Black-eyed peas and uncanny chicken
the first recipe in my sporadically pursued project, the Down-At-Heel Gen-X Cookbook
I know no one comes here for recipes, but I’m just proud of coming up with this one. The roasting of vegetables and meat in a Dutch oven, beginning with little to no liquid, is simply a lovely thing. And look at these pictures!
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Not all Boomers and Gen Xers came out financially stable. Even with inflation, I still found chicken drumsticks for 99¢ a pound. All the vegetables were purchased at Super King in Glassell Park, except the dried chilis which were a gift from friends whose restaurant business had gone under and was being cannibalized for parts.
So, there’s several things that have to all be going on at about the same time:
Get about 4 lbs of chicken drumsticks. In a big glass or ceramic bowl, massage them in olive oil and smoked paprika or whatever smokey powdered shit you have. Put the bowl in the fridge and do other stuff, such as…
…make a brine: Add a cup of salt, a tablespoon of whole black peppercorns, 6 big dried chilis like ancho, pasilla negro, guajillo, or New Mexico chilies – nothing hotter than guajillo – stems broken off, four dry bay leaves, a teaspoon of Vietnamese fish sauce, a quarter of a red onion, the whitest 4 inches of 6 scallions, one or more chopped red Thai birds-eye chilis (as desired heat demands), and 6 smashed garlic cloves to 4 quarts of water. Heat on the stove till the water is dark, the onion transparent and limp, and the chilis limp (you want them easy to blend but not too easy, feel me?).
Get a pound of black-eyed peas and boil them till they’re way tender, like almost falling apart or even more. Maybe you should have started this before the brine, I dunno. Drain and discard the cooking water. Let the peas sit there, they won’t go nowhere. Salt them and toss them about just to bring out their flavor.
Put a thin layer of neutral oil in the bottom of a Dutch oven. Put in a whole mid-size beet, a large turnip cut in half, cut side down in the oil, 4 potatoes (any kind), a big-ass carrot, and about 3 heads worth of peeled garlic cloves. Drizzle a little olive oil over the top and sprinkle salt, too. If you’ve heated the brine already, put the limp red onion in, too. Cover and bake at 400ºF for 40 minutes. Then remove and leave alone.
When the brine is pretty cool, say a couple hours, ladle the brine into the bowl with the chicken drumsticks so they can brine for at least four hours.
In a big stew pot, sautée two cups of chopped yellow onion, the white parts of the scallions from the brine, a large red Anaheim pepper, and a couple chopped red Thai birds-eye chili (more if you’re into it) in olive oil. Put in about a half-cup of the cooked black-eyed peas and continue sautéeing. When the onions are transparent, season with salt and pepper. Deglaze with the brine (you should still have a lot of left in the pot you heated it in). Add the rest of the beans and enough brine to get them cooking nicely in a thick stew. Blend the reconstituted chilis (from the brine) and put that paste in the bean stew. Add a couple of the chicken drumsticks (even if they haven’t brined for that long) to the bean stew, add about a 1/4 cup of ground cumin, 1/4 cup of rice vinegar, season with salt and pepper (yes, again), and stew those chicken drumsticks in the bean stew on low heat for a good long time.
When the Dutch oven has cooled off a bit, take all the vegetables out and put them aside in a bowl. Leave in whatever little bit or big bit of liquid or oil is left. Put the rest of the chicken drumsticks in the bottom to make as much like a single layer as possible. Drizzle some olive oil on them and season them with salt and pepper. Squeeze the juice of a whole lemon on them. Put a healthy later of cumin over them, again about a 1/4 cup. Add a tsp of cinnamon and one of allspice. Sprinkle with granulated garlic. Cover and put it in a 400ºF oven for 50 minutes.
In the bean stew, take the meat off the two drumstick bones and mix them into the stew. Toss the bones or save them for making stock.
While you’re at it, dump the brine the chicken was marinating in. Don’t dump the other brine, the stuff left in the pot, though, assuming there’s any left. Use it to thin the bean stew if it’s getting too thick.
When the Dutch oven with the chicken in it has been in for 50 minutes, take it out, uncover it, move all the drumsticks to one side in a pile, ladle the drippings (there should be a lot at the bottom) over the pile till you think they’ve all a had some basting. Ladle the rest of the drippings into a bowl. Put the vegetables from earlier back in: potatoes and beet under the drumsticks, redistribute the drumsticks, and put the carrot, turnip halves, and all the garlic cloves on top. Ladle the rest or a least a goodly amount of drippings over the drumsticks and vegetables (don’t submerge everything, though). Squeeze a half lemon on and season with salt. Cook in the still hot 400ºF oven for another thirty minutes or until done to your liking. Ovens are all different. Be wary, that’s all.
When serving the bean stew, squeeze lemon juice into each bowl and make sure there’s salt and hot sauce available.
As for a side vegetable, I tossed some green beans in a little butter. Do what you like.
Any drippings or brine left over, dispose of or repurpose as your conscience dictates.
Eat drumsticks, bean stew, and your root vegetables and garlic with a nice pilsner or hoppier ale if you’re that way.
Serves about 4 to 6 folks, or just eat it all yourself over a period of days, reheating it covered in the Dutch oven for an hour at 250ºF if you’re constantly alone like I am. You deserve tasty food even if you aren’t set up to entertain, right? Also, don’t be ashamed of drinking alone. Unless it becomes a real problem.
Yum!
oh boy