A friend an excellent Cajun cook told me about a fabulous dinner she made recently – sticky chicken.
Brenda's husband isn't a big chicken fan ("Stinkin' yard bird," he calls it), so as soon as he went out of town, she made this Cajun dish.
She says this sticky chicken should be eaten with brown gravy with rice. Actually, Brenda said most every Cajun dish should be eaten with brown gravy with rice.
"Most Cajuns cook it every night," she said.
A Cajun cookbook of mine says there's an old saying that a Cajun can look at a field of rice and judge how much gravy it would take to cover it.
This same book says a basic Cajun brown gravy must be made with a dark roux, and it's best if it's flavored with fat from cooked meat, not butter.
As for the sticky chicken, Brenda says: "With beef or pork, you cook the meat until it's really brown, then add the onions. Chicken cooks so fast that when you do smothered chicken, you brown the onions first, then add the chicken and brown it before you add the water. If you do it right, it's sticky. It's also wonderful."
This sticky chicken comes from the legendary Paul Prudhomme. But honestly, I would rather eat Brenda's.
CAJUN STICKY CHICKEN
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon paprika
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon onion powder
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1. Combine all ingredients together. Wash a 3 to 3 1/2 pound whole chicken fryer. Rub the spice mixture into the skin and inside the chicken cavity. Place the chicken into an oven-proof baking bag and seal. Refrigerate overnight or 24 hours.
2. The next day, remove and discard the oven-proof baking bag. Stuff the chicken cavity with 1 cup chopped onion. Roast the chicken, uncovered, breast-side-down, at 250 degrees for 5 hours, basting every 15 minutes with the pan juices/drippings. The juices will begin to caramelize on the bottom of the pan and the chicken will eventually become golden brown. Let chicken rest 15 minutes, at least, before serving, to retain moistness.
The chicken meat will be pinkish due to the low oven temperature-using an instant-read thermometer, insert it into the breast (breast should register 170 degrees) or thick part of the thigh (thigh should register 180 degrees).
Note: If you really want to make sure that you have a fully cooked chicken, and the pinkish meat color scares you-you can bake this whole chicken for 45 minutes to 1 hour at 350 degrees, uncovered. If you like a crisper skinned chicken, raise the oven temperature to 350 to 375 degrees, and watch chicken, carefully, and just brown the skin-you will still need to let your chicken rest 15 minutes before carving.
