Cooking in Cycles: Chicken

image: "Roasted Chicken" by L.Richarz (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

A whole chicken

Starting with a whole chicken (or several chicken pieces) here are some ideas:  a roast bird leading on to chicken broth, then hearty stracciatella chicken soup and ending with cold chicken and potato salad.

Chicken roasted in a casserole

A casserole, also called a cocotte or a Dutch oven, is a round or oval cast iron saucepan with a lid, large enough to accommodate a chicken (or a roast). Cast iron is a good heat conductor, enabling you to brown a bird (or roast, or vegetables), then, lid on, to cook it in a closed environment, a little like an oven, but retaining more moisture.

Ingredients

(for 4)

• a small to medium-sized chicken, trussed (tied up so that you can move it easily in the saucepan); if it comes with the giblets and liver, set these aside in a small dish. (Or 4 chicken pieces.)
• an onion peeled
• a carrot peeled
• (optional) a leek, carefully washed (!) cut in half lengthwise, then into 10cm / 4" pieces. Be sure to keep the dark green tops of the leeks (also carefully washed ;) )
• a bay leaf, dried herbs (herbes de Provence, or origano, thyme...)
• a clove of garlic, peeled, cut in half.
• optional: a small glass of white wine (or cider)

Method

Dry the chicken (or chicken pieces) with kitchen paper ; put half a peeled onion and some dried herbs inside the whole chicken. In the cocotte heat the oil over a moderate flame until it moves freely. Brown the whole chicken (or the chicken pieces) on each side then place the bird on its back and lower the heat, add the garlic, a bay leaf, the other half of the onion cut in quarters, a peeled carrot cut in a few pieces, the pieces of leek. Cover and let it cook (around 50 min per 1.25kg). Turn it on either side at 15 mn intervals to ensure even cooking. The chicken is cooked when you can pierce the thigh easily and the juice runs yellow. Turn off the heat and let the chicken rest at least 15 min.

Optional vegetables for the casserole mixture: add one of these combinations:

1. add peeled, quartered potatoes half way through cooking. They pick up all the cooking flavours (but soak up some of the cooking liquid).
2. if you like the taste of lemon, add a couple of strips of lemon rind when you are browning the chicken, then a few small segments of lemon. Add a small glass of white wine. Use thyme as your herb. Half way through cooking, add a handful of pitted black olives. This gives a very distinctive flavour you either love or hate!
3. add red and/or green bell peppers (capsicums), roughly sliced half way through cooking and a small glass of tomato passata. These will give a Mediterranean flavour to the chicken.

Serving suggestions

If you have not added any vegetables to the casserole, you can serve this roast chicken as it is, either with plain white rice, or with roast or fried potatoes and another vegetable of your choice (zucchini, green beans, broccoli....)

You can use the cooking juices as your sauce in all 3 variations. For versions 1, remove the chicken and vegetables to a serving platter (placed in a warm oven), add another glass of white wine and bring to the boil scraping up the juices as you go along. In a small bowl add 1 tsp of cornstarch to 2 tb of sour cream, mix well, add a few drops of water, then combine with the juices in the casserole.  Simmer until the sauce thickens (2-3 mn).

Don't throw out your chicken carcass - and keep whatever bones and cooking vegetables you did not serve (they may have browned too much...). And now you will find out why you kept the tops of the leeks...

Chicken stock

Make chicken stock straight in the casserole in which you roasted the chicken by covering the remaining chicken bones and whatever is left of the carcas with water, re-using the cooked vegetables and adding parsley stalks, the tops of the leeks and any other bits of wrinkled carrot or tired vegetable (celery, leek) left in the fridge. Add a bay leaf and a few cloves of garlic, unpeeled, half opened with a knife. Season. Add an optional glass of white wine. Let the broth simmer for at least an hour, more is better. The carcass should collapse. Strain the broth to remove all the tiny bits of cartiledge, bones, skin and vegetables. If you find it too fatty, place the broth in the fridge in tall container. The fat will rise to the top and congeal.  You can then remove most of it with a spoon.

Tip

If you are not using the broth straight away, pour it into a container with a lid and keep it in the fridge for 2-3 days. You can also boil it down to reduce the volume and concentrate the flavours. Pour the reduced stock into an ice-block tray and freeze. Once frozen, keep the cubes in a plastic bag in the freezer.  Don't forget to label with the contents and date. It's amazing how similar things look once frozen!

Stracciatella

Make Italian stracciatella soup with the stock: cook alphabet or other tiny pasta in the chicken broth (5-6 minutes).

Ingredients

• chicken broth
• alphabet or other small pasta - 1-2 cups
• sour cream
• an egg
• salt, pepper
• parmesan - grated
• parsely - chopped

Method

Heat the chicken broth gently. In the meantime, beat up an egg with 2 tb cream, salt and pepper and 1 tb grated parmesan in a bowl. When you are ready to serve (make sure your table mates are seated and waiting) pour the egg mixture into the hot soup, stir briskly for 1 mn over the heat, remove and pour into soup bowls.  Sprinkle with chopped parsley. More Parmesan will be needed for addicts! Pecorino is also great but stronger in flavour.

‌‌Cold left-over chicken

Serve cooked pieces cold with mayonnaise and a green salad - and a potato salad if you can whip one up...

Serve remaining strips in a Cæsar salad with crisp lettuce leaves, slices of tomato, croutons and a good dressing…

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