Marbled Rye Chicken and Dressing
Quality Ingredients & Time
When you think of dressing or stuffing, you tend to think cornbread or bread. But what happens when you make dressing with something besides white bread? I happened to have an abundance of marbled rye from one of the best baking companies in the United States. Turano has been baking bread for over half a century. The marble rye panini bread I happen to have on hand is baked on stone. The crust is better than fresh pizza crust. It is just a phenomenal product. I am not doing anything unbelievably new when it comes to dressing, but rather showing you how to use the best ingredients to obtain the best results.
Quality includes making your own chicken stock. Making stock is easy and a great way to clean out the refrigerator. Boil a whole chicken, debone, and put the bones back in the stock. You get the added benefit of the flavors and nutrients from the bone as your stock reduces.
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 200F. Put a large, rinsed chicken with giblets in a stock pot and cover with water. Add 4 eggs (to hard boil), two stalks of celery, a peeled carrot, a portion of the onion, garlic, sage, and rosemary. Bring to a boil. Remove eggs after 12 minutes of boiling and submerge them in ice water. Peel and reserve eggs.
- Cut bread into cubes and place on a foil lined cookie sheet. Bake at 200F until the bread starts to become crispy (~30 minutes). Turn off the oven and leave the bread there until needed. *If your bread is already old and dry skip this step and just cut it into cubes.
- After the chicken has boiled for 1 1/2 hours, remove it from the stock and let cool on a cutting board. When cool enough to touch, debone the chicken meat. Return the remaining bones, skin, etc. to the stock pot. Cook the stock on boiling high to reduce. Just before combining the bread with other ingredients, drain the stock into a bowl using a colander. You should have 3-4 cups of stock. You can always add water if needed.
- While the stock is reducing, bring a sauté pan to medium high. Add 4 tbsp butter. Sauté remaining celery and onion. When softened add the garlic and sauté for an additional 2 minutes.
- Put the bread pieces into an extra large bowl. Put the deboned chicken on top of the bread. Pour the celery onion, garlic, butter mixture over both. Wisk the remaining eggs and add. Pour the stock over the bread mixture. Stir well to combine. Taste, and add additional seasonings as desired. Now is the time to adjust salt, pepper, sage, rosemary, garlic powder, and onion powder to taste.
- Melt 2 tablespoons of butter in a 10" cast iron skillet at 350F. Melt an additional 2 tbsp butter in the oven on microwave. Pour the dressing mixture into the cast iron skillet. Pour the additional butter over the top of the dressing.
- Bake at 350F for 45 minutes. Remove from the oven and let sit for 10 minutes before cutting.
Celery, Onion, Garlic
Deboned Chicken
Boiling Stock
Dried Bread
Mixing the Dressing
Drained Chicken Stock
© 2019 Melissa Holton
