Georgian · Main
Satsivi
- Advanced
- 55 min
- roughly 2 of 4 for cost
Leads with richness that coats and comforts, an earthy, grounding base, fading in warm spice.
Ingredients
- 1 chicken, about 1.6 kg, or the same weight of turkey legs
- 2 bay leaves
- 500 g shelled walnuts
- 500 g onions, chopped fine
- 40 g butter
- 6 garlic cloves
- 5 g ground blue fenugreek (utskho suneli)
- 5 g ground dried marigold (kviteli kvavili)
- 3 g ground coriander seed
- 1 g ground cinnamon
- 4 cloves, ground
- 3 g dried red chilli flakes
- 30 ml red wine vinegar
- 18 g fine salt
The skills inside
Sweating aromatics: soft, never browned
Allergen screen
Found: dairy · nuts
Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.
Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.
Method
- Simmer the chicken with the bay in water just to cover, the surface barely trembling, until a leg joint moves freely, about 50 minutes; lift the bird out and keep 1 litre of the broth. 50 min
- Sweat the onions in the butter over low heat with a little salt until translucent and completely soft with no bite left, then add half the broth and simmer 10 minutes. 10 min
- Grind the walnuts to a damp paste that beads oil when you squeeze a handful, pound in the garlic, spices and salt, and let it down with the rest of the broth, cool, to the thickness of pouring cream.
- Take the onion pan off the heat, wait until it stops bubbling, stir in the walnut cream, then set it over the lowest flame at 80C (175F) for 10 minutes, stirring, never letting a bubble break the surface. 10 min
- Stir in the vinegar, joint the bird, submerge the pieces in the sauce and cool to room temperature before chilling; serve cold, with the sauce thick enough to sit on the meat.
How to tell it is going right
This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the technique it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.
Sweating aromatics: soft, never browned 198 recipes
- No colour anywhere: tipped under the light the pieces are translucent to pale gold, with no tan edges, no brown tips, and no browned flecks suspended in the fat.
- The pan is quiet: a low steady hiss, not a crackle. A crackle means the moisture has gone and browning has already started.
- The largest piece pressed against the side of the pan collapses without resistance and with no crunch left at its centre.
- The fat is still clear and loose in the pan and the pan floor is clean: nothing caught, nothing browned on to deglaze, because there was never any fond to build.
- It tastes sweet and mild with no raw allium bite at the back of the throat, and none of the roasted sweetness that belongs to the next technique up the heat scale.
Where it goes wrong The heat was too high and nothing covered the pan, so the pieces took colour before they softened; the finished dish carries a roasty sweetness where it wanted a clean one, and the pieces are still firm at the centre under browned edges.
At the Table
- The Pour
- Chardonnay (village Burgundy)
- Also Right
- Chenin Blanc
- From the Taps
- Bière de garde
- Zero-Proof
- Verbena iced tea
Chicken is wine’s most agreeable partner. Match the SAUCE, not the bird: cream to oak, tomato to Sangiovese’s acid, herbs to Loire whites.
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