Dearly as I love a burnished, crisp-skinned roast chicken, for value for money you can’t beat poaching the bird. There’s so much to love.
You get beautifully moist meat which can be eaten right away with a sauce made from the stock. Sauce Supreme is the French classic; Catherine Phipps suggests caper sauce; I favour one made with lemon, butter and herbs, keeping the stock for later.
Or you can eke out the meat in a whole series of dishes, perhaps a risotto or pilaf or egg fried rice, in a pie, with pasta (Diana Henry makes cavatelli with chicken, pancetta, peas and cream in A Bird In The Hand), in a salad or in the best chicken mayo sandwich ever. The chicken oyster is your world. Sorry.
You also get a big pot of deeply flavoured chicken stock. For optimum results, when the chicken is done, strip the meat and put the bones back in the stock for further cooking and reducing. This recipe will give you a sort of European ‘mother’ stock. If you’d like to push the flavours towards other cuisines, you can change the aromatics accordingly from the off, or make the base stock and tweak smaller quantities of it later.
The only unattractive thing about poached chicken is the flabby skin. Don’t waste it. Crisped up, chicken crackling makes a great snack and it’s really good crumbled over finished dishes or whipped into butter for an umami hit. There’s a recipe here, which also give you ideas for the schmaltz, or rendered chicken fat. Epicurious has further uses for schmaltz here.
If those of us who are omnivores are going to eat chicken, the least we can do is use every tasty scrap. Whatever you choose to make, buy the best quality chicken you can afford, free range if possible.
Poached Chicken
Ingredients:
1 large chicken (1.75kg-2kg)
1 or 2 leeks, thoroughly cleaned, roughly chopped
2 stalks of celery, roughly chopped
2 onions, peeled and roughly chopped
2 or 3 carrots, scrubbed and roughly chopped
3 or 4 cloves of garlic, don’t bother peeling
A bunch of parsley or parsley stalks
3 bay leaves
A sprig of thyme
A few sprigs of tarragon if you have it
8-10 black peppercorns
A good pinch of sea salt
Water
Method:
Put the chicken, with its giblets if you have them (not the liver though) into your biggest pan. Pour in enough cold water to almost cover it – any exposed parts will steam during cooking – and add the salt.
Bring to the boil on a medium heat. Skim off any scum, add the remaining ingredients, and simmer very gently for 45 minutes to an hour or until the juices run clear when you poke a knife in the thickest part.
Remove the bird from the pot and rest it. You can use both chicken and stock at this point but read on if you’d like a more intense broth.
Once the bird is cool enough to handle, take the meat off the bones and if not using straight away, cool, cover and store in the fridge. First pour a little stock over it to keep it moist, another tip from Catherine Phipps. Look how much meat I got off this bird …
Put the bones back into the stock pot and continue to simmer gently for at least 40 minutes, longer if you have time. Bone broth aficionados would say upwards of five hours. I have never done this because I am both impatient and sceptical. Please don’t write to me.
Either way the stock should gradually reduce and intensify. Taste it from time to time until it reaches the desired flavour, then strain it, discarding the bones and stock veg. It will keep in the fridge for three or four days or can be frozen for up to three months.
You are so right. Poaching chicken is really smart. And if I’m planning on making a soup geared more towards Southwestern flavors, like what’s called a tortilla soup, I love adding cilantro and chile peppers and what not to the broth before poaching. It’s just so much fun!
Thanks, Mimi. It maximises the value, I think. A good free range bird isn’t cheap but it’s worth every penny when you can use every scrap. And I’m with you on swapping out the flavours! Have a lovely weekend. Lx
I am in. Jeff
A vote for poaching?
Oh yes. A poached chicken, however expensive in the first place, must be one of the most economical ingredients there is. It’s the gift that just keeps on giving. And worth it for the stock alone.
Hear, hear! I’m just about to make something interesting with some of that mountain I chicken I cooked. 🙂
Will we read all about it?
Can you doubt it? 😀 Yes, but mostly on social media, though there’ll be something here next Friday. Lx
I love a beautifully poached chicken. I usually eat it with a nice salsa verde (not too far from a caper sauce). Pure comfort food for me.
You may have scandalized a few Italian readers by suggesting pasta with chicken, as you may know. Definitely taboo for most Italians, although having grown up in the US I’m perfectly fine with it, especially baked “Tetrazzini” style.
Haha, possibly not as much as the time I advocated a guinea fowl lasagne! I’d love to know the reason behind the rule when so many other meats are allowed in sauces, do you know the answer? Honestly, pretty much anything Diana Henry suggests is ok in my book, but as my husband isn’t a fan of pasta (I know!) this particular dish is unlikely to feature on our table. I might get a nice risotto past him though. 🙂 Thanks again for stopping by, Frank. Lx
I had an interesting exchange recently with Paolo of Disgraces on the Menu about this. His take is that the two *obviously* don’t go together, and only those who have grown up with the combination would like it. I’m not sure I totally agree since it’s a combination that shows up in various cultures, both Eastern and Western. Italian cookery is the only one I’m aware of where it’s verbotten… Not sure why.
Chicken noodle soup springs to mind! (Watch this space. 🙂 ) I sort of know what he means though, my kneejerk reaction is to instinctively veer away from chicken and pasta. Maybe it’s just what we’re used to. Have a great week, Frank. Lx
there’s just something about that huge nude chicken… 🙂 great idea to poach it, and use for lots of things. nothing better than a chicken sandwich. cheers sherry
Thanks, Sherry. It is a bit of a chubster, isn’t it? Like an Edwardian nude. 😀
Great advice Linda. I do an oriental version and make stock from the liquid. It leads to risotto, shredded chicken with rice and a host of other dishes. I must try crisping the skin. It usually ends up in the stock pot on the way to recycling.
I usually do it with raw chicken skin, clamped between a couple of roasting trays in the oven. But this works, too. Thanks, Conor, your Asian version sounds great.
Hello! I’m new here, and from Canada. My Grandparents were from England, and I inherited a strong British gene. The British part of me, “The place around my heart”.
I have saved this recipe. Thank you very much.
This is what I have found over the years of my cooking adventure. Leave out the sage and substitute Summer Savory. You will never go back to sage. Trust me here.
Hi, Charles, and welcome to Mrs P’s. Thanks for stopping by. I hope you find the paoched chicken recipe useful. I’m a big fan of summer savory (not so much of the winter one) but I won’t be parted from my sage, sorry! It’s so good with pork and veal. But I’m happy to agree to differ. 🙂