin. The breasts worked out very well.

Okay, I’ll just get to it then…

Coq Au Vin
Marinade:
1 1/2 cups red wine
3 sprigs parsley
3 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
1/2 cup olive oil
2 tsp salt
2 bay leaves
2 tbsp soy sauce
6 chicken legs
2 chicken breasts (or 6 thighs)

Braise:
1 carrot, peeled and roughly diced
1 onion, diced
4 ribs celery, diced
2 tbsp olive oil
6-8 black peppercorns
2 tbsp tomato paste
1 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
4 cups red wine
4 thyme sprigs
4 parsley sprigs
6 cups chicken stock

Saute:
1 1/2 cups flour
salt & pepper
4 oz pancetta, diced (the original called for double this amount)
16 oz button mushrooms, trimmed, cleaned and quartered
2 carrots, diced (I added this)
2 tbsp olive oil
3 tbsp cognac (I used Calvados because that’s what I had)
2 cups red wine (or the rest of your 2nd bottle which will be about a cup and a half)
20 pearl onions, blanched and peeled or defrosted if using frozen

For serving
Buttered noodles with parsley

Okay. Make the marinade. Put the red wine, parsley, garlic, oil, salt,bay leaves and soy sauce in a zip lock bag. Add the chicken and marinade for at least 24 hours. You can also, of course, do this in a big bowl.

To make the braise, saute the carrot, onion, and celery in the oil until the onion is lightly browned and soft.

Add the peppercorns and tomato paste and cook until soft. Next, add the cocoa powder and cinnamon.

Stir and then deglaze the pan with the wine. Reduce by half and then add the parsley, thyme and bay leaves. Simmer one hour and then strain.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Remove the chicken from the marinade and pat dry. Discard the marinade. Combine the flour with a little salt and pepper and dredge the chicken pieces in it. Set aside.

Cook the pancetta until crisp in a big, ovenproof skillet. Keep the fat in the pan but remove the cooked pancetta.

Saute the mushrooms and carrots next until well browned. Remove. Add a little oil to the pan if needed and brown the chicken next. About 5 minutes per side.

Deglaze the pan with the cognac and then the remaining red wine. Reduce the liquid by half. Add the strained chicken stock/red wine mixture, the mushrooms, carrots, onions and place the pan in the oven for 30 minutes.

Oh, you can also add the pancetta back in or leave it out and serve it all crispy on the side. Since I was using breasts, which are much bigger than legs and thighs, I removed and flipped chicken over and and gave it another 30 minutes just for fun.

Remove the chicken and keep it warm, and reduce the wine sauce by a third. Serve chicken and sauce over noodles.

Thank again to Sara at Weekend Cookbook Challenge!

This month’s theme is “Lucky Number Seven” — a very open-ended theme. As I was browsing through cookbooks, I picked up Anthony Bourdain’s Les Halles Cookbook. I had never made anything out of it before and thought it would be fun to do so for this WCC. Be sure to check out all of the entries here.

After a few seconds of browsing — there it is. Gigot de Sept Heures. Seven hour lamb. It doesn’t get much better (or luckier) than the word seven in the title! But, it’s July, I thought. There’s no way I will want the oven on for seven hours in July!

Silly me, this is Portland. Sure, in the beginning of the month we were in the 100’s but last weekend we had a high of 71 on Sunday. A high. Awesome. If that’s not the beginning of Post-Spring lamb weather, I don’t know what is. This was especially convenient too, as I hadn’t managed to find another recipe that I wanted to do for this challenge.

A Few Differences
I made a few changes in the way that I prepared this — in contrast to the written recipe. First, there’s only two of us. Instead of using a 6-pound, bone in leg of lamb, I opted for a 2.5 pound, boneless one. Now, eventually I think I will try this again with the big, full-on, honkin’, boned leg but for a test run, I felt okay using the smaller piece.

