Chicken Ragù With Fennel

We had this for dinner last night and fed it to our 9 month old, who then slept through the night for the first time in his life. We will now be eating this for dinner every night until he is about 5 or so.

Interesting recipe, but in the interests of fitting in my pants, I think I will skip the butter, noodles, cut the bacon down to one slice and just sprinkle a little parmesan on at the table. Should be able to get enough fats from the chicken and the olive oil.

I made this with a supermarket baked chicken... I followed the recipe (skipping the steps to cook the thighs). Then added my shredded chicken, both breasts and thighs, in step #9. Made for an even quicker preparation time! (I also added a few dollops of sour cream for a richer sauce at the end).

I just made this tonight (almost) as written. I accidentally purchased chicken breast instead of the thighs. The flavor is delicious, the bacon smoky, the fennel and onions are sweet. I am now cooking the meat pies. I painted the crust with a bit of the whole milk and sprinkled with a flake salt and freshly ground pepper. The ragú is wonderful as written (and I suspect a little less dry with thigh meat instead of the breast).

This is perfection. Don’t overdo it on the water, consider letting you milk warm to room temperature to for a smoother integration with the very hot sauce (prevent curdling). Flavor is outstanding. For the post from a year ago referencing ways to cut the fat and fit in your pants, I introduce to 2020 and the giving up on of waistbands.

Looking forward to trying this next weekend. Too late to gather all the ingredients at 4:00PM. Everything seems to be better with bacon and fennel. I'll probably double-up on the fennel.

Made some changes second time around that improved this vastly. Added flour - about a tablespoon after deglazing the pot, and a couple more tablespoons before adding milk. Huge improvement in consistency. Used homemade chicken stock instead of water for braising. This added some richer flavor and some nice silky texture to the sauce. Slowly whisked in milk to improve integration. Flavor was still excellent, and the consistency was finally where it should be - actually creamy instead of runny.

This is in my regular rotation. Wonderful in every way. Don’t change a thing.

Celery? I've often had good luck using it in place of fennel.

Some folks might skip eating this and have kale instead, if their pants a problem, but I'm going to try it mostly as is. We had the last of the week's allowance of bacon at breakfast, but I will season with applewood smoked salt for a bit of that flavor. I have only white meat in the freezer so maybe I'll pop it in the pressure cooker for tenderness. Nice to have a Ragu option that's different from bolognese or tomato heavy sauces. Seems great for a rainy September Sunday dinner.

Definitely will make this again. Velvety indeed. Thighs came in packages of 4, so l cooked 8 and used 2 fennel bulbs and a large onion. I think the remedy for the thin sauce is making sure the thighs fit very snugly. I only needed to add a little water and was left with a modest amount of liquid when the chicken was removed. Even still, I stirred 1/2 Tbsp of potato starch into the milk to tighten the sauce. Additionally l used only 1/2 the bacon and served over freekah to up the smokiness.

I loved this, though I didn’t use the milk. Instead I made it more like a soup—added extra broth and served over homemade ricotta dumplings. Delicious.

10/2/2019 -- Used ~6 oz. pancetta, 1 1/2 lbs. boneless, skinless chicken thighs. Sautéed pancetta without oil, browned chicken in rendered fat, then proceeded with recipe as written (but added only enough water to moisten veggies). Did not add butter. Served with pasta and extra grated Parmesan. Liked it much more than any bolognese sauce I've ever made.

I used 3 bulbs of fennel (for a slightly scaled up recipe) and would use more next time. Like others, I added much more thyme and was glad. The description calls this "simplified!" It has 11 steps, says to cook the chicken in oil, water, wine, and milk sequentially, and took over 3 hrs! What does the original look like??? The result was incredible. Everyone had thirds!

From a flavor standpoint, this is wonderful. But as others have noted, as written this comes out too watery. I had to reduce the sauce considerably, and it still ends up leaving a puddle on the plate when served over pasta (even when using the starchy pasta cooking water). I'll definitely make this again, but I'll likely add a little flour to thicken this up a bit. (I'll also reduce the amount of the initial braising liquid - the chicken doesn't need to be almost covered to cook well.)