“Is butter on chicken a thing? . . .”

Chicken with Forty Cloves of Garlic

Chicken with Forty Cloves of Garlic is a standard James Beard classic with Provençal roots. It is a rustic, versatile dish and should be in every cook’s repertoire. Since day one as a personal chef, it has been in mine. I cook it for my clients’ weeknight family dinners and for more elegant parties. It begs to be at the center of a convivial meal, where diners can sop up the delicious sauce with hearty chunks of toasted garlic bread. Accompanying the dish with a simple salad and a bowl of marinated olives makes for the perfect meal any time of the year. The bright green herbs and slightly caramelized lemons lend visual appeal, and on a buffet spread it holds its own alongside a variety of other bold-flavored dishes like Grilled Lamb Chops with Calabrian Peppers over Polenta and Slow-Roasted Salmon with Three Sisters Salad.

In other recipes for Chicken with Forty Cloves of Garlic, the whole cloves of garlic are roasted in the pan and then added to the braising liquid before it goes in the oven. I have tried this and don’t like the results. The garlic cloves cannot get an even golden color and sweet caramelized flavor this way. They burn too easily or cook inconsistently. Instead, I roast them separately, then add them to the braising liquid before the dish goes in the oven. I reserve some of the roasted garlic to mash into olive oil and spread on bread before toasting it in the oven. Fennel, coriander, and black pepper are a holy trinity of spices and are especially good in a sauce with vermouth and white wine. Lemon is not traditional to this recipe, but I love the way a bite of roasted lemon adds a welcome tangy and bittersweet contrast to the rich roasted-garlic jus.

Chicken is so commonplace that we take it for granted, and we often don’t think about how challenging it can be to make it special. In my recipe, I describe my method for preparing the portions of chicken and pan-roasting them slowly and patiently rendering the skin in a skillet without oil. But this isn’t how I was taught. My first serious encounter with cooking chicken was while working at Jean-Georges’ Nougatine as the meat and grill line cook. Every day, I picked up my tray of heirloom chickens from the walk-in cooler to prepare for the lunch service. After many months, I was able to cook ten at a time for our busiest days. Working as fast as I could, I turned every burner on its highest flame, put down the pans, and added oil. Just as the pans became screaming hot — but before the oil scorched — I carefully placed two of the perfectly butchered half chickens in each one. As the skin met the hot surface of the pan, it popped and spit, recoiling from the heat in protest. Using my fingers, I firmly pressed the pieces down until the skin relaxed and lay flat in full contact with the surface of the pan. When the chickens had an even deep golden brown and crisp skin they went in a 500-degree oven to finish roasting. Moving quickly from pan to pan, I found that my concentration on getting each chicken cooked perfectly blocked out the intensity of the heat, the sting of grease splatter on my hands, arms, and face, and the inevitable burn.

After the drama of cooking the chickens, they came to rest proudly over a bed of citrus-glazed carrots and were garnished with a few delicately cut squares of tarragon. At the table, the waiter poured the dazzling sauce that I made fresh every morning with aromatic shallots, garlic, thyme, lemon, and gewürztraminer. Just as with nearly every sauce I learned to make in fine dining, it required a shocking quantity of butter, in this case to balance the bright acidity. In French cooking the sauce is the crown jewel. It brings all of the elements of the plate together. My primary motivation for enduring the arduous demands of being a line cook at Nougatine was to earn my place in the three-Michelin star Jean-Georges Restaurant to decode the art of his highly praised sauces.

After years of working for low pay in fine dining, it was time to move on, and I landed a job as a personal chef for a lovely client with a family on billionaire row. It was an abrupt change. My client viewed food as the enemy, an evil temptress. She instituted rigid and puritanical measures around all aspects relating to the family’s consumption of food. She emphasized that I was to use very little to no salt, and very little to no oil or butter. Most spices and peppers were also off-limits. I struggled with my pride when I brought my first depressing plates of plain cooked chicken or salmon, plain steamed vegetables, and plain brown rice to the table. Sadly, the deeply flavorful dishes I had spent so many years learning to perfect were suspects on trial. Even the most timid of sauces were disdained with comments like, “We don’t need the extra calories,” or vaguely critiqued as having too much of “something,” too spicy, too salty, or simply just left untouched on the table.

