11 February 2015

Aimez-vous manger les choux ?

Yesterday was a beautiful day, one worthy of early spring. Problem was, I didn't feel the greatest. I woke up groggy. I felt a chill, and I wondered if I was coming down with something. It turns out I don't think I was, because I felt better in the evening and seem fine this morning.

I spent yesterday morning in the kitchen. I got involved in cooking a big crinkly Savoy cabbage that I had bought at the supermarket for one euro a couple of days earlier. Maybe it was eating cabbage that made me start feeling a little better.

I didn't want to cook the cabbage in a big pot of water or broth as soup. I looked around on the web and I happened upon a recipe called « Poulet au chou vert frisé » — chicken with Savoy cabbage. I had also picked up a chicken at the supermarket the day I bought the cabbage.


The recipe calls for blanching the coarsely chopped up cabbage for five minutes in boiling water before cooking it. French recipes often call for blanching vegetables and then cooking them in fresh liquid. I think it makes the vegetables sweeter. That's what I did. I also sauteed three small chopped onions in butter. (I saved a good dozen of the sturdy outer leaves of the cabbage for making stuffed roulades later this week. I blanched them too, while I was at it.)

The cut up cabbage cooked for about 45 minutes with a cup of broth and the buttery onions, seasoned with salt, pepper, ground allspice, bay leaves, and a pinch of ground cloves. When it was mostly done and getting tender, I set the raw chicken, seasoned with some smoked paprika, cayenne pepper, and more salt and pepper, on the bed of cabbage and onions. That all cooked, covered, for 45 minutes more in the oven.

Then I took the lid off the baking dish, turned up the heat, and let the chicken brown for 15 or 20 minutes. That was enough time for a good bit of the cooking liquid in the dish to evaporate. The result was tender cabbage and crispy, succulent chicken. The recipe said to serve the chicken and cabbage with some warm cream, but I left that part off for yesterday. We just had cabbage, chicken, and good fresh bread from the local baker.

While I was blanching and cooking the cabbage, Walt went out to do some chores in the yard. When he came back in, he looked at me and said that it sure smelled like cabbage in the house. "And it smells really good," he said. Luckily, we both like cabbage and find the aroma of it cooking to be appetizing.

22 comments:

  1. Chanson enfantine :

    Savez-vous planter les choux ?
    à la mode, à la mode,
    Savez-vous planter les choux ?
    à la mode de chez nous.
    "

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  2. I will pass on the cabbage.

    but OMG, you have the cornflower blue corning ware! spouse has a set of that, still sturdy after all these years.

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    Replies
    1. It was nice the way the chicken juices flavored the cabbage and onions.

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  3. That looks wholeheartedly cold weather warming!
    Mushrooms or chestnuts would go well in that cabbage...
    or mushrooms AND chestnuts!!

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    1. I thought about adding carrots but decided not to this time. We'll make stuffed cabbage rolls and put mushrooms in the filling.

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  4. Great meal if ytou are under the weather..

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    1. I think eating that cabbage made me feel better.

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  5. That looks very tasty! I love cabbage and brassicas in general. Maybe the taste is another of those genetic affairs. If you have the gene, you find it tastes unpleasant. Or maybe you have to have the gene that makes it taste nice. I taste it sweet and savoury, I count myself lucky in that case! Pauline

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  6. Replies
    1. I made a lemony oregano cream sauce to go with the cabbage and chicken today -- a supposedly Greek recipe. Pretty good.

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  7. If you had added à la mode, à la mode to your title, your American readers would have thought it was weird to have ice cream called for in this recipe!

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    1. Quand tu m'as dit "à la mode, à la mode" au téléphone cet après-midi, je n'avais pas encore vu ton commentaire. MDR.

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  8. your roast chicken is always an absolute VISION! just beautiful. i like cabbage too and i never think it smells bad. i'm with ann marie - that dish! just yesterday i dropped one of mine and it broke. so sad!

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    1. I don't know where I got that Corningware dish or when, but it may well be 40 years old. I wonder if my mother gave it to me back then.

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    2. Ken

      I have the same Corningware dishes ( a set of three that I purchased when we got married - some 30 yrs ago)
      Thank you for that cabbage recipe - I have had one sitting in my fridge since the new yr - Y bought two for a pot au feu but one was more than enough .

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  9. LOL chm! Your chicken cooked quickly. I like cabbage cooked like this- until it's done...the chicken juices with its seasonings must have given the cabbage extra healing properties.

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    Replies
    1. I think you are right. I've felt a lot better today.

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  10. Sounds delicious. Everyone in my family loves cabbage. I've never had it with chicken, however.

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  11. I love cabbage but find that one head seems to go a long, long, way, especially now that it is just the two of us at home. I bought one a while back and it seemed like we were eating cabbage-based dishes for a week.

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    Replies
    1. That's true. I put leftover cabbage in the freezer today. I even labeled it! I hope it won't stiil be in there next winter.

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