Chicken and Dressing

We made it through Christmas day, for lunch we had the ham that was left over from Thanksgiving and I fixed some chicken breasts and dressing.  I just love plain sage dressing!  Here is my simple recipe for our favorite dressing:

small loaf of home-made bread that is getting old
1 onion chopped
3 or 4 ribs of celery, chopped
1 stick of butter
2 eggs
1 can of chicken stock
One chicken cut into pieces or 4 chicken breasts if you like white meat or 6 thighs if you like the dark meat. 
rubbed sage, Kosher or course salt and pepper
Bouquet Garni (optional)

Salt and pepper both sides of the chicken pieces.  Rub in Bouquet Garni on the chicken pieces or if you prefer you can use additional rubbed sage.

Cook chopped onion and celery in the butter until onion is translucent and tender.  Cut the bread into 1/2" cubes, sprinkle the bread with the sage, spread them onto a cookie sheet and toast in the oven while the onion and celery are cooking.  (I like lots of sage so I use 1 to 2 tablespoons of it on my bread cubes, maybe even a little more!)  Soon as the bread is starting to lightly brown remove it from the oven and allow to cool down.  Pour the eggs over the crumbs, add 1 to 1 1/2 tsp. Kosher salt and 1 tsp. pepper, the onions, celery and butter.  Toss, then add the chicken stock until moistened.  If your bread is very dry or you have a larger loaf you may have to use 2 cans of stock.  Place in a 9 X 13" baking pan and place your chicken pieces on the top.  Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour then cover with a sheet of parchment paper and wrap with tin foil.  Never let the foil touch your food, always have a layer of parchment paper between the food and the foil.   Continue baking until chicken is 165 degrees when tested with an instant read thermometer in the thickest part of the meat.  Remove from oven and let the chicken rest for 10 to 15 minutes, this will make your chicken more moist and flavorful than if you don't allow it to rest.

When you make dressing you can make it with 1/2 corn bread and 1/2 regular bread if you like corn bread dressing.  You can also add all sorts of additional things to it, everything from Creole sausage to oysters to nuts to apples.  Any of these add a wonderful new flavor to your dressings.