Chicken with Vinegar.
Sounds delish, doesn’t it.?
Nope.
But that’s exactly what this meal is.
I love to use chicken thighs in this recipe because they have so much more flavor than breasts. It’s so easy. You brown the thighs in a bit of olive oil and run in the oven for about 20 minutes, take them out and make the sauce with shallots and balsamic or red wine vinegar.
This tastes like you have worked on it all day long. But of course you haven’t. You’ve run in the front door, late as usual, with people showing up in five minutes and you’ve got to look cute, entertain well and not yawn in the middle of dinner because you got up at five to hit the gym and maintain what’s left of your girlish figure.
So, one night, you get home on time, no one’s coming for dinner. You take your sweet time about deciding what to do for dinner, and you fall back on the “They’re going to be here in five minutes and I don’t know what I’m going to serve for dinner” dinner.
Chicken with Vinegar.
A not so delectable name for an oh so delightful entrée.
Chicken with Vinegar
1 good swirl extra virgin olive oil
5 chicken thighs, skin on
¼ cup minced shallots
1 cup balsamic vinegar or red wine vinegar
1 tbsp butter
Heat oven to 350.
Set a large cast iron or ovenproof skillet with steep sides over medium high heat. Add oil and wait one minutes. When skillet is hot, place the chicken in it skin side down. Cook for about 5 minutes and turn it and cook three minutes on the other side.
Season with coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper. Place skillet in the oven. Cook the chicken 30 minutes. Remove to platter and keep warm.
Pour most but not all of the cooking juices out of the skillet. Place it over medium high heat and add shallots. Cook stirring until tender . Takes about two minutes. Add vinegar and raise the heat to high. Cook a minute or two until the vinegar smell subsides. Add ½ cup water and cook for 2 minutes stirring until mixture thickens. Stir in butter. Return chicken and any juices to skillet and turn chicken in sauce and serve.
Serves 3.
5 comments:
Mary:
Wow! I do that with salmon. Sort of. I put the salmon, skin side down, in a pre-heated saute or ci skillet. After the salmon has had about 4 minutes on 1 side, I slide a flexible spatula between the flesh and the skin, leave the skin where it is and turn the filet over to cook the other side. Right after I turn it, I pour in some balsamic, a little honey and some good whole grain mustard. Makes it's own sauce in about 3 minutes. You just have to watch the heat, so's not to carbonize the sugars.
I'll be trying the chicken recipe, soon.
Thanks.
democommie
both of you
i am left in your dust
but i am cooking tomorrow
if only to impress you...
Democommie: I've done a version of the salmon thing look at the Smoke from a Distant Fire post back in November. I love what vinegar does to salmon. It's wonderful.
Claudia: Honey, don't go to too much trouble for me. I just want to drink wine and say ta tata with you!
Mary & Claudia:
I can assure you both that as much as I love food and cooking, my presentations are not artful, genrally.
Oh, and I forgot to list OJ as an ingredient.
Years ago, when I was concerned about cooking for some nice folks I had met in Al-anon (they were AA'ers as well, I'm not) I tried substituting fruit juice for wines in some dishes. Apple juice was always too sweet, particularly when it reduced. Grape juice, much the same. One day I tried using orange juice and found that it worked quite well, the acid/sweet balance was wonderful and even when reduced it hung in there. It doesn't work for everything but it's perfect with the salmon.
Mary:
That last post was mine.I will check out that other website.
Thanks.
democommie
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