Recipe
Pollo alla cacciatora with potatoes
Alla cacciatora means hunter's style, and like most dishes named after hunters, it contains no hunted animal at all.
The usual theory is that this is what a hunter's wife cooked when the hunter came home with nothing, which is a version of events that says a good deal about who was doing the cooking. The likelier explanation is the one that applies to fagioli all'uccelletto elsewhere in this book: a method developed for game got applied to whatever was actually available, the method kept its name, and the game quietly disappeared from it. Wine, herbs, onion and a long slow braise will rescue an old bird or a tough piece of hare, and they do something very good to a chicken thigh as well.
There is no single correct cacciatora and anybody who tells you otherwise is describing their own region. Tuscany uses no tomato whatsoever. Rome adds vinegar and sometimes anchovy. The north puts mushrooms in and the south puts peppers and olives in. What stays constant is the shape of the thing: browned meat, aromatics, an acidic liquid, and time.
This version keeps to wine, rosemary, tomato and mushrooms, and puts the potatoes into the same pan for the last half hour so they cook in the sauce rather than beside it. That is the difference between a dish with a side and a dish that is one thing.
Because it is a braise, all of it improves overnight. The sauce thickens, the rosemary works further in, and the potatoes that were slightly firm on Sunday are exactly right by Tuesday.
Use thighs. Breast has no business in a forty-minute braise and will punish you for putting it there.
- Prep 15 min
- Cook 45 min
- Serves 2
- Cost €
Method
- 1
Season the thighs well. Brown them skin-side down in the oil in a wide heavy pan until the skin is deep gold, then turn briefly. Lift them out.
10 min
- 2
Fry the mushrooms hard in the same fat, in one layer, until browned. Season and lift them out with the chicken.
6 min
- 3
Lower the heat, add the onion with a pinch of salt and cook until soft, then the garlic, rosemary and bay for a minute.
8 min
- 4
Pour in the wine and reduce it by half, scraping the base of the pan clean.
4 min
- 5
Add the tomatoes and stock, return the chicken skin-side up, and tuck the potatoes in around it. Half-cover and simmer gently.
30 min
- 6
Return the mushrooms for the last 5 minutes. Uncover and let the sauce reduce until it coats a spoon. Taste for salt and add a lot of pepper.
6 min
Variations
A handful of black olives and a tablespoon of capers for the southern version. Leave out the tomato entirely and use more wine and stock for the Tuscan one. Two anchovy fillets melted in with the garlic add depth without any fishiness. Rabbit is the traditional meat and cooks in the same time. Serve with polenta or bread instead of the potatoes. Take the skin off before it goes in a lunchbox, since it will not survive the night.