Alone in my client’s immaculately inconvenient kitchen of brushed stainless steel, black granite, and frosted glass, I mourned over the meagerness of the meals I prepared and asked myself, Are they really paying me for this uninspired salad of unseasoned tomatoes and cucumbers? I slowly learned to navigate the sharp handles on the cabinets and surfaces prone to scratches and smudges, and I also began to find ways to cook lighter and simpler meals that didn’t compromise my creativity. I was once again using the skills I had learned in fine dining while respecting my client’s wishes.

The family loved chicken, and I was challenged to cook it many different ways so as not to be repetitive. Overtime, I discovered that I could pan-roast chicken the way I learned to roast duck breast. A duck breast has a thick layer of fat under the skin, so you must render it slowly and patiently over medium-low heat removing the fat with a ladle as you go until the skin is crispy and the fat is melted away. There is less fat in chicken skin than on a duck breast, but in a heavy bottom cast iron skillet over medium heat you can render the chicken skin slowly and patiently in the same way without using oil in the pan. There won’t be excess oil to remove with a ladle, but this technique will yield a delicate and crispy skin without frying in oil.

As I grew comfortable with my client and more confident, I started taking some risks and being more creative, like whisking together a quick sauce of lime, fresh ginger, and grainy mustard to put over roasted carrots, chimichurri for steak, or sofrito to season the rice. When plates came back empty and I heard a compliment or two come my way I felt encouraged to trust my instincts as a cook. I started to push the boundaries a bit further.

One evening I roasted my chicken without oil as I had grown accustomed to doing, but instead of leaving it plain I took the chicken out of the pan and tossed fresh rosemary, thyme, and lemon zest into the skillet with a little pat of butter to briefly sizzle, then spread the mixture over chicken skin and finished roasting it in the oven. It was delicious, probably one of the best chickens I had made in a long time. I felt proud of what I thought was a particularly good meal, once again the empty plates proved that it was a success. I went home happy and confident. Humming along the next day in the kitchen, busy with a batch of whole-wheat cookie dough, I turned around to see my client hovering with her spoon to take a bite of the dough. She smiled a bit, paused, looked right at me holding my gaze and in a tentative voice said, “Is butter on chicken a thing?” It caught me off guard. I had used that pat of butter on the chicken the night before and felt my face flush with a sudden rush of guilt and confusion. My inner chef was beaming, “yes! And wasn’t it a wonderful thing!” But I knew this was not the right answer. Instead of the enthusiastic affirmation of the culinary use of butter on chicken, I stuttered a confession. There had been a bit of butter on the chicken. For the next few weeks I was to follow a new stricter set of demands. She wanted to know every ingredient that I used in their food, the number of calories, and I was to stop using butter at all. Except in cookie dough (which was always an exception).

Other than one tablespoon of butter, this dish is not heavy, and the sauce has a bright, deep complex flavor, and is balanced. Writing this recipe and testing it I realize that you can get by without the extra pat of butter, but I will always add it to mine because it sings a little bit sweeter and it affirms with a head held high, that butter on chicken is truly a wonderful thing!

Serves 4

Ingredients:

· 2 small fresh heirloom young whole chickens (poussin)

· 4 heads of garlic

· 4 sprigs of fresh rosemary

· 1 bunch of fresh thyme

· 3 lemons

· ½ cup white wine

· ¼ cup dry vermouth

· ¾ cup chicken stock

· 1 tablespoon arrowroot or cornstarch

· about ½ cup olive oil, divided

· 1 Tablespoon butter (optional)

· Kosher salt

· 1 Tablespoon fennel seed, toasted and ground with a mortar and pestle

· 1 Tablespoon coriander seed, toasted and ground with a mortar and pestle

· 1 teaspoon black peppercorns, toasted and ground with a mortar and pestle

· Loaf of crusty bread

· 4 generous handfuls of wild arugula

· 2 large bulbs of fennel

· 5 radishes (a variety is nice)

Procedure:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

2. Cut the chicken into 4 portions of airline breast and thigh. Pat dry and bring to room temperature on a wire rack. Reserve the wing tips, thighs, and carcass for stock.

