Prep: 15 minutes · Cook: 55 minutes · Total: 1 hour 10 minutes · Serves: 5 · Equipment: 12-inch (30 cm) deep skillet or braiser with a lid, instant-read thermometer
A fricassee sits halfway between a sauté and a stew. The chicken is browned like a sauté, then finished in its own sauce like a stew — but where a coq au vin goes dark with red wine and a long braise, a fricassee stays pale. White wine, stock, mushrooms, a little flour to hold it together and a splash of cream at the end. It is old French home cooking, the kind of dish built to turn inexpensive cuts into something that tastes like effort.
This version uses bone-in drumsticks and thighs, which is what makes it worth the hour. The bones and skin give the sauce body that boneless breasts never will, and dark meat stays juicy through a simmer that would dry out white meat. Everything happens in one pan, and the browned bits the chicken leaves behind become the backbone of the sauce.
Ingredients
For the chicken
- 6 chicken drumsticks and 4 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs — about 1.4 kg (3 lb) in all; the mix gives everyone a choice, and both cuts cook in the same time once browned
- 1½ teaspoons salt, 1 teaspoon black pepper and ½ teaspoon garlic powder — seasoning the chicken itself, before it ever meets the sauce
- 1 tablespoon olive oil — rubbed over the pieces so the seasoning sticks
- 3 tablespoons butter — for browning; it gives the skin a deeper colour and the sauce a nuttier base than oil alone
For the sauce
- 1 medium onion, finely chopped — finely, so it melts into the sauce instead of sitting in it
- 340 g (12 oz) button mushrooms, halved — halves hold their shape through the simmer; slices go limp
- 2 bay leaves and 4 sprigs fresh thyme, or ½ teaspoon dried
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour — cooked into the fat for a minute, it is what thickens the sauce
- 120 ml (½ cup) dry white wine — Chardonnay or anything dry you would drink; never a sweet wine
- 700 ml (3 cups) chicken stock — low-sodium if you can, since the chicken is already well salted
- 80 ml (⅓ cup) heavy cream — added at the very end, off the boil
- ¼ teaspoon each salt, black pepper and ground nutmeg — for finishing; the nutmeg is the classic French touch with cream and mushrooms
- Fresh parsley or thyme, to serve
How to Make It
1. Season the chicken
Pat the drumsticks and thighs dry with paper towels. Mix the salt, pepper and garlic powder, scatter it over the chicken, drizzle with the olive oil and rub it in on all sides. The skin should look evenly coated, with no dry patches and no pooled oil.
2. Brown the drumsticks — 8 to 10 minutes
Melt the butter in the skillet over medium heat. When it foams, add the drumsticks and brown them, turning every couple of minutes, until golden on all sides. Move them to a plate. They are not cooked through yet, and they are not meant to be. The skin should be an even deep gold all the way round, with no pale stripes where it touched the pan least.
3. Brown the thighs — about 7 minutes
Lay the thighs in skin side down and leave them alone for about 4 minutes, then turn and give the second side 3 minutes. Don’t force them: skin that sticks is not ready yet. Move them to the plate with the drumsticks. The skin should release from the pan on its own and have turned a deep, even gold.
4. Soften the onion and mushrooms — 8 minutes
If more than about 3 tablespoons of fat has collected in the pan, pour off the excess, but keep every browned bit stuck to the bottom. Add the onion and cook for 1 minute, then add the mushrooms, bay leaves and thyme. Cook for about 7 minutes, stirring now and then. The mushrooms will release water first, then start to brown once it evaporates — wait for the browning.
5. Add the garlic and flour — 2 minutes
Stir in the garlic and cook for 1 minute. Sprinkle the flour over everything and stir for another minute, so it coats the vegetables and cooks out its raw taste. The pan should look dry and pasty, with no white streaks of flour left.
6. Deglaze and simmer, covered — 25 to 30 minutes
Pour in the wine and scrape the bottom of the pan hard with a wooden spoon to lift the browned bits. Let it bubble for a minute, then add the stock and stir until smooth. Return the chicken and any juices on the plate, skin side up, keeping the skin above the liquid as much as you can. Bring to a gentle simmer, cover, lower the heat to medium-low and cook for 25 to 30 minutes. The chicken is ready when the thickest thigh reads at least 165°F (74°C) on a thermometer pushed in close to, but not touching, the bone.
