Vallée d'Auge Chicken

Ingredients :

- 1 whole chicken

- 25 gr of butter

- 2 shallot

- 1 little carrot

- 1 bouquet garni (Thyme, bay leaves, parsley)

- 5 cl of Calvados

- 10 cl of whipping cream

- Salt, pepper

- 2 Apples (pippins)

- Home made Chicken stock

- 1 Tablespoon of sugar

- 300 gr of white mushrooms

- 40 gr of butter

Preparation :

Cut the chicken into 4 or 6 pieces and season them well with salt and pepper. Heat the butter inside of a cooker and brown the pieces of chicken one after the other. 

Always begin the browning of the chicken with the skin side. As soon as it is brown, flip the piece.

Chop the shallots, cut the carrot into little dices. When all the pieces of chicken are brown, set them aside into a plate and pour the fat away from the cooker. Add the shallots and the carrot, a pinch of salt, and stir for a couple of minutes on high heat. Put the pieces of chicken back into the cooker.

Heat the Calvados into a little ladle, set it on fire, and put it inside the cooker. When there is no fire anymore, stir and add the bouquet garni and the chicken stock. Boil it for 5 minutes, put a lid on the cooker and let it cook for 45 minutes on low heat. (You can replace the chicken stock by some apple cider.

During the cooking, peal the apples, cut the core away and cut them into 8 pieces. Saute them inside of 20 gr of butter in a frying pan, sprinkle some sugar until they look a little caramelized. Don't let them cook for too long because they could be too soft.

In the same time in another frying pan, saute the mushrooms with the rest of the butter, in high heat. Set all aside.

When the chicken is ready, take the pieces out and keep them warm. Boil the juice to reduce by half.  Add the cream and boil it off a second time until the sauce gets thicker. Taste and season the sauce. You can filter the sauce, or keep it this way. Dress the plates with mushrooms, the chicken on top of them, and add some apples. Add then a little bit of sauce for the decoration but present the rest of the sauce inside of a sauce boat.

You can use bread with the sauce (it is delicious that way) or you can dress your plates with spaghetti or rice.

Note : The best menu for this dish would be to have some white wine and end up with a delicious aged Camembert.