This middle west chicken and dough are much more satisfactory than soup

Writing about Midwestern Foods occasionally feels like a hard sale-a 19th century modern equivalence ads Attracts his returns to the plain. Recently, I have imagined my own billboard: “Pasta or potatoes? You don't have to choose in the middle west. ”

Here I am thinking about my childhood convenience meal: Midwest chicken and pasta. In Iowa, where I grew up, it didn't mean soup. This meant that the juicy pieces of the chicken are steamed with a homemade egg dough with a Roux thick sauce (often complemented with milk or cream), all served with fluffy potatoes.

My health-minded mother often left mashed potatoes-as you think two starch were gilded in the lily. In my opinion, a little gilding is good.

Like many household food, the origin of the mid -west chicken and dough is confusing. Depending on the source, you will find recipes called “Amish”, “midwestern” or “hoosier”. In 1984 a Indianapolis The chicken and the pasta stated that “a food you always find on the true Hoosier table.” Thirty years later, a Iowa City Press Citizen Ordered a “classic Iowa food that evokes pictures of farms and fields.”

I let the “i” states bring it out. Meanwhile, I ate chicken and dough in Roadside Cafes in Missouri and Kansas, and replaced my childhood memories of food with my Ohio-native husband, the serious Eats writer. Jed PortmanOr

The basics of a great chicken and pasta

The basic principles of the big chicken and dough are the same everywhere: simplicity, flavoring and desire for an agricultural worker for easy -to -reach carbohydrates. This simplicity is one of the reasons why I highlighted common aromatics in this recipe. Carrots, celery and onions are good friends for the soup, but chicken and dough should be the most important than super-baked chicken. The only spicy salt and more black pepper than you think.

Given the simple flavor profile, it is expected due to the extra fat and taste of the dark meat chicken. Not that way. Early early I tested the recipes using whole chickens or chicken thighs, but the dark meat is less evenly chopped and the taste of the already heavy food is greasy and soft. The bone chicken breasts of the chicken breasts chickens were the answer to the juicy, essential white meat. The bones help protect their breasts from over -cooking by partially insulating direct heat, ensuring the gentle crumbs of the chicken during every bite.

I almost always prefer my chicken, but not this food. Because the skin is eventually removed, it only throws its taste by browning first. By removing the skin before cooking, this tanned aroma forms on the pectoral meat and remains in the pot, not in the trash.

The nailing of the dough

With such a simple food, all parts should be great. Which means you really need to make the egg set from scratch. Nowadays, many medium -west home chefs get to frozen egg dough, but for me, comfort is not worth it. During the blind tests, I was able to select the dough purchased in the store immediately, which, with their bright gold shades, tasted WAN and Pasty along with fresh, chewy egg dough.

If you have never made homemade dough, this is a low stressful way to try it. The recipe does not need a dough cylinder and does not need particularly permanent hands. The recipe I landed on is actually Niki Achitoff-Gray's excellent recipe fresh pastawith some changes. First of all, the dough uses only egg yolk (he said don't throw whites: Niki has an idea What is the rest of the egg whites). All Yolk pasta crumbles and is less flexible than pasta made with some egg whites, which means they are more acclaimed to work and require extra kneading. But this extra little preliminary disturbance is worth the super gentle, vivid yellow dough that retains its shape during cooking.

The second difference is to ask you to roll out and cut the dough. The egg egg pasta is thicker and more rustic than a delicious Italian pasta. Another reason for the extra heft is to reject egg whites in the dough – in my tests, the dough with any ratio of whites is further swollen during cooking.

Steaming the dough directly in the sauce promotes the thickening of the sauce, resulting in a shiny, silky chicken and dough, the perfect proportion of which is chicken and dough during each bite.

Don't forget the mashed potatoes (or do)

It just leaves the lily sphere. I haven't taken it here with a separate mashed potato puree because I don't think you can do better than Kenji Extremely fluffy with mashed potatoes For this purpose (tl; dr: russsss, rinsing, ricer). Nevertheless, you can undergo in the remaining mashed potatoes until the pudding, creamy breed – the potato should be a stand, not just the starch. No matter what you use, do not weave the spices. An empty canvas doesn't have to be boring.

