Do you ever have a magazine that gets misplaced? I certainly do. And for whatever reason I had a stack of three Cook’s Illustrated from 2007 in one of our upstairs guestrooms. They went from one place to another before I finally said to myself that I needed to get those three magazines back downstairs nearer the kitchen where they belonged. In doing so I glanced through them, leafing past numerous recipes that I had no recollection reading. And up popped this recipe for chicken and sausage done in an Italian style. With peppers and onions. Sounded perfect for dinner the other night.
First off, I DID read the article from beginning to end, to make sure I understood the instructions (of course, I’m the first one to not do this step under most circumstances). I read about how the recipe developer, Sandra Wu, worked from an old recipe for this chicken dish (in Italian it’s called scarpariello, which means “shoemaker style”). It’s not known whether the shoemaker means it’s a poor-man’s dish, or if it refers to the chicken bones sticking out of your mouth as you eat it, which reminds you of a shoemaker holding nails between his teeth. You choose! In either case, this is an American Italian invention, popularized by some of the early Italian settlers who opened Italian restaurants in New York City.
There is a bit of food prep here, but it’s not overwhelming. While you brown the sausage, you can cut up the chicken. While the chicken browns you can slice up the onion and pepper. And while the onions and pepper brown you can mince up the garlic. While that browns you can bring together the rest of it (some white wine vinegar, some chicken broth, and sugar). The recipe developer was stumped with how to get the chicken skin to stay nice and brown, so she finally resorted to browning the chicken, then once everything is assembled, the pan full of peppers, onion and sausage, with the chicken on top is baked in the oven. While THAT is baking you’ll have time to make a pan of creamy polenta, which makes a perfect bed for the onions and peppers. Once the dish is removed from the oven you do need to thicken the sauce with a bit of cornstarch, then it’s served over polenta (or you can make some orzo or mashed potatoes instead).
One thing this recipe calls for that I didn’t have (and had to buy) was (bottled) hot cherry peppers. They’re essential in this dish, although because I ended up using hot Italian sausage (instead of the sweet called for in the recipe) I used fewer of the cherry peppers. They’re hot little puppies, so be careful. I also didn’t have bone-in chicken breasts, so bought those especially to make this. The breasts were huge. I mean gi-normous, so I cut each breast into thirds (recommended in the recipe). That step also helps the chicken to cook more uniformly.
In the photo above you can see the bed of creamy polenta on the left side. And the result? Really delicious. The sauce makes it, to me. I might want to make more of it next time – there really isn’t all that much for all the quantity of chicken and peppers and onions. Just enough to drizzle over the top. The sauce has a piquant taste – meaning it’s a bit of sweet and sour (from the sugar and wine vinegar combo). And the thicker chicken pieces took a lot longer to cook through than expected. So if you have a meat thermometer, cook the thickest piece to 160 degrees F. We also liked the addition of the sausage – it gave the dish a stronger character, I think, than if it was just chicken alone. We enjoyed it with the polenta (I made creamy polenta – half water and half milk – with some butter and a bit of cream cheese and cheddar cheese added). But we liked this very much, and yes, I’ll make it again. Even for guests, although the recipe indicated it was more of a weeknight kind of dish. I didn’t think so. Quite worthy of guests, I thought.
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Italian Style Chicken with Sausage, Peppers and Onions
Recipe By: Cook’s Illustrated, 6/07
Serving Size: 6
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
8 ounces Italian sausage — sweet, casings removed
2 pounds chicken breast halves — skin-on, bone-in, trimmed of excess fat and skin and cut crosswise into 2 or 3 pieces salt and ground black pepper
1 medium onion — halved and sliced ¼ inch thick (about 1¼ cups)
1 large red bell pepper — stemmed, seeded, and cut into ¼-inch strips (about 1½ cups)
3 whole pickled hot cherry peppers — stemmed, seeded, and cut into ¼-inch strips (about ¼ cup) (3 to 5)
3 cloves garlic — minced or pressed through a garlic press (about 1 tablespoon)
2 teaspoons granulated sugar
1/3 cup white wine vinegar — plus 2 additional tablespoons
3/4 cup low sodium chicken broth — plus 1 tablespoon
1 teaspoon cornstarch
1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves — minced fresh
1 tablespoon fresh parsley — minced fresh
1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Heat 1 teaspoon oil in 12-inch skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add sausage and cook, stirring to break sausage into ½-inch pieces, until browned, about 3 minutes. Transfer sausage to plate lined with paper towels. Remove skillet from heat; pour off fat into small bowl and reserve; wipe out skillet with paper towels.
2. Return skillet to medium-high heat and heat remaining 2 teaspoons oil until smoking. Pat chicken dry and liberally season with salt and pepper. Add chicken, skin side down, and cook without moving until well browned, 3 to 5 minutes. Using tongs, turn chicken and brown on other side, about 3 minutes. Transfer chicken to large plate. Remove skillet from heat and pour off fat into bowl with sausage fat; wipe out skillet with paper towels.
3. Return skillet to medium-high heat and heat 1 tablespoon reserved fat until shimmering. Add onion and cook until beginning to soften, about 2 minutes. Add bell pepper and cherry peppers and cook, stirring occasionally, until bell pepper begins to soften, about 4 minutes. Add garlic and cook, stirring frequently, until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add sugar, 1/3 cup vinegar, and ¾ cup broth; bring mixture to boil, scraping up browned bits from pan bottom.
4. Add sausage and chicken (with any accumulated juices) to skillet, arranging chicken pieces in single layer, skin side up, on top of peppers and onion. Transfer skillet to oven and cook until instant-read thermometer inserted into thickest part of chicken registers 160 degrees, 18 to 22 minutes, removing smaller pieces sooner if necessary. Meanwhile, combine cornstarch, thyme, and remaining tablespoon broth in small bowl.
5. Carefully remove skillet from oven (handle will be very hot) and transfer chicken, skin side up, to platter or individual serving plates. Place skillet over medium-high heat and stir in cornstarch mixture. Simmer sauce mixture until slightly thickened, 2 to 3 minutes. Off heat, taste sauce and add up to 2 tablespoons vinegar. Adjust seasonings with salt and pepper.
6. Spoon sauce around chicken, being careful not to pour it directly over chicken. Sprinkle with parsley and serve immediately.
Per Serving: 389 Calories; 25g Fat (59.4% calories from fat); 33g Protein; 6g Carbohydrate; 1g Dietary Fiber; 106mg Cholesterol; 419mg Sodium.
A year ago: Crockpot Chicken Paprikash
Two years ago: Hot & Spicy Tofu Herb Dip (you’d never know it’s made with tofu)
Melynda
said on January 28th, 2010:
This certainly looks delicious! It will show up on the table, maybe for Sunday Cafe. I tend to cook from your blog a lot. But for some reason, I have yet to make the salmon patties with bacon. Thankfully the canned salmon will keep, for a while anyway! Thanks.
It’s a good recipe. We still have leftovers as I write this, and am looking forward to having them! I’ll be making that dish again. . . carolyn t
Jennifer
said on January 29th, 2010:
Hi there. I met you at the oliver’s class the other night. I was working, you were watching. I was just poking around your blog and its really lovely. Thanks for coming to our class. Cheers!
Hi Jennifer – thanks for stopping by my blog. Enjoyed the class the other night and hope to attend another. . . carolyn t