I'm pretty sure this is the first time I've broken out two cookbooks for one dinner. I'm kind of allergic to making side dishes, but I couldn't just call the chicken recipe a meal and leave it at that. Besides, I managed to finish both dishes at about the same time.
Yes, both cookbooks are America's Test Kitchen cookbooks.
Pan-Roasted Chicken Breasts with Sage-Vermouth Sauce
- 1/2 cup table salt
- 2 (1/2-pound) whole bone-in, skin-on chicken breasts, split in half along breast bone and trimmed of rib sections
- 1 teaspoon vegetable oil
- 1 large shallot, minced (about 4 tablespoons)
- 3/4 cup low-sodium chicken broth
- 1/2 cup dry vermouth
- 4 medium sage leaves, each leaf torn in half
- 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 3 pieces
- Table salt and ground black pepper
Brining chicken for 30 minutes. I was supposed to do this in the fridge according to the recipe, but after a day of defrosting in the fridge, the breasts were still largely frozen so I did this at room temperature.
from Wikipedia:
Brining makes cooked meat moister by hydrating the cells of its muscle tissue before cooking, via the process of osmosis, and by allowing the cells to hold on to the water while they are cooked, via the process of denaturation.[1] The brine surrounding the cells has a higher concentration of salt than the fluid within the cells, but the cell fluid has a higher concentration of other solutes.[1] This leads salt ions to diffuse into the cell, whilst the solutes in the cells cannot diffuse through the cell membranes into the brine. The increased salinity of the cell fluid causes the cell to absorb water from the brine via osmosis.[1] The salt introduced into the cell also denatures its proteins.[1] The proteins coagulate, forming a matrix that traps water molecules and holds them during cooking. This prevents the meat from dehydrating.
Browning skin-side down on the stove top in my rarely used cast-iron skillet.
Flipping them over. It sort of looks golden brown.
After browning, the breasts go into a 450 degree Farenheit over for 15 to 18 minutes or however long it takes the thickest part of the breast to reach 160 to 165 degrees. Then you remove the chicken from the pan and begin to build the sauce.
Sauce mise en place. Completed at some point while juggling the chicken and mashed potatoes.
Brown the shallot until softened.
Finishing the sauce by whisking the butter in 3 tablespoons at a time after the sauce had reduced to about 3/4 cup.
The finished chicken with light mashed potatoes. I wish the sage had been a bit more forward.
Mashed Potatoes
- 2 pounds russet potatoes (about 4 medium), scrubbed, peeled, and cup into 1-inch cubes
- Salt
- 3/4 cup 2 percent milk, warmed
- 1 tablespoon unsalted butter, melted
- 1/2 cup low-fat sour cream
- Ground black pepper
The potatoes I peeled.
Boiling the potatoes until tender enough for a knife to easily slip through... Took longer than I thought.
Apparently my roommate must have packed her potato masher already. I swear that I must've bought one when I lived in Sunset Park in Brooklyn about 2 years ago, but couldn't locate it. (It'll be a different story tonight [I own up to the fact that it can sometimes take me a rather long time to finish a blog entry]) when I mash sweet potatoes for another dish tonight.
I was somehow supposed to fold the sour cream into the potatoes. Perhaps that would actually have seemed to have happened if the potatoes has been processed finer (BTW, apparently the way to make the smoothest representations of this dish to use use a ricer or a food mill. the latter is totally on my Amazon wish list.). The potatoes were perfectly edible if far from perfect and I could see how the recipe would be a success low-fat version of the dish with the right equipment in hand.
In any case, I feel I should say a little bit about the book the mashed potatoes came from The Best Light Recipe from America's Test Kitchen. ATK usually doesn't give a damn about fat and calorie content while perfecting their recipes; the bottom like is flavor. But the staff begged founder Chris Kimball to do a light cookbook and he set out a challenge for them: to make a great low-fat cheesecake. I'm sure you can figure out the rest.
Anyway, after reading enough Michael Pollan and getting freaked out by the artificiality of low-fat food (even basic dairy), I come from the same position as ATK stands for in general. However, I'm game if they are. Never hurts to cut back on unnecessary richness every now and then and I'll own up to ordering Starbucks drinks made with skim. They're so damn sweet.
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