Chicken Cacciatore (or How Many Ways Can You Cook Chicken)

In my humble opinion, chicken is the most versatile of all meats. There are so many
different recipes and ways to cook it to get significantly different tastes and flavors. Roast chicken is so simple to make and such a comfort food and the leftovers can make a wonderful stock for a huge array of soups or stews. If you think about how many ways there are to cook chicken, it is mind boggling. There is fried chicken, buffalo wings, chicken cordon blue (or saltimbocca), chicken tetrazzini, jerk chicken, cacciatore, chicken fingers, chicken tacos, burritos or enchiladas, chicken gyros, chicken noodle (or rice) soup, coq au vin, chicken fricassé, chicken and dumplings, gumbo with chicken, chicken pot pie, chicken ala king, chicken teriyaki, chicken cutlets, chicken tenders and chicken parmesan. You can cook chicken by different every method: braised, sautéed, baked, roasted, grilled, stewed, etc. You can barbeque chicken, grill it whole or in pieces, marinated, bricked, on a beer can. You can make chicken salad. or have chicken on a salad. How about in Chinese stir fries, Greek marinated, Japanese-style or Mexican? You can cook it with 40 cloves of garlic, chicken satays or pound out some breasts and do a quick fry. Chicken Divan. Chicken fried rice. Chicken Kiev, chicken casserole, creole, stew, hash, paprika or a good old grilled chicken sandwich, breaded and fried or grilled, spiced or not. I particularly like the chicken sautés in From Julia Child's Kitchen, like Poulet sauté bonne femme (Chicken sautéd with potatoes, salt pork and onions). You know, there's not one here that here I haven't tried. Mind-boggling, isn't it.

So what's cooking in Carolina? The other night we had Chicken Cacciatore, also called Hunter's Chicken or Chicken Chasseur. Why you ask? I had several multi-colored peppers that needed to be used or they were going to go bad and I had a few big plum tomatoes from Costco. It had been a few years since I made it so there you have it. The recipe is on our web-site. Swank Recipes The picture is above. I left out the mushrooms (to save a trip to the store) and served over pasta. It was great! Life is good!

Caio or Chow (as we say in the South)!