Well it is very easy and the ingredients should not be difficult to obtain no matter where you are. As for any recipe the higher quality the ingredients, the better the final dish will be. It is the age old argument of authenticity versus creativity, if you want authencity follow this recipe exactly (including the ingredients) but if not, try using a similar ingredient to create a similar dish. Of course it won’t be the classical ‘chicken Chasseur’, but something close to it.
Ingredients
tomato concassé * 1/2 cup
butter 75 gm
demi glace 500 ml
Chasseur 200 ml
white button mushrooms 8 pc
Method
1. Place the demi glace on a gentle heat to bring to a simmer and turn the heat down low
2. Lightly flour the chicken pieces and in a frying pan sauté or fry them in the butter, for a couple of minutes each side to brown them. This will create and add flavour to the dish and give the chicken a nice caramelised colour
3. Remove from the pan and pat dry to remove any excess fat and place in a casserole dish large double handled saucepan
4. Add the tomato concassé and Chasseur
5. Place on a lid and over a gentle heat, simmer for five minutes to infuse the wine into the chicken
6. Remove the lid and allow to simmer until the cooking liquor has almost all evaporated; this will leave just the essential flavours of the wine
7. Pour in the warmed demi glace and with a set of tongs, gently combine everything
8. Place a lid back on return to a gentle heat
9. Simmer for approximately one hour until the chicken is cooked and tender, removing the lid occasionally to gently stir (best completed with tongs so the chicken does not break up) and skimming off any fat that rises to the surface
10. Stir through the mushrooms that have been sliced, cut into quarters or left whole
Chef's Tip
The consistency of the sauce should be just thick enough to coat the chicken but not so thin that it will run all over the plate.
The tomato concassé will have broken up and become part of the sauce, thickening it and impacting on the flavour wonderfully
When plating this dish up, a drizzle of crème fraiche and nice sprig of a fresh herb will really enhance the presentation
* Making a tomato concassé - concassé (con-cass-eh) means to roughly chop
1. Remove the core from the tomato, score an X in the skin and place into boiling water for 10 seconds, remove from the water and place under cold running water.
2. The peel should now just slip off; if it does not pop back in the boiling water for a few more seconds
3. Cut in half and remove the pips and rinse out and roughly chop
4. Gently cook the finely chopped shallots and the tomatoes in half the butter without colouring them (this is called sweating) for 5 minutes and set aside until required.
