Chicken replaces fish in our ‘Feast of the Seven Chickens’

The idea formed in the middle of Christmas dinner, as the family feasted on good food and reveled in great company. The talk around the table may have been about how other ethnic families celebrated the holidays or how this family could add a different take to one of their holiday meals.

This is how Valorie remembered it:

“It came out of nowhere. We were having Christmas dinner and I said next year I think I’m going to do Christmas Eve with seven fishes,” referring to the traditional Italian “Feast of the Seven Fishes.” “And Kristin says, ‘Seven fishes, I don’t eat fish.’ She said how about the seven chickens.

“And when she said that we all just hollered, that was so funny. So I said, ‘Why don’t we do it on New Year’s Day, have the seven chickens.’ Kristin made a flyer. It got funnier and funnier, and people were laughing about the idea and saying that is really a nice idea. People said what kind of chicken should I bring, and I said don’t stress yourself out, bring any kind of chicken you want to make.”

I was spending Christmas with my family on St. Simon’s Island, GA, and got a text from Kristin. “Get ready for New Year’s,” she wrote. “We are adapting the Italian tradition. You heard of the Feast of the Seven Fishes? Well, get ready for the feast of the seven CHICKENS.”

I love it,” I texted back. I had heard of the “Feast of the Seven Fishes,” but knew very little about the tradition itself. According to chef Mario Batali, it’s celebrated in Italian homes on Christmas Eve. It’s a time of fasting (abstinence from red meat), he says, but it has evolved into many courses of delicious seafood enjoyed with family.

The meal can consist to up to 10 dishes, and what is served in each household can vary. Some even do 12 dishes to represent the Apostles, he said. No one seems to know where the number seven comes, from but there are hundreds of references to it in the Bible.

Our “Feast of the Seven Chickens” would be our own original take on the celebration of food and family. What I especially liked was that the focus on chicken had nothing to do with the ethnic stereotype of black folks loving chicken. All of us do not; at least two people in my family will not touch a chicken leg.

Chicken, like music, is universal, and it can be prepared into all kinds of amazing dishes. So it was a perfect choice for our feast. After the family got used to the idea, Kristin created a cute little invitation with a plucky chicken, and I went searching for a recipe.

We all arrived for the meal with not seven but eight chicken dishes – most homemade, a few store-bought – along with a story of how we made our dishes and why we thought the feast was a grand idea.

Dale

“I think it’s awesome. I love the fact that you can take something Biblical, change it up and really have fun with it and come together. And to see what everyone has contributed (and) being able just to talk to everyone about their various dishes and how they made it. I think it’s just wonderful. In fact, I’m going to steal it for my church (which every first Sunday has a potluck meal).”

Her dish: chicken and cheese casserole

“Boil a whole chicken – I added two more big chicken breasts – seasoned it, deboned it and chopped it up. I put a layer of cooked noodles, layer of Velveeta cheese, layer of chicken (in a casserole dish), and repeated the layers and put cheddar on top. You can use broth from the chicken to pour into the chicken dish (and save some to later make a soup) to keep it moist. Bake it in a 350-degree oven for an hour. It’s an easy dish. You can  make it beforehand and put it in the refrigerator.”

Jerry, Dale’s husband

“It sounded like a great idea, plus it was also kind of selfish on my part because she brought you all a chicken casserole and she made one for us. So that’ll be some lunch or some dinner. Also, sometimes black folks are associated with certain foods. I personally never did care for pig feet and ‘quote-unquote’ ethnic foods, but black people eat chicken and I’m proud of eating chicken and serving chicken in whichever way. So I thought it was an excellent way of articulating who we are as black people. Fish is fine and chicken is good. And it doesn’t have to be always fried.”

Kristin and Epsie

“We just thought it was a big joke and we had a good time laughing about it.” – Epsie

Their dish: chicken salad and potato salad

“Well, my mother (Epsie) went to the market and got the chicken (boned-in chicken breast),” says Kristin. “I cleaned it and then we put it in a big old pot with water in the bottom and we put celery and onions in with the chicken and boiled it for however long until my mother said it was done. (That was her first time boiling chicken, Epsie noted.) I let it cool and I diced it.

“I put sea salt and red pepper and black pepper, celery and onion – just a little bit of onion – and more celery, and put it in the refrigerator overnight. And this morning I tossed it with mayonnaise and lemon juice.”

Lewisene

“I love it. I just love it, love it, love it. I think it’s the cutest thing I’ve heard of, and having known about the seven fishes I just love the afro-centric adaptation.”

