Chicken of Easy Virtue

Along with the opening of chicken-obsessed last week, there’s been some media fuss lately about a new chicken trend in the fashionable eating world.

Chicken is the new pork. Chicken is the new ramps. Chicken is your new best friend. This got me thinking a lot about one of the most disrespected members of the food kingdom.

Most people I know who care about food care very little for chicken. It’s dirty, it’s bland, it’s shot through with antibiotics and/or salmonella.

“Chicken is boring,” food-bro Anthony Bourdain declared in his book “Kitchen Confidential. “Chefs see it as a menu item for people who don’t know what they want to eat.”

Given a choice of meat in dishes like curries or enchiladas, I never go for chicken. In fact, I don’t think I ever eat chicken in restaurants unless it’s fried. And yet I do like cooking chicken at home, from simple sautéed thighs to classic family recipes like chicken with forty cloves of garlic. It’s cheap, easy, and roasting a whole chicken at home feels like a major accomplishment—though one of the first times I did it, I set the oven on fire. But never mind that.

But then there’s the instant gratification of store-bought rotisserie chicken. It somehow feels more wholesome than any other store-bought meal, but it takes a lot less planning and time than roasting a whole chicken yourself. Plus you can build so many different meals around it that it practically counts as cooking.

My household has recently become obsessed with rotisserie chicken taco night. We’ll buy a rotisserie chicken (our favorite is the adobo version from Union Market, though the shellacked and salty little fellas from C-Town, Key Foods, and have their merits, too), slice up an avocado, make some fresh salsa, and boom! Dinner. It’s especially nice on a hot summer night with a couple of margaritas.

So here’s a super simple recipe for rotisserie chicken tacos. Please bear in mind that the use of a habanero pepper in the salsa can make it pretty hot. It ends up being nicely balanced by the creaminess of the avocado and the rich salty chicken, but substitute a jalapeno if you’d like something a little gentler.

Rotisserie Chicken Tacos

Ingredients:

1 rotisserie chicken

1 avocado, cut into ½ inch slices

Corn tortillas

For salsa:

3 large tomatoes, cored and roughly chopped or a pint-box of cherry tomatoes

1 white onion, roughly chopped

1 bunch of cilantro, roughly chopped, including stems

Juice of two limes

3 large cloves of garlic

1 habanero pepper, roughly chopped

Directions

Dry-roast garlic in a hot pan, turning with tongs until dark brown spots appear on each side and the clove is softened.

Combine all salsa ingredients in food processor and pulse until mixed together and minced, but before it turns to a homogenized mush

Add salt to taste

Tear or cut chicken into small pieces, being sure to include the delicious skin

Heat tortillas in a hot, flat pan, about a minute on each side. After heating the tortillas, wrap them in a clean kitchen towel and place inside a covered bowl. (If you have a pancake or tortilla warmer, even better.) 

Assemble and eat!