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Julia Child often recalls her first meal after moving to France of oysters, sole meunière and fine wine as a culinary revelation. She was quoted later in The NYT referring to that moment as "an opening up of the soul and spirit for [her]." I've never been to France, but my soul & spirit opened - so to speak - when I was young, curled up in front of the television listening to Child's infamous sing-song voice. I think most gastronomes can recall a moment in which Child had such an effect on them. Thanks to her endless food exploration, she brought about America's culinary revelation.There are two cook books that can be found nestled away in most homes: The Joy of Cooking & Mastering the Art of French Cooking. For ages I only had the former. I finally got Child's revolutionary book earlier this year & have been diligently working my way through it since. The quietly coaxed flavors of time spent in front of the stove are championed in French cooking. These Suprêmes de Volaille aux Champignons are no exception. Understated flavors of salty beef bouillon, meaty mushrooms, velvety cream & fresh parsley make for an excellent piece of chicken!
from Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking
2 medium boneless skinless chicken breasts (a.k.a. suprêmes)
5 tbsp. butter
1 shallot, minced
1/4 lb. fresh mushrooms, sliced
1/8 tsp. salt
1/4 c. beef bouillon
1/4 c. dry white vermouth
1 c. whipping cream
1 tbsp. fresh parsley, minced
big pinch white pepper
salt to taste
pepper to taste
lemon juice to taste
Preheat the oven to 400F. Rub the suprêmes with a squeeze of lemon juice, salt & pepper. Heat 2 tbsp. of the butter in an oven proof casserole until it foams. Quickly roll the suprêmes in the butter & cover. Cook for 15 - 20 minutes.* Check for done-ness by pressing the top of the suprêmes. If still soft return for a minute or two. When the meat is springy to the touch it is done. Remove the suprêmes & set aside.Pour the bouillon & vermouth into the warm casserol with the remining cooking butter & boil down over high heat until the mixture becomes syrupy. Stir in the cream & boil down again over high heat until the cream thickens slightly. Taste & season as needed with lemon juice.
In a small sauce pan, add the remining butter & heat until foaming. Stir in the shallots & sauté a moment without browning. Then stir in the mushrooms & sauté lightly for a minute or two. Toss into the Volaille À Blanc sauce & pour over the chicken breasts & sprinkle with freshly minced parsley.
*Child's original recipe calls for 6 minutes cooking time. I am not sure how she managed to get the breasts cooked through in 6 minutes at 400F. I checked mine at 6 & they were still pink on the outside. Anyone have any ideas as to how she did this? Magical Julia powers?
11 comments:
Sounds just quite delicious and I imagine good for both soul and spirit.
I still don't have the joy of cooking, i think its time.
oh is that clear, i mean just quite delicious as in just divine notjust as in so so umm ok ......just in case.
just delicious. definitely clear! thanks for the kind words.
I am cooking this as we speak and was not too surprised to see the chicken still completely pink after only six minutes. I went online to see if I was the only one who had experienced this - I guess not! I'll keep it in there a bit longer. :)
I wonder if the chicken we buy from stores now is significantly different from the fresh chicken Julia would have been buying in France in the 1940s/50s??
Chicken now is given steriods to increase their heft: in all likelyhood, it is much thicker than it used to be. With this in mind, I pounded my chicken with a mallet first, and 8 minutes did the trick.
Reading the introduction to the "Supremes..." section in MAFC, p. 267, gives a clue to the size of the chicken breasts that JC would have used:
"Choose breasts from a 2.5 - 3 lb. fryer. Slip fingers between skin and flesh and pull off the skin..cut against the breastbone to loosen the flesh..pull flesh from bone until the meat ...separates from the bone in one piece. [remove] the tendon that runs about 2/3rds of the way down the under side of the meat. ....Trim off any jagged ends and flatten lightly with the side of a heavy knife. They are now ready for cooking."
In my experience, all this work produces a mere fragment of today's big hunky steroid-filled chicken breasts. LIke Erin, I slap the fragments with a mallet, and the 6 - 8 minutes is about right.
It is a heavenly recipe.
Did you include the addition of the buttered greaseproof paper on top of the chicken prior to putting the lid on the casserole? When I did this, even the larger breasts cooked in under 9 minutes.
I've been making a similar recipe of the same name for close to 30 years, it is one of my family's favorites. However, it calls for twice the white wine and doesn't use any broth, you deglaze the pan with the wine and boil down until it is syrupy, then add the cream and boil down again. It called for the short cooking time in the oven, but made sense because you sauted them in butter before you put them in. I think it was Charles Virion's Country French cookbook but I won't swear to it. I always double the sauce recipe because I serve it over wild and white rice as I see you do also, and it absorbs a lot. I think the chicken is just an excuse for the mushrooms and sauce, because I always find fingermarks where someone has tried to get the last little bit. I am going to try it with the broth next time.
I've been doing a bit of research on this recipe, and so I thought I would drop a line on your question about the chicken breasts and little amount of time necessary to cook them. Based on my research, this is what I've found... The chicken she uses is actually a cutlet, and not an entire breast. It seems that many people are being confused by this!
I hope this helps! :-)
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