Sometimes recipes have a finite life span. Food that was popular back in your mother’s or grandmother’s youth are no longer in vogue. Some of it may be due to fashion or access to ingredients. Rationing during World War II required some ingenuity that wasn’t needed afterward. Then there are recipes that just fell out of fashion.
Chicken marengo seems to be one of these recipes. We had this from time to time at the sorority when I was an undergrad. Julian thought it might be a good option for the upcoming French dinner. I knew there was a recipe in my 1970’s era Joy of Cooking. When I looked at other cookbooks of the era, I came up dry. Julia Child? Non. Craig Claiborne? Rien. Jacques Pépin? Non encore. I found a recipe in Michel Roux Jr.’s book, but it required crayfish and soft boiled eggs. So I tried the Joy version. Suffice it to say that we were disappointed. Maybe chicken marengo deserved to stay lost.
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