Chicken Marengo Recipe

Marengo, Marengoo? I actually remember someone once saying, “This lemon Merangoo pie is delish!” Well no pie today...

There are a number of dishes that have come to be named after events or persons of the Napoleonic Wars, including the Napoleon puff pastry desert and beef Wellington. Unique amongst these is Chicken Marengo, as this is the only one that is said to have been cooked or created on the battlefield after Napoleons victory at the Battle of Marengo on the 14^th of June 1800.

The tale goes that Napoleons personal cook (I don’t know if you can really call them chefs on a battlefield that sounds kind of wrong. Try the sausage it’s made of people!) made this up after the battle. Napoleon wanted a victory dinner (Slow down there short stuff) and sent the soldiers that still had most of their limbs attached to go foraging (Read ransack and burn peasant cottages) for food. They had apparently either lost the supply wagons or the contents were scattered over a three square kilometer area that was now rather full of ravens. That part is never quite explained, but it is always the same isn’t it? You head into battle with a bagged lunch and then some ba$tard steals it out of the breakroom fridge between your coffee break and your lunchtime.

They came up with some mushrooms, a raggedy chicken, some parsley, onions, crawfish (Shrimp are most often used these days), a couple of mushy tomatoes, and an egg.

Using some of the soon to be emperors private stock of wine (or cognac sources differ, soldiers didn’t have boots, but he had wine? You know that Napoleon went through a bottle of Millefleurs Cologne Every day? Stinky little Corsican shor@r$e... I digress) and his best inventive thoughts the cook threw together the chicken, wine or cognac, the onions, the garlic and the mushrooms, let it simmer with the tomatoes, and then tossed in the crayfish and placed a fried egg on top.

Here is my version, based off Escoffier’s 1895 version without egg or cognac. You can if you wish add eggs by all means do so.

Ingredients:

1 Onion Minced

1 Clove of Garlic Minced

3 Tablespoons of olive oil

4 Chicken breasts Sliced into thick slices

¾ Cup of White wine

½ Cup of chicken stock

2 Tablespoons of tomato paste

3 Chopped tomatoes or 1 cup canned diced tomatoes

½ Pound of mushrooms (Halved if small, quartered if small)

3 Tablespoons of parsley chopped

½ Cups of medium large raw shrimp peeled and deveined

Pinch of sugar if needed

Tarragon if desired

Method:

Heat the olive oil in a heavy bottomed skillet. Sauté the onion and garlic till transparent. Push the onions to the side and add the chicken breasts cook for a couple of minutes till just browned. Add the wine and scrape up any bits that have stuck to the bottom of the pan. Then add the stock and the tomato paste, stir to blend in with the chicken and the onions. Cook covered for ten minutes, add the tomatoes and mushrooms, continue cooking for a further ten to fifteen minutes covered till sauce is slightly thickened and chicken is cooked though. Uncover add the shrimp and cook five minutes further uncovered, sauce should be fairly thick, if not add a teaspoon of cornstarch mixed with a tablespoon of water, stir well till nice and thick. Tastes for seasoning, if needed to counteract acidity add a pinch of sugar.

To serve this? Well I like plain rice or a simple risotto. For a fairly impressive family platter: Place cooked risotto in a ring around the center of a large oval platter, fill the center with Chicken Marengo, and sprinkle with chopped flat leaf parsley.

For a wine? Well this is a puzzler, with both tomato and poultry? A Beaujolais or Riesling is overpowered duct taped and left in a supermarket parking lot as a warning to others. A heavier red such as a pinot noir or Chianti becomes the abductor and overpowers the Marengo, holding it for ransom until the palate can be cleansed. For this dish a not too heady Merlot or Claret-Merlot will actually accentuate the flavors in the dish.

Though again, it is all about enjoyment so if you want to serve a decanted bum-jug of E&J do it, it’s your liver.