Roast Chicken Breasts with Raisins & Couscous

Roast Chicken Breasts with Raisins & Couscous

By Wolfgang Puck

With Rosh Hashanah coming, it's that time of year again when many of my friends and restaurant customers ask me the perennial question: Do you have any ideas for something different I can cook for the Jewish New Year?

I'm not Jewish myself. My two oldest sons, however, have been raised to celebrate that heritage, and I've enjoyed and helped to cook many excellent traditional meals.

What impresses me the most when I do is how similar so many Jewish dishes are to the cooking I grew up with in Austria.

That's not surprising, of course, when you consider how much the cuisines of central and eastern Europe have historically intermingled. We've all eaten our fair share of sweet-and-sour beef briskets and stews.

And that's the challenge.

Yes, many people must have braised brisket with onions, dried fruit, and red wine for Rosh Hashanah. In past years, I've shared recipes just like that with you in this column.

So it's time to offer a different kind of sweet-and-sour dish for the holiday. The recipe I share with you here features chicken breast, which also reflects the desire many home cooks have these days to cook lighter, lower-fat fare.

My recipe comes from the tiny Italian island of Pantelleria, which is actually just 50 miles from the eastern tip of Tunisia on the coast of North Africa. I first discovered the dish on a visit I made to the island almost 10 years ago.

The simple recipe, with its appealing combination of tart dried raisins, fresh sweet grapes, dry white wine and sweet dessert wine, grated lemon zest, fresh sage, and a bed of the tiny grain-shaped pasta known as couscous, reflects the exotic melting pot that the Mediterranean has been down through the centuries.

In fact, you can add your own personal influences to the dish, too. In place of the sage, for example, try stirring a pinch of dried ginger or a teaspoon or more of grated fresh ginger into the sauce. Or add a little allspice, or a whole cinnamon stick.

Or, as I like to do, you can replace the traditional North African-style couscous with larger pearl couscous, so called because the spherical grains of pasta are as big and smooth as small pearls. Look for boxes or bags of pearl couscous in well-stocked supermarkets or specialty foods stores, or on the Internet.

Especially popular with cooks in the easternmost Mediterranean, it also goes by the name of Israeli couscous. And that makes it an even more fitting part of a special Rosh Hashanah dish that will really help you ring in the changes for the Jewish New Year, or at any time of year!

Roast Chicken Breasts with Raisins & Couscous

Serves 4

Recipe Ingredients

Chicken:

4 whole chicken breasts, each about 12 ounces

Kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper

1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1 cup dry white wine

1/2 cup sweet Italian wine such as Moscato

1/2 small fennel bulb, trimmed and cut into 1/4-inch dice

1/2 cup seedless raisins

1 sprig fresh sage

1 lemon, zested

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1 cup organic chicken broth

1 cup sweet seedless grapes, cut in half

Couscous:

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1/4 cup finely chopped onion

1 cup Israeli couscous (also labeled pearl couscous)

1 teaspoon salt

2 cups good-quality canned chicken broth

1 tablespoon minced parsley leaves

1 tablespoon minced fresh sage leaves, for garnish

Recipe Preparation

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

For the chicken, season the breasts all over with salt and pepper. Heat the olive oil in an ovenproof saute pan over medium-high heat. Add the chicken skin side down and saute until golden, about 3 minutes. Turn with tongs and saute for 3 minutes more. Transfer the pan to the oven and roast until the chicken is cooked through, 15 to 20 minutes. Transfer the chicken to a platter and wrap in heavy-duty aluminum foil to keep warm.

Pour off excess fat from the pan. Add the dry and sweet wines, fennel, raisins, sage, lemon zest, and lemon juice, and, over high heat, stir and scrape with a wooden spoon to deglaze the pan deposits. Boil the wine until it reduces by half its volume, 5 to 7 minutes. Add the broth and boil until it reduces to a consistency thick enough to coat the back of the wooden spoon, about 5 minutes more. Remove the sage, stir in the grapes, cover to keep warm, and set aside.

Meanwhile, prepare the couscous. In a saucepan, bring the broth to a boil, then remove from the heat. In another saucepan, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the onion and saute until glossy, about 1 minute. Add the couscous and stir until well coated with the oil. Stir in the salt and 1 cup of the hot broth. Cook, stirring occasionally, until about two thirds of the liquid has been absorbed, 5 to 7 minutes. Add the remaining hot broth and continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until the couscous is al dente, tender but still slightly chewy. Adjust the seasonings to taste, stir in the parsley, cover, and keep warm.

To serve, spoon the couscous into the center of 4 serving plates. Slice each chicken breast diagonally off the bone and arrange on top of the couscous. Spoon the sauce, raisins, and grapes over and around the chicken and garnish with the minced sage leaves. Serve immediately.

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