Of course you can leave the potatoes completely – this is what my mother would do. But the ultimate midwestern comfort of carbohydrates is missing.

Cooking method
(Keep on the screen awake)

For the dough:

• 9 ounce universal flour (255 g; 2 cup), plus more to dust

• 8 yolk -from 8 large egg (6.5 ounce; 180 g😉

• 1 teaspoon Diamond crystal kosher salt; For table salt, use half a quantity

• 1 teaspoon or all the way 2 tablespoon water

For chicken and sauce:

• 1 tablespoon (15 ml) virgin extra olive oil

• 3 osteoporism chicken breastThe skin is removed (approx. 1 pound; 454 g all)

• 4 tablespoon (60 g) butter

• 4 tablespoon (32 g) universal flour

• 4 cup (945 ml) Homemade chicken kit or shop bought in a low sodium chicken soup

• 1 cup (240 ml) water

• 2 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper

• 2 teaspoon Diamond crystal kosher salt; For table salt, use half a quantity

• 1/2 cup (120 ml) heavy whipping cream

To the mashed potatoes:

• 1 dual recipe -y -the Kenji's extremely fluffy mashed potatoes or at least 6 cup (about 1.5 kg) heated mashed potatoes your choice

1. For the dough: Clean, dry work surface flour into a large domb. Make a well in the middle of the hill and pour the egg yolk into it. Add salt and beat with a fork, gradually installed the hill until a sticky dough forms.

2. Use a bench scraper to fold and press the remaining flour into the dough until a dry, crumbly dough forms. Add water, 1 teaspoon at a time and kneaded after each addition, until the dough is tight, smooth balls (you may need up to 2 tablespoons). At this stage, the dough feels quite determined and not very flexible. Wrap the dough tightly into plastic packaging and let it rest at room temperature for at least 30 minutes or 4 hours.

3. After the rest, divide the dough into 2 equal pieces. Set 1 piece of dough to a slightly floured work surface and hold the other piece to avoid drying. Use a rolling tap to roll the dough into a 12 -inch circle. Cut the round half to form two semicircles and then cut each semicircle into 1/4 -level strips in the transverse way. Toss the cut dough with a small amount of flour to prevent attachment and set aside for use.

4. For chicken and sauce: In a large Dutch oven, heat the oil on medium to high heat until glittering. Great seasoning the chicken with salt and pepper on both sides. Add the chicken, the chest down and cook it without moving it until the chicken is deeply browned and approx. It easily release the pan for 7 minutes. Turn the chicken and cook until the lower part of the breast is also deeply browned and sets the heat as needed to avoid scorching, approx. 5 minutes. Place the chicken on the plate and set aside.

5. Add butter to the now empty Dutch oven and heat until melt and foaming falls, approx. For 30 seconds. Add the flour and mix until the scent of the fully built -in and raw flour is cooked, approx. 30 seconds longer. While constantly whisk to avoid lumps, slowly add chicken soup and water in a thin stream. Boil the sauce, then return the chicken and juices to the pot and cook at lower temperatures. Cook, the cooking is twisted halfway until the thicker part of the chicken breast reads 65 ° C (65 ° C) 150 ° F with an instant reading thermometer for 20-25 minutes. Remove the vessel from the heat. Use the pliers to carry the chicken from the sauce to a large heat -resistant bowl.

6. With 2 forks, chop the chicken and discard the bones. Return the pot to medium to high heat and add dough. Boil, occasionally mixed to prevent the knot until the dough is gentle for 10-15 minutes.

7. Return the chicken in a dish, mix and remove it from heat. Thin, if necessary, 1/2 cup (120 ml) with auxiliary broth to reach thick velvety sauce that coats the chicken and dough. Stir in the cream and season it to taste it with salt and pepper. For serving, spoon with a generous chicken, dough and sauce with mashed potatoes.

Special equipment

Bench scraper, large Dutch oven, instant reading thermometer, rolling tap

Make-Head and Storage

The remaining chicken and dough can be cooled in airtight container for up to 4 days. Heat in a Dutch oven in a medium heat on the stove, stirring occasionally until it warms up. Thin, if necessary, with additional water to restore thick sauce -like texture.