Poulet sauté is the classical French term for a chicken cooked almost entirely in butter and seasoned only with a few herbs. This is the simplest way of cooking a chicken, the bird cut into portions and cooked till golden.
INGREDIENTS
1 chicken60g butter
olive oil
250ml white wine
250ml chicken stock
2-3 tbsp tarragon
2-3 tbsp parsley
METHOD: Melt 30g of butter in a deep-sided frying pan with a tablespoon of olive oil. Add a chicken, jointed into six or eight pieces, brown meat first, and cook skin-side down to a nice, golden, nutty colour. Add the white meat. When the meat is cooked, season all and return to the pan with 30g or so of fresh butter, cover, and cook on a low heat for 25 minutes or so. Remove the chicken to a warm dish then pour 250ml of white wine and the same of chicken stock into the pan. Turn up the heat and let the liquid reduce to half its original volume, scraping at the pan-stickings with a wooden spatula and letting them dissolve into the liquid. Season carefully then add 2 or 3 tablespoons of finely chopped parsley and tarragon, and finally stir in a knob of butter.
THE TRICK: The sauce is nothing more than the caramelised meat juices from the pan dissolved in wine, so make certain the meat stays in place long enough. The dark meat will take longer to cook than the white, so add the breasts and wings only once the rest of the carcass has started to lightly colour.
THE TWIST: A splash of Marsala instead of white wine will lend a sweet richness, Madeira a nutty quality. My favourite twist is to add a healthy handful of tarragon at the end of cooking, for its soft aniseed notes. Or you could add finely chopped lemon grass and red chillies to the pan and finish with lime juice and a splash of fish sauce instead of wine.
