Nothing says comfort food like gram’s chicken tetrazzini. Her recipe called for stewing her own chicken with celery and carrots before being shredded into a rich cream sauce made with sherry and tossed with al dente spaghetti and freshly grated Parmesan cheese and then topped with a butter crumb topping. It was then slow baked until it was bubbly and just starting to crisp at the edges.
The creation of tetrazzini is widely debated as to whether it was Auguste Escoffier of French fame, the Knickerbocker Hotel in New York City or Ernest Arbogast at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco in 1905 that originally created the recipe. Most sources lean more heavily on it having been Arbogast. But, sources do agree that it was definitely named after the Italian opera singer, Louisa Tetrazzini who made her American debut at the Tivoli as Gilda in Rigoberto. In those days recipes were often named after famed celebrities.
No matter who originally created it, from that day on the comforting chicken casserole with the Italian name, Tetrazzini would become a large part of the average American home recipe box and morphed into the recipe we know and love today. It was highly Americanized for the middle class in the 1960’s by many a housewife using Campbell’s condensed soup, velveeta cheese and wide egg noodles or spaghetti and more iconically as a frozen dinner. Tetrazzini began appearing in many a cookbook, including Betty Crocker.
Tetrazzini is considered an Italian American dish made with diced poultry or seafood in either a butter, cream, milk and cheese sauce flavored with white wine or sherry. It was often made with a béchamel or mornay sauce originally that incorporated linguine, spaghetti or egg noodles. It was then topped with cheese and bread crumbs before being baked.
From 1950 to 1980 many upscale restaurants including Sardi’s and Mamma Leone’s featured tetrazzini on their menus. Southerners began referring to it as chicken spaghetti and it became a soul food classic and readily available in-house and on catering menus in places like Baton Rouge’s Piccadilly cafeteria or Durham’s Foster’s Market where it remained a customer favorite for many decades.
When I was a kid this recipe was used by my family as a go to for holiday leftovers – it was made with turkey or ham and mom would make it with canned mushrooms and Campbell’s soup – YUCK!
CHICKEN TETRAZZINI
8 ounces bucatini spaghetti, broken in half, prepared al dente’
3 cups chopped or shredded cooked chicken
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 cups sliced mushrooms (see notes)
1/2 cup small chopped onion
1/2 cup small chopped celery
1 can baby sweet peas, drained well
3 tablespoons AP flour
2 cups homemade chicken broth
1 cup heavy cream
3 tablespoons sherry
FRESH ground salt and black pepper, to taste
1 cup FRESH grated Parmesan cheese
- In a large bowl toss drained pasta chicken pieces together.
- Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium heat.
- Add the mushrooms, onions and celery and cook 3-4 minutes until soft.
- Reduce the heat to medium-low and whisk in the flour, cooking a minute or so until golden.
- Whisk in the chicken broth and cook 1-2 minutes until it begins to thicken.
- Stir in the cream and sherry, season to taste with salt and pepper, and continue to cook 2-3 minutes, stirring, until the sauce comes JUST to a boil.
- Remove from the heat and fold in 1/2 cup of the Parmesan.
- Pour the sauce into the bowl with the chicken and noodles and stir to combine.
- Fold in the peas.
- Transfer the chicken mixture to a 9×13 inch baking dish.
- Sprinkle with the remaining 1/2 cup Parmesan or optional butter crumbs and Parmesan.
- Bake 25-30 minutes slightly covered until the last 5 minutes and then until the casserole is bubbling.
- Let rest for 10 minutes before serving.
OPTIONAL BUTTER CRUMB TOPPING
2 tablespoons butter, melted
1/3 cup Panko bread crumbs
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
- Mix together well.
- Sprinkle over top before baking.
NOTE:
- The original recipe called for thin spaghetti, but we prefer bucatini.
- I also often use rotisserie chicken pieces unlike gram’s original stewed chicken.
- I also use whole Beech mushrooms for their nutty flavor.
