President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's "Aspic of Chicken"
Looking back at the past four posts prior to this one, I realized I’m on a real beige kick. Can’t wait to end that soon and in fantastic fashion. I’ll need a big bump of color — something bright and Jello-based. But for now, we’re reaching back into history again for another presidential meal. This one was supposed to be enjoyed cold on a warm spring day, perhaps at a picnic in Hyde Park.
Chef Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Democratic President from Illinois
As always, I followed the recipe word for word directly from the president known to serve the worst food ever in the White House, no alterations:
INGREDIENTS
4-pound chicken
1 sliced carrot
1 cut-up stalk of celery (including leaves)
1 bay leaf
A few cloves
1 package of gelatin
4 tsp cold water
salt and pepper to taste
INSTRUCTIONS
1) Boil fowl in salted water to cover, along with celery, carrot, bay leaf, and a few cloves.
I have to come clean here — I used a parsnip. I am allergic to carrots, and while I love this project, it is not worth dying for (yet).
2) When chicken is tender remove it from the broth, take meat from the bones and cut it fine.
It took about 95 minutes for my fowl to boil. I took “cut it fine” to mean chop it finely, not shredded.
3) Put the bones back in the pot and continue to boil until broth is reduced to 1 pint. Add salt and pepper to taste.
4) Soak gelatin in cold water, then stir it into the hot strained broth.
5) Pour this over the cut-up chicken, which has been arranged nicely in a mold.
This is the final step, but obviously, we have to refrigerate this aspic or else it will just be hot chicken Jello soup, and no one wants that.
Voila! If you want to actually watch me attempt to eat it, go to the CwC Instagram or TikTok. Hey, I’ve even begun posting on Reddit in the Old Recipes subreddit, and the conversations there are delightful. And if you haven’t subscribed to my monthly email newsletter, Theater of Disgust, you can do it at the bottom of this page to see what new things I have up my sleeve (Cocktails with Congress? Mystery foods? Giveaways!). But back to Aspic of Chicken and its shiny, grey mold. It is, somehow, the greyest food I’ve ever made. There isn’t much to the dish in terms of ingredients you can actually see — just gelatin and chicken and some broth. Like Jellos of Cookin’ with Congress past, it glistens, but does it taste delicious?
Verdict:
Sure, it looks like dog food, but it tastes significantly better and a tiny bit wetter. How do I know what dog food tastes like? Not your concern. The point is, FDR’s aspic of chicken would be decent smeared on buttered toast with chopped celery, maybe some mayonnaise and hot sauce. As is? It’s meat Jello. So…not great.
