Chicken Galantine

Here is something a little different. My first time making a galantine, or a traditional terrine of any sort really. And I kinda hope to never have to do it again. A galantine is a forcemeat wrapped in the skin of the dominant meat and poached, traditionally served cold.

So what does that mean? It means you have to debone a chicken from the back, keeping the skin completely intact. Then the skin has to be spread out thinly and scraped of every gram of fat until it is paper thin. This is obviously extremely difficult to do without tearing the skin, so to make things a little easier while simultaneously prolonging the experience, you can freeze the skin, scrape it for five minutes until it thaws again, and repeat 600 times.

Next, the breasts are heavily seasoned and seared, then sliced to be used as the inlay.

The dark meat is ground with pork fat, seasonings, and binders to make the forcemeat, whose flavor is tasted by poaching a small amount.

Place the forcemeat in the skin, trimming off the extra. Make an indent and lay the breasts in it, and cover with forcemeat. Then wrap this roll in cheesecloth, secure with butcher's twine, and poach. Chill, then slice thinly and serve.

The result? Pictured above. Is it worth it? In one word, I would say, no. The incredibly thin skin surrounding the forcemeat either ends up barely even detectable, or too thick to chew through. It's also rubbery and not crisp since it is poached. It adds zero flavor to the entire mix. The foremeat itself is ok, it could be seasoned as desired, but it could easily be made from any scrap meats and cooked without the skin. Is it worth all the extra labor time, money, and effort? No. Do restaurants do this anymore? Not really. It's a really old, classical way of doing things. But then again, I am not a fan of most charcuterie items to begin with - just not my cup of tea!