Wednesday 10th of April 2013

Okay, so we had good ol' roast chicken for supper (again), but owing to my increasing aversion to potatoes-with-what-feels-like-absolutely-everything, I needed to cook something that came up to scratch in the hearty, satisfying stakes without being an obvious, 'I just don't want to make potatoes' thing.  Now, I appreciate that a celeriac is not something that, ahem, normal people necessarily have just knocking about in their vegetable basket, but I did - still on a bit of a Francophile tip, I was planning to make celeriac rémoulade later this week but, hey, them's the breaks... Celeriac & Mushroom Gratin it was!

In actual fact, as far as side dishes for roast chicken go, this one is a definite keeper.  I peeled the celeriac, halved and then sliced it.  I popped the pieces in a pan of cold water along with a couple of chopped shallots and brought it all to the boil.  Once drained, I layered the celeriac and shallot in a roasting pan with some sliced mushrooms, scattering a bit of chopped tarragon (mmmm...) between the layers.  Poured over a 284ml carton of whipping cream (though double would also be fine, that's just what I had to hand), ground over some (white) pepper and covered it with a handful of grated parmesan.  That was it; ready for 45 minutes in the oven at 180ºc (which was, helpfully, the second half of the chicken's cooking time).  I allowed the gratin to rest for 10 minutes alongside the chicken after taking them out of the oven; I always think that baked dishes like this benefit from being served on the warm side, rather than searingly hot, they seem to taste more of themselves, somehow.

Cath xx