I was born to sauté...
I remember thinking this and smiling when I finally made my way up in the kitchen brigade to the Saucier spot.
I loved the pulse of the kitchen, working the saute station with a dozen sauté pans on the flat top, delicious stocks and mother sauces held hot in the steam table and carefully prepared mise en place so I could make delicious meals for the customers... one order or two at the time. Everything was cooked with love and respect.
Chicken Sauté for beginners
The Culinary Institute of America is arguably the finest culinary school in the world! Students spend 6 weeks learning and practicing basic culinary fundamentals in Skills I and II-one of my favorite classes to teach.
I'm a big fan of proper technique. One of my mentors, CMC Tom Peer used to say, "Practice doesn't make Perfect... Perfect Practice makes Perfect". I truly believe this.
Sauté is a dry heat method of cooking-it's important to choose tender cuts of protein such as chicken breast, pork cutlets, scallops etc... sauté translates to 'jump in the pan'. When we sauté, we cook something quickly in a very hot pan. It's important to develop caramelization (light or dark depending on the recipe) and prepare a delicious sauce in the same pan you cooked the protein in.
Sometimes the sauce compliments the protein such as chicken with a cream sauce and sometimes the sauce counters the protein such as a spicy mustard sauce with pork.
Basis Chicken Sauté
Prep Time: 30 min
Cooking Time: 15 min
Yield: 2 portions
Ingredients
2 ea Chicken Breast, (skin removed) cut into two even pieces
tt Salt and Black pepper
4 Tbsp AP Flour
3 Tbsp Olive Oil or Clarified Butter
2 Tbsp White Wine, dry, optional
6 Tbsp Chicken Stock
2 Tbsp Shallots, minced
6 oz Heavy Cream
4 Tbsp Fresh Herbs, minced (tarragon, Italian parsley, chives)
How to Sauté Chicken
Step 1
Set up an area to season the chicken, in this photo I'm using a chicken breast I've cut into two similar sized pieces. I lightly pound the chicken with a mallet to flatten the chicken breast for even cooking. (trying to have the protein the same thickness)
I would work the same way with a whole chicken breast or boneless chicken thighs. I would use the same method if I left the skin on the chicken.
Season the chicken (I prefer to simply use kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper), and dust with AP Flour. Pat the chicken so the flour sticks to the flesh.
Step 2
Add oil to a warm, sauté pan. It's important to use a pan which is the correct size for the amount of chicken being sautéed. If the pan is too small, the chicken won't get a nice, golden brown sear and moisture will purge out of the chicken, basically boiling in chicken 'purge'... liquid can only get to a boil but we want to sauté in oil that is approximately 400° F.
Also, if the pan is too large, the areas with no chicken cooking will burn!
Carefully place the seasoned, floured chicken breast into the hot oil and let the chicken brown for 2-3 minutes. You should hear a sizzle when placing the chicken into the hot oil. I like to gently 'jiggle' the pan so the chicken doesn't stick and browns evenly. Try not to peek... let the chicken brown. When you see browning on the sides, carefully invert the chicken with tongs, be careful not to splatter the hot oil.
When the chicken is golden brown on both sides, place the chicken onto a sizzle plate to rest.
Step 3
Add minced shallots into the fond (the nice brown bits of chicken and flour in the oil) and sweat for one minute; add white wine and reduce until 'sec'-almost dry so the sauce has a mild wine flavor but not overpowering.
Add chicken stock and reduce to 'sec' (about 3 minutes), then add the cream and simmer for 2 minutes.
Add the herbs, place the chicken (and juices in the sizzle plate from the resting chicken) into the sauce and bathe the chicken with the sauce,
serve
Every culture seems to have its own way of celebrating squash. Years ago, when I was invited to assist the amazing Puerto Rican Chef Alfredo Ayala at Worlds of Flavor at the CIA San Antonio campus. I spent the morning carefully preparing diced pumpkin and other mise en place for Puerto Rican Sofrito, Adobo & Habichuelas Guisadas (Bean Soup) Chef Ayala arrived in the kitchen with a paper bag of Ají dulce, (Rocotillo peppers) from Puerto Rico and the other Latin chefs went wild! When he came to greet me he tossed all of my pumpkin dice into the garbage, poured a few cups of rice onto the table and discussed how to peel garlic. He explained he had eaten this same, exact rice dish every day of his life and shared the pumpkin I had prepared was for Halloween; he needed butternut squash. I had told the procurement chef the same thing earlier but decided to keep that to myself… an absolutely amazing experience learning to cook pumpkin and rice with Chef Ayala, a true master!
Fines Herbes: Freshness, Balance, and History Art and Science of Growing & Cooking with 'Fines Herbs'
I was very fortunate to spend several months on a cruise ship traveling around Alaska and Canada. I was able to learn how fisherman caught salmon and the native Alaskan people canned salmon. There are five types of salmon, the guides loved to share the 'salmon fingers trick'. King salmon is considered the most flavorful salmon with a fatty, buttery flavor. (This is the longer, middle finger) Coho or Silver salmon is firmer with a milder flavor (ring finger for silver); Sockeye salmon (pointer finger) is lean and has a darker red color. Pink salmon (pinky finger) is most common and used by Alaskan people for canning and Chum (thumb) salmon is mild and seems to be the least popular. I prefer farm raised, Atlantic salmon for forcemeats due to the milder flavor and fatty texture. I spent a week fishing for halibut in Alaska and we rigged up the belly of a chum salmon for bait... it worked really well!
My mother liked to cook a variety of fritters, with leftover holiday ham or turkey but in the summer she prepared delicious squash flower or corn fritters which were more like savory pancakes and inspired this recipe.
Beyond Pesto: The Art and Science of Growing & Cooking with Herbs
I've been growing figs for more than 50 years! In fact, I have about a dozen fig trees in my yard. Several are from cuttings propagated from trees at my parent's home and one fig tree is from a cutting of a fig tree in Monticello! I like to think Thomas Jefferson and I enjoy delicious figs from the same tree...
I liked to begin each class day of Skills Development class at the CIA with a quote. One of my favorites went something like this, 'You can walk to the corn fields but you must run back to the kitchen'. Basically it speaks to the sugars in sweet quickly converting to starch when it's harvested. We Chefs know a thing or two about food chemistry...
More and more the loss of technique and understanding of traditional ingredients is destroying the soul of American kitchens. But there is hope.
I agreed to be the Chef Advisor for the Gourmet Society at the CIA, an amazing honor to work with some of the best and brightest students. We planned to demonstrate preparing pesto with a mortar and pestle and also with a food processor-then evaluate them both side by side. We all suspected that the food processor would aerate the pesto, possibly the heat generated would be a problem- One student brought in a molcajete, the traditional mortar from Mexico, made from volcanic rock used for grinding spices, making salsas, moles, etc... I'm not sure this was the preferred mortar and pestle to use, these days I often use a marble mortar and pestle and make small batches. The 'mortar and pestle' pesto was much more delicious than the food processor version at the CIA that day.
I remember my days working as chef/manager for food service cafeterias. People loved muffins for breakfast! We used dry muffin mixes or large tubs of various, premade muffin batters; scooped the batter into muffin tins and made dozens of mini, regular and large sizes daily. I love topping the muffins with garnishes like oats, chocolate chips, streusel, nuts etc... Morning Glory was my favorite, I bet I baked thousands of muffins in my five years at Gardner Merchant! I think my 'go to' muffin is a delicious, corn muffin grilled with butter on a plancha-New Jersey diner style!