Skillet Chicken with Bacon Cream Sauce

After we left Switzerland we had another 1 day stop in Dijon, France.  I didn't do a lot of research about Dijon before we left and so I had the impression that it was a small town but boy was I wrong, it was definitely at least the size of PDX.  Here we stayed in an adorable little garden cottage with a very sweet host who left us fresh croissants from the bakery.  We wandered around this city for hours and we went to the famous mustard shop called Maille founded in 1747.  This shop was amazing and we bought lots of gifts for people here, we did save two things for our selves though which were apple cider vinegar and a mushroom mustard.  There were tons of people on the main shopping street,  huge music boxes,  beautiful fountains (pictured below), and something similar to a puppet show.  We later found out that we were at the Saturday market that happens every week.  We eventually made our way back to our cottage and decided we were too tired to cook so we found a little sushi place near our home called Sushi Wabi.  It was so delicious, if you look at the picture below towards the back you can see they even gave us duck sushi!  I wish we had a little more time in Dijon but more time in Paris was also just fine with me.  We also enjoyed lots of wine from Rhone.  I adapted this recipe last night for dinner and it was crazy delicious, although my sauce didn't seem to thicken up like it was suppose to.

Serves 4-5

The Ingredients

2 tablespoons olive oil

5 chicken thighs

salt and pepper

3 garlic cloves, minced

1 cup chicken stock

8 strips bacon (cooked, fat drained off, and chopped into small chunks) - divided

5 thin lemon slices

2/3 cup heavy cream.

2 green onions, chopped

The Process

1.  Heat olive oil in a large skillet on medium-high heat. Generously season chicken thighs with salt and pepper - make sure to season under the skin too. Add chicken thighs skin side down to the hot skillet. Cook for about 5-7 minutes on high-medium heat, covered, skin side down, without flipping, checking occasionally, until the skin side is very well browned.

2.  Remove chicken from the skillet.

3.  Add minced garlic and a small amount of chicken stock to de-glaze the pan and cook the garlic for about a minute. Add the remaining chicken stock (1 cup). Add half the bacon (cooked, fat should be drained off, and chopped into small chunks).

4.  Add chicken back to the pan, on top of bacon and in the chicken broth. Arrange 5 thin lemon slices around chicken thighs - and cook, simmering, covered, for about 20 minutes, until chicken is done and is no longer pink in the center.

5.  After chicken is cooked, remove it from the skillet. Remove lemon slices from the skillet - it's very important that you remove them now, do not leave them in for the sauce otherwise it will be too sour. Add 2/3 cup heavy cream to the skillet. Bring to boil and mix everything well, scraping from the bottom. Immediately reduce to simmer, add chicken thighs back to the skillet and reheat.

6.  To serve, spoon some of the sauce over the chicken thighs, and sprinkle with remaining chopped bacon and chopped green onions.