Around My French Table (44 page)

STORING
If you have leftovers, they can be reheated gently the next day.

BONNE IDÉE
Pork à la Normande.
Swap the chicken breasts for pork cutlets (they should take 15 minutes, more or less, to cook through, depending on their thickness), and keep everything else in the recipe. If you'd like, because pork and sage are such a lovely combination, you can add a little finely chopped fresh sage to the flour that you use to dredge the meat.

M
Y FRIEND ALICE VASSEUR
has a most expressive face. Her smiles and frowns are oversized, and when she's excited, her eyes widen and her brows look like they're going to take off. And so there we were, having tea in my Paris kitchen on a chilly winter afternoon, when all of a sudden her face lit up and she exclaimed, "I forgot to tell you what I made last night—it's so easy and so good, and my friends loved it: chicken with speculoos!"

Speculoos (also spelled speculaas) are thin, buttery cinnamon and spice cookies that, although crunchy, melt in your mouth like shortbread. They're a specialty of northern France, Belgium, and Holland, most popular at Christmastime, but available year-round, even in American supermarkets (look for LU Cinnamon Sugar Spice Biscuits or LU Bastogne), and they are paired most often—when they're not served alongside tea or coffee (they're great dunkers)—with foie gras or something gamy. Using the cookies with chicken was a leap and Alice's little stroke of brilliance.

This dish has only three main ingredients, chicken breasts, crème fraîche, and speculoos, and it takes just 10 minutes to prepare, but it's not only unusual and delicious, it's also a recipe that perfectly represents French home cooking today: it makes supermarket ingredients look stylish and taste haute.

Crème fraîche is really what you should use here, as much for its tang as for its heatability. If you must, you can substitute heavy cream, but not sour cream, which will curdle and break over heat. And, while I love homemade speculoos (
[>]
), this recipe is best with store-bought.

Using a long serrated knife, chop the cookies unevenly so that you've got some cookie powder, some cookie crumbs, and some cookie bits. Stir the cookies into the crème fraìche and season with salt and pepper.

Pat the chicken breasts dry and slice them crosswise into strips about a scant inch wide.

Place a large skillet, preferably nonstick, over medium-high heat and add 1 tablespoon butter or oil. When it's hot, toss in the chicken strips and sauté, adding more butter or oil if necessary, until the chicken is lightly colored on all sides and almost cooked through, about 7 minutes.

Season the chicken with salt and pepper and add the cookie mixture to the pan. Bring to a boil and cook for another minute, stirring, or until the chicken is coated and completely cooked. Taste for salt and pepper, and serve.

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

SERVING
My favorite side dish is Lemon-Steamed Spinach (
[>]
) mixed with nothing but salt and pepper and, if you'd like, a little freshly grated nutmeg. Since the dish is sweet and a little rich, it's nice to have something very basic as a go-with.

STORING
The dish is quickly made and should be eaten as soon as it's ready.

I
CAN'T EVEN COUNT THE NUMBER OF TIMES
I've made this dish, but each time I do, I have the same reaction: I wonder how anything this good and this pretty can be this easy. It takes about five minutes to assemble and needs absolutely none of your attention while it cooks, yet it comes out of the oven full of flavor, fragrant, beautifully colorful, and ready to serve alone or with a little white rice. Normally I use nonstick foil to make the cooking packets, but if I'm serving this at a dinner party (don't think it isn't dinner-party-worthy just because it's easy), I make the papillotes from parchment paper and bring the pouches to the table, so that each guest can have the pleasure of opening the packet and getting that first heady whiff of aromatic steam.

A word on multiplying the recipe: With anything cooked
en papillote,
it's easy to increase or decrease the number of servings. However, if you do increase them, you shouldn't put all the packets on one baking sheet. Four packs to a sheet is the max; you need to leave room for heat circulation and papillote puffing.

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Cut four 12-inch squares of nonstick aluminum foil. Have a baking sheet at hand.

Cut the chicken into long strips and then cut the strips crosswise in half. Put the chicken and all the other ingredients in a bowl, seasoning them with salt and pepper, and stir until the curry powder has evenly colored the chicken and vegetables. Spoon an equal amount of the mix onto the center of each piece of foil. Draw up the edges of the foil and seal the packets well, but don't crimp the foil very close to the chicken—you want to leave room around the ingredients so they can steam. Put the packets on the baking sheet.
(You can assemble the packets up to 4 hours ahead and refrigerate; bake for a few more minutes.)

Bake the papillotes for 17 to 20 minutes, or until the chicken is cooked through—carefully open a packet and cut into a piece of chicken to test.

Serve the packets immediately, bringing them to the table straight from the oven or opening them in the kitchen and arranging the chicken and vegetables on individual plates.

