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Last week I wrote about joining Resolutions In Motion. My goal, or resolution if you will is to make one new recipe a week for 6 weeks. Seems doable, right? I am totally and completely capable of really cooking, real food with actual ingredients. It's a big job considering my cooking usually consists of boxes, cans, and frozen items. So why start off with a bang and try something as advantageous as a roasted chicken? Because I'm me, and I never, ever, do things as planned.
I picked a roast chicken because it's something I've always wanted to do. Isn't that like the badge of honor for first time cooks? Roasting some kind of protein without burning the house down? Plus I had seen a recipe in an issue of Real Simple Family, 2 years ago, and have wanted to try it since. I just never felt like I had enough time, or was too intimidated to do it. So here was my chance. New year, new resolutions.
As part of my "resolution in motion", my plan was to tackle a new recipe on a Sunday. Because we are all usually home on Sunday, no work or school, I can start early, and we can all sit down and have a stress free dinner, no problem. Let me start by saying that my first goal should have been to buy the ingredients the day before... Which I tried to do, except my grocer was all out of chickens. Who runs out of chickens? So Sunday afternoon I went to a different grocer, to buy a nice whole chicken. No biggie, it was easy, and I got that little birdie home and wouldn't you know it, it was frozen solid in the middle.
Enter a Google search on the safest way to defrost a chicken, which included running under cold water, leaving in the fridge overnight, and the microwave. Of course it was already going on 4 o'clock. So with the time spent defrosting, I was moving into "dangerous late" for dinner territory. So as disappointed as I was, I rinsed the chicken, zipped in an extra large zip lock and put her in the fridge for a Monday roasting. I ate left overs, the hubbs and the kids had fish sticks and Mac and Cheese. Pretty typical Sunday night fare.
Monday morning, after breakfast and while Caity was at school, I roasted my chicken. I was nervous. I had to use things like cotton twine and a meat thermometer. I also had to dig giblets out of a "cavity" which is a an experience all its own. I cut up my veggies, used my roasting pan that was a wedding gift (almost 8 years ago) for the 2nd time, and put it all in the oven.
I almost got this one right this time. I over cooked the chicken just a little, but the veggies were amazing. I have gotten over my fear of roasting a chicken. It wasn't so bad, and now that I know what to do, I'll totally do it again. The big plus was that I used all Grain Free, Dairy Free, ingredients with a little tweaking of the recipe. That means I was able to cook one meal, with alternate sides (broccoli, cut apples for the kiddos). That's a huge win because most nights I make two dinners, one for me and one for the bunch.
Since this is not a cooking blog, or a blog that ever does prize winning DIYs, you can find the recipe HERE. As an editors note: I used olive oil instead of butter, I used half a bag of precut baby carrots, and in the future I would cut the lemons in half before placing them in the chicken "cavity". Let me know if you make this or get inspired to do some roasting of your own. It wasn't as bad or complicated as I thought, and has inspired me to roast some more!
