OLE! Spanish chicken in garlic almond sauce

Annalena fancies herself a MEDITERRANEAN cook, rather than an Italian one, so she explores the repertoire from time to time, venturing out of the safety of the boot, to test other dishes that sound tasty and use the things she likes.

While Annalena sees the value of a boneless, skinless breast of chicken and eats more than her share of them,  in truth, she is a legs girl.  To her, the legs have more flavor, and are more "gratifying" to eat.  They have more texture, more juice, more "chickenness" for lack of a better word. Yes, my health food fans, she knows that they have more calories, and that they have more fat  but the recipe she is about to give you comes in at a whopping 450 calories, if you consider one full leg a serving - and it is.  Annalena found it a bit difficult to even finish this, so give it a try.

It does seem interesting to Annalena that, in her day,  chicken legs were extremely popular.  Wings were almost never eaten,  breasts were eaten but not really much mentioned.  Legs, legs, legs.  Now, however, one is hard pressed to find a recipe for a whole chicken legs. Thighs? Oh yes.  Drumsticks?  Si.  But the whole leg?  Not so much.  And so, we turn to this one which requires it.

The recipe will take you about an  hour to make, from start to finish.  It has some involved steps, but nothing you can't handle.  It's different.  Try it.

We start with four whole chicken legs.  As always, if you have the time, salt them and let them sit in the fridge overnight.  If not, salt and pepper them as far ahead of time as you can, and pat them as dry as you can get them.

While you are letting the chicken sit, measure out a half cup of almonds.  Now, let's stop here for a minute.  Ideally, you will use slivered, or sliced almonds for this dish.  If you do not have them, use the whole unsalted ones.  The skinless ones would be better, but the unskinned ones will work.  If you do use the whole ones, get the toasted variety, and skip the step below where we fry the almonds.  If you try to do it with whole ones, you will burn them .

You also need two cups of crustless bread cubes.  Annalena's recipe called for white bread.  She had a bread that was 1/3 whole wheat, 2/3 white, and it worked just fine.  Any firm country bread will do, as long as it is not a bread that, in the words of Fran Lebovitz  "is so good for you you need an ax to slice it."

Now, chop up four garlic cloves, but don't worry about how fine you make them.  In fact, if you are pressed for time, you can use the whole, peeled cloves.  At this time of year, green garlic is showing up in the market, and you could use a bunch of that too.  If you like the flavor of garlic, you can also increase the quantity here.  It will change the dish, but it will still be tasty.

You also need 2 cups of chicken stock, and then a scant cup of either white wine, or dry sherry, or a mix of these.  Annalena recommends a mix.  Sherry gives the dish a Spanish feel, but too much of it can be overwhelming in a dish.  Finally, you will want a good pinch of saffron, and a chopped onion.

Okay, ragazzi, now we make the dish.  First, we fry those almonds.  Put three tablespoons of olive oil in a big pan, and add the nuts.  Spread them out, so they cook faster, and fry them at medium heat.  Have paper towels ready, and when they begin to brown, scoop the nuts out with a slotted spoon and drain them (remember:  you leave this out with whole nuts).  Now, put those bread cubes into the remaining oil, and move them around, until they begin to crisp up.  In all, the two steps will require, perhaps, six minutes to do.

Put these in a blender with the garlic, the chicken stock, the wine,  and the saffron.  Add some salt as well, and puree this, until it's smooth.  You will get a very creamy looking, ecru colored sauce.  Taste it.

Betcha it's like nothing you ever tasted before.


Now we move to the chicken.  Clean out that pan.  You don't need any oil, because of the fat in the chicken, and the fact that the pan is still warm.  Add the legs, and cook at medium heat, until they brown on one side. If your chicken is dry, this will take about six minutes.  It will take longer if it's not.  Then flip them, and brown the other side.

When the browning is done, you may be stunned at how much fat is in the pan.  Drain it off, and leave about a tablespoon.  Now add the onion and cook it until it begins to brown.  Maybe five minutes here?    When that happens, add the chicken back, and add the sauce.  Cover the pan, lower the heat to a simmer, and let this cook for 20 minutes.  Taste it, and adjust the salt and add pepper if you like.

If you serve this directly from the pan, it will be a very liquid sauce, and the seasonings may seem underdeveloped.  If you leave it to sit, overnight in the refrigerator, the sauce will thicken as the bread picks up moisture.  Reheating it will be fun.  The combination of natural gelatin from the bones of the chicken and the bread turns this into a very solid  "mass,' that needs gentle warming in the oven, rather than high heat at the stove.

The sauce is so rich tasting that you will probably find that, if you serve plain rice, or potatoes, with the meal, you only need one.  Indeed, the Guyman and Annalena ate this with mashed potatoes and spinach, and had a fine meal.  With leftovers.

Bet you wish you were there...