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

SERVING
You can put each packet on a plate or in a shallow soup plate and have your guests open them at the table, or you can open them in the kitchen and plate them there. White rice seems like the most traditional accompaniment (consider Cardamom Rice Pilaf,
[>]
), but couscous or quinoa are very good too.

STORING
You can assemble the packets a few hours ahead of time and refrigerate them; just add another minute or two to the baking time.

B
'STILLA (OR PASTILLA, AS IT'S SOMETIMES WRITTEN)
is one of the legendary dishes of Morocco and something that the French have adapted infinitely to make their own. Essentially a covered pie constructed from see-through-thin flaky pastry, the sweetly spiced dish is traditionally made with pigeon, but I've seen it made in Paris with guinea hen, quail, chicken, and even fish. This version stars chicken spiced with ginger, cinnamon, coriander, and saffron; uses filo dough for the pastry, which is perfect for the pie; and has, as it does in Morocco, a dusting of cinnamon sugar over the crust.

It takes time to make a b'stilla—the chicken must marinate and then be cooked ahead, and the construction is a tad artsy-craftsy—but the dish is worth the effort, especially if you're having a party. Aside from being do-aheadable (always a plus), it's beautiful and, since it's meant to be eaten with your hands, fun to eat. Actually, it's also meant to be eaten at the start of a multi-course meal, but no one will fault you for following my lead and bringing it to the table as the
plat de résistance.

BE PREPARED:
The chicken needs to marinate for an hour.

Put the chicken pieces, onions, garlic, and spices into a Dutch oven or other large casserole and give everything a good stir (I do this with my hands). Cover and let the chicken marinate for 1 hour at room temperature.
(If it's more convenient for you, the chicken can be marinated in the refrigerator for as long as 1 day.)

Add the chicken broth and 1 teaspoon salt to the pot and bring to a boil over high heat. Lower the heat so that the liquid simmers, cover the pot, and cook for 1 hour, at which point the chicken should be falling-off-the-bone tender.

Using a slotted spoon, transfer the chicken to a bowl. Strain the broth, saving both the liquid and the onions. When the chicken is cool enough to handle, remove the meat from the bones and cut it into small cubes or shred it.

Clean the Dutch oven and pour the broth back into it, or pour the broth into a medium saucepan. Whisk in the lemon juice, bring to a boil, and cook until you have about 1 cup liquid. Reduce the heat to low.

Beat the eggs with the honey, and, whisking all the while, pour into the broth. Heat, whisking constantly, until the sauce thickens enough that your whisk leaves tracks in it, about 5 minutes. Pull the pan from the heat and season the sauce with salt and pepper.

Stir the chicken and reserved onions into the sauce, along with the cilantro and parsley.
(You can make the chicken and sauce up to 1 day ahead and keep it covered and refrigerated.)

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with foil.

Place the filo sheets between sheets of wax paper and cover with a kitchen towel. Brush a 9-inch round cake pan, one that's 2 inches tall, with melted butter. Brush 1 sheet of filo with butter and center it in the pan, so that the excess hangs over the edges. Brush another sheet and press it into the pan so that it's perpendicular to the first sheet and forms a plus sign. Place a third and then a fourth buttered sheet into the pan so that they form an X; the overhang from all of the sheets should cover the edges of the pan.

Sprinkle half of the almonds over the filo. Spoon in the saucy chicken, spreading it evenly across the pan, and top with the rest of the almonds. Fold the overhanging filo over the chicken.

Butter the remaining 4 sheets of filo, stacking them one on top of the other on the work surface. Using a pot lid or the bottom of a tart pan as a guide, cut out a 10- to 11-inch circle. Center the circle over the cake pan and gently tuck the edges of the dough into the pan, working your way around it as though you were making a bed. Brush the top of the b'stilla with a little butter and sprinkle with some cinnamon sugar. Place the pan on the baking sheet.

Bake the b'stilla for 20 minutes, then lower the temperature to 350 degrees F and bake for 20 minutes more. If the top seems to be getting too brown at any point, cover it loosely with foil. Transfer the b'stilla to a cooling rack and let rest for about 5 minutes.

Lay a piece of parchment over a cutting board, and have a serving platter at hand. Turn the b'stilla out onto the parchment-lined board and then invert it onto the serving platter, so that it's right side up. Serve the b'stilla now, cutting it into wedges, or serve it warm or at room temperature.

MAKES 6 SERVINGS

SERVING
B'stilla needs no accompaniments.

STORING
You can make the chicken and sauce up to a day ahead and keep it covered and chilled until you're ready to construct the b'stilla; however, once the b'stilla is baked, it's best served that day. If you've got any left over, cover and refrigerate it; let it come to room temperature before serving, or reheat it in a 325-degree-F oven—the pastry will not be as flaky, but the dish will still be satisfying.