Chicken Kiev facts for kids
Chicken Kiev cut open
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| Alternative names | Côtelette de volaille, suprême de volaille à la Kiev |
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| Course | Main |
| Place of origin | Russian Empire |
| Associated national cuisine | Russian, Ukrainian |
| Serving temperature | Hot |
| Main ingredients | Chicken breast, (garlic) butter, herbs, eggs, bread crumbs |
Chicken Kiev (Russian: котлета по-киевски, kotleta po-kiyevski; Ukrainian: котлета по-київськи, kotleta po-kyivsky) is a tasty dish made from chicken. It uses a chicken fillet (a boneless piece of meat) that is flattened and wrapped around cold butter. Then, it's covered in eggs and breadcrumbs, and either fried or baked until golden and crispy.
In Russian and Ukrainian cooking, this kind of stuffed chicken breast is often called côtelette de volaille. Since chefs sometimes call chicken fillets suprêmes, you might also hear this dish called suprême de volaille à la Kiev. Even though its exact beginning is a bit of a mystery, Chicken Kiev is very popular in countries that were once part of the Soviet Union. It's also well-loved in many other countries, especially those where English is spoken.
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History of Chicken Kiev
The exact story of how Chicken Kiev began isn't fully clear. Different people have different ideas about where it came from. For a long time, Russian chefs have used cooking styles from French haute cuisine (fancy French cooking). They mixed these French ideas with their own traditional Russian ways of cooking.
Famous French chefs like Marie-Antoine Carême and Urbain Dubois even worked for rich Russian families. This helped spread French cooking ideas in Russia. By the 1800s, using good cuts of meat, like different types of cutlets and fillets, became very popular. Many new dishes using these cuts were created in Russia around that time.
What is a Chicken Cutlet?
The French words de volaille simply mean "of poultry" or "of chicken." So, côtelette de volaille just means "chicken cutlet." But here's a fun fact: the Russian version of this recipe isn't really known in France! In France, côtelette de volaille usually means any chicken breast, or sometimes a patty made from minced chicken.
In Russia, the general name for chicken cutlets is kurinaya kotleta. This usually means a minced (ground) chicken patty. But kotleta de-voliay (Russian: котлета де-воляй) is used specifically for the stuffed chicken breast dish. This name started appearing in Russian cookbooks and stories around the early 1900s. It was often mentioned as a common dish you could find in restaurants.
Old Russian cookbooks show that côtelette de volaille was made from whole chicken fillets. They were often stuffed with a mix of minced chicken and cream, with butter added. This was similar to other fancy dishes of the time, like "game cutlets à la Maréchale" which were made from wild birds.
The term à la Maréchale (meaning "marshal-style") in French cooking describes tender pieces of meat. These meats, like cutlets or chicken breasts, are usually coated in eggs and breadcrumbs, then sautéed (fried quickly). Many recipes for such dishes, some with stuffings, were in cookbooks from the 1800s.
The Pozharsky Cutlet
The biggest difference between the old côtelette de volaille and today's Chicken Kiev is the stuffing. Older versions had complex stuffings, but modern Chicken Kiev uses simple butter. Using butter in chicken cutlets has been a Russian cooking trick since the early 1800s. This was seen in the Pozharsky cutlet.
Pozharsky cutlets are breaded patties made from ground chicken. Butter is mixed into the ground meat, which makes the cutlets super juicy and tender. This dish was a big hit in 19th-century Russian cooking. It even became popular in French fancy cooking and then around the world.
So, while Chicken Kiev has roots in French and Russian cooking from the 1800s, the exact story of how the specific Chicken Kiev we know today came to be is still debated.
Who Invented Chicken Kiev?
Some people say Chicken Kiev was created by the famous French chef Marie-Antoine Carême. He worked for the Russian Emperor Alexander I for a short time in 1818. Even in that short time, he had a big impact on Russian cooking. While his cookbooks don't have the exact Chicken Kiev recipe, his "fowl fillet à la Maréchale" (a similar dish) might have inspired it.
Other stories suggest a French chef named Nicolas Appert invented it. He's famous for inventing how to preserve food in airtight containers. However, most books about Appert don't mention him creating this dish.
Modern Chicken Kiev's Rise
In the city of Kiev (now called Kyiv), people often say that the "cutlet de volaille Kiev-style" was invented at the Continental hotel. This fancy hotel was built in Kiev in 1897. People who lived back then remembered Chicken Kiev as the special dish of the hotel's restaurant.
An early mention of "Kiev cutlets from chicken or veal" appeared in a Russian cookbook called Cookery Digest in 1915. These were minced meat cutlets, similar to Pozharsky cutlets. But they were shaped like a croquette (a small, round fried food) with a piece of cold butter in the middle. Just like modern Chicken Kiev, they were covered in eggs and breadcrumbs and then fried.
After World War II, Chicken Kiev became a popular dish in fancy Soviet restaurants, especially those for foreign tourists. It was so popular that tourist guides even warned diners to be careful because the melted butter inside could squirt out! At the same time, it also became very popular in the United States. Many people saw Chicken Kiev as a symbol of fancy Russian cooking.
The dish also traveled to Poland in the 1800s. Today, Poles still call Chicken Kiev kotlet de volaille, or sometimes dewolaj.
Newspapers in the US started mentioning Chicken Kiev in 1937. Restaurants in cities like Chicago and New York were serving it. Recipes for "chicken cutlet à la Kiev" were even published in The New York Times in 1946.
How Chicken Kiev is Made
Chicken Kiev is made from a chicken breast that has had its bones and skin removed. The breast is cut lengthwise, flattened, and then stuffed with butter. In Western recipes, garlic butter is often used, but in traditional Russian recipes, plain butter is common. Sometimes, herbs like parsley and dill are added to the butter for extra flavor. Some American recipes even use blue cheese instead of butter!
In the traditional way of making these chicken cutlets, a small wing bone is often left attached to the chicken breast. This is true for classic Chicken Kiev too. When served, this bone is usually covered with a decorative paper napkin. However, today, many Chicken Kievs are made from pure fillets without the bone, especially those you buy in stores or in some restaurants.
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Classical version with bone retained, as served in Kyiv
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Boneless version
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Chicken Kiev as Convenience Food
In the middle of the 1900s, ready-to-cook ground meat patties became popular in the USSR. These were cheap and easy to make. Some of these patties were even given names of famous Russian dishes, but they weren't much like the original recipes. For example, there was a pork patty called "Kiev cutlet." Later, "real" Chicken Kievs also became available as convenience food in Russia.
In Britain, Chicken Kiev was the first ready-made meal introduced by the Marks & Spencer company in 1979. It's still very popular in the UK and can be easily found in supermarkets and some restaurants. Because it's so popular, Chicken Kiev is even included in the list of items used to calculate inflation in the UK!
Its popularity also led to the word "Kiev" being used for other stuffed chicken dishes. You might see things like "leek-and-bacon Kiev" or "cheese-and-ham Kiev" (which is similar to chicken Cordon Bleu). Vegetarian versions of Kievs, made without meat, also became popular in the UK in the 1990s.
Similar Dishes
There are other dishes that are similar to Chicken Kiev. One very popular one in Western countries is chicken Cordon Bleu. Instead of butter, it's filled with cheese and ham. Another dish, Karađorđeva šnicla, is a Serbian breaded veal or pork cutlet that was inspired by Chicken Kiev.
Images for kids
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Recipe of "Kiev cutlets from chicken or veal". Cookery Digest, 1915
See also
In Spanish: Pollo Kiev para niños