Her dish (with help from husband Paul): Barbecue chicken

“My barbecue chicken is just regular barbecue chicken. It’s just seasoning, although we did brine it this time. (How did you brine it?) That was interesting, only because it was frozen when I took it out and Paul said I think I’ll brine it. They were two whole chickens, and so he brined it with a lot of seasonings: bay (leaf), sage, onion powder, garlic. Put seasonings in water and submerged (the chickens) overnight. We took it out this morning and he cut up the chickens and I seasoned them again with garlic powder, roasted garlic, reduced salt, pepper from a pepper mill, a lot of paprika, and just put it in the oven. Put on a coating of (Sweet) Baby Ray’s (barbecue) sauce and let it brown, and then put another coating of Baby Ray’s.

Paul

“I brined the chicken (using) sea salt, anise seeds, celery seeds, peppercorns. I made a brining pot out of the container that soap comes in (he thoroughly cleaned a 5-gallon container that soap powder came in). I hang it up in my garage. It’ll hold a 14-15 pound turkey because I brine my turkey in it. With the fowl/poultry, I use water and a lot of sea salt. With pork and beef I use coffee. Seems like it breaks up the fibers in the meat a little better. I brine because it seems like (the meat) tastes better. I (saw) this guy on television and he used coffee. I make a pot of coffee and dump it in there.”

Deborah

“When I was invited I thought ‘Gee, this is different, chicken.’ Everything was delicious.”

Deborah brought true-and-tried fried chicken from a particular grocery-store location that her church has been using for years. She didn’t get a chance to cook a dish but she does have a favorite chicken recipe.

A favorite dish: “I had it at a friend’s house and it was just delicious. You saute boneless chicken breast, and saute onions and mushrooms. Then you put a layer of chicken, layer of onions, layer of mushrooms and a layer of swiss cheese (in a casserole dish). You serve it with angel hair pasta. That’s what I would have made if I had the opportunity and time.”

Valorie

“I think it was a great idea. It was innovative. … And everybody made something different. The potato salad was delicious. The chicken salad was delicious. I got my black eye peas and my greens, so I’m going to have some good luck.”

Her dishes: Chicken soup and baked chicken

“I did the soup because I didn’t know what kind of chicken to make. I said it might be cold so we could have soup. So I made chicken soup. First I boiled chicken breast in salt and chicken stock. And then I cut it all off the bone because I didn’t want anybody to choke up in here. Then I put in celery, onions, red peppers, carrots and seasonings, a lot of Italian seasonings. I cooked it in the crock pot.”

Baked chicken: She marinated boneless chicken breast in red pepper vinaigrette and sprinkled rotisserie seasoning on it before baking it.

Tina

“I just have enjoyed myself from soup to nuts. I am so full I’m going to waddle out of here. This was such a unique experience of everyone bringing a dish, whether it was their favorite dish or not. Yes, I’m used to chitterlings and I do eat chitterlings (a New Year’s Day tradition). Chitterlings and black-eye peas and potato salad and corn bread – all that fattening food. So this was light but very filling, and then to have all the friendship here. This just made 2016 a good beginning with food, with the different perspectives of how we are going to eat and pray together and enjoy all the food.”

She brought wings that she had purchased, although she cooks sometimes: “I am not a cook. I eat out. I enjoy going out. Chefs have a different way of cooking things. (She travels a lot and enjoys the food in other countries. While in Italy, a chef prepared a complete meal for her group with fresh local ingredients). It’s interesting to see how a chef prepares food, different from how we do it.”

Sherry

My dish: Chicken piccata, along with black-eyed peas and roasted herb onions

As I always do, I Googled. This was the first time I’d made chicken piccata. I thought about it after Epsie had it at an Italian restaurant when we went to see the play “Hamilton” on Broadway. When I Googled, chef Ina Garten was the first who came up. Her recipe took a few more steps, she wanted you to flour the chicken breast, then put it in eggs and then in bread crumbs, and hers didn’t mention capers and everybody else’s did. Then I looked at chef Giada De Laurentiis and a couple others, and saw that everybody’s was basically the same.

I thought I’d have to find thick pieces of chicken and pound them, but I found thin pieces of breast in individual packets and they were on sale. So I only had to flatten them a little bit. I don’t use salt, so I used all kinds of seasonings – onion powder, garlic powder, Mrs. Dash this, Mrs. Dash that, black pepper and Spike with salt. I floured them and cooked them in butter and olive oil. I don’t normally use butter; I use ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter’ but I bought butter for the folks at the meal. I should’ve brought the leftover butter with me to give away. Giada mentioned that butter made the sauce richer.

I fried – sautéed – the chicken and set it aside. I didn’t want to put the sauce on it before coming to the dinner because I didn’t want the breading to get too wet. For the sauce, I sautéed garlic and shallots, and then put lemon juice, chicken broth, capers and a little white wine in the pan, and scraped up the brown bits. I let it boil down, and added a little more butter at the end.