Kitchen Call: Pop goes the chicken … and ribs

In the southernmost parts of this country, cooks often rely on unique ingredients in cooking. Think of that first, courageous — or maybe desperate — Louisiana cook who, cupboard bare, sent the kids out to harvest “mud bugs” for supper. Surely, she never envisioned that one day, re-named crayfish, they’d sweep the country, demanding high prices at trendy restaurants. But they sure tasted great!

Southern cooks are equally creative in making stews and braises. They use pop, or soda, or what some call tonic. The concept isn’t so strange when you think about Europeans using wine as a cooking medium.

In European countries where beer is produced, it also ends up in the pot of a stew, soup or braise. After all, wine- and beer-making, when you think about them, are industries. And in the American South, where a good deal of soda is produced, it was only natural that cooks tried it out — in place of wine or beer. Surely home cooks in a pinch discovered soda as a cooking medium long before any manufacturer or bottler printed the recipes on a promotional pamphlet.

Soda, in fact, acts like wine or beer in the pot: It tenderizes meats while adding flavor. You can cook it gently for hours with chicken or beef or pork, and you can deglaze a pan with it.

Root beer and cola are two all-time favorites that take well to cooking. Uniquely American, they pair nicely with favorite Southern main ingredients — chicken and ribs.

Both recipes here can easily be made a day ahead and reheated in time for this Sunday night’s festivities.

CO’ COLA CHICKEN
Makes 6 to 8 servings

Based on recipes from the Coca-Cola company.

Buy a whole chicken and have it cut into eight serving pieces, wing tips and backbone removed, at the supermarket or meat market. (Save the backbone and wing tips for homemade stock.)

Using enough oil to coat the bottom of the pan (so the chicken doesn’t stick), brown the skin side first to give the finished recipe good eye appeal.

Use flat-leaf parsley in this — and all recipes — for best flavor.

4-pound chicken, cut into 8 serving pieces
Salt, pepper
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons butter
1 pound large white mushrooms, thickly sliced
1/2 cup chopped scallions, white and green parts
2 cloves garlic, minced
3 to 5 tablespoons flour
2 cups Coca-Cola (not diet)
3/4 cups chicken stock
Flat-leaf parsley
1/2 teaspoon fresh rosemary leaves, minced

1. Pat the chicken pieces dry with paper towels and season all over with salt and pepper. Heat the oil and butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the chicken pieces. Cook until golden on one side; turn and cook on other side. Remove from pan; set aside.

2. Add mushrooms to pan; cook over medium heat until golden. Add onion and garlic; cook, stirring until softened. Sprinkle the flour into pan and cook, stirring, until the flour is lightly colored, about 2 minutes. Stir in the cola, stock, and herbs. Cook 4 to 5 minutes.

3. Return the chicken pieces to the pan. Bring just to a boil; reduce the heat until gently bubbling. Cover and simmer for 25 to 30 minutes, until tender.

4. Remove the chicken from pan to a serving platter. Skim the fat from sauce. Pour the sauce over the chicken to serve.

ROOT BEER SMOTHERED RIBS
8 servings

Much later, in summer, when you light up the grill, you might think about simmering together all the “wet ingredients” in this recipe — with maybe a touch of hot sauce — for your own original barbecue sauce.

3 pounds boneless beef short ribs, cut into serving size, 2 to 4 ribs each
1/4 cup flour
2 to 3 tablespoons canola or vegetable oil
6 cloves garlic, peeled
2 ribs celery, chopped
2 onions, chopped
2 large carrots, chopped
12 ounce bottle root beer (not diet)
1 cup beef stock
2 tablespoons tomato paste
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon each salt and pepper
2 pounds sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed

1. Coat the ribs with flour, shaking off any excess. Heat the oil in a heavy oven-proof pan. Add the ribs and brown on all sides. Remove the ribs the from pan; set aside.

2. Heat more oil over medium heat in the same pan. Add garlic, celery, onions and carrots. Cook, stirring, until the vegetables are tenderized. Add the root beer, water, stock, tomato paste, vinegar, salt and pepper. Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring and scraping up any browned bits of meat left in the pan.

3. Return ribs to pan. Cover and cook in a 300-degree oven for two hours.

4. Add the sweet potatoes; cover and cook for one hour longer. Cool until fat rises to the top. Skim fat from top before serving. Reheat before serving.

Linda Bassett, author of “From Apple Pie to Pad Thai,” teaches American regional cooking and international cuisine at Massachusetts' North Shore Community College. Reach her by e-mail at KitchenCall@aol.com.