Yassa Poulet (Senegalese Chicken and Onions)

When I lived in Senegal, this dish was my comfort food. It starts with pieces of pan fried chicken, is cooked with a delicious onion sauce and then the whole thing is served over rice. The very best version came from this small restaurant in the old town of Saint Louis called La Linguère. The ride into town from université  and the walk across the Pont Faidherbe was more than worth it for this meal alone! It was just a bonus if you managed to get any other errands done at the same time. The dish is a simple one, marrying flavors of onion, habanero, mustard, and lemon. La Linguère offered Yassa Poulet and Yassa Poisson most days of the week, both equally delicious, but I've not been able to find a fish substitution that I like as well as what I had in Senegal, so I stick to making the chicken at home.

 Typically this is just served simply with white rice, but I find it goes equally as well with a green salad. Here is the yassa plated with my winter kale salad. Totally scrumptious!

You can prepare the marinade up to the night before if you like. I like to use only dark meat chicken for this recipe, but a whole cut up fryer chicken also works well.

• 1 cut up fryer chicken or family size package of chicken thighs
• 4-5 large yellow onions, cut into thin slices
• 4 cloves of garlic, minced
• peanut oil for cooking the chicken
• hot peppers to taste (I use 2 habaneros, unless I'm cooking for company, then I'll use two serranos or two jalapeños, depending on their tastes)
• red wine vinegar
• spicy dijon mustard
• black pepper
• juice of two lemons
• Maggi seasoning and a chicken bouillion cube* 

*I don't do MSG, which is loaded in these ingredients, so I just skip them. The dish doesn't have quite the same depth of flavor as what I remember having in Senegal, but I think it tastes great anyway. Feel free to experiment with the bouillon and Maggi if you like the taste.

Combine 1/4 cup dijon mustard, 1-2 Tbsp peanut oil, lemon juice, black pepper, minced garlic, 1 sliced onion and 1-2 tsp of red wine vinegar in a medium bowl. Add chicken to this mixture and marinate as long as desired (at least a few hours).

When finished marinating, remove chicken pieces and brown in peanut oil in a large cast iron pot, a few at a time to avoid crowding the pan.

 Remove the chicken, set aside on a plate. Reduce heat and add the onions to the pan. It is important to cook them for a long time over med-low heat to get the flavor. Once these onions have begun to caramelize (will take about 45 min) add in the onion that marinated with the chicken and all the sauce. Add in the desired hot peppers, and Maggi and bouillon cube if desired. Allow to simmer over med-low heat for an additional 30 min or more. Taste and adjust seasoning if desired. Add chicken back in to onion sauce 20 minutes or more before serving.