One pot, one chicken, two meals

French chicken in a pot, or poule au pot, is the Sunday dish King Henri IV wanted every family in France to have. Four hundred years later it still makes sense. A whole chicken is poached slowly with leeks, carrots, turnips and an onion studded with cloves. The liquid barely trembles the whole time. That gentle heat keeps the breast juicy and the stock clear. The original was made with an old boiling hen that needed…