Monthly Archives: September 2011

Friday Feasts: Lemon Rosemary Rotisserie Chicken

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WARNING!  If raw chicken makes you ill in any kind of way – I suggest not scrolling down!

Happy Friday!  I’m looking forward to a weekend full of cooking and relaxing.  Those are my favorite kind of weekends!

I’ve shared before that I don’t care for chicken too much.  BUT, if chicken were the only piece of meat I could eat for the rest of my life it would be a rotisserie style chicken.

Making a rotisserie chicken is so easy and worth it!  After you make this you’ll never buy one of those store bought ones again – I promise!  You can make them all sorts of ways, but my favorite way is with butter and fresh herbs under the skin, stuffed with lemon, more fresh herbs, and garlic.

First, make sure you have about half a stick of room temperature butter out and ready to go.  Next,  gather some rosemary, lemon, and garlic.  Any fresh herbs will do.  So happens I had some rosemary on hand.  A combination of rosemary, thyme, and sage is delicious too.  If you’re like my friend Tori and rosemary tastes like soap when you eat it, by all means use something else!

Chop your rosemary and garlic and add it to a mixing bowl with the room temp butter.  Squeeze a little lemon in too – it won’t hurt you!  Give it a good stir, but don’t over stir.  The butter mixture has to be firm but, soft.  If you feel it’s on the verge of melting, stick it in the freezer for a few so hardens it back up.

Meanwhile, remove all the innards, rinse, and pat dry.  Carry the chicken over to your roasting pan.  Sometimes I use a 13″x9″ casserole dish when I don’t feel like pulling out the roasting pan.  Make sure to spray with a little non-stick cooking spray.  It seems to help later when it comes time to doing dishes.  Start lifting the chicken skin from the opening of the cavity – slowly with your index and middle fingers trying not to tear the chicken skin.  Tear as far as you can – about to each leg.  Grab your herb butter and rub it under the skin.  Save some to rub on the outside of the chicken too.  Stuff the cavity with a few garlic cloves, lemon, and rosemary.  Rub the rest of the herb butter on the outside of the chicken.  Sprinkle with Kosher salt and fresh ground pepper.

Throw your bird into the oven and bake until your food thermometer reads 160 degrees fahrenheit.  I usually stick my thermometer in the thigh.  And don’t worry – 160 degrees is cooked through.  After you take your chicken out of the oven you’ve got to let it rest for at least ten to fifteen minutes before cutting into.  While it’s resting it’s still cooking and the temperature can reach another ten degrees.  The government suggests chicken being done at 180 degrees and to me chicken taste like dry leather at that point!  Do whatever you’re comfortable with though.

I always serve this with mashed sweet potatoes and fresh steamed veggies.  The combination never seems to go wrong.

Ingredients:

1 3-4 pound fryer chicken

1/2 of stick of butter

fresh herbs of your liking

5 garlic cloves

1 lemon

Kosher Salt

Fresh ground pepper

Directions:

Preheat your oven at 350 degrees F

Directions:

Place butter on your counter to get to room temp.  Meanwhile, remove all the innards, rinse, and pat dry.  Carry the chicken over to your roasting pan.   Next, start lifting the chicken skin from the opening of the cavity – slowly with your index and middle fingers trying not to tear the chicken skin.  Tear as far as you can – about to each leg.  Grab your herb butter and rub it under the skin.  Save some to rub on the outside of the chicken too.  Stuff the cavity with a few garlic cloves, lemon, and your herbs of choice.  Rub the rest of the herb butter on the outside of the chicken.  Now, rub with Kosher salt and ground pepper.

Bake until your food thermometer reads 160 degrees fahrenheit – about an hour to an hour and fifteen minutes.  Let the chicken rest for at least ten to fifteen minutes before carving.

Serve with your favorite sides and enjoy!

 

Meatless Monday: Artichokes

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By the time you see this post, I will be mostly moved.  We’ll still be carting boxes from the old place to the new this week, but we’ll be resting our heads under the new roof and, soon, cooking our meals in the new kitchen.  It’s a good thing I took a few pictures before we started with the moving madness so I’d have at least a little something to share with you this week:

I love artichokes.

Artichokes

I love the hidden flower inside. It's like the surprise inside of a capsule toy. Except that capsule toys don't bite.

Please, hold your applause.  For the girl who, as a child, stashed carrot sticks behind the television in hopes her parents wouldn’t know she hadn’t eaten them, learning to enjoy anything green is worthy of a gold star.

This isn’t the first time I tried to eat these, either.  I’ve often picked a few up at the store or when they were in season at the farmer’s market, then sentenced them to a chilly death as they slowly went bad in the ‘fridge.  Knowing how to deal with these delicious monsters is half the battle.

After a little Internet searching, I decided to try my hand at roasting.  With the oven bumped warming to 400 degrees, I began the preparations.  The top third of the artichoke can be cut off, since there isn’t anything delicious there, anyway.  Then I cut them in half length wise to expose the gorgeous purple center.

Artichokes

Like a lionfish: beautiful, but deadly. Beware the artichoke's wrath.

Using a knife, a spoon, and basically everything else in my cooking arsenal, I pulled the petals and scary-painful white stuff out of the artichoke before dressing it up for cooking.

I imagine fresh garlic would have been amazing, but I was out and used garlic powder instead.  Olive oil, garlic powder, salt and pepper.. rub them around on the foil-covered cookie sheets and then pop them in the oven.

Artichokes

Make sure to cut the tips of these leaves before you put them in the oven! No one wants to cry while they eat.

