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Chicken Valencienne
Procure a nice, tender two-and-a-half-pound roasting chicken. Cut off the head and feet; singe, draw, wipe dry and truss nicely. Arrange a thin border of lard over the breast of the chicken, nicely tied. Peel and cut into half-inch square pieces one small, sound Spanish onion, one ounce lean raw ham, cut the same way, and one clove sound, chopped garlic. Place these in an earthen pot, if possible, sufficiently large to hold the chicken. Add one tablespoon good oil. Lay the chicken over and place the pot in the hot oven for ten minutes, or till it gets a nice light golden colour; then draw the pot to the oven door. Add two gills raw Italian rice, four sweet Spanish peppers cut into half-inch squares and two tablespoons green peas. Season with a light tablespoon salt, half teaspoon white pepper, a very little Spanish saffron (or a saltspoon), and one stalk parsley, finely chopped. Moisten with a heavy pint hot broth or water and a good gill white wine. Cover the pot and place in the oven again to cook for forty-five minutes. Remove from the oven, take up the chicken from the pot, dress the rice, etc., on a hot dish, arrange the chicken on the rice and send to the table.
N. B. When drawing poultry of any kind split the gizzards in two, then carefully remove the sandy pouch, wash well in clear, cold water and add to the white broth "stock pot", as well as the hearts and livers.
A rice-and-chicken casserole in the Valencian manner, written for a coal range and an earthenware pot. Nothing here is difficult, but the measurements are pre-metric American and the salt is out of step with modern taste.
- The hinge: liquid to riceTwo gills of rice is one cup; a "heavy pint" of broth plus "a good gill" of wine is a little over 2 cups plus 1/2 cup. That ratio, somewhere near 2 1/2 or 3 to 1, suits short-grain rice, which drinks more than long-grain. Measure it rather than eyeballing, since there is no stirring or topping up once the lid goes on.
- Oven temperaturesThe recipe asks only for a "hot oven," by the conventions of the period roughly 400-450F, and gives no second setting. Lowering to about 350F for the covered 45 minutes is a modern adjustment if the liquid looks like boiling away before the bird is done.
- SaltA light tablespoon of salt for a 2 1/2-lb bird and a cup of rice is far more than most cooks now want, especially with ham and commercial broth already salted. Start with a teaspoon or so and correct at the end.
- The lard borderThis is barding: a thin sheet of pork fatback tied over the breast to keep it from drying. Ask a butcher for fatback, or use a couple of slices of unsmoked streaky bacon. It is not lard from a tub.
- Sweet Spanish peppersFresh red pimiento-type peppers, sweet and thin-walled. Red bell pepper is the ordinary substitute; jarred piquillos, added late so they do not disintegrate, are closer in flavour.
- Italian rice and saffronArborio or carnaroli, or Spanish bomba, all short-grain and absorbent. A saltspoon is about 1/4 teaspoon, which is a great deal of saffron by today's prices; a large pinch of threads crushed and steeped in a little of the hot broth gives the colour and perfume.
- DonenessForty-five minutes assumes a genuinely small bird. Modern chickens of the same weight are broader in the breast, so check the thigh joint reads 165F before serving; if the rice is ready first, lift the chicken out and let the rice sit covered off the heat.
- Drawing and trussingSupermarket birds arrive drawn and singed, so the head, feet and gizzard instructions are historical. The note about splitting the gizzard to remove the grit sac still applies if you buy a whole farm bird with the giblets in.
- YieldServes four as written, with the rice as the substantial part of the plate.
The name points to Valencia, the rice-growing region where paella developed, and the dish is essentially a paella built in a covered pot rather than a shallow open pan: sofrito of onion, ham and garlic, short-grain rice, saffron, sweet peppers and peas, all cooked in one vessel with the meat. The earthenware pot specified here is the older Spanish habit, the cazuela, which holds and evens out heat in a way that suited both a wood oven and the fierce top heat of a coal range. The phrasing throughout, from "procure" to the stock-pot footnote, is that of a professional chef dictating to an amateur. The instruction to save hearts, livers and cleaned gizzards for the white stock pot is the genuinely period detail, from a kitchen where nothing edible left the room.