A recipe that will make you game for pheasant
Roasted pheasant stuffed with wild rice served with pomegranate and persimmon sauce makes a flavorful winter dish.
Tired of the same old barbecue or honey-glazed chicken wings? Don’t worry. Whether it’s snack food for a football game or any other party, this trio of chicken wing sauces will have your partygoers flying high and high-fiving you. The easy recipes take their cue from my Thai heritage and a little Tex-Mex flair from my stint living in Austin and Fort Worth, Texas.
Poached chicken looks rather naked compared to a beautifully browned roasted hen. Add some spring baby vegetables to the pot and Henrietta Hen arrives at the table adorned with beautiful, edible bling.
When visiting the Queener Fruit Farm I was inspired by the sight of their huge, luscious peaches hanging on the trees waiting for Tommie to test its readiness to be harvested, I went beyond devouring them hand to mouth to incorporating these luscious beauties in a chicken dish. I remembered seeing a recipe on The Pioneer Woman Cooks using whiskey, barbecue sauce and peach preserves. Now the whole inspiration was complete.
I thought of this dish and my brief childhood sojourn in Singapore recently when I learned that a wonderful friend, a witty Singaporean now living with her charming husband in New York City, was coming through the Northwest on a tour to promote her new book, “A Tiger in the Kitchen,” a memoir about her experience reconnecting with her Singaporean roots and family by travelling home to learn her family recipes. I wish I had time to prepare the dish for Cheryl and Mike, but our visit was brief but fun.
In 2000 AD, I was gifted with a Showtime Rotisserie by Vic’s mom, Pranee. That’s right, it was the original “Set it and forget it” machine that you see on TV ads between midnight and dawn.
Being a southern boy who appreciated such retailers as Neiman-Marcus and Tiffany’s, I rolled my eyes at this one, discreetly of course. Hurting Pranee’s feelings is like fooling Mother Nature — it’s just not nice!
As far as American fare goes, chicken is one of those old stand-bys. Roasted, grilled or battered and fried, it has attained comfort-food status in most American households. In the Far East, chicken also has the coveted comfort-food status on many family tables. My recipe for this dish combines Thai and Chinese techniques of poaching a whole chicken in garlic and ginger and then serving it with a zingy sauce of crushed garlic and ginger, salted soybeans, soy sauce and vinegar.
Southern Fried Chicken! By all means, yes! Cornbread and buttermilk! Eew!
Fried chicken, be it Southern, Chinese crispy, Thai, Korean or wherever, it’s a universal enjoyment. Like Sara Lee, “Everybody doesn’t like something, but nobody doesn’t like fried chicken.” Cornbread and buttermilk aficionados are a cult unto themselves. No teetering on this fence - you’re either in or out. My mother was definitely in, and eventually I was in too.
Nam prik pao, a thick sauce made of ground-up roasted chilis, soybean oil, palm sugar, fish sauce, ground-up dried shrimp and shallots, has one of those unmistakable flavors. Literally translated, the name means roasted chili water. It’s a sauce that I grew up loving — believe it or not — on toast. Mom’s version of chicken and cashew nuts uses this delicious sauce, giving this Chinese dish a uniquely Thai twist.
Traditional Coq au Vin is usually thought of as a tough old bird braised in red wine, usually Burgundy. However, like most recipes, they get re-invented as they move from region to region. In Alsace, this dish is called Coq au Riesling and is a most elegant and lighter version of the original. Serving it with Hazelnut Spaetzle seems like the perfectly natural thing to do since Alsace has a rich heritage with both French and German influences.
Chicken Marsala is one of my main “go to” dishes when I’m too lazy to look for something new. Over the years I have added onions or shallots and mushrooms. Recently I found a recipe on epicurious.com for Chicken Marsala with Sage. Adding the sage to my evolving recipe was a hit, and using oyster mushrooms instead of white or crimini was perfect. The family proclaimed it the best Marsala I have made to date.