Poulet Sauté Parmentier

Poulet sauté Parmentier (butter-browned chicken with potatoes) teaches one true thing: the potatoes must take colour in butter before they enter the oven. Put them in pale and they remain pale, however long you glare through the oven door. Colour first, then finish them beside the bird.

The old entry assumed an oval spoon-cutter, another pair of hands frizzling potatoes while the chicken browned, and a saucier drawing veal gravy from a stockpot never off the fire. At home, equal large dice replace the decorative olive shape, one heavy ovenproof skillet handles the work in sequence, and a spoonful of properly prepared veal gravy supplies the same concentrated foundation. The spoon-cutter and parallel workflow were brigade scaffolding, so they go. The butter colouring, oven finish, white wine deglaze, and original proportion of one pound of potatoes to one chicken stay. One cook, one stove, one evening.

The finished platter should carry deep-golden chicken, butter-glossed potatoes with crisp bronze corners, and just enough sauce to moisten everything without drowning the crust. Give the potatoes their colour before they meet the oven. That is the step that decides the dish.