Pennsylvania Dutch Chicken Potpie

Message Topic Search Topic Options Post Reply Create New Topic Printable Version Translate Topic

From Time/Life's Foods of the World - The Eastern Heartland - 1971:

 In Pennsylvania Dutch cooking, potpies are pieces of noodle or baking powder dough. They are boiled with meat and often potatoes to make rib-sticking potpie stews that are named for the kind of meat used. Thus, the following recipe made with chicken is called "chicken potpie," though it bears no resemblance to the pastry-encased potpies typical of other parts of the United States.

When Dave posted his family's ham and bean potpie, I immediately fell in love with it as I recognized simple, farmer's fare that could very well have been served by my own hard-working Lutheran ancestors in rural North Dakota, which was heavily settled by German and Scandinavian Protestants. The monikor "Pennsylvania Dutch," may be confusing to some, but Time/Life explains:

 [T]he Pennsylvania Dutch [are] descendants of the German religious radicals who began emigrating to America at the end of the 17th Century to join William Penn's thriving young colony for "schismatical, factious people," his "Holy Experiment" in religious tolerance.... [Pennsylvania Dutch] is a corruption of Deutsch, meaning German, and has nothing to do witih Holland.... [T]this region became a sanctuary for thousands of German Protestants of many diverse sects whose homeland in the Rhine Valley had been ravaged first by the Thirty Years' War and then by the armies of Louis XIV. The mennonites, members of a sect founded by Menno Simons in 1561, were the first and most important group of Deutsch to arrive in Pennsylvania, followed by a multitude of others - Crefelders, Amish, Dunkards, Schwenkfelders, Seventh-Day Adventists, Moravians and strange minor cults with names like New Born, Mountain Men and the Society of the Woman in the Wilderness. Under the sheltering wing of William Penn, who offered them land at 10 cents an acre, they settled down, increased and prospered. In 1763 there were approximately 280,000 Germans in the state, and their neighbors were highly impressed with their industry. Wrote Benjamin Rush, an influential Philadelphian of the day: "A German farm may be distinguished from the farms of other citizens by the superior size of their barns, the plain but compact form of their houses, the height of their enclosures, the extent of their orchards, the fertility of their fields, the luxuriance of their meadows, and a general appearance of plenty and neatness in everything that belongs to them."

The incredible work ethic and simplicty of the Pennsylvania Dutch are directly reflected in their food, which is simple without pretense, yet simply good, nourishing and bountiful; solid food for hard-working people. This approach to life and to food brings back every good memory from my rural background and speaks to the incredible labour and love for the land that brought "the Heartland" into prosperity, whether in rural Pennsylvania or rural North Dakota. Such attitudes toward land and life built rock-hard values in the generations who live there. As Time/Life says, "These are people who love to eat, in their own expressive phrase, feinschmeckers, which, roughly translated, means those who know how good food should taste and who eat plenty of it."

So, without further introduction, here is the recipe provided by Time/Life; my method will be a melding of this recipe with methods introduced by Dave in his post:

 Chicken Potpie

To serve 6 to 8:

A 5- to 6-pound roasting chicken, cut into 6 or 8 pieces 
4 quarts water 
2 medium-sized celery stalks, including the green leaves, cut into 3-inch pieces 
1/4 teaspoon crumbled, dried saffron threads or 1/4 teaspoon ground saffron* 
1 Tablespoon plus 2 teaspoons salt 
6 whole black peppercorns 
1/2 cup coarsely-chopped celery 
2 medium-sized boiling potatoes, peeled and coarsely chopped 
1/2 pound potpie squares (using Dave's recipe here) 
2 Tablespoons finely chopped fresh parsley 
freshly ground black pepper
Combine the chicken and water in a heavy 6- to 8-quart casserole and bring to a boil over high heat, skimming off the foam and scum as they rise to the surface, Add the pieces of celery, saffron, 1 tablespoon of salt and the peppercorns, and reduce the heat to low. Simmer partially covered for about 1 hour, or until the chicken shows now resistance when a thigh is pierced deeply with a sharp knife.
With a slotted spoon, transfer the chicken to a plate. Strain the stock through a fine sieve and return 2 quarts to the casserole. (Reserve the remaining stock for another use.) With a small, sharp knife, remove the skin from the chicken and cut the meat from the bones, discard the skin and bones, slice the meat into 1-inch pieces and set aside.

Add the chopped celery, potatoes and the remaining two teaspoons of salt to the casserole and bring to a boil over high heat. Drop in the potpie squares and stir briefly, then cook briskly, uncovered, for about 15 minutes, until the noodles are tender. Stir in the reserved chicken and parsley and cook for a minute or so to heat them through. Taste and season with more salt if desired and a few grindings of pepper.

To serve, ladle the chicken potpie into preheated individual bowls.

*WHAT??? Saffron (widely known in Middle Eastern and Mediterranean cuisine) in a Pennsylvania Dutch (decended from south Germany) dish? What's this all about??? 

Patience, dear reader - all will be made clear during the preparation post.

For simplicity's sake, here is Dave's recipe for the potpie noodles, cut in half as he recommends: 

 Potpie Noodles:
3 cups flour
2 eggs
2 tsp shortening
1 1/4 cups cold water

Mix the egg, flour and shortening together.  Slowly mix in the cold water until you get a thick dough.  Flour the dough and roll until it is approximately ⅛ thick.  
The flour on the dough will help to thicken the broth. 

Cut the dough into noodles that are approximately 2-3 inches square.  

Gently, place the noodles into the broth.  Some people like the noodles to be balled up so they are a little doughy.  