Thursday, October 11, 2012

Roast Chicken - a guest post with Grace


This guest post is from the wonderful blogger, Grace, who lives in Boulder and has her own food blog, Grace(full) Plate where she shares favorite recipes, her traveling foodie excursions and local food happenings in Colorado and beyond. 

Alongside her blog (and her day job of running the sales department for an online startup) she writes for Eater Denver, runs the Facebook page Boulder Food News and is the co-founder of Boulder Food Media, a growing meetup. 

You can find her tweeting @gracekboyle or for all things food @gracefullplate. 

Finally, she said she is excited to be guest posting on Donna's wonderful blog. "Thanks for having me!"

Thanks, Grace, for sharing this great recipe!


Fall Roast Chicken With Sweet and Russet Potatoes 


When colder weather sets in and the leaves start to change I start to retreat into my home, hunker down in big, comfy sweaters and cook food that warms me up. To me, a favorite simple comfort food during Fall is roast chicken. I love the crispy skin, baking vegetables and apples alongside the dish and making sandwiches and soup with the leftovers. The other best thing is that this doesn’t require hours of prep and it yields food for a few days after.

Ingredients:

1 5-pound chicken
1/2 cup softened butter
4 cloves chopped garlic (I’m Italian, I may even add more!)
1 teaspoon paprika
1 apple chopped
2 onions diced
2 russet potatoes chopped
1 sweet potato chopped
1 lemon
salt and pepper
1 springs of thyme

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.

Completely remove the giblets from inside of the chicken. Wash the inside and outside of the chicken with cold water. Next, pat dry with paper towels inside and outside the chicken.

Thoroughly season the inside of the chicken with salt and pepper.

Cut the apple, onions and lemons into quarters. Stuff the cavity of the chicken with the lemon, apple, half of the onion quarters and a spring of thyme. Note: Choose whatever vegetables are in season or taste great roasted, to your liking.

Take the softened butter and mix with garlic, thyme, salt, pepper and paprika. Mix well. With your fingers, separate the skin from the meat of the chicken without tearing the skin off.  Gently, rub the butter mixture underneath the skin of the breasts. Once done thoroughly spreading the butter under the skin, season the outside of the chicken with salt and pepper.

Tuck the chicken thighs and wings closer to the breast / body (make it compact) so it cooks evenly.

In a baking pan, place the chicken in the center and surround the chicken with the remaining chopped onion, potatoes and sweet potatoes.

Bake for approximately 1.5 hours or until the juices have run dry and the chicken is golden brown.

Let the chicken sit for about 15 minutes, then carve and serve. Stay warm and enjoy!
Yum