3. Cut the heads of garlic in half. Lay them face up on a double layer of aluminum foil large enough to make a packet for the garlic. Season with kosher salt and pepper. Place 1 sprig of the rosemary and thyme on top of the open face of the garlic. Drizzle 1 Tablespoon of the olive oil over the garlic and wrap tightly. Roast in the 350-degree oven for 30 minutes, or until golden brown and very soft. Once the garlic has roasted, raise the temperature of the oven to 450 degrees. When the garlic is cool enough to handle, pop the cloves out of the skin and set aside. Discard the garlic skins and herbs.

4. While the garlic is roasting prepare your mise en place for the rest of the dish.

a. Toast and grind the fennel, black pepper, and coriander.

b. Remove the leaves from the stems of the herbs and roughly chop them. (You will need about 1 Tablespoon of each.)

c. Portion the bread into 8 hearty slices and lay them out on a sheet tray.

d. Zest and juice two lemons and thinly slice the third.

e. Make a quick vinaigrette for the salad by whisking together the lemon juice, ¼ cup olive oil, salt and pepper to taste.

f. Shave the fennel and radishes with a mandolin and place in a bowl with enough ice water to cover them.

g. Gather and measure the wine, vermouth, and chicken stock. (Swanson’s is best if using a store bought brand.)

h. Make the slurry by adding the cold chicken stock and arrowroot powder to a jar and shaking vigorously, or whisking well in a mixing bowl.

i. Place the vinaigrette, fennel, and radishes in the refrigerator and neatly arrange the herbs, spices, lemon zest, salt, wine, vermouth, chicken stock slurry, and lemon slices next to the burner where you will be searing the chicken.

5. Heat a large cast iron skillet over medium high heat. Season chicken with a generous amount of kosher salt and the black pepper, coriander, and fennel mixture on both sides. Place them in the skillet once it is somewhat hot (no oil is needed). Do not move them around, allow them to sear over medium heat to render and crisp the skin. Check them fairly often by gently lifting them with a tongs. Rotate the pan over the heat source to make sure they brown evenly and if necessary reposition the chicken. Once they are an even deep golden brown, turn them over and cook them for another 3 minutes, then remove them from the pan and place them on a platter skin-side up. Work in batches, cooking two portions at a time.

6. After the chicken is cooked, turn the flame down a bit and add 1 Tablespoon of butter, lemon zest and herbs to the pan, briefly allow the herbs to sizzle in the melting butter. Then spoon this mixture over the chicken. Deglaze the skillet with the white wine and vermouth. Add the chicken broth and ¾ of the roasted garlic. Turn the heat up to high and bring to a rolling boil. Whisk often. When the liquid is clear and slightly thick place the chicken back in the skillet. The liquid should come about halfway up the sides of the pieces, if not, add more stock, or a bit of water. Lay the slices of lemon over the chicken.

7. Place the chicken in the oven and turn the heat down to 375 degrees. Roast the chicken uncovered for 30 minutes. The lemon will brown slightly, but make sure it doesn’t burn. If it is browning too much cover the chicken loosely with a piece of aluminum foil.

8. Mash the remaining ¼ of the roasted garlic and mix with 1 Tablespoon of olive oil. Spread the mixture over the slices of bread, season with salt and pepper. Toast on a sheet tray in the oven during the final 10 minutes of cooking time.

9. Remove the fennel and radishes from the ice water and pat dry on clean towels. Toss the arugula, radishes, and fennel in a large salad bowl with the lemon juice and olive oil vinaigrette. Season with salt and pepper.

10. Serve the chicken in shallow bowls with generous portions of gravy, garlic bread, and the salad on the side.