Chicken and mushies a one-pot wonder
Bathed in white wine and family lore, this one-pot chicken is a braise for all seasons, writes Becky Krystal.
The food writer voice in my head started racing through all the things I could tweak, while the loyal daughter voice said, ‘stop, you’re ruining the family recipe.’
Do you remember one of the first dishes you really, truly mastered? There’s the euphoric rush of actually finishing it, the bliss when you taste it, and just outright satisfaction. I had all those feelings the first time I nailed my family’s chicken with mushrooms.
This was not long after college, in my first apartment, when I was actually old enough to, you know, buy wine. It was a simple dish, passed down from my grandmother to my mum and, like many family recipes, exact provenance is unknown.
Coat boneless, skinless chicken breasts with breadcrumbs in a skillet, transfer to a casserole dish, pour on a tin of mushrooms, some wine, and bake. That was it. I started making it all the time.
There was a lot I didn’t know about cooking then – that this dish would be called a braise, that you could actually overcook the breasts, that cheap pink plonk wasn’t the ideal bottle for it. In other words, pretty much everything I know now, about 15 years later.
So it was an interesting endeavour when I decided to cook it again after too many years of not making it. The food writer voice in my head started racing through all the things I could tweak, while the loyal daughter voice said, ‘‘stop, you’re ruining the family recipe’’.
I nervously told my mum about my project and, bless her, she seemed more pleased that I was writing about her mum’s recipe than annoyed that I was adapting it.
But the changes keep the recipe true to its original spirit. I found I preferred bone-in chicken thighs (skin removed) for ultra-tender meat and rich flavour. Fresh mushrooms replaced tinned.
Using mustard to adhere the breadcrumbs streamlined the dredging process and added a zippy flavour that complemented the wine, as did a few cloves of thinly sliced garlic. I also moved the entire operation to a dutch oven, firmly ensconcing this dinner as a one-pot meal.
It goes from stove to oven, where I pull the lid off the pot during cooking to concentrate the braising liquid that just begs for crusty bread to soak it up. It’s light enough to enjoy even on a warm day but hearty enough to please in cool weather, too.
Wine-braised chicken with mushrooms