Several weeks ago, I read that there might be a shortage of chickens coming down the pike. So I decided to be proactive and order a “couple” whole chickens, some boneless skinless breasts, and some boneless skinless thighs from a local custom meat packer. Great, no problem. I ordered, Mr. C. picked up the order, and we tucked our newly purchased provisions safely into our freezer. Feeling terribly smug for being so on top of things, I conveniently forgot about the whole chickens until the day before yesterday. (I hardly ever bake a whole chicken, so I don’t usually buy whole chickens. But for some unknown reason, I must have felt that in so doing so, I was being especially well organized pre-planning for every eventuality.) And I was right! However, the eventuality turned out to be that I would completely forget about these whole birds until my memory was jogged by looking at a piece of paper.

You see, Mr. C., being the well-organized person that he is, actually keeps a list of the contents of our freezer. And there on the list under the heading “Chicken” appeared the words Whole Chickens – 4. Four?!?! What in the heck had I been thinking when I placed my order? A mini Armageddon was imminent? Chickens everywhere would be escaping their confines and running amuck in the suburbs? What?? I could understand me ordering 1 whole chicken. Maybe even two. But four? Crazy! Anyway, I decided after checking the list that perhaps I’d better get on the stick and actually use one of the chickens I had so zealously ordered. So that’s just what I did.

Now I am a great fan of brining or salt (dry) brining whole turkeys. And I had read that brining chickens also insured succulent meat. So off I went to research recipes. And this brining recipe that I found on the dinneratthezoo.com site is absolutely perfect. The chicken skin browned beautifully and was super delicious, and the meat was tender, juicy, and flavorful. Everything anyone could ask for in a baked chicken. (Tonight some of the chicken breast meat is going to be featured in a chicken Caesar salad. Yum. I can hardly wait!)

So next time you want to bake a whole chicken, give this recipe a try. It does require that you start the process the day before you plan to eat the bird. But it’s worth the effort. And because we enjoyed the chicken so much last evening, I am truly glad I have 3 more whole birdies in my freezer. So maybe I wasn’t so crazy after all. Only time will tell.

So as always, stay safe, stay sane, and make a difference. I leave you with this quote from Maya Angelou:

“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.

There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

Prejudice is a burden that confuses the past, threatens the future and renders the present inaccessible.

My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style.

I know why the caged bird sings.

Nothing will work unless you do.

Love recognizes no barriers. It jumps hurdles, leaps fences, penetrates walls to arrive at its destination full of hope.

You can’t use up creativity. The more you use, the more you have.

You may write me down in history with your bitter, twisted lines. You may trod me in the very dirt, but still, like dust, I’ll rise.”

Brining the Chicken:

8 c. water

½ c. kosher salt (do not use table salt)

¼ c. honey

3 dried bay leaves

5 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped   

1 T. whole black or multi-colored peppercorns

3 sprigs fresh rosemary or 2 tsp. dried rosemary

1 tsp. fresh thyme leaves or ½ tsp. dried thyme leaves

1 T. chopped fresh parsley or 1 tsp. dried

2 lemons sliced

3-4 lb. whole chicken (as much fat removed as possible)

Place the water, salt, honey, bay leaves, garlic, peppercorns, rosemary, thyme, parsley, and lemon slices in a large nonreactive pot. Bring to a simmer over medium heat. Simmer for 3-4 minutes or until the salt has completely dissolved. Remove from heat and cool completely.

Add the chicken to the cooled brine. Make sure the chicken is completely submerged. Cover the pot and refrigerate for 8-24 hours.

Baking the Chicken:

2 T. unsalted butter, melted

freshly ground black pepper

Four hours before roasting, remove the chicken from the brine and rinse with cool water; pat dry with paper towels inside and out. Place the brined bird on a small rimmed baking sheet and return to the refrigerator to air-dry, uncovered, for about 3 hours. Remove from refrigerator and let stand at room temperature for 30 minutes. Pre-heat oven to 425 degrees at this time.

Slather the chicken with the melted butter and generously season inside and out with pepper. Place the chicken on a rack set inside a low sided roasting pan. Tie the legs together with kitchen twine.  Roast on the middle rack for about 70-80 minutes, or until an instant-read thermometer inserted into the thigh meat (away from the bone) registers 170 degrees. Note: After about 30 minutes, check to see if the skin is getting too brown. If so, loosely cover with aluminum foil.

When the chicken is done, remove from oven and let chicken sit, loosely tented with aluminum foil, for at least 15 minutes before carving.

  

This recipe from the famous Silver Palate cookbook, reduced by me to feed 4 rather than 6-8 at table, is absolutely delicious. It beautifully combines the brininess of olives and capers, with the sweetness of dried prunes and brown sugar. I know! Say what?

But you just have to trust me when I tell you that this combination of flavors is amazing. And the great thing about this dish is that it is stinkin’ easy to build. You marinate the chicken one day, and bake it off the next. The chicken is succulent and the sauce is fresh tasting and unique and positively divine served over mashed potatoes.  

I loved this snippet from an article published on May 6, 2007 by Christine Muhlke in The New York Times, so I thought I would share it with you.

