Blue Duck Kitchen's First Cooking Demo - Creole Chicken

New Orlean's Style Creole Chicken

1 medium size yellow onion
1 medium size green pepper
3 cloves of fresh garlic
1 large stalk celery
1 large tomato
4 sprigs fresh thyme
1/2 tsp dry oregano
1 15 oz can tomato sauce
2-3 dry bay leaves
1 pinch of red pepper flakes

2 chicken drumsticks
2 chicken thighs
2 chicken wings
4 table spoons vegetable oil

Rinse chicken pieces , pat dry and season with salt and pepper. Heat large sauce pan and add vegetable oil. Lightly dust chicken pieces with flour and place in heated saute pan. Brown chicken (10 minutes). Turn pieces over and brown the other side (5 minutes). Remove chicken from pan and place on platter and place in preheated oven to keep warm.

Pour off any excess oil in pan and set oil aside. Return pan to stove top and turn heat to medium. Coarsely mince onion, green pepper, tomato, celery and place in saute pan. Saute for five minutes, add thyme, oregano, red pepper flakes, bay leaves, salt and pepper. (Add reserve oil if needed) Finely mince garlic and add to pan. Scrape "fond" from bottom of pan while stiring vegetables. Add can of tomato sauce, chicken broth and minced tomato. Remove chicken from oven and place into sauce pan with sauce. Return to stovetop and simmer for 1/2 hour with top on pan. Remove from heat, taste and adjust seasoning.

Traditional accompaniment - Uncle Ben's Rice cooked with chicken broth

The Art of Cooking

The art of cooking is all about bringing ones individual talents to the kitchen. You must not only make the sauce but you must also feel the heart of the sauce. Be it on the prep table or on the stove or in the oven, you must have a sense of what you are in the process of cooking. Measuring cups will not tell you if you have added enough. Listen to your heart and feel like it is enough.

It is not only important to be a good cook or chef, it is equally important to be able to transfer ones culinary skills and abilities to someone who is willing to watch, listen and learn.

About Blue Duck Catering

We have always acknowledged that catering is about more than excellent food. At Blue Duck Catering, we sincerely believe that an event is a combination of great food, great themes, impeccable and unobtrusive service with a gracious and professional staff. It is our most sincere desire to see to it that you and your guests experience the joy and surprise of a truly special party.
Blue Duck Catering is a premier off-premise caterer and event management company with a reputation for providing uncompromising quality to a demanding clientele.

This past fall (2008) Blue Duck Catering, Inc. enjoyed tremendous success with it's Personal Chef program. Executive Chef Gary Cole has developed a young cadre of Cordon Bleau culinary school graduates to prepare from scratch beautiful and tasty meals for clients, in the privacy of their own home. With you, the Chef plans the menu, then makes recommendations, does the shopping, prepares and presents the food. The host or hostess only task is to send out the invitations. A pampered guest as though she or he were a guest in their own home is the goal.

The guests are welcome to watch the food preparation in the kitchen and will leave the kitchen with some new aspect of cooking that they did not know. Jan Slaughter of Oak Park, Illinois stated "I had a wonderful time and I did not have to cook a thing. The meal was wonderful and my guests were floored by the chef's food presentation. I'm scheduling another date to invite some of my more important clients, who knows I may close a deal over a glass of Chardonnay after we finish the Flounder stuffed with crabmeat".