A 3-INGREDIENT RECIPE FROM MARÍA’S KITCHEN

My garden tomatoes this year are small, but intensely flavored.

I learned to speak and cook Spanish in María’s kitchen in my early years in an Andalusian village.  María and her mother did all the cooking for the tapas bar the family ran. Every day of the year these women put out an assortment of tapas, ten or more different dishes, both hot and cold, that changed with the seasons and with what ingredients María had from the family’s huerta, vegetable garden, in the nearby campo, countryside. 

I would sit at the table in María’s kitchen several evenings a week. In the beginning I just watched and chatted, my vocabulary growing by leaps and bounds. Soon, I was asking questions and taking notes (where my recipe collection began). Eventually, I began to help peel and chop and even lend a hand at the stove.

In the summer, one of my favorite tapas was pollo con tomate, chicken with tomatoes. María’s husband, Paco, would come back from irrigating the fields with a basket of dead-ripe, fragrant tomatoes. María peeled them and added them to a pan with chunks of chicken browned in olive oil. She added salt and a bay leaf. Ya está. Nothing more.

The tomatoes cooked down to a thick sauce, savory with chicken juices. The dish was served in small tapa portions with chunks of bread for mopping up the sauce or as a ración, a larger serving, with patatas fritas, fries, as well as bread.

Not counting olive oil, salt and pepper, this dish can be made with only three ingredients. Over the years, I have gussied it up with Sherry, mushrooms and herbs, but, honestly, the intense flavor of vine-ripened tomatoes is all that’s needed to make a delicious dish.

Pollo con tomate--chicken with tomatoes--an easy summertime dish.

Fresh tomatoes cook up to a sauce the consistency of jam.

As a tapa, pollo con tomate is served with bread to mop up the sauce. How about some torn fresh basil on top?

Mix the savory tomato sauce with pasta. Add fresh rucula leaves on top.

Tender chicken legs in tomato served with rice--a whole meal.

Top the chicken with a 1-2-3 sauté of diced zucchini, red pepper, garlic and pine nuts. 

Chicken with Tomato

Pollo con Tomate

This recipe is pretty close to María’s original—three ingredients, chicken, tomatoes and bay leaf—except that I’m using legs and thighs instead of hacked-up chicken. Instead of bay, you could swap a different third ingredient (onion, garlic, red or green peppers, chile, pimentón, Sherry, brandy, mushrooms, ham, olives---). Add some fresh and flavorful herbs to the finished dish. Serve the chicken with bread, with pasta or rice or even with fries.

The tomatoes need to be skinned and the easiest way to do this is to blanch them in boiling water. You may also wish to remove seeds. To do this, cut each tomato in half crosswise and either scoop out seeds with a spoon or gently squeeze the seeds out. Cut the tomatoes roughly into pieces. After skinning and chopping, there should be about 4 cups of pulp and juice.

Serves 6.

3 basic ingredients
2 ½ pound chicken legs and thighs
4 pounds fresh tomatoes
2 bay leaves (or choice of another ingredient)
Free ingredients
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
¼ cup olive oil

Sprinkle chicken pieces with salt and pepper. Allow to come to room temperature.

Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Cut a slit in the skin of the blossom end of the tomatoes. Drop them in the boiling water for 2 minutes. Drain them into a colander and rinse in cold water so they do not continue to cook.

Tomatoes, peeled and chopped.

When the tomatoes are cool enough to handle, slip off the skins, cut out the cores and break or cut the tomatoes into pieces.  (Remove seeds, if desired. I didn't.)

Tomatoes cook until jammy.

Heat oil in a large skillet. Slowly brown the pieces of chicken. Add the cut-up tomatoes, bay leaves and 1 teaspoon salt. Raise heat until tomatoes begin to bubble. Lower heat and cover the pan. Cook 15 minutes.

Turn the pieces of chicken in the sauce. Continue cooking, uncovered, until chicken is very tender and tomatoes are reduced to a thick, jammy sauce, about 25 minutes more.

Another version of pollo con tomate: Chicken Sautéed with Tomatoes.
Similar: Pork with Tomatoes (Magro con Tomate).

Tomato picking and Country Gazpacho.

Picking tomatoes in the huerta (1968).