This is a quintessentially French dish with a classic cream sauce. It is rich, so small portions are adequate. I have included very few dishes with creamy sauces in The Cook’s Companion but could not resist this memory of the Bresse countryside where the finest chickens are said to grow. Cut the breast fillets from a grain-fed, free-ranged 2 kg chicken and reserve the legs for another day.
Ingredients
1 teaspoon paprika
2 tablespoons plain flour
2 chicken breast fillets, skin on
salt
freshly ground black pepper
1 cup parsley, freshly chopped
1 egg
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
¼ cup Clarified Butter*
¼ cup verjuice
½ cup Chicken Stock
½ cup crème fraîche
500 g small Swiss brown mushrooms, thickly sliced
*To clarify butter, melt and simmer butter until the solids fall to the bottom of the saucepan, then ladle the liquid butter through a damp muslin cloth into a bowl. The clarified butter in the bowl will set solid and can be refrigerated, covered, for weeks without fear of rancidity.
