Healthy Haitian Chicken Stew

Marge (00:00:05) - And we're back. Friends. Did you miss me? This week we're going to be doing a Haitian chicken stew. Welcome to Bite Me, the show about edibles where I help you take control of your high life. I'm your host and certified gonger. Marge and I love helping cooks make safe and effective edibles at home. I'm so glad you're here. And thank you for joining me today. Welcome back, friends. I'm so glad you're here. And I'm very excited about today's episode, as I always am every single week. As I probably say, if you've been listening to this for a while, I probably need to change that up a little bit. But it's what comes out of my mouth when I sit down at my computer and I'm staring at my screen. So apologies. I've also realized in the process of editing over 200 episodes, this one's I think I'm recording right now. Episode 232. That I say the word so, so fucking much. And it drives me crazy because I edit out a ton of them.

Marge (00:01:04) - And then I still listen. And there's like so many in there. Apologies for that. I'm going to be working on that. I'm sure there's other filler words or verbal tics that I have that I'm trying to improve improve on. If you hear anything, I almost said it again. If you hear anything, please let me know if there's something that you think I could improve upon. I always like to hear. If you're joining me for the first time, I'm very glad that you're here, and I hope you get some inspiration in the kitchen and realize that edibles can be so much more than the lowly, highly pop brownie. And if you've been listening for a while, I appreciate your support. Either way, we're gonna have a good time today. This episode will. Have you going back for seconds, believe me. Now, before we get into the recipe. I've got another stoner trivia question for you. This one's worth 20 points if you're keeping track of the race to 420. This is a culture question.

Marge (00:01:58) - They do have all the questions divide into different categories. In Bhutan, cannabis grows wild and is mainly used by whom? Adults. Teenagers or animals. And I will reveal the answer to this stoner trivia question at the end of the episode. Now let's talk about chicken stew. I got this recipe it's been on my list to make for quite a while, because I was looking for interesting things to make and things that you can infuse. And it happened upon a chef at one point last year, at some point named Gregory Goudet. And he operates the Kann restaurant in Portland, Oregon. K, A, N, N, and if I've mispronounced his name or the name of his restaurant. I deeply apologize, you know, for me. Name pronunciation has always been so important, and that's because I grew up with a sister who had an unusual name. And she. Still spends her entire entire. But she spent her entire adult life and childhood, especially correcting people on the pronunciation and the spelling. And there were people in her life that I know that never did get the pronunciation quite right.

Marge (00:03:33) - Like, these are people that had known her from birth and still never said her name, right? Like they always said it wrong. And it was just one of those things that she had to live with, knowing that, you know, so-and-so is never going to say her name properly. So to me, watching her go through all this, it's made me very aware of people's names because of course, the sound of your own name and someone coming from somebody else is a lovely thing. And it when you take it seriously and you ask people how to properly pronounce their names, they really, genuinely appreciate that. So that's my little PSA of the day. I suppose that if I mispronounced any of those things, I do apologize. Now, Gregory Gourdet has a lot of fantastic recipes on his website, and I can see why his restaurant was named Portland, Oregon's Restaurant of the year in 2022. No easy feat, I'm sure, especially after watching my daughter. Run a restaurant for over five years.

Marge (00:04:33) - It's challenging, to say the least. And now we have rising food prices and inflation and talk about recession and all this stuff. You've got to be very creative to get people coming back and the food has to be good. But this particular recipe really stood out to me. And he actually calls it poulet non sos. And of course, that's my that's my French and French listeners out there. Again, I apologize if you spend half my half this episode apologizing. But Gregory says this about this particular dish. When I was a kid, we often left Queens on Sunday mornings to visit my memere, my paternal grandmother in new Jersey, along with warm kisses and a few words of broken English. This chicken stew would greet us its official name, poulet non sos in Haitian Creole or chicken in sauce is quite an understatement. The meat is marinated overnight with onions, garlic, time and chilies along with citrus, the fruits juiced and then rubbed forcefully onto the skin. The chicken to access the fragrant oils as well. After the meat takes on all that flavor, it stewed in the marinade and loads of bell peppers for a satisfying, thrilling stew.

Marge (00:05:57) - This dish is Haiti, something we make time and time again. I suspect you will too. After making this dish. Yes, I will make it again. It was a hit in the house. The leftovers were even better. And so thank you, Gregory, for making this. I did try to reach out to him to see about having him on the show, to talk about cooking and culinary cannabis. He gives absolutely zero indication on his Instagram profile whether he uses a cannabis in any kind of way in the kitchen. But it's always interesting talking to chefs. There's always something new to learn, especially when they're cooking something from a different culture like Haiti, which I'm pretty unfamiliar with. And I love cooking with new tastes and flavors. But alas, he has close to 200,000 followers and I'm sure my message got lost amongst a thousand others. So my efforts have not been rewarded. But maybe I can tag him when I post the graphic for this particular episode. But either way, this is a recipe you should try.

