Chicken in White Wine Sauce

As regular TR recipe readers may remember, I spent a lot of my youth in France. It was there that I started to collect recipes. Some from my friend’s parents when I went to dinner at their houses but mostly from restaurants.

This particular recipe—at least the original because I have changed it quite a bit to make it more nutrition-science friendly and less calorific—comes from a little restaurant called “Le Bec”, a short way down the hill from the castle in the medieval village of Haut de Cagnes, not far from Cannes.

In those days, and probably still, the Haut de Cagnes was full of artists and writers. My parents were friends of many of them and we frequently lunched in the town. I often wandered off and found my own favorite places away from the crowds in the Place de Chateau. Le Bec was the one I liked best. The food was good, varied and cheap. I got to know le patron, Monsieur Paul who was also the chef of the tiny restaurant. I was a great fan of his escargots (snails) and when Alicia and I lived in New York I once got them from the local supermarket, cooked them according to le chef’s recipe and tried to induce Alicia to eat them. No luck. That recipe will not appear in this newsletter—ever.

But there were plenty of Paul’s other recipes which I squirreled away. One of them is this one—a simply wonderful chicken in wine sauce dish. It’s beautifully simple to make but can be presented with pride at any dinner party.

Ingredients

• 2 boneless skinless chicken breasts—about 350 grams (12 oz)
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 tblsp olive oil
• 4 tblsp of non-tropical oil light margarine
• 1 cup finely chopped yellow onion (1 small)
• 2 tsp minced garlic
• 1 1/2 cups + 1 tblsp low-sodium chicken broth
• 1 cup dry white wine—red wine such as Merlot also works, it depends somewhat on what you want the finished dish to look like
• 2 tsp thyme leaves
• 1.5 tsp cornstarch
• 1 tblsp minced fresh parsley

Instructions

1. Prepare the chicken: Slice chicken breasts in half through the thickness to create 4 portions total. Cover with plastic wrap and pound with a meat mallet—or your fist—to even out their thickness.
2. Place flour in a shallow dish. Season both sides of chicken breast portions with salt and pepper and then cover each side in flour. Gently shake off excess flour.
3. Heat oil in skillet over medium-high heat.
4. Place chicken in skillet (spacing evenly apart) and cook until browned and cooked through, about 5 minutes per side.
5. Transfer chicken to a plate and cover with aluminum foil to keep warm.
6. Return skillet to medium heat. Add 2 tbsp margarine and melt stirring frequently.
7. Saute onion, then garlic: Add onions and saute until tender and golden brown, about 5 minutes. Add garlic and saute 30 seconds longer.
8. Slowly pour in 1 1/2 cups chicken broth and the wine while scraping up browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Stir in thyme leaves.
9. Bring to a simmer, then reduce heat to medium-low and let simmer until alcohol flavor has cooked off and sauce has reduced to about 1/3 of its original volume, about 15 minutes.
10. In a small bowl, whisk together remaining 1 tblsp chicken broth with cornstarch until smooth. Once sauce in skillet has reduced, stir in the cornstarch mixture and cook until thickened, while whisking, about 1 minute longer.
11. Melt remaining 2 tblsp margarine in sauce.  
12. Return chicken to sauce in skillet, spoon sauce over and sprinkle with parsley and serve

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Servings: 4

Energy per serving: 912 kJ (228 cals)