My Year of Cooking Stupidly commences with that mainstay of Eisenhower-era buffet tables and Ladies' Luncheons: Chicken á là King.
Basically leftover chicken in white sauce, I have to make a few alterations: fresh mushrooms instead of (ook) canned, and deep-six the quarter cup each of chopped green pepper and cooked pimientos in favor of a like amount of frozen green peas. (The Cupid family dislikes green pepper, and because I've never encountered a cooked pimiento outside of a Spanish olive I hold pimientos in deep suspicion. But peas, everybody likes peas.)
The Cook Book has a little asterisk next to the request for "1 cup diced cooked chicken": it directs me to a Stewed Chicken recipe, which calls for a stewing hen, lotsa veg, and an afternoon's worth of prep. But I don't have an afternoon's worth of time, so I shortcut with boneless skinless breasts poached in stock and veg, including mushrooms, saving the excess for another day.
And now to build the sauce: butter and flour for roux, the enhanced stock I made, a cup of heavy cream, salt, pepper, and that's it. Cook until bubbly, toss in chicken and peas to heat, serve in attractive puff pastry shells (thank you, Pepperidge Farms).
I worry that it's going to be bland, and the sauce is so thick it's almost gluey, but the dish is greeted with enthusiastic yums. And it is good--the multi-veg stock adds a nice depth, the cream and butter give that mouth-round fullness--and rich. Really, really rich. Sous-Chef bails with two forkfuls left. Tallboy manages two helpings, but just barely. I eat mine, and Sous-Chef's leftovers. I'd lick the plate if no one were watching; I wasn't expecting to like this .
Later, we watch season two of The IT Crowd and compare how the Chicken á là King is sitting with us: "Like a big fist up under my ribcage." "Like a baseball sized wodge of silly putty in my intestines." Yes! the adventure begins!