Okay, so there’s one more thing — I peeked. Hangs head in shame. See, you make a flour and water grout and seal up the pot while you bake it. Around hour four I got really nervous, thinking the Dutch oven would explode and I cracked it open a little. Yeah, I know, I shouldn’t have done that. It wouldn’t have exploded, I know. I know that now! Next time, no peeking, I promise.

Gigot de Sept Heures
1 leg of lamb (about 6 lb, bone-in or a 2-3 lb boneless one will work too)
20-24 cloves of garlic (just buy 2 heads), slice 3-4 cloves into small slivers, leave the other whole
1/4 cup olive oil
salt & pepper
4 carrots (or a whole bunch of tiny ones)
2 small onions, sliced
1 bouquet garni (1 bay leaf, a few sprigs of thyme and a few sprigs of flat-leaf parsley — I also added a rosemary sprig — all tied together with kitchen twine, bundled in cheesecloth if you have any lying around)
1 cup dry white wine (I used red, as I didn’t have any white wine on hand)
1 cup flour
1/2 - 1 cup water

Optional: 1/2 cup chicken or beef stock (add in with the wine if using a smaller piece of meat, to keep it a bit moister during the cooking time)

Prep the Lamb
Preheat the oven to 300 degrees. Using a paring knife, make a lot of small incisions in the lamb and shove a sliver of garlic clove into each hole. Do this until you get tired of doing it — add any leftover slivers of garlic to the pot. When that is done, rub the lamb well with the olive oil and season it with salt and pepper.

Oh, here I browned the lamb quickly. The recipe doesn’t say to do this but I thought it might give it a nicer color. I think it did but you certainly don’t have to.

Add all of your vegetables to the pan. Pour in the wine and add the herbs.

Next, you’ll make the flour/water grout. Mix the water into the flour until you have a thick paste. Use this to seal the lid to the pot. You can either place it along the inside and press the lid down into it, or run it alongside the outside of the pot, sealing it that way. I did a bit of both.

Now, into the oven. For seven hours. Don’t peek! Oh and can I talk about the smell briefly? Wow. The house smelled so good. It was amazing. Being able to smell the lamb cooking all day alone is worth the seven hours in the oven.

After the seven hours, then you will want to crack the lid off. You will think it won’t come off and start to panic. Don’t worry, just keep trying to pry it off with a butter knife or other object of your choice. If you actually break your object of choice before you get the lid off — then you panic. Nah, it’s okay. Just grab a bigger implement!

Before that point however, you may want to pan roast some potatoes. Let’s say about 15 minutes before the lamb is scheduled to come out. I just halved a bunch of small red potatoes, sprinkled with salt and cooked them in some olive oil and let them brown and crisp up. I sprinkled with pepper and fresh, chopped rosemary right before removing from the heat.

Okay, okay, let’s check out the lamb.

If it was wrapped in cooking twine, cut that away. The meat should be falling apart with slow-cooked tenderness. I lifted it out with the carrots and the other veggies I could find (some of the garlic melted into the sauce) and tried to strain out most of the fat and oil. The remaining lamb/wine liquid was excellent poured over the lamb and served on the side.

This was really good. The lamb was, for the most part, super tender. There were a few spots where it seemed a bit dry but I am blaming this on my peeking. It could also be using the smaller, boneless piece of meat. But hey — we both really liked it and the amount of tender, amazingly flavored lamb was much more than the few drier pieces. Next time, if using this size of lamb leg, I think I will add a little chicken or beef stock along with the wine and maybe pull it out of the oven after five hours.

If you are thinking about trying this recipe, I definitely would. I thought it was worth it and I’m going to make it again this Fall or Winter for sure.

Leftovers
As there are only two of us, we had leftover lamb. This I used the next night in a soup using a big can of whole tomatoes, some chicken stock, onions, carrots, lima beans and orzo. I also added some dried oregano and cinnamon to the mix and it was really, really tasty. The drier pieces of lamb were fine in this as the soup liquid sort of rehydrated them.

We each brought some for lunch on Tuesday and the rest is destined for the freezer, to be enjoyed one day this Fall. Thanks again to Sara at Weekend Cookbook Challenge for a creative theme this month!

