Braised chicken with tarragon is a classic French dish.
But braised chicken is winter cooking.
This is summer; we don’t braise in the summer.
I do have an abundance of tarragon, though.
I love tucking things under the skin of chicken before grilling. It lets all the flavors seep into the chicken as it cooks.
I kept the ingredients simple – I wanted the tarragon to be the star.
A light basting sauce to crisp the skin is all that’s needed to finish it.
Grilled Chicken With Tarragon and Capers
Total time: 45 minutes Prep earlier in the day
Ingredients:
- 1 chicken, cut-up, skin on, or your favorite pieces
- 6 tbs chopped fresh tarragon
- 3 tbs finely chopped capers
- 2 tbs lemon juice
- 2 tbs olive oil
- Basting Sauce:
- 2 tbs lemon juice
- 2 tbs olive oil
- 1/4 tsp celery salt
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
Instructions:
- Early in the day combine the tarragon, capers, lemon juice and olive oil.
- Loosen the skin on the chicken by slowly working your fingers between the flesh and the skin. Try not to puncture the skin.
- With your fingers take a bit of the herb mixture and put it under the skin, smoothing it over the flesh. Stretch the skin to cover and put in a dish of some sort, just large enough to hold all of the pieces.
- Cover and refrigerate for several hours until ready to cook.
- Combine lemon juice, oil, salt and pepper for basting
- Cook on barbecue grill for 30 – 45 minutes, turning and basting occasionally.
Scaffolding has so many uses.
Two weeks ago it was used for drying shallots.
Last week it was used for drying onions.
I had to move the onions because mon mari needed to use it as a crane.
Last winter the big, cast iron radiator in our den started leaking.
Mon mari was not pleased.
This radiator provided a lot of heat for our house but there really wasn’t an easy way to repair it while the furnace / boiler was on.
As it was March, we decided to suck it up until summer.
It’s summer.
In order to figure out where / why it was leaking he had to get it off the wall.
Did I mention that it was cast iron?
He rigged up a pulley system to get it off the wall and lay it down, gently, on the floor.
Pretty slick, huh?
He found the leak – two, actually, cleaned them out, welded them shut and put it back.
He tested it.
We’ll be buying a new radiator.
And it won’t be cast iron.
As to the shallots…..
I braided them.
It took me a bit of research to find out how to do it. Most people / sites demonstrated tying them with string loops.
I wanted to braid them, but wasn’t sure how to make a long, staggered braid..
Then I read two words: French Braid.
Well, I’ve done that often enough on the back of my own head, I thought I could figure out how to do it in front of me.
I ended up with 25 braids of shallots.
Next week: the onions.
If you want nutrition information, try this site: Calorie Count
Wow. This tarragon chicken sounds wonderful. As usual, the tarragon in our mostly shady garden has packed it in and given up. I will have to steal some from our neighbours.
You have a lot of shallots!
fyi…I can’t seem to add your new address to my blogger feed link list. I am still trying…
I love your French braids – fabulous variation on a theme !!
Elizabeth, and my tarragon is crazy this year…. I’ve cut it back twice.
Meredith – yeah…. more than planned for LOL Let me know… don’t know what the problem could be but there have been weird things,
Kate, glad I remembered how to do them 😉
Wow, would kill for 25 braids of shallots. Fabulous.
Phoenicia, I’m thrilled – and I hope they keep well. So far, so good!
I would love to be able to store root vegetables to use throughout the winter. Here in Arizona we are too hot and I don’t have extra dry, cool areas for storing.
Will the 25 bunches last you til next years crop is ready??
The shallots should last through the winter – but I’ll probably use more than normal since I have them LOL