Sandwich Chaud au Poulet

So... most Canadians will recognize this dish.

Certainly most Québécois should.

It is, after all, one of the signature dishes at St. Hubert.

What is St. Hubert, you ask?

A very nondescript, yet very prevalent, chicken-centric family restaurant in Québéc.

I mean, if you've never been, you should go.

Anyway... I'm not saying that the Hot Chicken Sandwich thing is exclusively theirs, but I will say that their version is actually done quite deliciously.  And it is the one that comes to my mind, at least, whenever I think of a Hot Chicken Sandwich.

Here's an image that I swiped online, but because I'm up-talking their dish, maybe they'll let it slide?

Doesn't that look yum-town?  

Just for juxtaposition's sake, I'll show you the end product of my version here.

Doesn't quite look the same, does it?

Well, it didn't taste as good, either... but it was still seriously yummy.

OK.  So... I followed a recipe for this one... sigh.  I know!  I'm sorry!

This is one of only a handful of times I can ever recall doing so.  And you'll see that there are some things in here which I shuddered at putting in (like ketchup?!)

Anyway...

It actually starts out kind of promising.  With the making of an actual, authentic roux... but - as you'll see - it quickly gets... trashier.

So, traditional roux, melt some butter...

Add some flour...

Whisk for a few minutes until nice and golden.

This recipe called for the following dry ingredients:  dry mustard, paprika, cayenne, onion powder, and chili powder.

Some crazy mix.  And it made my roux decidedly pasty.

Now, to this, we're going to add some beef stock.

And already it looks like a really smooth gravy.

Mmmmm...

But, here's where it gets shady.

Ketchup:

and worcestershire:

That's it.

That's the 'chicken sauce'.

As for the other aspects of this dish... I had leftover chicken.

Of quite high quality.  I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that this is maybe a little better than most of the chicken served in these dishes commercially.

;)

The peas were easy to cook up.  I steamed them.  I can't abide boiled vegetables.  Steaming is as far as I will go to cook a green vegetable (literally... I often don't even like doing that...).

And then some french white bread.  Not a good rustic artisan kind, but instead the cheap trashy kind.  This is trash food, after all.

Then it's just ASSEMBLAGE:

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm...

Incidentally those are just fried potatoes, not french fries... but what are you doing looking at those, anyway?  

Jeepers.

So... not as good as St. Hubert's, but a pretty good home-made facsimile, I'd have to say.

And still quite delicious!