Smokey Chicken and Bean Cassoulet - Sort of.

I'm a massive fan of Cassoulet, the southern French dish consisting of toulouse sausage, confit du canard, pork belly; baked in the oven with breadcrumbs on top, cooked slowly with beans and goose fat.  Apparently its a peasant dish, well I'm a peasant and I can rarely afford to buy these ingredients. Its delicious belly busting savory goodness is so full of fat, it sets when cold.  But its heavy, very heavy, you can't eat a dish like this often and I had one last week so I won't be doing it again until the winter sets in.

Anyway, I was rummaging around my jars of dried goods, saw the pinto beans, saw some smokey chipotle chilli's, the dried porchini's, thought of Cassoulet, then made this.

Its not really a cassoulet, its a slow cooked smokey bean and chicken stew.  Its very hearty but its not a sinful dish.  With all the smokeyness and the beans, its definitely got a bit of a cowboy kick to it too.  

Ingredients:

A whole chicken - jointed (or 6-8 chicken thighs)

1 small onion

2 cloves of smoked garlic (normal will be fine too)

2 stalks of celery

1 carrot

Dried mushrooms - rehydrated (save the water)

2 Dried Chipotle Chillis - rehydrated (save the water)

Tomato Puree

Tinned Tomatoes

Thyme 

2 handfuls of dried pinto beans or a can of cooked.

Oregano

Olive Oil

Bay leaf

Red Wine Vinegar

Salt and Pepper

Breadcrumbs with grated garlic.

Brown the chicken pieces in 2 tablespooms of olive oil and remove from pan in. Add more oil and in the same pan add diced onion, carrot, celery, garlic and sweat.  Meanwhile I drain the mushrooms, chop, then add these to the pan.  Then 1 tablespoon of tomato puree, cook off for a couple of minutes.  Add the herbs.

Meanwhile if you are using dried beans, you are cooking these in unsalted water until they have rehydrated.  Takes about an hour and a half (good if you soak over night).

To the other pan, in goes the chopped rehydrated chillies, the tinned tomatoes, the mushroom water and the chicken pieces.  Season, cover and slowly cook for about an hour.

At this stage I decant into a pretty yellow dish and leave in the fridge for a couple of days.  The reasons for this are two fold. 1.  The flavours mingle. 2. We ate out for 2 days.

Then when it is time to cook the 'Cassoulet', I put it into a preheated oven at 180 for an hour until happily bubbling.  I take it out, stir through more olive oil and a couple of tablespoons of red wine vinegar, check seasoning and sprinkle the garlicy breadcrumbs on top.  Then cook in the oven at 200 until the top is golden.

Serve with bread to mop up the juices or a vinegary side salad.