04 August 2014

Poulet à l'estragon et au vin blanc

Chicken and tarragon (estragon in French) are a match made in heaven. The flavor is very subtle but delicious. I cooked chicken this way over the weekend, using sprigs of fresh tarragon from a potted plant that I've managed to keep going for two or three years now.

I had bought a whole chicken — a corn-fed poulet jaune — and I decided to cook just half of it for the two of us. I cut it in half along one side of the backbone and through the breastbone, and I put the half with the backbone still attached in the freezer. Maybe we'll cook that on the grill later.

Poulet à l'estragon et au vin blanc — you could make the same thing using just chicken breast or thigh meat.

I cut the other half of the chicken into four pieces: the drumstick, the thigh, and the breast/wing split in half. The first step in making tarragon chicken is to brown the chicken, skin side down, in a frying pan with some butter and/or oil. Once the chicken pieces are golden brown, take them out of the pan and put them in a medium oven, covered, for 15 minutes to stay warm and continue cooking.

The second step is to make the sauce. Remove some of the fat from the frying pan if you think there's too much in there. Slice up a couple of shallots or a small onion and cook the slices lightly in the pan. When they are softened but not really browned, pour in half a cup of white wine and half a cup of chicken broth (or water). Stir well.

Let the tarragon sprigs and shallot slices "steep" in the sauce to give all their flavor.

Add three six-inch sprigs of tarragon into the liquid, along with a quarter-cup of cream and a teaspoon or two of Dijon mustard. Another option is to put in a teaspoon or two of white wine vinegar instead of mustard, but I think the Dijon mustard is tastier. Simmer the sauce for five minutes so that the tarragon flavor will have time to develop. Don't forget to add some salt and pepper, to taste.

The chicken isn't swimming in sauce — you just want a small amount.

There you've pretty much got it. Add more cream if you want a richer sauce, which will thicken slightly as it reduces. Then take the chicken pieces out of the oven and put them back in the pan. Put on a lid and let the chicken, which is nearly completely cooked by now, simmer and steam through in the sauce for five minutes. Cook it as done as you like it, actually.

Chicken, tarragon cream sauce, pasta (coquillettes), and steamed summer squash slices panned in butter.

The final step is to put the chicken and the sauce in a serving dish and sprinkle on some chopped tarragon leaves to give everything that good fresh flavor. Serve with rice or pasta. We had some tiny elbow macaroni and some steamed summer squash slices with ours.

24 comments:

  1. I just made this last week. It is fabulous. I thought I did not like tarragon, but I had always had dried. Nothing like fresh. So good. Company worthy.

    Madonna
    MakeMineLemon

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    Replies
    1. M/Ms L, did your recipe resemble mine? Where did you get the recipe? A lot of cooks put tomatoes, in one form or another, in the ingredient list, or use tomato as a garnish.

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    2. I can't remember where I got the recipe, but no tomatoes were involved. I think it was a combination of a couple recipes. It was so good I surprised myself.

      My Mother's family made a tomato gravy, (not the Italian version). We called it stewed tomatoes, but it was made with a roux; we did not use tarragon. We put it on chicken, fish, and pork chops.

      I do enjoy your cooking. You seem so casual, yet so wonderful.

      Madonna

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    3. We often had stewed tomatoes when I was growing up, but not with a roux. And I'm like you, I look at several recipes and then take the parts of each that I like to make up my own version, using what I have in the kitchen or can find here in markets and supermarkets.

      I'm pretty relaxed about cooking. I think that's because I mainly just cook for Walt and myself. And each meal is, well, just another meal. Some are better than others, but they are all good. "Best lunch I've had today" is what we say to each other during or after the noontime meal. I'm not much on restaurants any more, though they can be a treat and a nice change of routine.

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  2. I love chicken tarragon. My recipe is somewhat different, so I'll try this one. It looks so good!

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  3. CHM, here's a recipe I found on the Internet and followed more or less. I put in more tarragon and more cream than the recipe called for.