The other day I got an e-mail from the Western Culinary Institute containing a press release about their upcoming Bastille Day celebration. This made me happy because — 1. the lunch sounds really good and I totally want to go and 2. someone at WCI reads my blog and thought to send me a press release. Yay! So, I will pass this on for any Portland area people, as it sounds great and the price certainly cannot be beat.

***

This year, Western Culinary Institute’s Restaurant Bleu, located at 921 S.W. Morrison, invites Portland to celebrate Bastille Day from July 11-14, from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m., with a special three-course menu including: Chicken Vol au Vent, Halibut a la Nage and Lavender Infused Pot de Crème. Priced at $17.89 for two, in honor of the year marking the beginning of the French Revolution, meals are affordable for royalty and peasants alike.

On July 14 at 12:00 p.m., the Blue Chippers – Western Culinary Institute’s award-winning ice sculptors – will present an Eiffel Tower carved out of raw ice, demonstrating some of the coolest culinary arts skills in town. In addition, Restaurant Bleu will feature photographs of Paris by Portland artist, Randy Cole.

Allons manger! (Let’s eat!) For reservations, please call Restaurant Bleu at 503-294-9770.

***

Also, remember to make a cake or something cake-like if you would like to participate in next week’s Anniversary Cake-athon! Whee!

This IMBB’s theme this month — graciously chosen and hosted by Derrick at An Obsession with Food and Wine — is stale bread. Wonderful things can be made from stale bread — things like french toast and bread pudding and croutons and this spinach and bread salad.

I came across this recipe at Epicurious. Once I read through it, I knew I had to make it. The recipe is originally from Bon Appetite. That recipe also had a chicken component but I actually opted for a different roasting method for my chicken.

The directions I followed are from The Bouchon Cookbook by Thomas Keller. It just seemed so simple and the reviews were practically fawning in their awe and recommendations. Now, I know that the main star of this meal should be the stale bread, as that was the IMBB theme but….well…huh…crackling, salty, tasty chicken skin. That is my defense!

I have to say, both jwa and I were in gastronomic heaven while eating this meal. The chicken was amazing. Who knew throwing a bird into a super hot oven and not touching it (no basting, no turning, no nothing!) at all for the next hour would produce something so succulent and tasty? The bread and the spinach mixed together with all the pan drippings and currants/raisins to create a savory, crunchy and sweet bedding for the juicy meat of the chicken.

I bought my chicken at New Seasons — a nice 3.5 pounder. However, their small chickens were sporting some lemon and parsley. So, my chicken had a few strands of lemon zest and some chopped parsley on top. It seemed to work fine but a plain chicken is what the original recipe calls for.

The one thing to keep in mind with this recipe though — there were reviews on Epicurious that cooking the chicken at this high of a temperature produced a lot of smoke in some kitchens. I didn’t have a big problem with that but it is something to be aware of while making this meal. Make sure you have good ventilation and that you are starting with a pretty clean oven!

Roast Chicken with Bread & Spinach Salad
One 3- to 4-pound chicken
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 teaspoons minced parsley and/or thyme

6 cups 1-inch cubes of stale bread
1/2 cup low-salt chicken broth
1/3 cup red wine vinegar
1/2 red onion, diced and cooked in 1 tsp olive oil over low heat until golden and caramelized
1/2 cup dried currants & golden raisins
3 bunches fresh spinach, trimmed (about 2 cups)
1 head garlic

To start, if your bread isn’t stale, pop it into a 250 degree oven for about 10 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 450°F. Rinse the chicken, then dry it very well with paper towels, inside and out.

Salt and pepper the cavity. Just for fun, I added half a red onion to the inside of the bird. Next, comes the trussing. Fold the wings back under the bird and tie the legs together with cooking twine. At least, that is my version of trussing.

Salt the chicken liberally. I used almost a tablespoon of salt. It sounds like a lot but after the roasting, it was really good. The skin is all crispy and salty. Trust me, it just works. (Or rather, trust Thomas Keller).

