Lizze, my enthusiastic kitchen accomplice, was ready at the helm on this one. She watched me wash and pan my two 3.5 lb organic chickens with onions, carrots, celery, and garlic cloves. We started with the roasting of the chickens on Monday. The recipe below does not include this step, you can totally roast or boil the chicken the day of, but I'm funny about wanting to make my own broth and wanting to skim ALL the fat off and skimming fat is much easier after a nights rest in the refrigerator.
On Tuesday, Lizzie was especially helpful in deboning the chicken with me. Actually, she was sampling as fast as I could debone - amazing when she has taken a sabatical from eating well for the last 5 weeks! So - I was totally going with this. Even if it meant she would be too full for her actual dinner! I browned 2 onions in my Great Grandma's heavy cast iron pot and then slowly added the chicken broth from the day before (minus all the solids that I strained out including the hunk of congealed fat that so nicely floats and hardens on top). This equaled to about 1 c of broth. I added another 4 cups of store bought broth. Then I added about half the paprika and the chicken to the pot and simmered for 1.5 hrs. Once this was done, I mixed the flour with the sour cream and thinned it with some of the broth from the pot, ensuring no flour lumps b/c these would make your entire stock lumpy. Then, add the sour cream flour mixture VERY slowly to the chicken, whisking all the while to ensure no lumps. Then, just reheat to a simmer and your all done with the Paprikash. Easy!
Spaetzle Time! For those who are even thinking about being intimidated by making a homemade dumpling, let me tell you, it takes longer to get your pot of boil to water, than to make these spaetzles. (Unless you have a gas stove - and if you do - can I arrange for a trade?) Having a speatzle maker is also key. I have never hand cut my dumplings even though I know it can be done, seems and uneccessary and very daunting task. I love spaetzles so much, the $15 invesment is well worth it. I actually have two kinds of makers, the one you see pictured and another one which looks more like a cheese grater. The cheese grater style is my favorite, but this round style was the first one I came to, so I went with it.
Chicken Paprikash - This recipe is enough for 8+ servings.
2 - 3.5 lbs whole chickens (or chicken pieces -whatever you prefer or have on hand)
2 Lg onions
2.5 Tbs paprika
16 oz sour cream
10 Tbs flour
salt and pepper
5 cups chikcen broth (i made my own using the drippings from the roast chicken. I roasted my chicken with garlic, celery, onions and carrots)
If you don't roast your chickens beforehand, brown chicken in the large pot that you are going to make the entire meal in. Lg heavy cast iron pot or other. Once chicken is browned, remove and saute the finely chopped onion. Then put chicken back in pot (this is where you'd pick up in the recipe if you decided to roast your chicken beforehand) and add broth and 1.5 Tbs paprika and simmer 1.5 hrs till done. Remove chicken, skim fat. In a seperate small bowl, whisk flour into the sour cream till smooth and then thin with some chicken broth. Add slowly to your large pot so it doesn't lump. Add the remainder of the paprika. Simmer till thickened then add back the cooked chicken and simmer until you serve. Serve over spaetzles or if you whimp out, your favorite shaped noodle - like elbow, shell, or rotini.
This pic is of Lizzie's dinner plate!
2 C flour
1 Tbs farina
2 Lg eggs
3/4 c milk (add slowly b/c you may need less or more if batter is too thin/thick, should be mostly dry but sticky/wet enough to drip through the holes of the speaetzle maker into small dumplings)
3/4 tsp salt
2 Tbs butter
* I doubled this recipe twice in order to make two batches of speaetzles. One batch to take to Meghan, Patrick and Jude and one batch for us to eat. I cooked each batch seperately, but you probably don't have to if your pot is large enough.
I dare you not to eat mouthfuls of the heavenly buttered delights before serving them to your family for dinner. Double Dare!
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