Chicken Breast with Langoustines

After making the Tomato Sauce, I got all the other ingredients ready to make this Floyd dish. I had no idea how this was going to turn out, so was definitely looking forward to the eating stage and trying it out!

The recipe said that it serves 4, due to it being a chicken breast per person. As there were only 2 of us we only used 2 breasts but kept the rest of the recipe the same, so there was lots of sauce left over. Next time I make this recipe, I will halve the sauce ingredients too.

You can tell there is a real French heritage behind this dish, using the Langoustines and Cognac and the final results were typically French too – flavours that I wouldnt normally put together to create a fancy and very rich tasting Floyd dish. This is not a recipe you want to make if you are on a diet. Having said that, we both polished the meal off and wished there had been a bit more chicken and a few more langoustines too. Floyd says to serve with boiled rice, which we did, but next time I think I will serve it with green vegetables and french green beans.

(Printable Recipe)

Serves 4

Ingredients:
4 Chicken Breasts
4 Langoustines per person - Large Crevettes or Whole King Prawns can be used
1 tbsp Onion, finely chopped
1 Clove Garlic, chopped
1 tbsp Parsely, chopped
1 cup of Tomato Sauce
½-1 cup of Double Cream (I used ½ cup and this was very creamy)
2 oz Butter
1 large glass White Wine
1 measure Cognac or Brandy
Pinch Thyme
Salt and Pepper
1 tbsp jellified Chicken Gravy
1 tsp Dry Sherry

1 Season the chicken and fry in the butter for 10 minutes.

2 Add the onions, garlic, thyme and langoustines (I removed the shells but the recipe didn’t say what to do).

3 Flame with the Cognac and add the white wine. Allow to simmer for a few moments.

4 Add the tomato sauce and the cream and if possible a tablespoon or two of jellified gravy. Taste the sauce, it should not be too creamy.

5 Season with salt and pepper. At this stage a teaspoon of sherry could be added to sharpen the sauce a little.

Serve with plenty of boiled rice and a green salad.

Enjoy!

Floyd’s Tomato Sauce

I thought it was about time to try something from ‘Floyd’s Food’ so I decided to cook up something I would never normally choose, in this case “Chicken Breast with Langoustines” (recipe to come) and one of the ingredients was a coffee cup of his own “Tomato Sauce”. So I found the recipe and set about cooking this sauce that reminded me of a very fragrant mediterranean pasta sauce. I’m going to make this again to use with other dishes in future!

(Printable Recipe)

Ingredients:
14 oz/400g Tin Tomatoes
2 Cloves Garlic, chopped
1 Onion, finely chopped
1 tsp fresh or dried Basil
1 tbsp chopped Parsley
1 tbsp White Sugar
1 tbsp Olive Oil
Black Pepper

1 Fry the onions and garlic in the olive oil until soft.

2 When soft, add all the other ingredients and cook over a low heat for 15 minutes.

3 Then liquidize the lot. This sauce can be served either hot or cold.

Enjoy!

Floyd’s Food Cookbook

At the weekend I was very happy to receive my copy of ‘Floyd’s Food’ Cookbook in the post, for being one of the three Farewell Floyd Food Blogging Event Winners. It is a fantastic book and would make a great christmas present for any Floyd fan or fellow foodie.

It has some fantastic recipes, inspired in most by his time in France and there is an even more traditional Coq au Vin recipe, than the one I did for the competition, that I will trying very soon and blogging about on here!

Farewell Floyd Event – A Winning Recipe: Coq au Vin

Having waited just over a week for the judges, Julia and James, to choose their winning top 3 entries to the Farewell Floyd Food Blogging Event, I received an email from them yesterday morning, letting me know that my blog post Coq au Vin – A Tribute to Keith Floyd had been chosen as one of their Top 3 Winners, therefore winning myself a copy of ‘Floyd’s Food’ from Absolute Press. It was lovely to receive their email and kind words about my dish, first thing on a Monday morning and it made my day!

I had such great fun creating my tribute to Keith Floyd, for me and my family, and several glasses were consumed on his behalf during the cooking and eating, true Floyd style!

I was astounded by the lovely dishes the other winners and entrants had made and realised that there are other big Floyd fans out there that will miss him.

