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Chicken Hash
1 1/2 cups chopped chicken 1 cup diced boiled potatoes 2 tablespoons fat 1 tablespoon parsley Salt Pepper 1/2 cup stock or water Mix the chicken and the potatoes lightly together. Melt the fat in the blazer, add the potato and meat, parsley, seasoning and stock, and cook directly over the flame. If desired, one-fourth cup of chopped green peppers may be added.
A chafing-dish recipe from the era when hash was finished in front of guests rather than in the kitchen. It is built from leftovers, so the quality of the cooked chicken and potatoes decides the dish.
- The blazerThe blazer is the shallow upper pan of a chafing dish, used directly over the flame without the hot-water bath beneath it. A 9- or 10-inch skillet does the same job on a burner.
- "Cook directly over the flame"Direct heat rather than the hot-water bath means a hotter pan, which will drive off the stock and can let the underside brown. The recipe gives no time; allow several minutes without stirring once the liquid has mostly gone, then turn it in sections.
- FatIn a recipe of this period this would mean butter, bacon fat, or rendered chicken fat. Two tablespoons is about the minimum for browning; three is easier in a pan that is not nonstick.
- Boiled potatoesThe recipe assumes potatoes already cooked. Cold, firm boiled potatoes dice and crisp better; very freshly boiled ones tend to break down and go pasty.
- Stock quantityHalf a cup is enough to moisten and no more. If the mixture still looks wet after ten minutes, raise the heat rather than adding time.
- SeasoningCooked chicken and boiled potatoes are both bland; assume about 3/4 teaspoon salt and a generous grinding of pepper, and taste before serving.
- YieldAbout 2 1/2 cups finished hash, which serves two as a light supper or four as part of a larger table.