I’m a big fan of clean-out-the-refrigerator cooking. It is the most satisfying thing especially when the dish turned out to be exceptionally delicious. This chicken in white wine is exactly that. I used a bottle of Chardonnay that has been left in the fridge for some time and eventually turned into an eyesore whenever I open the fridge.
Cooking is all about creativity. This dish is very simple to put together, using only a few ingredients and is very accommodating to modifications. You can use chicken breast in place of chicken legs, just bear in mind that chicken breast are larger so adjust your ingredients accordingly. I suppose two breast is equivalent to about three legs. You can use any type of white wine. The one I used was on the tart side so I added some mirin to balance the flavor. Mirin is my favorite thing to use for cooking. It provides balance to any dish. If you can’t get hold of mirin, just replace it with sugar. This dish was cooked using a cast iron pan. Don’t worry if you don’t have one, just cook on stovetop with any skillet pans you have and move the chickens to a casserole dish to bake in the oven. You can always do without the camembert cheese but it adds a great flavor to the dish.
Chicken in White Wine and Camembert
- 3 chicken legs, skin on
- 1 red onion, peeled and sliced
- 1 cup of white wine
- 1-2 tablespoons of mirin
- Knob of butter
- Salt and pepper
- 3 wedges of camembert cheese
Preheat the oven to 220C and position the rack at the highest tier. Rub the chicken with some salt and pepper. Set aside.
Heat up a cast iron pan, add a knob of butter and let it sizzles. Add onions and saute on medium heat until soft. Now add the chicken skin side down and let it cook for 5 minutes until slightly brown. Turn over and cook for another 5 minutes. Add half of the wine and let the liquid cook down to half the volume. Add the remaining wine and the mirin. Season with more salt and pepper to taste.
Place the pan into the oven and bake for about 20 minutes, baste once or twice with the liquids in the pan. Once done, place a wedge of camembert cheese on each chicken and let it melt ever so slightly for a minute or less in the oven. Remove the pan from oven.
Serve with bread on the side, for soaking up the juicy wine sauce. Bon appétit!