My grandmother was known as a great cook and had some delicious recipes that were passed down over the years. One recipe we didn't get was her chicken cacciatore. My dad loved that dish and wanted to make it a part of our repertoire of family recipes. Sadly, there was no cookbook or written recipe that we could find to match it since cacciatore is an Italian term for a baked dish, and everyone has their own take on it. Thus began a series of attempts to recreate that dish as my dad remembered it. Many interesting meals followed, but most were not what he yearned for. He ultimately decided that one Texas Barbeque Sauce recipe (I made a handwritten copy of it long ago, so you can e-mail me if you would like it.) that he found in one of Mom's cookbooks was the closest thing to it if he added some onion and celery and baked everything afterwards.
Here's what he did: He would make the sauce, a rather standard barbeque sauce found in similar forms in most cookbooks of the time. Then he would fry chicken pieces with the skin left on. He then transfered the chicken to a casserole dish, covered it first with a small yellow onion thinly sliced and then half a cup of diced celery, and he ended by pouring the whole batch of sauce over it. The dish baked about an hour at 375 F. It was delicious!!! The chicken came out juicy and had soaked up most of the flavors of the sauce. I especially loved it served over rice. My dad, the mashed potato king, always wanted to have it served over mashed potatoes to soak up the succulent sauce.
Well, many years ago I decided to make it, and the dish has been evolving since then. First, I elimated the two frying pans and a casserole in favor of what QVC calls a saucier (Sp?). Second I eliminated a few of the ingredients...cayenne pepper, Worchestershire sauce and tomato juice. Third, I added a lot more onion and celery plus added chopped green bell pepper. Even more recently, I end up the final sauce by balancing the vinegar and brown suger to get a sweet and sour flavor.
Here's my method:
- First , make the sauce in a big, double handled saucier on the stove.
- Second, put in boneless, skinless, most fat removed chicken thighs, some cut into large chunks.
- Third, bake it for about an hour at 375 F.
- Fourth, serve it over rice.
Although I add things to taste now and don't follow the recipe, here's an approximation of my recipe:
- 1 large yellow onion diced
- 4-5 ribs of celery sliced
- one large green or red bell pepper chopped into about 1" squares
- olive oil to cover the bottom of the pan for browning
- 1/2 cup catsup
- two cans chopped tomatoes, using all of the juice, preferably the kind with basil and garlic in it
- 1 cup water or chicken broth
- 1/3 cup cider vinegar
- 1/3 cup brown sugar
- 1 tsp smoked paprika (ground, Spanish)
- 1 T dry mustard
- 2 T chili powder (I always used a brand called "Grandma's" but can no longer find it. It is NOT spicy.)
- one package of boneless, skinless chicken thighs (All other parts are good, but come out a bit dry because of cutting off the skin and fat.)
- NOTE: I don't use any salt because there is plenty of flavor for me and the tomatoes and catsup have enough salt for the whole dish.
I carmelize the onions in olive oil, adding the celery and pepper part way through browning to begin cooking. Then I pour on the liquids and tomatoes, stir in the brown sugar and sprinkle the spices on top. After stirring to blend, I leave the whole mixture to simmer for 10 to 20 minutes on the stovetop while the oven preheats. I adjust the sweet and sour balance and lay the chicken pieces into the sauce and spoon the vegetable sauce to cover them. Leaving everything in the saucier, I put it in the oven to bake for about and hour at 375 F.
The cacciatore is served diretly from the saucier, eliminating one more dish to wash. I like to serve it over rice with a green salad side. The photo at the top of this post is my most recent cacciatore just after I took it out of the oven. It was delicious but slightly on the "sour" side after I added a bit too much cider vinegar.
Do you know where they still sell Grandma's chile powder? Please let me know if you find it!
