Chicken with a side of history, substitutions allowed: Country Captain

A Southern Lowcountry curried chicken dating back to the 1800s welcomes variations and tastes comfortingly old-fashioned. Recipe below.

FOOD CHANGES, TASTES EVOLVE. Yes, there are some enduring classic dishes that will forever be made, but many have their moment, then fade from memory. I only heard of Country Captain recently, when I read about a baker in Savannah giving it a makeover as a salad. I immediately wanted to know more about the non-made-over original.

Turns out this Southern Lowcountry chicken curry dish has quite a history, including being a “favorite at Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s estate in Warm Springs, Georgia,” according to the article on Taste (I’ll share the link to the full article in the Kitchen Notes below).

The FDR reference is what hooked me. My maternal grandmother, a proud union seamstress, had a huge newspaper rotogravure portrait of our 32nd president framed and hanging in her kitchen.

But Country Captain greatly predates even FDR. Wikipedia, knower of all things, reports that a recipe first appeared in the United States in “the pages of Miss Leslie’s New Cookery Book published in Philadelphia in 1857.” The dish came to America from India—the specifics of its origin unknown. One theory is that it was created by a British sea captain, which would explain its travels. One thing that supports its British expat origins is a key ingredient, curry powder, an ersatz Indian spice blend created by said expats to approximate the spice blends of the Indian cuisine they grew to love.

Whatever its origins, it became an enduring favorite dish in the Southern Lowcountry of coastal South Carolina and Georgia. And as with most dishes with such history, it has countless variations. Which makes it perfect for cooking now, when food shopping is limited and we’re either working from what we have on hand or something close to the original ingredients that we can track down. In the recipe Kitchen Notes, I outline a number of substitutes for a number of ingredients.

Oh, and one more bit of history. As I said, I had never heard of Country Captain. But when I mentioned to Marion that I was thinking of making this new-to-me dish, she said she used to make it before we met (we refer to these times for both of us as “in a previous life”), using the recipe in her 1975 edition of Joy of Cooking. I consulted that one too. It helped shape what I ultimately created.

And how was it? Country Captain has a comfortingly old-fashioned flavor, food from another time. Plenty of tomato tang, and the bell pepper and celery retain a nice bit of crunch. And the curry and the currants or raisins deliver a pleasant armchair adventurer exoticism. A perfect dish for right now.

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Country Captain

A lowcountry Southern curried chicken dating back to the 1800s welcomes variations and tastes comfortingly old-fashioned.

Course Main Course, Poultry

Cuisine Southern

Servings 4 to 6 people

Ingredients

• 6 bone-in skin-on chicken thighs
• salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon dried thyme
• 4 slices bacon (optional—see Kitchen Notes)
• olive oil (if not using bacon)
• 1 medium yellow onion, chopped
• 3 ribs celery, chopped
• 1 green bell pepper, seeded and chopped (or red or… see Kitchen Notes)
• 2 large cloves garlic, minced
• 1 28-ounce can crushed tomatoes (or diced or… see Kitchen Notes)
• 1 tablespoon curry powder (see Kitchen Notes)
• 1/2 cup dried currants (or raisins or... see Kitchen Notes)
• slivered almonds (or peanuts or… See Kitchen Notes)
• cooked white rice

Instructions

• Trim excess fat from chicken thighs and season thighs on both sides with salt, pepper and dried thyme.
• Put bacon in a cold, large sauté pan. Cook over medium-high heat, turning frequently, until crisp. Transfer to a paper towel-lined plate.
• Add oil, if needed (if your bacon did its fat-releasing job, you won’t need to—if you’re not using bacon, start with 2 tablespoons olive oil). Put chicken thighs into skillet, skin side down. Cook undisturbed until quite brown, 6 to 8 minutes. Turn chicken, reduce heat to medium and cook for about 4 minutes. Transfer chicken to plate.
• Drain all but 2 to 3 tablespoons of oil/chicken fat/bacon grease from pan. Add onion, celery, bell pepper and garlic to pan, stirring to combine and coat everything with oil. cook, stirring often, for about 8 minutes. You want to soften the vegetables, but not brown them—reduce heat, if needed.
• Add tomatoes to pan, and sprinkle on curry powder and currants. Stir everything to combine, drizzling in a little water if tomatoes seem too thick. Crumble up bacon into pan. Nestle chicken thighs into the mixture skin side up. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and cover pan. Cook until chicken is cooked through and flavors have combined, 15 to 20 minutes.
• Spoon cooked rice into shallow bowls. Top with tomato/vegetable sauce and a chicken thigh. Sprinkle slivered almonds over each bowl and serve.

Kitchen Notes

Bacon or no? Some recipes call for it, some don’t. Some use oil, some use butter. We like what bacon adds overall, but your choice.

Bell pepper, what color? Most recipes call for green bell pepper, but some call for red—or yellow. We mixed it up, half green (to use some on hand) and half red, because we like its flavor.

You say tomato… We used crushed tomatoes, but use what you have on hand, including diced or whole tomatoes that you mash up before adding. Marion's 1975 Joy of Cooking calls for stewed tomatoes, in keeping with older recipes.

Curry powder. Use what you have on hand. Or your favorite. We are currently really liking the Singapore Citrus Curry Blend from The Spice House. It packs a nice lemony brightness.

Currants? Raisins? Most recipes call for the former, but suggest raisins as a perfectly good substitute. You can also use chopped prunes, dates or apricots. You do want those occasional sweet bites, so do use one of them.

Slivered almonds? Sliced? Peanuts? Slivered almonds are the most regularly called for nut garnish. As you can see, we managed to get sliced. One recipe specifies peanuts, though. Use whatever nuts you have, for a nice little crunch and nutty flavor.

And the article that got this party started? It's Country Captain Deserved a Comeback, by Nneka M. Okona, published on TASTE, the online food magazine.