Ingredients
- 2 chicken fillets (organic) à 140 g
- 2 slices of smoked raw ham2 tbsp. coarsely chopped green herbs
- (chervil, chives and tarragon)
- pepper, salt
- 2 tbsp. butter
- 200 ml double cream
Garnish:
- 200 g snow peas
- whole herbs as above
- hard rolls
Homegrown herbs on your balcony, windowsill, or in your little garden… taste quite different from the winter ones from the store, which I gratefully bought as well, by the way. We in the Netherlands cannot do without them. An old custom. Gheraert Vorselman, for example, features salads with burnet, fennel flowers, and borage in his 1560 cookbook, and our 18th-century Kitchen Maids knew how to use them too. We had briefly forgotten this due to the misery of the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries. Even halfway through the last century, you couldn’t get much more at the greengrocer than parsley and celery; only a high-born lady like Queen Wilhelmina had tarragon brought from her garden in Soestdijk in the 1930s. And now, we ordinary mortals can also celebrate spring royally: with the delicate herbs of April and May. The most beautiful combination is chervil, chives, and tarragon. Snow peas pair well with this. And those herbs go well with them too. Below is a menu suggestion to keep the herb feast going until the very end.
• The often-criticized chicken fillets do not dry out at all when stuffed, and here is how to do it. Score the fillets with a very sharp knife like a pointed bread roll. Top with ham and herbs, fold closed. Secure slightly with a cocktail stick. Sprinkle the outside with salt and pepper.
• Heat the butter in a non-stick frying pan. Brown the fillets with the rough side down, turn, and brown on the other side as well. Cover and cook gently for fifteen minutes, turning occasionally.
• Wash the snow peas, trim the ends if necessary, and boil for 5 minutes in plenty of water over an open pan. Drain.
• Keep the cooked fillets and snow peas warm.
• Pour the cream into the frying pan and simmer briefly until the sauce thickens slightly. Stir in the herbs, pour half under the fillets, and serve the rest separately in a sauce bowl. Garnish the snow peas with the whole herbs. Serve with bread.
Wine: Rosé de Provence.
Menu suggestion:
• Starter: hollowed-out tomato filled with cooked shrimp mixed with mayonnaise and chives on a bed of shredded butter lettuce, sprinkled with plenty of basil leaves.
• Dessert: strawberries with bourbon vanilla sugar and fresh mint leaves.