Chuck leafed through Jean Anderson's DOUBLEDAY COOKBOOK tonight and came up with Poulet Basquais which was relatively quick and certainly easy: a whole cut-up chicken browned in the Dutch oven, then simmered with green pepper, tomato, mushroom, and ham. Served over buttered egg noodles, it was very filling and hinted at how much better the leftovers will be tomorrow night.
The Basques came to America to herd sheep in the West, I learned at the James Beard Foundation Awards last month when a boarding house/restaurant called Noriega's in Bakersfield, CA won an American Classic Award. The two sister/owners flew to NYC for the first time to accept the award, as daunting a trip to them, I'm sure, as the original sailing across the Atlantic and traversing of the US of was to the pioneering Basques of the nineteenth century!