Marge (00:07:05) - And for the fact that it's January when this will be coming out. It is a warming stew to enjoy and it's pretty easy to make, but the marinade is super important. So it's sort of a two stage process. And he really suggests that you don't skip the marinade. I did marinade it for, I believe, the 24 hours. 100% worth it. It gives the flavor in this is astounding. And it's also really simple. That's the other brilliant thing about this one. You need chicken thighs and drumsticks. Bone in skin on. Now when I read the recipe initially it just said bone in, bone in chicken. And so I did what I always advise you not to do, which is not read through the recipe in total thoroughly. And when I saw that, I thought, oh, it must mean skinless, though it never did say skinless. I just made this inference and then later realized I could have left the skin on. And I wish I had, but I took the time to take it off because I thought it wasn't needed.

Marge (00:08:06) - Shame on me. But anyway, the nice thing about this chicken thighs and drumsticks. A lot cheaper than buying chicken breasts. And I don't know about you, but I actually like the dart meat on those particular cuts and they are. Sometimes they say it's healthier for you as well. So this makes it affordable. So you're going to take those those chicken pieces and you're going to put them in a dish and lay them out that they're all in a single layer. And then you take a juicy orange, a juicy lime and a juicy lemon. He says that specifically in the recipe. And you'll find out. You'll find out why in just a second. You take those citrus fruits and you cut them in half, and then you squeeze the juice all over the chicken of those three different citrus fruits. And then, as he says in that little descriptor, you rub the skin forcefully with the citrus that's been squeezed. You discard those and then you've chopped up your onion. The habanero I used habanero. He recommends either habanero or scotch bonnet.

Marge (00:09:14) - Both pretty fiery chilies. But you only need two of them. And it's amazing the flavor you get from just two chilies. Like, seriously, any more than that, it might have been too spicy for some people in my house. Not for me though, because I do enjoy spice thoroughly. And of course you're going to use garlic roughly sliced, and you take these other ingredients the onions, the garlic and the Scotch bonnets and a quarter cup of fresh thyme leaves, which if you made the the garlic or the ginger, the ginger beet soup from last week's episode, maybe you still have some kicking around that hasn't gone bad in the back of your fridge. You can use that as well. But you're going to take those ingredients and put them in the dish with your chicken, and it says to rub the chicken as well with all those ingredients to. And then you're going to cover it and put it in the fridge. For 2012 to 24 hours. I left mine for 24 hours for the dish itself.

Marge (00:10:16) - You need extra virgin olive oil. You need a third of a cup. So you cook quite a bit in the virgin olive oil. But for this particular dish, even though there is no way to like directly infuse it, because I find that when it's at the higher heat, you might destroy some of the cannabinoids in your olive oil. It's it's best to drizzle some of that into your soup. At the end, I would find your infused version so you can make sure you preserve all those cannabinoids that are going to get you high. So for the dish itself, you need olive oil, tomato paste, salt, two red peppers, two bell peppers, the chicken stock which I have to remember to use up. Because I do often open a carton of chicken stock. He suggests homemade or store bought and I hate I hate it when I forget it in the fridge, and then I pull it out later just to find it. It's gone bad. I should probably just make this again because it was so good.

Marge (00:11:09) - But how many servings is this for? For serving? I would say that's pretty accurate too. So you're going to let your chicken marinade for up to. Oh actually I'm looking at it now up to 12 or for up to 48 hours. So you can let it marinate even longer. But when you go to make the actual dish, you're going to take the chicken out of the marinade and you're going to. But in this case you keep the aromatics, you brush them off the chicken. If there's any that stuck to the chicken and you're going to strain the liquid. From the rest of the ingredients that are still in the in the dish, the aromatics, as he likes to call it. You're going to pat your chicken dry, and then you're going to heat this olive oil in a, in a ovenproof pot that will hold all your chicken. I think the one that I had was a little bit small, but I did manage to squeeze everything in there, so it was okay. And you're going to cook the chicken skin side down.

Marge (00:12:03) - You're going to turn the thighs every so often. Or sorry, the drumsticks, but not the thighs. And then you get them browned up and then you take them out and transfer it to a plate. Then you're going to turn it to medium. And this is when you add your tomato paste and your salt. And then you add your bell peppers and the reserved solids for the marinades, who've almost done a bit of cooking and preparation ahead of time, because a lot of the stuff that's going into this dish, you chopped up a day or two earlier, then you're going to cook those. And once the peppers have softened, you are going to put the chicken back in the dish in a single layer, and you're going to pile all those delicious vegetables on top, and then you put it in the oven. Actually, you also pour. This is when you also pour the reserved marinade and the stock overtop. Now it sits up, put in the oven basting every 15 minutes. But I wasn't really sure myself.