The recipe I saw online (and this was months ago, so I can’t even begin to point you in the right direction), said to roast them for 90 minutes.  Based on the size, I’d check them a little earlier than that, if I were you.  Also, put them open side up, that way the ever-so-tasty heart doesn’t fall in harm’s way.

Now that I’ve gone through the experience of cooking a fresh one (personally, I think pickled things are for the birds and tasting the pickled heart was the reason I thought I hated these), I can totally appreciate the trouble that goes into making anything with artichokes in it!  And since roasting these, I had the good fortune of stopping over at my brother’s house near dinner time and finding a lone and unwanted steamed artichoke.  That’s much easier to get the flower out of, but it has an entirely different flavor.

All delicious, though.  I can’t wait to try my hand at growing these!

Saturday Night Hooking: Like A D6

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Dice Bag of Doom

Peek-a-boo!

I’ll be honest with you: This is one of my earlier knitting projects.  Somewhere after the Kindle Cozy and the owl themed coffee snug, I stumbled upon this adorable little guy.  Sure, he’s all tentacles and eyeballs, but he will lovingly store your dice between adventuring sessions.  Or, for you non-gamers, you may store other small things inside his fearsome pouch.  It’s like having a purse guardian.

Dice Bag of Doom: Progress

This is a picture of my desk at work. That stapler in the corner if my favorite. This is also a picture of our little friend before the bag is inserted or before the tentacles are wound around eyeballs. If you turn him upside-down, he looks like a poorly knit jellyfish.

He no longer lives with me, since he was a birthday present for a brave Tiefling my friend’s husband a few months ago.

Dice Bag of Doom

Mr. O'Doom says: "Errrghhhhllahahhccckkk."

You can find the “Dice Bag of Doom” on Ravelry.  It’s a fairly quick knit, even though I didn’t feel that way at the time.  When I’m in the middle of a knitting project, I always feel like it’s been going for months.

It’s also a good introduction to the I-Cord!  Easy stitch and, I think, fun!

. . .

It’s a busy week for this half of Cooking and Hooking.  Today’s post is on the short side because it’s Vogue Knitting Live Day!  My environmentally-friendly chariot arrives in an hour and will whisk me and my Yes-Man off on a wild knitting adventure filled with yarn, yarn and even more yarn.  This is my first step into a convention that isn’t Comic Con or X-Files related.  But that does beg the question:

What does one cosplay as at a knitting convention?

I really hope I get to find out.

Friday Feasts: Chicken Pot Pie

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Last week’s weather got me into a fall kind of mood.  I made all kinds of cozy things over the weekend.  By Sunday though, that feeling went away when the temperature outside reached the mid 90s.  It was back to barbecuing.

I’m in love with chicken pot pie.  This recipe I’m about to blog about will make you fall in love with it too.  I think chicken pot pie get’s a bad rap because people are always comparing it to the ones you buy in the freezer section.  YUCK!  The crust is never crispy and the chicken looks like the meat that use to be in the inside of the chicken nuggets from McDonald’s.

I got this recipe from Allrecipes a couple years ago and have probably made it at least ten times since than.  I think what makes it is the celery seed.  It gives it a whole different taste.  I don’t know how to explain it — you’ve just got to make it for yourself.  The last one I made I think was the best one ever.  I believe it’s because I made a whole roasted chicken the night before and used the left over meat for this baby.  Make this, this fall.  You’ll love me forever – I promise!

Full Recipe:  Chicken Pot Pie IX

A couple of things I do differently:

1.  Instead of boiling the vegetables and chicken I have pre-cooked chicken already made and diced up.  After I place the bottom pie crust I spread the cooked chicken evenly at the bottom too.

2.  After the butter and onion step I add the veggies and saute until they are still a little hard.  They’ll get softer in the oven.  I thought boiling them and cooking them in the pie was a little much.

3.  To get the crust looking shiny and brown I either make an egg or milk wash.  The last pie I made I used a milk wash which doesn’t turn out as shiny as an egg wash.  I think I like the milk wash look better but, it’s entirely up to you.  Just use a kitchen brush and brush on evenly once you seal the top crust.

How to Make an Egg Wash:

1 egg

2 TBS of water

Beat with a whisk until combined

How to Make a Milk Wash:

1/4 C of milk

2 TBS of water

Beat with a whisk until combined

Enjoy!

Tuesday Tip Day: Keeping Your Veggies Fresh

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Do you ever buy celery and have to throw it out within a couple of days because it all of a sudden it decided to go limp?  I seem to have this problem often!  I can’t tell you how many bunches I’ve had to throw away!  It’s ridiculous!

Well, I was over at someone’s house, I don’t remember who’s house and I saw that they had their celery cut up sitting in a glass of water!  I thought it was a great idea!  I’ve been doing it ever since and have gotten a couple more days worth or freshness.

Lately, I’ve been on a huge celery kick.  I remember pushing it aside for the longest time.  I think it’s best dipped in some ranch dressing, but isn’t almost everything in ranch good?


I recently purchased a cookbook that I saw on Amazon.  I saw a great looking brussel sprout recipe posted on foodgawker one day and I had to check it out.  Her blog led me to this cookbook.  As soon as I saw who the book was dedicated to I HAD to buy it!  The author dedicated it to her Grandmother Honey and that is what my cousins and I call our grandmother (my mother’s mother)!  I didn’t think anyone in the whole world called their grandmother that!  The author suggested doing the same thing with asparagus (pictured above).

Both ideas have worked out great!  Hope they work for you too!