Smothered chicken cooked in a roux with baby lima beans, pictured here with creamed brussels sprouts.
Chicken and Butter Beans
I have been busier than a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs y'all!!
We have the grandkids everyday now after school - which I love, love, love, don't get me wrong. Since our move to be closer to them six months ago, we have seen and spent more time with them from since they were born. It isn't that we were all that far away from them to begin with, but where we did live was off the beaten path and far enough away to be inconvenient for everybody.
It does leave me with a small window of time in the mornings to get everything done though, and believe me, it goes by quick! I suppose that some of you moms know exactly what I mean.
Just a quick reminder.... if you aren't interested in the chit chat, info, photos, tips, product recommendations and such on a blog, as always, you'll find the complete recipe text with measurements and instructions, as well as a printable document, a little bit further down the page. Just swipe or scroll down to the bottom of the post for the printable!
Along with that, some of you know that I am (finally) working on publishing my first cookbook (#ad) that so many of you have been asking me to do for years.
It's exciting to be able to bring the website here to life in the form of a book you can hold in your hands, but it takes a lot of behind the scenes work to birth that process. I always wanted the process to be authentic and happen organically, as everything else at Deep South Dish has, and I am thrilled and honored to be working with the publisher who discovered me.
I'll reveal more about that on down the line of course but look for the Deep South Dish cookbook to arrive in your favorite stores and online at places like Amazon, in early spring of 2015, yay! Update: My cookbook is available (#ad)!
And, of course, I'm still cooking, of course, and writing new recipes!
You'll see a few of those as cookbook exclusives, but much of what I'm cooking are things that are already here on the site, or easy pressure cooker and slow cooker recipes. Over the weekend I pressure cooked a whole chicken, roasted a turkey breast and made my favorite pot roast.
My hope was that having those leftovers will hold off The Cajun for a few days so I can get some work done! I don't know though - I walked through the family room yesterday and caught him with a plate full of the chicken and a side of several slices of white bread, eating it, like a caveman, with his hands!
He is definitely a meat-eater.
So, anyway... while we're heading into a fall chill later this week even here in the Deep South, I think I'll sneak in a great comfort food dish that we love. This is a popular dish in my part of the world, with some variations, as usual, among families. It's basically a smothered chicken, stewed in a roux with baby lima beans.
Here in the Deep South, butter beans often means the larger lima beans, so you'll see this prepared sometimes with those. I prefer the smaller baby lima beans here, also known around the South as butter beans. They're both butter beans y'all and either will work here. Sometimes the prep of the chicken is varied, but this is the way I prepare the dish. By the way, simply cooking butter beans alone in the roux all on their own, without the chicken, in the same manner we prepare our Creamed Peas, is an excellent and popular dish here too.
Here's what you'll need to make my Chicken and Butter Beans:
- 1/2 cup cooking oil
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 cup chopped onion
- 1 tablespoon minced garlic
- 6 cups chicken stock or broth
- 1 (28 ounce) bag frozen butter beans or green baby lima beans
- 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
- 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
- 1/2 teaspoon dried basil
- 2 tablespoons cooking oil
- 1 (3 to 4 pound) whole fryer, cut up
- Kosher salt, freshly cracked black pepper and Cajun seasoning, to taste
- 1 green onion, sliced
- 1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
Add the oil to a large Dutch oven or pot, and slowly stir in flour a little at a time.
Until you have a medium-brown roux.
Add the chopped onion to the roux and cook.
Stir constantly for about 3 minutes. Add the garlic and cook another minute.
Slowly stir in the chicken stock until fully incorporated, bring to a boil.
Add the lima beans, Worcestershire, thyme and basil and return to a boil. Stir, reduce heat to a very low simmer - the key here is a bare simmer, not a boil - and slow cook them for about 20 minutes, stirring several times.
Season chicken on both sides with salt, pepper and Cajun seasoning.
Heat oil in a large skillet and brown chicken in batches on both sides.
Transfer chicken to the bean pot, deglaze the skillet with a splash of water and pour pan drippings into the bean pot. Continue cooking on a low simmer for about another 45 minutes to one hour, stirring occasionally, OR until chicken is completely cooked through, beans are soft and liquid is thickened. Stir in the green onion and parsley, taste and adjust seasonings as needed. Serve over hot rice.
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