I cooked my chicken in the bottom half of the oven so that I didn’t really have to worry about the parsley burning. The skin also just got golden. If you want more color, place your rack about halfway in the oven. Likewise, if you want to live dangerously, sprinkle some chopped parsley and/or thyme on your chicken before roasting. If you want to make sure it doesn’t burn, just sprinkle with chopped herbs after roasting.

Oh, I also sliced the very top off of a head of garlic, wrapped it in foil and let it roast in the oven with the chicken for about 40 minutes.

Roast the chicken in the hot oven until it’s done, 50 to 60 minutes. The skin should be crackly and golden. If during the cooking time, the chicken does get too dark, you can tent it with foil. Move to a cutting board and let it rest 15 minutes before carving.

Meanwhile, pour pan juices into 4-cup measuring cup. Pour fat off top of pan juices, returning the bottom 1/3 of liquids to roasting pan. Add chicken broth and vinegar to pan. Bring to boil atop stove, scraping up browned bits. Add the cooked onions and currants. Simmer 3 minutes to reduce liquid slightly.

Remove from heat. Add bread to pan and toss with juices.

Mix in Spinach and stir while it wilts a bit. Season with salt and pepper. Place bread salad in a big bowl and top with whole chicken.

I figured this would make a nice presentation and also, when carving the chicken, all of the juices would drip onto the bread salad. Yeah. Brilliant.

The skin was just so good and the chicken was very moist. And the bread cubes! Wow, they soak up all of the drippings and the vinegar and it was all just awesome. Rounding it out, the raisins and currants add a little bit of sweetness.

Place the roasted garlic head on the platter. Not only does it look pretty, but you can squeeze the paste onto bites of chicken and bread salad as desired.

Oh and since it’s in the title photo, I’ll mention that we had our chicken and bread salad feast with a bottle of Benton Lane pinot noir. Thanks again Derrick for hostng this event!

Tagged with: IMBB25.

The recipe I chose for this fabulous incarnation of IMBB is from the Rhone-Alps region of France (near Grenoble) and comes from the French Farmhouse Cookbook by Susan Hermann Loomis, which is a cookbook that I enthusiastically recommend. It was also very useful for this event as she says exactly where she got each recipe, so I knew the region of Poulet aux Noix without much sleuthing. Perhaps this is why I ended up making so much food.

Idle hands and all that, I guess…

Anyway, this area of France is walnut growing country, which is reflected in this meal. This leads me to the chicken. Oh my, the chicken. It was so amazingly good but really very simple to prepare. The walnuts soak up chicken juices and garlic and wine and lemon and almost caramelize with flavor. I suggest a baguette for sopping up all the garlicky-chickeny-lemony juices. I also suggest using more than 12 cloves of garlic — hell, use a whole bulb. You will not be sorry!

And, before I forget, thank you to Cucina Testa Rossa for hosting IMBB23 and for picking such a wonderful theme. I think that this is one of the best (and most fun to plan) meals I have made for any cooking event since I’ve had my blog.

Poulet aux Noix (Chicken with Walnuts)
2 tbsp olive oil
1 chicken (3-1/2 to 4 pounds), cut into 8 pieces (2 breast pieces, 2 wings with portion of breast attached, 2 legs, 2 thighs), giblets reserved
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/2 cup plus 2 tbsp dry white wine (I used Vouvray, which is what it suggested in the cookbook. I was just walking around Cost Plus and happened upon a bottle. I took it as a sign)
12 cloves garlic, (the recipe says unpeeled, but I peeled mine by accident but was very pleased with the results)
1-1/4 cups walnut halves or large pieces

Heat the oil in a large heavy skillet over medium-high heat. When the oil is hot but not smoking, brown the chicken pieces, seasoning them liberally with salt and pepper, until they are golden, about 5 minutes per side. I just used two breast pieces (with skin and bones) and two whole leg pieces, I didn’t bother with buying wings. As I bought my chicken already in parts, I had no giblets. I’m kind of sad about that as I can only imagine how tasty those would have been in the pan. I think it may even be worth just throwing caution to the wind and hacking up your own bird.

