Whole Chicken for Winter Weekday Dinners

[Joe Gerard]

I realize this rquires more planning then you intended, but I often buy a chicken from my butcher on the weekend and use The Zuni Cafe roast chicken recipe. Clean bird, dry, stuff various fresh herbs under skin of breast and legs, season thoroughly with just s&p and wrap up in foil for two to three days. When you get home the day of, preheat oven to 450-475 (depending on what temperature will fill your kitchen with smoke) while you preheat a skillet on the stove. Add a touch of oil to pan, roast bird 25 minutes breast side up, flip it for another 25 and then flip right side up for about another 7 minutes or so.

This never fails to provide juicy meat, really crisp skin, and a quick easy meal. Man, I want one tonight.

[Chris Amirault]

This topic hovers in my mind, all these days... the crucial bit, as has been reiterated, is walking in at 6 with the chicken and still ending up with dinner at an entirely reasonable hour, and that includes all cleanup and lunch/leftover repackaging.

Quick & dirty:  1 chicken, 1 bottle Thai sweet chili sauce if you don't have one already for such and other purposes (I do; Caravelle brand), 1 hothouse cucumber.  Turn on the oven to hot, 425 or so, first thing.  While coming to temp peel/slice cucumber, rub in a little salt, dress as desired with soy/rice vinegar/sugar, maybe sesame oil or fish sauce, depending.  Cut chicken in halves, s & p, bung in hot oven until done, which probably takes about as long as rice in the old cooker, with or without coconut milk as part of its liquid.  Glaze the chicken with some sweet chili sauce in its last few minutes of cooking, and provide a ramekin of extra alongside.

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Priscilla, you get it exactly -- and I've got all of those ingredients. It's what's for dinner. Tomorrow, I mean.

[BRM]

It is not really roasting but I would add to this mix virtually any of the chicken recipes from Paula Wolfert's, Couscous..I have tried a lot of them and they are fairly easy to do, delicious, different and the kind of dish you can put together and go do other things for an hour or so. The first couple of times will take longer as it always does. Try something like Chicken with Olives and Preserved Lemons to start with. I bring the broth/chicken up to temp on the stove and put it in a 250 oven until its done. Its fun to serve on a large platter and have everyone pick at it.

[Chris Amirault]

Guest for dinner, so went with a sort of Indian roast chicken.

Cut chicken into 8 pieces (halved breasts). Tossed with a spice rub (Penzey's vindaloo, garam masala, black pepper, salt). Melted some butter (no ghee handy) in peanut oil. Tossed in some fenugreek, cumin seed, black mustard seed, and a cinnamon stick. Let 'em pop, then added a large sliced onion, and when that started to wilt, added a few crushed garlic cloves for a few minutes. 1/2 c stock, then the chicken on top in a 450F oven for about 45 minutes.

Served the chicken, onions, and rice with a sauteed carrot with ginger and garlic side. Oh, and mustard pickles, which I eat like candy in meals like this.

[snowangel]

This recipe is great -- and it sure would have been nice if they'd credited Bittman (it appeared a couple -- maybe more -- years ago in one of his NY Times Minimalist columns.

Basically, it is a cut up chicken, sauteed in garlic, ginger and chili flakes, and you can serve it as is with cilantro and lime, or remove the chicken, carmelize some sugar with more garlic, ginger and peppers, add some fish sauce, and return the chicken. Cook the chix a bit longer (you'll want to remove it earlier from the first saute if you do this) and serve, again with lime and cilantro.

This is a fav here, and it works well with boneless chix parts.

Edited to add: Thai basil works well on this, too, as a garnish.

[cakewalk]

This recipe is great -- and it sure would have been  nice if they'd credited Bittman (it appeared a couple -- maybe more -- years ago in one of his NY Times Minimalist columns.

Basically, it is a cut up chicken, sauteed in garlic, ginger and chili flakes, and you can serve it as is with cilantro and lime, or remove the chicken, carmelize some sugar with more garlic, ginger and peppers, add some fish sauce, and return the chicken.  Cook the chix a bit longer (you'll want to remove it earlier from the first saute if you do this) and serve, again with lime and cilantro.

This is a fav here, and it works well with boneless chix parts.

Edited to add:  Thai basil works well on this, too, as a garnish.

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I like that one. A lot of good ideas here, and very timely, too, since a friend is coming over for dinner tonight and the chicken is still just sitting in the fridge.

[Syrah]

A favorite here is out of Michael Field's Cooking School.  One cut-up chicken and 15 or 20 whole shallots, peeled.  Brown the chicken, remove, brown shallots, return chicken to pan, cover pan and let cook at a bare burble until the chicken is done.  Perfumes the house beautifully.

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I want to really thank you for this suggestion. It's wonderful. I've made it more than once and each time the chicken is delicious and tender. Served with either mashed potato or soft polenta.

I do wonder how it would go being roasted rather than on the stovetop. My electric frypan is slightly difficult to manage in the low temps so I'd be willing to give it a go.

[Tangelo]

Once the weather turns cooler, THIS is my favorite roast chicken recipe. I found it several years ago in Cuisine@Home and make it often. You really need a cast iron skillet for this though. The bread on the bottom of this, when done, is so darned good. The herbs and spices and lemon juice have all gotten on it. The juices from the chicken have run down on it. And it turns this amazing dark and crunchy brown against the cast iron. It's really an excellent dish.