Marge (00:12:56) - I turned the timer on for 15 minutes because it cooks in the oven at 375 for an hour, but I found like I was like. I was like, what am I marinating? I don't, I don't really know unless it was just the vegetables itself. Oh, coat that basting every 15 minutes to coat the chicken with the peppers and sauce. But the chicken I had, maybe because the pot was a little bit smaller, complete, was completely covered by the sauce and all the peppers and other ingredients. So after the first 15 minutes I was like, I don't really need to do this. And I just left it in there for the next 45 and you pull it out, the sauce will slightly thickened, and then the meat, you want to make sure it's nice and tender. Falling off the bone didn't really take too much effort at all. It it was perfect. You serve it with parsley and a drizzle of your infused olive oil. In this particular instance, which again, anytime you can do a drizzle on the top when you're done is preferable my mind, because you can tailor each dish to the preferences of whoever is dining with you, whether they consume cannabis, whether they just want CBD or THC, or their tolerance is very different than your own.

Marge (00:14:08) - It works. And because you already use quite a bit of oil to cook the vegetables in this recipe, there is no oil in this dish, so it's going to pair nicely. I have to admit, I bought the parsley and then I forgot to use it, so I'm going to have to find something to do with parsley soon, because I don't want to find that in the back of my fridge in a month's time, having forgotten about it either. It would be really nice with the parsley. This sauce does have a bit of zip to it. Again, as I mentioned, it only requires two hot peppers, but that's enough to really give it some nice heat. Freaking delicious. It was so good. It was delicious and well received, I made some. I will be making this again because as you could hear, it's very simple. Ingredients. You need your chicken pieces. You need some peppers, tomato paste which probably most of you have a can kicking around in your pantry somewhere, chicken stock, store bought or otherwise.

Marge (00:15:02) - A really simple dish. But the flavour, oh, it's the flavour that really gets me. And if this is Haitian cooking, I'm here for it. I'll be making it again. This one will be in regular rotation, especially in those winter months when you want something warming. So I hope you try this one out and let me know what you think, because I think you will really enjoy it. And if you've ever been to the Yukon restaurant, let me know. I'd love to hear what it's like. Who knows, maybe Gregory will one day appear on Bite Me the show, but edibles to talk about his cooking process. If you enjoyed this recipe, this episode, please share it with somebody else who needs some inspiration in the kitchen. Because sharing is caring and it helps new people find the show. You can always talk to me. I love to hear what you think. I love getting listener emails and of course, if you feel so inclined, please leave a great rating and review because that also helps people find the show as well.

Marge (00:15:55) - Stay up to date with the email newsletter and consider using the products and services on the Marge Recommends page. Also, don't forget I have the Bite Me Cannabis Club, which I think. Is a pre-roll at the beginning of this episode, but I may take that down, but I'm trying to do some different things over there in the new year, and I would love to have you join us. Before I forget. Because it's stoner trivia, of course. And that would be apropos stone or trivia in Bhutan. Cannabis grows wild and is mainly used. By whom? Adults, teenagers or animals. If you guessed animals, you were correct. Can you imagine living in a place where wild cannabis was just growing, and most of it went to the local flora and fauna? How wild is that? No pun intended there. It's crazy to me because we still live in a place where, I mean, in Canada it's legal where I am, but my neighbors to the south, there are still places where you can be put in jail for this stuff.

Marge (00:17:02) - There are still people serving time for non-violent cannabis offenses. There may still be here in Canada because you have to apply for a pardon in order to have that removed from your record, and there is a cost to that which many people find prohibitive. People have been thrown in jail for a plant that in some places is mostly being eaten by wild animals. What a world we live in. In any case, I'm hoping this podcast really helps break some of that stigma and shows people listening that people who are using cannabis come from all walks of life. And if there's anything that I've seen doing this show, my interactions with people, my time doing the program when I went to California and the people I met through that, like all, all the different places I've met, different people in the cannabis space, people using it, working in the industry, just all these applications. There is no one version of the cannabis user. There just isn't. I mean, my own father, who is 92, now uses cannabis topically.

Marge (00:18:08) - Not your typical cannabis user, but we all do come from different walks of life, and it's a fun thing that we share. I'm happy to break some stigma. I'm your host, Marge. And until next time, my friends, stay high.