Authentic Fricasé de Pollo Recipe (Cuban Chicken Fricassee)

Fricasé de pollo is the Cuban braise your abuela made on a rainy Sunday. Chicken thighs soaked overnight in citrus and garlic, browned hard, then simmered low in a tomato and sofrito sauce with green olives, raisins, capers, and potatoes that drink up everything in the pot. Sweet, briny, garlicky, and deeply Cuban.

Plenty of famous Cubans have their own version. Andy Garcia's family recipe, the one that inspired this take, marinates the chicken overnight and treats the cooking as an all day affair with music on. That part is not optional. Put on some Celia.

What Is Fricasé de Pollo?

The name comes from the French fricassée, but the Cuban version left France a long time ago. Cuba took the technique (brown the bird, braise it in sauce) and made it criollo: sour orange and garlic in the marinade, a sofrito base, dry wine, and the sweet-salty combination of raisins and olives that shows up in the island's best braises, picadillo included.

Here is the part Barbaro Mojo fans will recognize: the overnight marinade is basically a mojo. Sour orange, a pile of garlic, salt, pepper. If you have made our Cuban mojo marinade for lechon asado, you already know the move. Same DNA, different pot.

Ingredients

Serves 6.

The Night Before (Marinade)

• 4 lb bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs
• 10 cloves garlic, roughly chopped
• 1 cup sour orange juice (naranja agria), or 1/2 cup lime juice mixed with 1/2 cup orange juice
• 1 large onion, sliced
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 2 tsp kosher salt
• 1/2 tsp black pepper

The Day Of (Braise)

• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 2 large onions, sliced
• 2 bell peppers (green plus red for color), sliced
• 1 (6 oz) can tomato paste
• 1 cup dry Spanish sherry or vino seco (real wine, not the salty "cooking wine")
• 3/4 cup raisins
• 1/2 cup pitted Spanish green olives
• 1 Tbsp capers, drained
• 1 1/2 lb Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and cut into large chunks
• 1 cup frozen green peas
• Salt and black pepper to taste
• El Havanero hot sauce, for the kick (see below)

Directions

The night before. Marinate. Put the chicken in a glass or ceramic container (not metal, the citrus will react). Add the garlic, sliced onion, oregano, salt, pepper, and the sour orange juice. Turn everything so the chicken is coated, cover, and refrigerate overnight. Even 4 hours helps, but overnight is the dish.

Step 1. Brown the chicken. Pull the chicken out of the marinade and pat it dry. Save the marinade, onions and all. Heat the olive oil in a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat and brown the thighs in batches, skin side down first, 4-5 minutes per side. Set them on a plate.

Step 2. Build the sofrito. Drop the heat to medium. In the same pot, cook the sliced onions and bell peppers 8-10 minutes until soft, scraping up the brown bits the chicken left behind. That fond is flavor, do not wash it away with the wine yet.

Step 3. Deglaze with the sherry. Now pour in the sherry and let it bubble for a minute while you scrape the bottom clean.

Step 4. Make the sauce. Stir in the tomato paste and the reserved marinade with its onions and garlic. Add the raisins, olives, and capers. Season lightly with salt and pepper (the olives and capers bring their own).

Step 5. Braise. Return the chicken and any juices to the pot and add water until the chicken is barely covered. Bring it to a simmer, then drop the heat to medium-low, cover partially, and cook 30 minutes.

Step 6. Add the potatoes. Tuck the potato chunks into the sauce and cook another 30-40 minutes, until the potatoes are tender and the chicken is close to falling off the bone. Stir in the peas for the last 5 minutes.

Step 7. Serve. Taste the sauce one last time for salt. Serve over white rice with the sauce spooned generously on top.

Want It With Kick? (Fricasé Picante)

Traditional fricasé is a mild dish. Delicious, but mild. If your table likes heat, this is where Barbaro Mojo comes in, two ways:

• In the pot: stir 2-3 teaspoons of El Havanero into the sauce during the last 10 minutes of cooking. The habanero, red pepper, and tomato in the sauce disappear into the braise and leave a warm, building heat behind the sweetness of the raisins.
• At the table: put the bottle next to the rice and let everyone find their own level. A few dashes over the potatoes is the move.

El Havanero is the pick because its tomato base speaks the same language as the fricasé sauce. If you are feeding heat-shy guests, Jalabáo (jalapeño and green bell pepper, a 3 of 10 on our heat scale) keeps it friendly. If your crew asks why the sauce is not hotter, Matanza will end that conversation.

Tips

• Glass or ceramic for the marinade. The citrus reacts with metal and the chicken picks up the taste.
• Dry the chicken before browning. Wet chicken steams. Dry chicken browns. The whole sauce is built on that browning.
• Vino seco vs sherry. Cuban home cooks reach for vino seco. A decent dry Spanish sherry is the upgrade and worth it. Skip anything labeled "cooking wine," it is mostly salt.
• Raisins are not negotiable. The sweet against the olive brine is the entire point of the dish. If you have picadillo opinions, you already knew that.
• Bones will loosen. Long braise, dark meat. Fish out any stray bones before serving if kids are at the table.
• Day two is better. Like most Cuban braises, fricasé improves overnight. Reheat gently with a splash of water.

What to Serve It With

• White rice, the non-negotiable base
• Sweet plantains (maduros), fried until caramelized at the edges
• Avocado and thin-sliced onion salad with olive oil and a little vinegar
• Cuban black beans if you are going full Sunday spread
• Yuca con mojo when one starch is not enough (it never is)

Fricasé de Pollo FAQ

What is fricase de pollo?

Fricase de pollo is a Cuban braised chicken dish. Chicken thighs marinate overnight in sour orange and garlic (essentially a mojo), get browned in a Dutch oven, then simmer in a tomato and sofrito sauce with dry wine, green olives, raisins, capers, and potatoes. It is served over white rice.

Is fricase de pollo spicy?

No. Traditional fricase de pollo is a mild dish. The flavor comes from sofrito, wine, olives, and raisins, not from heat. Cuban tables that want heat add it with hot sauce: stir 2-3 teaspoons of El Havanero into the sauce near the end of cooking, or pass the bottle at the table so everyone sets their own level.

Can I make fricase de pollo with chicken breast?

You can, but bone-in thighs are the traditional cut and they hold up to the hour-plus braise. Breast meat dries out over that time. If breast is what you have, cut it into large chunks and add it with the potatoes for the last 30 minutes instead of braising it the full time.

What do you serve with fricase de pollo?

White rice is the non-negotiable base, since the sauce is the point. From there, add sweet plantains (maduros), an avocado and onion salad, Cuban black beans, or yuca con mojo for a full Sunday spread.

Related Reading

• Cuban Sofrito Recipe, the base this sauce is built on
• Cuban Mojo Marinade, the marinade's older sibling
• Arroz con Pollo Cubano, the other Cuban chicken pot that feeds a crowd

Final Thoughts

Fricasé de pollo is not fast food. It wants a night in the fridge and an hour and change on the stove. What you get back is a pot of chicken that tastes like somebody's grandmother approved of it, sweet raisins, briny olives, potatoes soaked in sauce, and, if you did it our way, a slow El Havanero burn underneath it all.

¡Qué bárbaro!