Chicken With Shallots, Chef-Style

The recipe, which came in a Twitter update from the chef and television personality Andrew Zimmern, was succinct, as the form requires: “Brown 8 thighs, 3 C shallots. Add wine, tarragon, Dijon, sim 30 min covered. Remove lid, reduce. Add 2 C cut cherry toms.”

There was no photograph attached, but he was clearly writing about chicken. An image of the dish was instantly in my mind: the burnished brown of the skin peeking out of a sauce the color of goldenrod, with flecks of green from the tarragon and bright red from the wilted tomatoes. Such is the power of a great recipe in whatever form. The dish seemed obviously cookable. Better yet, it was deeply appetizing. I made it for the family right away.

What happens when food professionals are off work and cooking for children and spouses? At home, after all, these people are much like the rest of us. They’re not looking to show off or spend a lot of time at the stove. They just want to eat well, simply and fast. Unlike the rest of us, of course, they’re uncommonly good at this. It can be useful to ask them for instruction — or to benefit, as in the case of Zimmern’s tweet, from their generosity.

Gavin Kaysen, the executive chef at Café Boulud in Manhattan, cooks out of a largely French larder at work. So at home, he said, he moves in the opposite direction, toward “spice, lots of acid and, this time of year, when it’s still so cold, herbs.” He gave a recent example: Chili-rubbed skirt steak with a chimichurri sauce, served with baby gem lettuce, some roasted carrots with lime butter, shaved radishes and grilled onions. He knocked it off in less than an hour, he said, pleasing both his wife and son. I figured I could do it in two hours on a weekend, with similar results. (Correct.)

In Providence, R.I., the chef Matthew Jennings of Farmstead Inc. said he fires up his home grill no matter the season. Marinate some chicken, and cook it crisp and flavorful over the fire, he said. (What marinade? Onion, garlic, chiles, smoked paprika, lemon juice, cider vinegar, miso, wine and olive oil, he said.) Put the kids to sleep. Then make a salad, and serve it with the chicken, crusty bread and “some cheese and unending goblets of wine.” This is a doable weeknight meal, even if you avoid the marinade and just buy a rotisserie chicken at the market for the centerpiece.

Actually, the vegetable shaman Steven Satterfield, of the estimable Miller Union in Atlanta, advocated doing just that — picking up an organic roasted bird on the way home, slicing the meat, then putting it on top of a salad before opening a bottle of wine. The result “feels fancy without being so,” he said. (Rigorous testing confirms: This is accurate.)