The Perdue Chicken Cookbook Part 1

The Perdue Chicken Cookbook.

by Mitzi Perdue.

PREFACE

WHY I CHICKENED OUT

Want to know a high stress situation? Try being a food writer and cookbook author, and then marry Frank Perdue. You come home from the honeymoon, everything has been wonderful and then...it's time to Cook the First Meal!

Frank wants to eat chicken and you're supposed to be a good cook.

I remember that afternoon so vividly. I knew he'd be coming home around six and that he'd be hungry. Now up until that day, I had always felt fairly confident in the kitchen. After all, I love cooking and trying new recipes is my favorite pastime. But cooking chicken for Frank Perdue? I began to get stage fright. As I was trying to find where the pots and pans were in his kitchen, I started calculating that there were probably few people in the world who've eaten chicken more times than my husband.

"He's been eating chicken almost daily for his entire life" I thought, "he likes it, he cares about it, and my cooking is about to be judged by a world cla.s.s expert."

As I rummaged around looking for the right herbs and spices$and couldn't find the ones I liked $ my stage fright grew worse. "This man must be one of the world's greatest experts on cooked chicken," I thought to myself. "He's attended dozens and dozens of chicken cooking contests, he's been part of hundreds and hundreds of taste testings for Perdue products. Everywhere he goes, people know he likes chicken and the best chefs and hostesses in the world have served it to him." In my mind I ran through some of the times when together we'd driven an hour out of the way to go to a restaurant that cooked chicken particularly well, and how he always seemed to have lists of the restaurants he wanted to visit.

Help! My stage fright was getting still worse. The thirty year old oven didn't seem to be heating right, but I couldn't be sure because there wasn't any oven thermometer.

The "elbow test," which our grandmothers used to use before the days of thermometers (you stick your elbow in the oven and feel how hot it is), told me that things weren't right, but I didn't know how far off the oven was so I didn't know how to compensate. As I rubbed my elbow with my other hand, I thought of Frank's reputation for being demanding.

If you've seen the ad that we call "Boot Camp," you know what I mean. (He plays the part of a drill sergeant in this ad and teaches the new Perdue recruits the 57 quality points that they have to inspect -- and then he's all over one recruit for missing what seems like an invisibly small hair.)

It's a funny thing, but when you start losing your confidence, you start asking some basic questions about what you're doing. Part of me was saying that cooking chicken is pretty simple; after all, I'd been doing it for most of my life. But another part of me realized when attempting to cook chicken for Frank the first time, that I knew very little of the basics of cooking chicken. Like, for example, what makes a chicken tender? How do you really know when it's done$and not over done? How do you get the best flavor? Should you salt before or after cooking?

In desperation, I made a two-part promise to myself.

First, I'd let myself take the easy way out that first meal, and not even try to cook the chicken myself.

Instead, dinner would be a never-fail salad, pasta (Frank loves pasta), plus store-bought fully-cooked Perdue Tenders. In return for letting myself off so easily, I'd make it my business from then on to learn how to make the best chicken every time. That meant asking Frank every question that popped into my head; checking with the food technologists who work for Perdue; getting tips from the farmers who grew the Perdue chickens; and systematically going through the thousands of recipes that Frank has in his files, trying a different one each night.

Dinner that night wasn't the show piece I would have liked to create, but it was good enough and Frank happens to love his own Tenders so the chicken part of the meal was a success. In the time since, I've tried to live up to the second part of the promise, the one about learning how to serve the best chicken every time.

In this book, I'd like to share with you the most useful cooking tips and the most appealing, most successful recipes developed by Perdue Farms over the last twenty years. The first chapter contains the kinds of information I wished I'd known from the beginning. You don't need to read this chapter, because chicken isn't that hard to cook; but there are tips in it that can save you time and money and that can enable you to cook with greater confidence. This chapter also has the latest tips on food safety.

The remaining chapters are organized, not by method of cooking or whether the food is an appetizer or salad or whatnot; but rather by the kind of occasion you're facing.

You want to put some spark and variety into every day meals? You want to make the most of your microwave? Or you're in a hurry today? Maybe you need something that will please kids? Or you're dieting? You've got a bunch of leftovers? You have to cook for a hundred people tomorrow night? I tried to think of the kinds of situations in which you could need recipes and then I organized Frank's recipes around them. Jean Brillat- Savarin, the famous French gourmet, once said, "A chicken to a cook is like a canvas to a painter." Enjoy the recipes and tips that follow, and may they help you to feel the creativity and confidence that make cooking fun and eating a joy!

YOU DON'T HAVE TO WING IT!

LET FRANK TAKE YOU UNDER HIS.

Everything You Wanted or Needed to Know about Cooking Chicken

Frank gets roughly 40,000 consumer letters a year.

Half of these are requests for pamphlets, but many of the others are requests for information on selecting, storing, serving, or cooking his products.

These letters are tremendously important to Frank.

