HELP. I Ruined my dinner.. Need to learn what went wrong.!

W123-80's

Hi all,

As the title says, I ruined what was going to be a lovely dinner last night in approx 2 seconds and can't figure out why.. your thoughts and knowledge are appreciated.!

Apologies. This is long. Bear with me if you can.

I decided i was going to do a chicken in stock/white wine/cream type dish. To be honest I wasn't following any recipe just thought it might be nice. I will list in steps exactly what I done and maybe someone can educate me as to what went wrong..

1. Bought a full chicken from the butcher. Got him to quarter it. 2 x boobs (with wings attached) & 2 x legs.

2. Wanted to use the boobs on the bone in the dinner as I figured they would provide better flavour.

3. lobbed the two boobs in a big heavy pot to brown off. Also lobbed in both wings. Few minutes later added a full onion and some garlic.

4. Fried off for another couple of mins until onions nice and soft.

5. lobbed in a couple of chopped carrots and some dried thyme.

6. 500ml chicken stock & approx 300ml wine. Salt & Pepper.

7. Brought to the boil and simmer for approx 50/60 mins.

8. Removed the chicken from the pot so I could take meat off the bones. It is worth noting that at this point the stew/soup/stock whatever its called mixture tasted lovely.

9. Returned the meat to the pan. Gave this a couple of mins.

10. This is where it all went wrong

11. I decided at this point to add a splash of cream to proceedings, to give it a nice texture and just make it look nice and creamy

12. Big mistake

13. Approx 1 min after adding the cream I tasted it. Not good. It tasted like the cream was gone off. The whole thing tasted sour. Checked the date on the cream. Fine. Drank a mouthful of cream. Again fine.

14. Figured if I diluted the whole thing with more stock and wine I might cancel out the cream taste. No good. That plan didn't work.

Basically the whole thing was destroyed. In order to save my dinner I ended up straining all the meat/veg out and putting it into a different pan with fresh stock/wine. This completely defeated the whole point of doing the dinner with chicken on the bone. I lost all that lovely flavour.

Needless to say I was disgusted.

What is interesting is the original offending wine/stock/cream mixture is still in the pot. The wine is completely separated from the stock/wine mixture. Its sitting on the top like oil on top of water. This must be something to do with what went wrong.

Another point to consider. The wine I used was in the fridge since around the 22nd of dec. I don't know if this is the issue. Figured its worth mentioning. But as I said earlier, before I added the cream it tasted fine.

I am at a loss as to what went wrong and I would really like to learn for future reference.

Many thanks.

trackguy

How would you describe the taste now exactly? Bitter? Sour?

Unless the cream has curdled, there shouldn't be a problem.

W123-80's

trackguy wrote: »

How would you describe the taste now exactly? Bitter? Sour?

Unless the cream has curdled, there shouldn't be a problem.

The whole dish just tasted of gone off cream.. sort of like if you put gone off milk in your tea.!

I would say it tasted sour.

What is confusing me is I have added cream to stuff similiar to this before with no problem! i.e.. Chicken pie.

trackguy

It sounds like it's curdled, especially if the sauce has a split look to it.

It's a pain in the arse, I've curdled curries loads of times when adding coconut milk.

If you reduce the heat before adding the cream it shouldn't curdle on you.

nice1franko

Did the cream have enough time to boil? If it did then it could curdle. Other than that it sounds like it might have been too acidic. Was there lemon juice or anything else added? Maybe there was too much wine. 300 ml wine to 500 ml stock sounds like a fair bit (although not necessarily over the top) but if it was an acidic wine like (like some Chardonnays can be) it could have just made the whole pot too acidic and the cream curdled.

You *might* have been able to rescue it if you put the broth into a blender for a few mins.

W123-80's

nice1franko wrote: »

Did the cream have enough time to boil? If it did then it could curdle. Other than that it sounds like it might have been too acidic. Was there lemon juice or anything else added? Maybe there was too much wine. 300 ml wine to 500 ml stock sounds like a fair bit (although not necessarily over the top) but if it was an acidic wine like (like some Chardonnays can be) it could have just made the whole pot too acidic and the cream curdled.

You *might* have been able to rescue it if you put the broth into a blender for a few mins.

Interesting.
There was no lemon juice in it.. but if truth be told I didn't really measure the wine and 300ml is the minimum that went in.! It could easily have been 400ml. Not sure what type of wine it was.

That is a plausible reason though. Plus I didn't know that too much wine/acid could make cream curdle. Thats good to know.

On a side note is there a rule of thumb ratio of wine to stock for dishes like this to avoid such a scenario?

Thanks for the suggestions. As I said in my OP I want to learn.!

W123-80's

trackguy wrote: »

It sounds like it's curdled, especially if the sauce has a split look to it.

It's a pain in the arse, I've curdled curries loads of times when adding coconut milk.

If you reduce the heat before adding the cream it shouldn't curdle on you.

Thanks. I have a feeling the dish was close to bubbling if not actually bubblin when I tossed in the cream.

And here was me thinking I was making a very simple fool proof dinner..!

the beer revolu

I think your method sounds good.
Maybe the cream was just on the turn and heating it was just too much for it!
(I'm kind of grasping at straws here).
Curdling in itself shouldn't create a sour taste.

W123-80's

the beer revolu wrote: »

I think your method sounds good.
Maybe the cream was just on the turn and heating it was just too much for it!
(I'm kind of grasping at straws here).
Curdling in itself shouldn't create a sour taste.

I was never so upset..!

I've checked the date on the cream and its 05.01.2012. Which is tomorrow. So it's possible it was turning, but it tasted fine.

Minder

Acid, salt and high heat will split a cream sauce. The wine may have been too acidic for the cream that was on the turn. The higher the fat content in the cream and the fresher it is; the better it can withstand the acidity and high heat. If the wine is sharp, reducing it a lot will reduce the acidity. I'd cook the wine out, reducing by at least 50%, then add chicken stock for volume in the sauce. Let the sauce cool a little before adding double cream to finish. Season right at the end.

W123-80's

Minder wrote: »

Acid, salt and high heat will split a cream sauce. The wine may have been too acidic for the cream that was on the turn. The higher the fat content in the cream and the fresher it is; the better it can withstand the acidity and high heat. If the wine is sharp, reducing it a lot will reduce the acidity. I'd cook the wine out, reducing by at least 50%, then add chicken stock for volume in the sauce. Let the sauce cool a little before adding double cream to finish. Season right at the end.

Thanks.

Thats probably it in a nutshell.

Thanks everyone for your replies. I have a better understanding now of what went wrong. Appreciate all the input.

Alun

One more thing, the wine was way past it's best when you used it (open 10 days+), so would already have been pretty acidic anyway, whatever about it's initial state.

John Mason

i have done that, always because the sauce was either too hot when i added the cream or else i got distracted and let the sauce boil. complete pain in the bum

Kimia

Without a shadow of doubt in my mind, it was the wine. You put too much in, you didn't reduce it and the mixture was probably too hot when you put the cream in.

Less wine next time, and reduce it before adding anything else in!