Where did all the Chicken a la King go?

Groundbreaking research on this topic found here: http://justserved.onthetable.us/2014/03/chicken-la-king.html

I remember eating Chicken a la King growing up. I also remember some fairly awful recipes for it, e.g., a can of Campbell's condensed Cream of Chicken soup plus a jar of pimientos.

By the way, the whole On The Table site is interesting, from the lengthy, lengthy page of food-related quotes:
http://www.onthetable.us/culinaryquotes.shtml
to the monthly roundup of new food sites (and memes) on the intertubez:
http://www.onthetable.us/

Thanks, Jeff, that was a fascinating read.

Dishes come in to and go out of fashion...

[Jenise]

What a fun read. Scholarly and snarky at the same time.

You know what, though, I don't think I've ever had Chicken a la King. It's a name that's been around forever--I may even have become aware of it in childhood if it was a TV dinner flavor--I distinctly recall a picture of it and those red pimiento bits, though I wouldn't have been a partaker. I may have also seen it in the Betty Crocker cookbook, which I pored over back then. But it never appealed--as a kid, I hated gravy, and the blonder it was the more I hated it.

We make it regularly:

FREE LANCED CHICKEN A'LA KING:

Soak a handful of dry mushroom in very hot water. Drain them saving ½ cup of water; and add a half cup of chicken stock and a cup of milk. In the meantime I chop the mushrooms with two cloves of garlic, the equivalent of a whole red pepper from a jar of roasted ones; and a large shallot. Then sauté the veggies in two tablespoons of EVOO. Meanwhile make the sauce with four tablespoons of butter, a fourth cup of flour, one cup each of chicken stock and milk, and two tablespoons of sherry. Add the veggies and two cups of smoked chicken chunks to the sauce and warm through.

Serve over biscuit halves, with green beans almandine.

I've never had Chicken a la King - only Turkey a la King, almost always after Thanksgiving.

Well...

On Wednesday we made our monthly visit to London to dine in my favourite restaurant, Oslo Court*, whose menu, it's said, hasn't cjhanged since the 1970's (its not changed in the four years I've been going).

I don't usually look at the menu** because I know what I want, what I go there for, but this time I did and while they don't have Chicken ala King on it they do have ...Chicken Princesse Oslo Court, Onions, Mushrooms, White Wine and Cream which sounds like the ame thing.

But then, many of the dishes are those that vanished from other restaurants long ago.

*They're hidden away, don't advertise, it was only last year they put up a basic website, and there's never an empty table

**there's also as many, or more 'daily specials' that are recited by the waiter. Thing is, they never seem to change either.

So, all the Chicken a la King had a gender change and moved to Norway?

Got it!

[Jenise]

On a lark, I decided that today was the one day of the year I would consult the totally useless Oxford Companion to Food. Surely, they would know about Chicken a la King or that interloper from Oslo.

But no. Firstly, the author shows his bias by describing chicken as "lacking flavor" then lists about five examples of chicken dishes designed to get around that fault, including Kiev and Southern Fried. Peculiarly, measuring the copy by the inch, the space given to this healthy and versatile protein is only three times larger than his preceding entry on, of all things, chewing gum. I kid you not. Why this book is useless!

[Robin Garr]

Ick! You can buy it in a can, still, and Amazon (of course) has it!
http://www.amazon.com/Swanson-Chicken-K ... B006VS0622

swansons.jpg

[Jenise]

Euw, gross!

Carl Swanson was Swedish, yet somehow the Norwegians got the goods. Something's wrong here....