One Pan Chicken With Shallots

This delicious one pan chicken dish with a Dijon white wine sauce is quite easy to put together and one of those dishes that once you have your prep done and chicken browned you are set to just allow it to simmer and do it’s thing until it’s cooked through. The pan juices are delicious - Dijon, white wine and thyme plus all the flavours from browning the chicken. Those are always the makings of something delicious. The shallots are sweet and caramelized by the time the dish is done. They sort of melt away in the pan. The tomatoes are extra but add just the right amount of acidity to the overall dish. I have made it with or without them and I love the dish both ways but I do enjoy the extra texture and acidity that they add to balance out the dish.

This is a recipe I saw in my inbox from NYT cooking - I’m on their email list and this recipe was on their weekly series ‘what to cook this week’. It’s a wonderful recipe by Rishia Zimmern that was printed in the New York Times a while back. I was drawn to it immediately for a few reasons. It’s a simple one pan chicken dish.  Chicken thighs specifically.  If you don’t already know this about me I’m a leg and thigh girl/ dark meat. Im not just being cheap about it - I am not a fan of chicken breast and neither is my husband. (We will eat it but it’s not our preferred part of a chicken) I know what you are thinking it’s because I’m not cooking it right. It’s not that. For me it’s a weird textural thing. With all meat in fact - esp cuts that are on the thicker side like chicken breast and steak and even pork chops. I go through phases where I just don’t eat it all. For me bone in thighs not only have better flavour, cook faster, but they also never turn me off texturally - except for when I’m cleaning them but that is a whole other story - don’t get me started on cleaning chicken and my chicken juice phobia.  

There are more reasons I was drawn to this recipe other than it being made with thighs (you can definitely make this with breast or leg and thigh pieces too - just increase cooking time as needed).  There is a beloved Greek stew called stifado that is made with any stewing meat and pearled onions. I love it and I immediately thought of it when I saw this recipe. I just had to make it.  I was also drawn to it is because it’s a one pan dish.  Less cleanup and just perfect on it’s own with crusty bread and a salad or a simple side like rice or mashed potatoes or even a creamy cauliflower mash.  It’s easy enough for a midweek dinner but fancy enough for a dinner party.

Let’s talk about some substitutions. This recipe works really well with thyme but feel free to switch it up with any of your favorite herbs. The wine is not an ingredient I would substitute because it is one of the main ingredients of the sauce. Some people use a non alcoholic wine as a substitute and that is fine if you like to drink non alcoholic wine.  I don’t and I only cook with wine I drink. If you are concerned about adding alcohol to your food, just remember the alcohol will burn off in most cooking procedures.  The shallots can be substituted with pearl onions but they take some effort to peel so I would definitely stick to shallots. You cannot just substitute that amount of shallots with regular onions because onions have too strong a flavour. Shallots are mellow and sweet. When it comes to the flour it adds to the browning process plus acts as a thickener for the sauce. I wouldn’t omit it but if you are gluten intolerant feel free to substitute it for a GF flour. One thing I noticed about the recipe that I should mention is that because it’s partially cooked with the lid on, it loses its crispy skin. The flavours are there but the skin isn’t crunchy. The stewing and steaming sort of soften it.  I want to make sure you understand that so you don’t expect crispy skin. That being said what I have done in the past is keep the lid off and allow it too cook a bit longer in the sauce to fully cook through. This means that you will have to watch over it a bit more to ensure the pan juices do not reduce so much that there is none left for the chicken to cook in and burn the chicken.  I would add in a bit of broth a little at a time as needed to ensure there is enough pan juices for the chicken to simmer away in and fully cook through and still maintain crispy skin.  And that is pretty much it.  

It’s a chicken dish we love and is one we make a lot and I think you are going to love it as much as you guys love the other chicken dishes I have on the blog like my chicken Marbella, my coque au vin blanc, my cider braised chicken, and my Creamy One Pan Lemon Garlic Chicken Are you noticing a trend? There are quite a few one pan chicken dishes on the blog and I still have a few up my sleeve so stay tuned.