Jennifer Aaronson, Editorial Director of Food and Entertaining for Martha Stewart Living, joins us for a stop along the Martha Stewart Living Blog Tour to give us helpful chicken roasting tricks and tips. Flip through the six scrumptious chickens, and don't forget to follow this week's tour: check out yesterday's post with winter gardening tips at The Stir and the final post on refinishing furniture at AOL DIY Life; and, as always, you can find more great entertaining and recipe ideas at MarthaStewart.com.
The new year is always a good time to start fresh, revisit the classics, and ramp up your basics. What does that mean in the kitchen? Roast chicken -- the go to for Sunday's family dinner (and Monday's sandwich and Tuesday's tacos...) as well as a no-fail dinner party favorite. We've put six new flavor-packed spins on the basic bird, perfecting technique along the way and defining The New Roast Chicken. Why reinvent the wheel every week? Put these 6 chickens in your back pocket and you'll have one tasty year.
Tips/tricks for great chicken:
1. Let raw chicken stand at (a cool) room temperature for at least one hour and up to two hours before roasting.
2. Dry skin really well before buttering or seasoning.
3. If stuffing under the skin, loosen the skin from the wider neck end- this way it is less likely that the skin will break and it will keep the smaller, pointed end of the breast covered to prevent it from drying out.
4. If you leave the raw chicken uncovered in the refrigerator overnight the skin will get nice and dry and result in extra crisp skin after roasting.
5. Buy a meat thermometer or make sure the one you have is calibrated (place in boiling water --at sea level it should read 212°).
6. Do not overcook- To check doneness insert thermometer into thigh- it should read 165° (also- juices will run clear after piercing meat and legs will wiggle easily).
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I add yukon gold potatoes, 1/2 yams and onions cut into quarters in the roasting pan with the chicken and at a later stage, I add whole cloves of garlic. I sprinkle them with smokey paprika, cayanne pepper and a little salt. I add white wine, olive oil and salt. If the potatoes,etc. are done before the chicken take them out and keep them warm in a serving dish. Keep adding white wine if it the pan gets dry.
wash the chicken, pat it dry, dust it with a mixture of ginger, nutmeg and white pepper and then roast it for about 40 min to an hour at 450F
Or for a nice Marinade:
Tahini, ginger and lemon juice.
-Rub bird with olive oil, pour a bit inside the cavity as well.
-Season with salt and black pepper rub it into the olive oil. Season inside the cavity as well
-Prick a lemon with a fork and shove into the cavity
- Put sprigs of rosemary and thyme into cavity, chop some up and rub on top of bird
-Heat oven to highest temperature, bird in then turn it right down to 180Celsius- (i'm from the UK), This will give it a really crispy skin without drying out the meat too much.
1. Dry out the bird as long as possible (as mentioned above) and bring to room temperature.
2. Meanwhile, prepare a compound butter -- such as 4 tbsp butter, zest of 2 lemons, 1/2 tsp puréed garlic, 2 tbsp minced fresh herbs, 1/2 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp pepper.
3. Preheat oven to 475, with a 12" cast iron skillet inside.
5. Spread compound butter under the breast skin (and thighs/legs if you can).
6. Fill cavity with lemon halves (after juice squeezed out), crushed garlic cloves (skin on is fine), leftover herb stalks, salt and pepper.
6. Truss chicken and generously season the outside with olive oil, salt and pepper.
7. Slice 2 onions thickly, take skillet out, make a bed of onions in the skillet, and put the chicken on top.
8. Bake for 30 minutes, then turn the heat down to 375 and cook until done (165 in thigh).
If the chicken was big enough, you can make a quick pan gravy after straining/defatting the liquid in the skillet, too. Eye-rollingly delicious!
oh well.. at least the fridge was very well stocked and they were jovial about trying my creations, of course i think they'd have ate anything after being in the office for 16+ hour days.