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1
Take a large pot and add your water, whole onion, bay leaves, pepper, sea salt and chicken over high heat.
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2
Do not add any oil as the chicken has enough fat.
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3
Once it comes to a boil, lower the heat and simmer on low for 45 minutes, until the meat is nearly falling off the bones.
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4
Once it is cooked, discard the onion and bay leaves.
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5
Take out your chicken and put aside to cool.
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6
Strain the broth and keep it on hand for later.
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7
Once your chicken is cool enough to handle, pull the meat apart from the bones and place meat in a separate bowl.
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8
Discard the bones.
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9
You can keep the chicken meat in large shreds for a main course or shred them finely for a fantastic appetizer.
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10
Its up to you.
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11
I do both for different occasions.
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12
Take your day-old bread and rub it in your hands over a mixing bowl until you have fine crumbs or use your food processor on pulse.
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13
You are aiming for fine bread crumbs.
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14
Take your walnuts and either pound them with a mortar and pestle (my favorite!)
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15
or whiz them up in a food processor with the olive oil.
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16
Again, crush, pound or micro-plane your garlic so there are no chunks.
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17
Mix your walnuts, bread crumbs and garlic together.
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18
Slowly add your strained broth, ladle by ladle, until you achieve a paste.
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19
Dont add too much you just want to reach paste consistency.
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20
Add a little salt to taste.
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21
Now, mix the paste and your shredded chicken, ladling in the remaining broth.
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22
You do not need to use all the broth.
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23
Once your chicken, paste and broth mixture is moist but not sloppy it should be creamy for a main course and spreadable as an appetizer melt the remaining butter gently over medium low heat and add the paprika to the butter.
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24
Remove from heat as the butter will begin to smoke and you dont want that.
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25
Move your chicken mixture to a flat serving dish.
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26
You should have a reddish-brown butter to pour evenly over your chicken as a garnish that will flavor it like you would not believe.
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27
We traditionally serve this with corn bread but any dense sour bread or crusty bread will do.
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28
Trust me this is very special.