Name: Authentic Chicken Cacciatore Recipe
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 50 min
Total time: 70 min
Yield: 5
Ingredients: ¼ cup of reconstituted dried porcini mushrooms; 1 whole chicken broken down into parts; 2 tablespoon olive oil; ½ peeled and small diced yellow onion; 3 small diced ribs of celery; 2 peeled and small diced carrots; 4 finely minced cloves of garlic; 1 cup each sliced baby portabella and button mushrooms; 1 cup of dry red wine; 2 28- ounce cans of whole peeled tomatoes; 1 tablespoon of chopped fresh parsley; 1 ½ teaspoons of chopped fresh rosemary; sea salt and fresh cracked pepper to taste

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Authentic Chicken Cacciatore Recipe is a delicious braised chicken dish loaded with mushrooms and vegetables in a tomato and herb broth.

I’ve been listening to you all and I keep hearing more family meals, so enter stage right this classic dish. I love this and not only because it’s Italian but because it’s a classic recipe that is so delicious.

I can’t lie, I’m starting to get nervous that we’re losing these traditional recipes. People now-a-days are taking these old traditional recipes and adding in all sorts of crazy stuff and saying it’s authentic.

NO, IT’S NOT.

You have to research things like and find out it’s true roots and the intent of the recipe, because more times than not I think you’ll be very surprised by them.

WHAT IS IT

It’s an incredibly simple recipe consisting of chicken and mirepoix that is cooked and braised in a simple tomato broth with herbs. Cacciatore translates from Italian to English as “hunter.”

Cacciatore is a style of cooking, so hunter style would include certain ingredients such as onions, herbs and tomatoes. Again, it’s really simple.

Italy, being one of the founding countries of modern-day cookery wasn’t an overly rich country in the 17 and 1800’s. A lot of the classic Italian foods you’ll hear about and eat today are simple peasant foods.

This is to the Italians as Chicken Cassoulet is to the French.

These recipes are simple, they’re delicious, and mostly were comprised of what was leftover or readily available. You’ll see all sorts of variations these days that have tons of different herbs, and olives and random ingredients in them.

In no way am I saying these are bad additions, but they just don’t reflect the classic nature of it. Italian chicken cacciatore uses few ingredients and either uses chicken or rabbit. Yup, I said rabbit in addition to readily available.

HOW TO MAKE IT

Here are the steps to making it.

STEP 1: Reconstitute your porcini mushrooms and dice – reserve the liquid.
STEP 2: Bread down a whole chicken into parts and season with salt and pepper.
STEP 3: Sear the chicken until golden brown in a large rondeaux pot.
STEP 4: Remove the chicken and sauté the vegetables until tender.
STEP 5: Deglaze with red wine and cook to au sec.
STEP 6: Pour in some of the reserved porcini mushroom liquid along with tomatoes, herbs and salt and pepper.
STEP 7: Add the seared chicken back in the pot and braise.

As I have told you so many times, this is beyond easy to make and just so flavorful.

HOW TO SERVE IT

Chicken cacciatore can be served with several different things such as rice, pasta or polenta.

I like to finish off my chicken cacciatore recipe with a ton of chopped parsley.

It just adds so much needed color to the mixture and of course some flavor.

Well my friends, that’s all I got. Hope you all enjoy this and that’s the most perfect family meal recipe.

Italian Recipes

If you are digging on this then check out some of these other classic Italian dishes.

Here’s the creamy polenta recipe that goes really well with this.

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5 from 6 votes