We’re getting ready for another virtual program inspired by our From the Homestead Kitchen series (you can see a recording of our first Thanksgiving-themed program here). Something’s Brewing! Women and Tea in 20th Century Los Angeles will explore the social impact of gathering for tea and how women used it as a time for camaraderie, organizing, and working towards greater independence. Throughout the program, we’ll sample historic recipes and we invite you to join us. A couple of weeks before the event on May 9th, we’ll post the featured recipes on our website. Show An artifact from the Homestead’s collection that will be featured in the program is Luncheon, Tea and Party Suggestions, a booklet compiled by the California Home Economics Association in 1927. A recipe from the booklet that did not make the cut for the program, but was well-worth exploring for its history and legacy is Chicken à la King: diced chicken in a cream sauce that often includes mushrooms, green peppers, and pimientos, typically served on toast, noodles, or inside patty shells (shells of puff pastry made to hold a filling). I’ll cut right to the chase here and tell you that this recipe was beyond easy to make (even the patty shells!), but completely underwhelming. As my colleagues and I have prepared numerous historic recipes over the last year, “bland” is a word that has come up quite a bit, but often we notice that if a recipe survived the test of time, it was usually tweaked to include new ingredients or more/different seasonings. In the case of Chicken à la King, we see that some modern recipes are almost an exact match to the one in our booklet, but there are variations, too. The only differences in the recipe found on the Betty Crocker website, for example, are that Betty’s includes black pepper, but no olives or a hard boiled egg. The recipe is well reviewed (4.5 stars out of 90 reviews), and not surprisingly, many of the comments are nostalgic in nature noting that the recipe tasted just the way someone remembered it as a child. Other modern recipes note the addition of things like celery, onions, and peas, all three of which can be found in Stouffer’s frozen Chicken à la King at your local grocery store. A recipe from the Food Network pushes the envelope a bit further with ingredients like shallots, thyme, cayenne pepper, nutmeg, and even shiitake mushrooms. So to each their own, right? The dish can easily be adapted to your taste. My husband and I added a bunch of fresh herbs to our creation including dill, chives, and parsley—but it still needed more seasoning. Practically speaking, it’s a great use of leftovers than can easily be made to look sophisticated if you serve it in a patty shell.
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