Chicken a la Marengo

Category: Meat dishes

Ingredients
chickens	2 pcs.
Wheat flour	for rolling chickens
olive oil	for frying
tomatoes	2-3 pcs.
Champignon	250 g
dry white wine	200 ml
cognac	3 tbsp. l.
garlic	4 cloves
Bay leaf	2 pcs.
rosemary	2-4 branches
capers or olives (optional)	2 tbsp. l.

Cooking method

Wash, dry and cut the chickens into pieces.
Salt the pieces and brew well in flour.
Fry 2 crushed garlic cloves in a deep frying pan (roasting pan, saucepan) in olive oil, and discard as they brown. Fry the breaded chicken pieces in garlic oil, season with black pepper.
Then you can go in two ways: 1) add the rest of the ingredients and continue to simmer in the same pan, or 2) put the ingredients in a baking dish and bake in the oven.
We took the second path.
Drain the oil and pour in the wine.
Scrape the bottom with a spatula, allowing the wine to absorb the meat juice.
Put chopped tomatoes, the remaining garlic (crush), rosemary, salt in a mold.
Add champignons cut into halves, bay leaves, salt.
Capers (olives) can be added for piquancy.
Place the fried chicken on top of the mushrooms.
Pour in the wine sauce.
Drizzle with cognac.
Put in the oven.
After a while, the mushrooms and tomatoes will release the juice. Wait until about half of the juice has evaporated and the sauce thickens.
Serve with toasted white bread and white dry wine.
You can sprinkle with chopped parsley.
Bon Appetit!
P.S. This dish can be very easily transformed into something completely different the next day.
Place the chicken and mushroom chunks (no tomatoes) into a baking dish. On a preheated skillet, strain the remaining sauce through a sieve. Sift flour (1-2 tablespoons) and mix thoroughly. Boil the flour base and add cream. Season with salt and pepper. For lovers of soy sauce, this is just the case when you can add it. Cook over low heat for a few minutes to mix the flavors. Try the sauce. Season, if necessary, and pour into the meat pan. Let simmer in the oven for 20 minutes. Serve with toasted bread. Voila! Two meals in one!

The dish is designed for

6 servings

Note

The Secret Conspiracy, Alexandre Dumas

“... As soon as Bonaparte got up and dressed in a full morning suit, his man appeared, shaved and combed his hair, while the secretary or adjutant read him the newspapers, starting with Le Moniteur. He was seriously interested only in English and German newspapers.
“Read on,” he said as he listened to the French newspaper, “I know what they write,“ only what I like.
At the end of the toilet, he went down to his office. Above we talked about what he did in his office.
At ten o'clock, as you know, he was called to breakfast.
The head waiter himself appeared with a report, saying:
- Breakfast is served to the general.
He did not even call him First Consul.
Breakfast was simple: every morning he was served one of his favorite foods, such as chicken fried in Provencal oil and garlic, a food that the chefs later called “chicken a la Marengo". Bonaparte drank little; he drank Bordeaux or Burgundy, preferably the latter.
After breakfast and after dinner, he invariably drank a cup of black coffee, but never drank it in between meals ... "

Reference:
- a la Marengo (a la Marengo) - in Provencal oil with garlic;
- Provence oil is an old name for olive oil from the French province of Provence.