    -----------------------------------------

    Poulet à l’estragon et au vin blanc

    2 c. à soupe d’huile ou de beurre
    500 g de poulet
    4 échalotes émincées
    125 ml de bouillon de poulet
    125 ml de vin blanc sec
    1 c. à soupe de moutarde
    1 c. à soupe de crème fraîche
    1 c. à soupe d’estragon frais haché (ou 1 c. à café d'estragon séché)


    Faire sauter le poulet dans l'huile à feu moyen, environ 5 à 10 minutes. Assaisonner. Transférer le poulet dans une assiette.

    Réduire le feu à moyen. Ajouter l'huile. Faire sauter les échalotes 2 ou 3 minutes. Mouiller avec le bouillon de poulet et le vin blanc sec.

    Laisser réduire de moitié, soit environ 3 minutes. Ajouter le poulet et cuire environ 4 minutes à feu doux.

    Ajouter à la sauce la moutarde, la crème, et l'estragon. Assaisonner au goût. Servir aussitôt avec des pâtes ou du riz.

    -----------------------------------------

    I also consulted my got-to sources for French recipes, Le Larousse Gastronomique and Monique Maine (Cuisine pour toute l'année). The LG doesn't put cream in the recipe, but Mme Maine puts in more cream than I did.

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    Replies
    1. My recipe could be called Poulet bourguignon à l'estragon, because I use red wine, as well as mushrooms and flour to thicken the sauce. No cream or mustard.

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    2. That also sounds good. I'm going to try it. Lardons aussi ? Et peut-être des carottes ? Je me régale déjà...

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  4. That looks absolutely delicious...thanks for the inspiration...it will be on the menu this week!

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  5. Interesting and easy recipe.Thanks for sharing. Salad according to your recipe was a success.

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  6. Thanks for giving me a new idea for chicken which we eat often. I have trouble keeping tarragon alive. Maybe I'll try growing it in a pot.

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    Replies
    1. I have the tarragon planted in an old plastic paint bucket. I punched holes in the bottom for drainage. I bring the bucket inside and leave it in our little sun porch for the winter. So far so good.

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    2. I'll try your bucket idea.

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    3. Evelyn, any big pot will do, I think. The nice thing about the paint bucket (which was the only big pot I had when I planted the tarragon in it) is that it has a handle, like paint buckets or cans do. It's easy to pick the potted tarragon up and bring it into the house in early winter and then put it back outside in spring. I'm afraid to repot the tarragon into something more decorative because I might kill it!

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  7. I've got to try this one. I'll bet the kitchen smelled heavenly, too :)

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  8. Ken

    It is very good with bow-tie pasta.
    Once the pasta is al-dente, I put some sauce in a pan and then drop the pasta into the pan, cover the pan and let the steam/sauce finish the cooking of the pasta.
    Then we serve like you did

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    Replies
    1. Agreed about the farfalle. I'm thinking of making a curry by this same method next time, substituting curry spices for the tarragon. I like the way the chicken cooked in this — not boiled but more dry-cooked and then lightly steamed.

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  9. Bonjour, Ken. Je pense que je préférerais cette recette au poulet farci («Poulet à la Rouennaise»?) que tu as décrit en 2012.

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    Replies
    1. Bonjour Dean, je me souviens que le poulet rôti à l'estragon était servi froid. Il était mémorable, mais pas du tout la même chose que ce poulet braisé avec une sauce à la crème.

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  10. Oh, that sounds so good. chm's version does, too. What about using rice instead of pasta, or is that a more insistent taste vs. the chicken?

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    Replies
    1. Actually, we had leftovers of the chicken in tarragon sauce with brown rice yesterday for lunch. It was delicious. I added a little more cream to sauce to stretch it. So yes, rice or pasta or even steamed or boiled potatoes.

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  11. That looks delicious, I'm going to try that soon, thanks for the recipe!

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