By The foliage is coming on strong now. The ridge above the farm has gone from hints to declaration: red and orange and gold in the sugar maples, the particular yellow of the birches alongside. I drove the back road on Tuesday just to see it — a thing I do every October with the deliberate attention it deserves. I've lived in Vermont for sixty-nine years and I have not exhausted the foliage. I don't expect to.
The apple butter project occupied most of the weekend. Four pounds of apples cooked slowly with cinnamon and clove and maple syrup until the whole thing reduced to something dark and concentrated and more than the sum of its parts. Eight jars, the same hex-lid jars, labeled in my handwriting. The cellar shelf has its proper fall inventory now: sixteen quarts of tomato sauce, six jars of dill pickles, eight jars of apple butter, the preserved pepper jars, the rhubarb jam from June. A winter's worth.
Bill from Maine made his first apple butter and sent me a jar in the mail. He included a note that said: yours is better, but mine is mine. That's the right attitude. The fact that yours came from your own trees and your own work is worth something that no amount of technique can substitute for. I wrote back to tell him so.
Made chicken and apple, a fall dish — browned chicken thighs with sliced Macs and cider and thyme, finished in the oven. The sweetness of the apples cuts through the richness of the chicken in a way that makes the combination feel inevitable. Some combinations are that way. You encounter them and think: of course.
The chicken and apple I made this week reminded me of something I’ve known for a long time: sweet fruit cut against rich poultry is one of those combinations that feels obvious once you’ve had it, the kind of thing that makes you wonder why you don’t do it every week. Apricot Chicken works on exactly the same logic—a bright, sticky glaze that does for chicken what those sliced Macs did in the pan on Wednesday night. If Bill up in Maine is learning that the fruit you put up yourself tastes better for the effort, he’d understand this dish instinctively: simple, seasonal in spirit, and more than the sum of its parts.
Apricot Chicken
Prep Time: 10 min | Cook Time: 35 min | Total Time: 45 min | Servings: 4
Ingredients
- 4 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs (about 2 lbs)
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 2/3 cup apricot preserves
- 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
- 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
- 1 teaspoon soy sauce
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes (optional)
- Fresh thyme or parsley, for garnish
Instructions
- Preheat the oven. Heat oven to 400°F. Pat chicken thighs dry with paper towels and season all over with salt and pepper.
- Sear the chicken. Warm olive oil in an oven-safe skillet over medium-high heat. Place chicken thighs skin-side down and cook without moving them for 5–6 minutes, until the skin is deep golden and releases easily from the pan. Flip and cook 2 minutes on the second side. Remove chicken and set aside briefly.
- Make the glaze. Reduce heat to medium. Add garlic to the skillet and cook 30 seconds until fragrant. Stir in apricot preserves, Dijon mustard, apple cider vinegar, soy sauce, and red pepper flakes if using. Whisk together and let the glaze bubble for 1–2 minutes until slightly thickened.
- Glaze and roast. Return chicken to the skillet, skin-side up. Spoon glaze generously over each piece. Transfer the skillet to the oven and roast for 22–25 minutes, basting once halfway through, until the internal temperature reaches 165°F and the glaze is caramelized and sticky.
- Rest and serve. Let chicken rest 5 minutes before serving. Spoon any pan glaze over the top and finish with fresh thyme or parsley.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 390 | Protein: 28g | Fat: 18g | Carbs: 28g | Fiber: 0g | Sodium: 420mg