Ok. I am here. I am here to post my promised food thing. I am going to be very frank and say that I can honestly admit that I don't see myself sticking to something like this on a regular basis. At all. Unless I carefully schedule it into my life and prepare very very carefully. Maybe I will get better at it but I am such a retard when it comes to to doing something, I want to do it RIGHT and I had my daughter take the photos and my lord we had SEVENTY THREE pictures of ME COOKING A STINKIN CHICKEN!!! Needless to say I am one week and one day late and it's been weighing so heavily on my mind to GET IT DONE it's making me crazy. So here goes...and from here on out, no promises. You get what you get. So be happy. ;)
First of all let me explain that I have 2 gadgets in my kitchen that I love. One is a rotisserie and the other is a rice cooker. The rice cooker is a fairly new addition because I have a ceramic stove top that I DESPISE and had too many burned batches of rice so the hubster was so thoughtful to bring me this great contraption to assist me. I love it. Simply because I can put everything on to cook, then I can go do my thing. Like blog. (sure) But I do like to clean the kitchen, set the table, cut up veggies, and so forth while dinner is cooking and I feel very productive and secure that our meal will be cooked thoroughly in a reasonable amount of time. So. If you don't have either of these, or you only have one, I will try to include an improvised method to achieve the same results. :)
I'm going to start with the chicken.
Ingredients:
One whole chicken with guts removed
Fresh rosemary (mine is stolen from my neighbor's yard, forgive me Lord)
Fresh garlic (3 cloves peeled and minced)
Sea Salt
One lemon
Black Pepper
Here is a photo of the sea salt I buy at Costco. My son painted these darling little salt and pepper shakers so I thought I would share...but I do use a black pepper mill for fresh ground pepper in all my cooking.
The key ingredients: lemon, stolen rosemary, and garlic
And here are the fat little garlic cloves all peeled and ready to be minced!
Here I am doing my most favorite (NOT) thing in the world to do. Removing the innards of the chicken. This right here can convince me to be a vegetarian for life. I promise, I say it every time but then when the chicken comes out of the rotisserie all dripping and crispy I always change my tune.
After removing the guts, squeeze the lemon juice all over the guy. He will love it.
Then salt him generously. He might yelp a little during this process because salt can burn especially right after the lemon wash but it will be ok.
After that I stuff the lemon halves into the body cavity. (that way he doesn't suffer from malnutrition during the cooking process)
Here is where you use the handy dandy garlic press and just squeeze all the garlic right on top of Chicken Little.
Then you gently massage the minced garlic all over the bab...I mean chicken. He will find this rather relaxing.
Next is the stolen rosemary treatment.
Here I am stuffing some into the body cavity to keep the lemon company.
Here I had just been chewed out by the hub so I was just letting out some frustration...just kidding, I made a few cuts in the breast (ow) to insert some rosemary sprigs.
Fresh cracked pepper
Almost ready for the next step! But first, a message from our sponsor:
Have I ever told you how much I love birds? Well this little bluebird is a very special family heirloom. He is part of a bird collection that my grandmother had while I was growing up. He is in fact the smallest one of the collection and the only one I have been fortunate enough to have in my posession. Anyhow, he sits on my kitchen counter and brings me much cheer. I also love colored glass, which you can see in the nicely blurred background, in addition to the darling little handpainted apple/sugarbowl that Caeden painted for me at "Kid's at Art". I love my birds and my glass! And now, back to our show.
This next section of our process is tying this little guy up. I usually cut a piece of COOKING twine (please don't use anything else and expect for your house to not burn down, I will not be responsible for your arson escapades) about 24-30 inches in length.
First start off by stretching the twine midways across the chest of the chicken. Don't worry about cutting off his circulation.
Gently flip him over
And crisscross the twine just like this.
Then flip him again and cinch the twine catching his little legs right above the kneecaps.
Tie the twine in a knot and trim off any excess. There. Now he has no choice but to sit still and there will be no chance of him scampering off to join the Gingerbread Boy.
Now comes the fun part. If you don't have a rotisserie you would be putting Chicken Little into the conventional oven at this point. (preheated to 350 degrees.) Cook for 30 minutes at 350 then reduce heat to 325 and cook for one more hour. For the rotisserie crowd you get to spear the chicken right in the breasts with the rotiserrie sticks.
Carefully work him down until the rotisserie sticks come poking out right between the legs and the...ummm...butt area I guess.
Put the other end of the rotisserie wheel on and voila he's ready to enter "the chamber".
Doesn't he look so cozy and snug? (He? I've been saying "he" all this time and I just realized I think it's a "she". Oh well)
Set the timer for 1 1/2 hours and go take a nap!!! Ha! Actually no, go scrub toilets or spank a bottom I don't care but you have at least an hour and a half to do whatever you want. In all reality, I start the rice about now but I am waiting for part of the recipe from my sweet sister in love who shared it with me so I will add that LATER. Sheesh. My neck is killing me from all this blogging and photo importing and whatnot. I usually serve this with yemeni rice, homemade hummus, toasted whole wheat pita bread, sliced red peppers, and sliced cucumbers.
I hope you enjoy your chicken!!!
