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Coronation Chicken (Poached Chicken in Curried Mayonnaise with Apricot)

Name: Coronation Chicken (Poached Chicken in Curried Mayonnaise with Apricot)
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 35 min
Total time: 1 h 5 min
Yield: 6 servings
Cuisine: British
Ingredients: 800 g boneless chicken thighs or breasts; 1 L water; 150 ml white wine; 0.5 onion; 1 carrot; 1 bay leaf; 6 black peppercorns; 1 tsp salt; 1 tbsp vegetable oil; 0.5 onion; 2 tbsp curry powder; 1 tsp tomato purée; 100 ml poaching liquid; 1 tbsp lemon juice; 80 g dried apricots; 250 g mayonnaise; 100 ml double cream; 1 to taste salt and pepper; 40 g sultanas; 20 g flaked almonds

A cold chicken salad created for the banquet at the coronation of Elizabeth II in 1953. Chicken is poached gently in water with white wine and cooled; curry powder is cooked once in a little oil and cooled; that base goes into mayonnaise and cream with an apricot purée for sweetness. The spice meets heat only in that one step, because mayonnaise is cold fat that can never cook it afterwards — so it is cooked apart, and everything is cold before it is combined.

Steps

Bring the water, wine, onion, carrot, bay, peppercorns and salt to the boil. Add the chicken, and just before it returns to the boil turn it down so the surface barely trembles. Poach for 20 minutes.
⏲ 20 min
Turn off the heat and leave the chicken in the liquid for 30 minutes. Lift it out, let it cool completely and tear or cut it into bite-sized pieces. Keep 100ml of the liquid.
⏲ 30 min
Meanwhile cover the dried apricots with water and simmer for 10 minutes, then blend them smooth with a little of their water. Let it cool.
⏲ 10 min
In a small pan, soften the chopped onion in the oil over a low heat for 5 minutes. Add the curry powder, stir for 30 seconds only, then pour in the tomato purée and the reserved liquid straight away. Simmer 5 minutes until thick and add the lemon juice.
⏲ 10 min 30 sec
Strain the curry base, pressing the onion hard, and let what comes through cool completely.
Mix the cold curry base and 2 tbsp of the apricot purée into the mayonnaise. Whip the cream to soft peaks and fold it in. Adjust with salt, pepper and more apricot.
Fold in the cold chicken, with the sultanas if using. Chill for at least 1 hour, scatter the almonds over and serve on a rice salad or on green leaves.
⏲ 60 min

Variations

The version in the photograph: the modern one, studded with sultanas; they are the optional line in the ingredients. Flaked almonds on top are common too.
As a sandwich filling: in Britain it is met more often in a sandwich than as a salad. Tear the chicken finer.
Instead of cream: crème fraîche or yoghurt in place of the double cream makes it sharper and lighter.

More detail and the reasons why (1)

The coronation original: according to English Wikipedia, it was created for the banquet at the coronation of Elizabeth II in 1953 by the food writer Constance Spry and the chef Rosemary Hume. The chicken was poached in diluted, seasoned white wine, coated in a mayonnaise-based cream of curry sauce, and set on a rice salad. The original calls for apricot purée rather than raisins.

Tips

Poach the chicken, do not boil it. Keep the surface barely trembling and let it cool in its liquid, and the meat stays moist. Eaten cold, dry chicken has nowhere to hide.
Chill it, then season again. Cold dulls salt and sweetness, so give it a last check for salt after it comes out of the fridge.

More detail and the reasons why (4)

The spice meets heat once. The reason is the first line of blooming spices: "Stirred into water only some of it comes out; hit with hot oil, far more is extracted and it spreads through the whole dish." Currywurst uses the same curry powder in three states, and still "This dish has no frying step for the spice at all." This dish keeps only the frying step, and does it before the mayonnaise, in a different pan. Mayonnaise is fat too, but cold fat, and powder stirred into it never meets heat again.
Thirty seconds, then liquid. The guide gives ground spice about thirty seconds in the pan and goes on: "After that it turns bitter. If you are unsure, add a splash of liquid first to bring the temperature down." Softening the onion first makes the oil, the powder goes in, and the liquid follows thirty seconds later.
Everything is cold before it is combined. Serving temperature says of Olivier salad that mayonnaise "put onto lukewarm ingredients the fat softens, the emulsion coalesces, and steam condensing into it thins the sauce". The chicken, the curry base and the apricot purée all go into the sauce cold.
The apricot is where the sweetness goes. Between the heat of the curry and the richness of the mayonnaise sit the apricot's sweetness and the lemon's acid (balancing flavour). Add the purée a little at a time and taste.