7. Finish with the cream — 3 minutes
Lift the lid. Fish out the bay leaves and thyme stems. Stir the cream, nutmeg and the final salt and pepper into the sauce around the chicken and let it heat through for 2 to 3 minutes without boiling hard. Taste and adjust the salt. Scatter with parsley or a few thyme leaves. The sauce should coat the back of a spoon and hold a line when you draw a finger through it.
Why It Simmers 25 Minutes, Not 12
Plenty of quick versions of this dish cover the pan for 12 minutes and call it done. With bone-in pieces, that is not enough. Browning colours the outside, but it barely cooks the meat near the bone, and a drumstick needs real time in the sauce for the heat to get all the way through. Recipes built on the same cuts typically simmer them for 25 to 30 minutes, and that is the range used here.
The clock is only a guide, though. Pieces vary in size, pans vary in how hard they hold a simmer, and the only reliable answer is a thermometer. The U.S. food safety guidance on safe minimum internal temperatures puts all poultry, whole or in pieces, at 165°F (74°C). Check the thickest thigh and the largest drumstick, close to the bone without touching it, since bone reads hotter than the meat around it.
Dark meat is also forgiving. Unlike breast, it does not dry out a few degrees past the minimum — it gets more tender as the connective tissue softens. If your thermometer reads 165°F at 25 minutes, another 5 minutes will not hurt it, and often helps.
One more thing worth knowing: three cups of stock make a generous, fairly loose sauce. If it is thinner than you like once the chicken is cooked, lift the pieces out onto a plate, simmer the sauce uncovered for 5 to 8 minutes to reduce it, then add the cream and return the chicken.
What to Serve With It
A fricassee is mostly sauce, and it wants something to soak it up. Mashed potatoes are the classic choice; plain rice and buttered egg noodles both work just as well, and a crusty loaf does the job with nothing else at all. If you would rather roast than mash, garlic herb roasted potatoes hold up well beside it.
Something green on the side cuts through the cream — garlic butter sautéed spinach takes five minutes while the sauce finishes. And if you like the mushrooms here enough to want more of them, miso butter roasted mushrooms make a good second side.
Storing and Reheating
Cool the fricassee within two hours of cooking and refrigerate it in a covered container for up to 3 days. Like most braises, it is often better the next day, once the sauce has had time to settle into the chicken. Reheat gently on the stove over medium-low heat, covered, with a splash of stock or water to loosen the sauce, until the chicken is hot all the way through. Keep it below a full boil once the cream is in, or the sauce can split. It freezes for up to 3 months, though cream sauces can turn slightly grainy when thawed; a vigorous stir while reheating usually brings them back.
For more ways to put chicken in a creamy sauce, try the creamy garlic parmesan chicken or the creamy sun-dried tomato chicken, or browse all the chicken recipes.
Chicken Fricassee
Ingredients
Method
- Pat the chicken dry. Mix the salt, pepper and garlic powder and rub it all over the drumsticks and thighs.
- Heat the olive oil and 1 tablespoon of butter in a large, deep skillet or braiser over medium-high heat. Brown the drumsticks for 8 to 10 minutes, turning, until golden on all sides. Move them to a plate.
- Add another tablespoon of butter and lay the thighs in skin side down. Cook for about 5 minutes until the skin is deep golden, turn and cook 2 minutes more. Move to the plate.
- Pour off all but about 2 tablespoons of fat. Add the remaining butter, the onion, mushrooms, bay leaves and thyme. Cook over medium heat for about 8 minutes, until the mushrooms have released their liquid and started to brown.
- Stir in the garlic and cook 1 minute. Sprinkle in the flour and stir for another minute until no dry flour is visible.
- Pour in the wine and scrape up the browned bits. Let it bubble for a minute, then stir in the stock until smooth. Return the chicken and its juices, skin side up. Bring to a gentle simmer, cover, lower the heat to medium-low and cook 25 to 30 minutes, until the thickest thigh reads at least 165°F (74°C) near, but not touching, the bone.
- Remove the bay leaves and thyme stems. Stir the cream, nutmeg and final salt and pepper into the sauce and heat through for 2 to 3 minutes without boiling hard. Adjust the seasoning and finish with parsley or thyme leaves.