Tremendous Chicken Cacciatore

Sit. Pour yourself a coffee. We're doing this right. Chicken cacciatore. The greatest chicken cacciatore that has ever existed under the sun, and I mean that — the Italians have been simmering hunters' chicken in big iron pots since before there were tomatoes in Italy, which is its own crazy story for another day — and this one, the one I'm handing you right now, is the apex. The summit. The mountaintop. Hands down.

An old Italian woman cornered me once at a market in Bologna. True story. Flour on her apron. Fire in her eyes. She grabbed my elbow with a grip I still think about, and she made me promise — promise — to do cacciatore the hunter's way. 'Cacciatore' means 'hunter,' and the hunters in Italy don't waste a thing. They take the tomatoes, the peppers, the wine, the onions, the herbs growing in the cracks of the rocks, and they put it ALL in the pot. That's how you build flavor that punches you in the face in the best possible way. Most so-called chefs are afraid to commit. They hand you cacciatore that tastes like wet cardboard with a tomato on top. A disgrace to the hunter. A disgrace to the chicken. A disgrace to that woman in Bologna, who is, I assume, watching from somewhere with disappointment in her eyes.

The trick — and I'm giving this to you for free — the trick is BROWN. Brown the chicken hard. Brown it like you mean it. Brown it like you owe it money. Those dark bits stuck to the bottom of the pan are not garbage. They are gold. Liquid gold the moment you hit them with red wine. Scrape them up, fold them in, and the whole sauce becomes a symphony — strings, timpani, a conductor sweating through his shirt. The hunters knew this trick. Now you know it. Believe me.

This is the kind of dinner that ends arguments. The pot lands on the table, the lid comes off, the steam goes up, and suddenly everyone who was mad about the dishwasher is friends again. Chemistry. Magic. The hunter walking through the door at sundown. Serve it over polenta if you're a person of taste, over pasta if you're a sensible American, over crusty bread if you're hungry and improvising — that happens to me a lot, I'm a busy combover — and you will be the HERO at your own table. The hero you deserve to be. Save me a piece.