Pollastre a la Catalana amb Prunes i Pinyons

Pollastre a la catalana is Catalonia's feast-day chicken braise, known at home as pollastre amb prunes i pinyons: chicken with prunes and pine nuts. Vi ranci gives the sauce its dry, nutty depth, the fruit softens into the braising juices, and a final picada, the pounded mixture of almonds, bread, garlic, and parsley, draws everything together. It is rich, but it must never taste sugary.

The step that decides it is the sofregit, the slow onion and tomato base. Cook the onion low until dark gold and jammy, then let the grated tomato lose nearly all its water. That patient cook gives the sauce sweetness without making the prunes carry the whole burden. Brown the chicken well, braise it gently, and stir in the picada only near the end so the sauce thickens around the meat instead of catching on the bottom.

If vi ranci is hard to find, use a dry oloroso sherry. It is nuttier and a little sharper, but it belongs to the same family of oxidative wines and does the work honestly. Don't use sweet cream sherry; the prunes bring enough sweetness already. In the Margin beside this recipe I wrote, "the sauce should cling, not drown." Follow that and the gentle simmer. Siempre sale, si lo sigues.