The other 2 winners were:
Going With My Gut: Kenyan Goat Feast — For Farewell Floyd: Food Blogging Event
Foodycat: Farewell Floyd – Jambalaya
both of which are fantastic recipes.

I cant wait to cook up my first dish from Floyds first publication and blog about too.

For the announcements and round-up from the judges please read the following posts:

Farewell Floyd: The Round-up
Farewell Floyd: Round-up and Winners Announced

FoodCandy Featured Blog Post – Coq Au Vin

Having had a busy week at work, I have been playing catch up on all my emails, tweets and blog posts. One nice email to receive was from the new Food Social Network – FoodCandy.

They featured my blog post “Coq au Vin – A Tribute to Keith Floyd” on the front page of their site with the following note – ‘Enjoy the celebrity!’

Coq au Vin – A Tribute to Keith Floyd

My version

Keith's version

(See also “Farewell Floyd Event – A Winning Recipe: Coq au Vin”)

After not being able to take part in the ‘Farewell Floyd Food Blogging Event’ last weekend due to feeling ill, I was so happy to read that the deadline for the competition had been extended to the 25th October, meaning I was able to take part after all!

The idea of the event is that we all cook a meal in tribute to this much-loved chef either by cooking up a classic Keith Floyd recipe, an adapted Keith Floyd recipe or a recipe of our own design inspired by, and in tribute to Keith Floyd.

Having been lucky enough to borrow my mum’s original copy of ‘Floyd on France’, I spent an evening trawling all the delicious recipes to find a true classic that I could attempt to cook for this event. I ended up deciding to cook his Coq au Vin recipe which is translated in his book as ‘Cockerel in Red Wine’.

So I set about getting all the ingredients including a decent bottle of red Burgundy as Floyd uses it specifically in his recipe and mentions that “Burgundy is supposed to be famous for Coq au Vin”.

As for my own take on this recipe, I decided to use free-range chicken from Somerset as well as local cider brandy.

Now for my gluten free twist, I used cornflour to make my Beurre Manié and gluten free bread for my Garlic Croutons. This meant that my whole family could enjoy this fantastic dish, as I cooked it in Somerset on a weekend visit home.

I hope everyone that had taken part in this event has had as much fun creating their dishes as I have with mine and I hope that others try this fantastic Coq au Vin recipe. I also hope the late, great Keith Floyd would appreciate my twist of his recipe, as he was born and raised in Somerset too!

(Printable Recipe)

Serves 4 to 6

Ingredients:
4lb (2kg) Free-range chicken joints (from Somerset preferably)
5ozs (150g) Green streaky bacon, cut in cubes
20 Small Onions
4ozs (125g) Butter
1/2 Glass Brandy (Somerset Cider Brandy)
2 pints (1ltr) Red Burgundy
1 Bouquet Garni (made with fresh Thyme, Parsley and Bay Leaves)
2 Cloves Garlic
Salt and Pepper
1tbsp Sugar
7ozs (200g) Button Mushrooms
1tbsp Cornflour
Garlic Croutons (Gluten Free)

1 Fry the chicken, bacon and onions in about 2.5ozs (65g) of butter in a large pan.

2 When they have started to brown, chuck in the brandy and flame.

3 Pour on the red wine and add in your bouquet garni, garlic, salt and pepper.

4 Bring to the boil, add the sugar, cover and simmer for approximately 2 to 3 hours or until the chicken is cooked.

5 At the end of the cooking time, heat the mushrooms in some butter.

6 Remove the chicken from the pan when it is done, putting it into a deep platter to keep warm.

7 Discard the garlic and bouquet garni, then add the mushrooms to the sauce and simmer for 5 minutes.

8 Make a Beurre Manié with the remaining butter and cornflour and add it to the sauce little by little.

9 Stir it well until the sauce had thickened.

10 Arrange the chicken pieces in the platter and pour the sauce over, garnishing with the garlic croutons.

Serve with potatoes of your choice, or crusty bread, green vegetables and/or a green salad.

Enjoy!

Competition Links:
Back to the Chopping Board: Farewell Floyd: Food Blogging Event

A Slice of Cherry Pie: Farewell Floyd: Food Blogging Event