Often I've been with him when he has a few extra minutes, such as waiting for an airplane, and he'll dash to a pay phone to answer one of the letters with a phone call. He also likes to attend store openings or conventions or other public places because he genuinely wants to hear what people are thinking. One of the marketing men once told me that he was embarra.s.sed about a day he had planned for Frank because it included meetings with people who owned just a few stores. When I pa.s.sed this on to Frank, he answered that these were some of the best meetings because the owners of the smaller stores were so close to their customers. He went on to say that the reason he likes to visit butchers (and in New York, he's called on as many as 30 in two days) is that these men are close to the needs and wants of their customers and he can learn things from them that he'd learn in no other way.

I've heard that there's almost no other head of a Fortune 500-size company who would spend as much time with the people who buy his products. People are often surprised that a man with his responsibilities would take the time for this much face to face contact. But the fact is, learning what people care about is almost a religion to him.

Here are some of the questions that people either write to Frank or ask him in person. In answering the questions, I've either used the information I've heard Frank give, or else I've checked with the Perdue food scientists or home economists.

What should I look for when I shop for chicken?

Whatever city we're in, whether it's on the East Coast, or Puerto Rico, or even London or Moscow or Tokyo, Frank visits supermarkets the way other people visit museums or monuments. He notices the following kinds of things himself and would recommend that you do also when selecting chicken.

_Give the package a little squeeze. Are there signs of ice along wings, backs or edges? Frank explained to me that some chicken producers blast their birds with air as cold as -40o F, but he never does. Freezing causes a breakdown in protein, loss of natural juices, and reduced tenderness. Also, when you cook a frozen bird, the bones and nearby meat may turn an unappetizing dark color.

_Look at the thickness of the meat in proportion to the bone. If, for example, the breast looks scrawny, you're paying a lot for bone rather than meat.

_Read the labels so you know what you are getting. Many different parts and combinations are available, and some look surprisingly alike even to Frank's trained eye. The label tells exactly what is inside.

_Ask questions. If any meat or poultry product doesn't look, feel, or smell just right, check with the professionals behind the counter.

_Notice the pull date. Most stores are scrupulous about removing chicken before the pull date expires$but sometimes there's a slip-up.

_Was the chicken well-cleaned? Or are there little traces of feathers or hairs? These can look really unattractive when the bird is cooked.

_Is the chicken stored correctly on the chilling shelf, or are the trays of chicken stacked so high that the top ones aren't kept cold? When that happens, the shelf life of the top ones is seriously shortened.

_Is the meat case kept so cold that the fresh chicken is frozen and ends up with ice crystals on the tray? If so, complain to the manager.

_Look at the ends of the bones. Are they pink or are they turning gray? Generally, the more pink the bone ends are, the fresher the chicken.

How should I store chicken at home?

Chicken, like all meat, is perishable. It should be stored in the coldest part of the refrigerator (40o or below), sealed as it comes from the market, and used within two or three days of purchase.

Should I freeze chickens?

Frank doesn't recommend freezing poultry. However, if a bird must be held beyond three days, freezing will keep it wholesome.

How do I freeze poultry?

When freezing is necessary, seal chicken or other poultry in an airtight container, heavy plastic bag, plastic wrap, foil or freezer paper.

Try to have the wrapping tight against the chicken because any place where it isn't, small ice crystals will form. That means moisture has been drawn from the meat, and where that's happened, the meat will be tough and breading won't stick.

Frozen uncooked chicken can be stored up to six months; frozen cooked chicken should be used within three months. (Personally I try to avoid freezing chicken since I know that freezing makes the chicken less tender and less juicy. Still, in spite of good intentions, I sometimes end up doing it. I've learned to make it a point to have a wax marking pencil and freezer tape handy, so I can label the package with the date and contents. I wonder if you've found, as I have, that it's unbelievably easy to lose track of how long things have been in there.)

Do not stuff poultry before freezing, and freeze cooked birds and stuffing separately.

Can frozen chicken be thawed and frozen again?

Each time you freeze chicken, you sacrifice quality.

If carefully handled, however, it is safe to defrost uncooked chicken and to freeze it again after cooking. If frozen after cooking, do not thaw and freeze again.

Why is chicken sometimes implicated in illness?

In a warm, moist environment, illness-causing bacteria can grow in high-protein, low-acid foods such as meat, fish, poultry, eggs and milk. But there is no reason to become ill from eating or serving these foods, if they are cooked thoroughly and served or refrigerated immediately.

To prevent transferring bacteria from one food to another, use warm water and soap to wash hands, utensils and work surfaces before and after use.

What makes chicken tender -- or tough?

Frank does his best to make Perdue chickens as tender as possible, but there's also a lot you can do.

_Don't let chicken dry out in the refrigerator; dry chicken is tough chicken. Keep it wrapped in the package it comes in until you use it.

_Avoid freezing it. When the juices inside the cells freeze, they act like little spears and they'll rupture some of the cell walls. When you defrost the chicken, you'll lose some of the juice and the chicken will be less tender.