Add the lemon juice, 2 tablespoons of the wine, and the garlic cloves to the skillet. Reduce the heat to medium, cover, and cook until the chicken is nearly cooked through, about 15 minutes. Then stir the walnuts into the skillet, along with the giblets, cover, and continue cooking for about 8 minutes.

Remove the cover from the skillet and continue cooking, stirring occasionally, until all the pan juices have evaporated and the chicken, walnuts, and garlic are golden, 5 to 8 minutes. My juices didn’t really evaporate — the chicken was done in about 8 more minutes so I just removed it and went from there. Be sure to watch the walnuts, for they tend to brown easily. If they are getting too brown at any point in the cooking, remove and reserve them, returning them to the pan just before serving. Mine actually started to get a bit dark so I scooped them all out and set them aside.

Transfer the chicken, garlic and walnuts to a warmed serving platter and deglaze the skillet with the remaining 1/2 cup white wine, scraping the bottom to loosen any browned bits.

Cook until reduced by half, about 4 minutes. It says to pour the sauce over the chicken to serve, but I actually added the chicken and walnuts back into the pan and served it from that right on the table, where we greedily dished a breast each onto our plates.

One of the steps for this event was to pair the dish with a regional wine. After some online investigation, I decided to go with a Côtes du Rhônes but I ended up finding this Côtes du Ventoux Rogue, from Orange, France instead. Orange (the OF?) is about a two hour drive away from the Grenoble area, so I figured this was close enough to be regional. Mainly, I really liked the poultry drawing on the bottle — after that won me over, there was no going back to the Côtes du Rhônes idea. I really am a pick-a-bottle-by-the-label kind of girl.

So, you might have noticed more items on the plate than just the poulet aux noix — well, I kind of went crazy. I was just so inspired by this theme that I also made two other regional dishes — warm green beans in walnut oil and Alps-favorite, Gratin Dauphinoise (potatoes). For it is cold there I suppose and the people need their butterfat to keep them warm!

Haricots verts a l’huile de noix (Warm green beans in walnut oil)
(also from the French Farmhouse Cookbook)
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
2 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
sea salt and freshly ground pepper
3 tbsp good quality walnut oil (tore in refrigerator after opening)
1 lb green beans, trimmed and washed
1/2 cup walnut pieces

Whisk together vinegar, garlic, salt & pepper. Add the oil in a thin stream, whisking constantly and set aside.

Add the beans to a large pot of boiling, salted water. Cook until crisp tender — about 5 minutes.

Whisk the dressing again and add the hot beans, along with walnut pieces. Toss and serve immediately.

Gratin Dauphinoise
2 cups half and half
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
2 cloves garlic
5-6 Yukon gold potatoes, peeled or unpeeled (depending on your preference) and sliced thinly
Optional: 1/4 cup grated Gruyere cheese
1 tsp unsalted butter

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Split one of the garlic cloves and rub it along the inside of the baking dish you’ll be using for the potatoes. Then, mince both cloves of garlic. Heat the half and half, salt, pepper and minced garlic until simmering is achieved. Remove from heat and keep warm.

Layer about half of the potato slices in the baking dish, overlapping slightly in concentric circles. Pour half of your warm half and half mixture on top of the potatoes. Then layer the remaining slices, topping with the rest of the half and half to finish. If you are going the non-traditional route like I did, finish with a sprinkle of Gruyere and dot the top with about 1 tsp of butter, broken up into small pieces.

Bake in bottom third of the oven for about 20 minutes or until he half and half mixture starts to bubble up sides. Move baking dish to the top part of the oven and continue baking for about 25 minutes longer or until potatoes are tender and top is golden brown. Let stand for 15 minutes before devouring.

After our journey to the French Alps with this dinner and wine, jwa had to do some work, which was really too bad as I sat on the couch and then went to Caprica — watching the best episode of Battlestar Galactica ever. Ever! But, being sweet, I saved it for him and we watched it together Saturday afternoon. Awwwwww…

Tagged with: IMBB23 + French