“If there’s such a thing as boomer cuisine, it can be found in the pages of “The Silver Palate Cookbook.” With its chirpy tone and “Moosewood”-in-the-city illustrations, the book, published in time for Mother’s Day in 1982, gave millions of home cooks who hadn’t mastered the art of French cooking the courage to try sophisticated dishes like escabeche, wild mushroom soup and that new thing called pesto. Years later, mothers sent their grads into the world with their raspberry-vinaigrette-stained copies. And now, with the 25th-anniversary edition, a new generation will try dishes like chicken Marbella, which once seemed as risky (capers! prunes!) as the East Village.The Silver Palate was born of the women’s movement. The co-authors, Sheila Lukins and Julee Rosso, a caterer and an advertising executive respectively, realized that they couldn’t have it all and dinner too. (“There were school schedules, business appointments, political activities, art projects, sculpting classes … weekends in the country or at the beach. … It was much too much,” they later wrote.) If they couldn’t be wonder women, they figured, who could? So just days after the blackout of ’77, they filled the niche with a nook: the Silver Palate, an 11-by-14-foot shop on New York’s Columbus Avenue stocked with tarragon chicken salad, ratatouille, salmon mousse and brownies made from scratch. “The city was primed,” Lukins said recently over lunch in Manhattan. Indeed, that same year the gastro-temple Dean & DeLuca also opened. At the time, two women opening a business together was “wild,” Lukins said. So were blueberry chutney, pâté maison and poppy-seed dressing. “But people wanted to learn,” Rosso said. “They started to trust us. We began serving bisteeya, torta rustica — in those days, people hadn’t heard of them. As we discovered new things, like balsamic, we could teach them.” Their menus and newsletter, published to demystify the Silver Palate line of condiments, helped form the basis for the cookbook. The cheerful, chatty voice and the tips, menus and quotations that appear on almost every page were a way to make cooking cozy and fun, Rosso said, as well as to tell readers: “Don’t make a big deal with the food. Get some balloons up in the air and have a picnic!” Now in their early 60s, they are an unlikely pair, Rosso with her highlights and diamonds and Midwestern cheer that sometimes culminates in a “whoop-ee-doo!”; Lukins with her no-nonsense hair and red Bakelite jewelry, a brow arching over her reading glasses as she uses the title “Marat/Sade” to describe a square bathtub. After they sold the Silver Palate in 1988, Rosso returned to her native Michigan to buy and run the Wickwood Inn in Saugatuck with her husband and published two cookbooks; Lukins has written three cookbooks and has been food editor of Parade magazine since 1986, a job she and Rosso took over from Julia Child. The two had a public falling out in 1991, when Lukins objected to something Rosso, who had started a newsletter, wrote about her. Today they have the alternately fond and strained patter of a divorced couple at their child’s wedding.”

Well, I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much I did. Food preparation has come a long way over the decades thanks to women like Lukins and Rosso. It has also suffered setbacks. I think home cooking started to change when women began to have careers outside the home and convenience foods came into fashion. And it certainly didn’t help when home economics (defined as cooking and sewing) was eliminated from the curriculum in many school districts. Some thought cooking and sewing skills could and probably should simply be learned at home. (Well they sure as shootin’ didn’t know my mother! She couldn’t sew on a button, and her cooking skills were rudimentary. And that’s putting it nicely!)

So where does that leave us today? Well, since you are reading this post you obviously are interested in this recipe. And must love to cook. And hurray for that.

So to all of you, who like me, are passionate about providing ourselves and our families with healthy, nutritious, and delicious food, keep doing what you’re doing. You are making a difference in your families’ health and well-being. Virtual hugs from Chez Carr. (Oh, and try this recipe. It’s da bomb!)  

• freshly ground black pepper
• 4 boneless, skinless chicken thighs

• 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut in half   

• ¼ c. light brown sugar
• ¼ c. dry white wine
• 1 T. finely chopped fresh Italian parsley

OK, if anyone out there is a WordPress expert and knows how to make a list, without those annoying spaces (like between kosher salt and pepper), could you please show me the way. I need help. Thank you!

Combine the olive oil, vinegar, prunes, olives, capers and juice, bay leaves, garlic, oregano, salt, and pepper in a 9×13-inch Pyrex dish or shallow casserole. Add the chicken and stir to coat. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

About 30 minutes before you plan to bake the chicken, pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees.

Turn the chicken over and make sure it is in a single layer in your baking pan. Sprinkle the chicken pieces with the brown sugar and pour the white wine around them.  

Bake, basting frequently with the pan juices, until the thigh pieces yield clear yellow (rather than pink) juice when pricked with a fork, 35-40 minutes. The internal temperature should be at least 165 degrees.

With a slotted spoon, transfer the chicken, prunes, olives, and capers to a serving platter. Moisten with a few spoons of the pan juices and sprinkle with the parsley. Pass the remaining pan juices in a sauceboat.

Chicken is great with creamy mashed potatoes and a green salad or veggie. 

 

  

I wanted comfort food last evening. Even though we here at Chez Carr are among the lucky ones, it is still very difficult to realize that our lives have dramatically changed, probably never to return to “normal”. (Normal is now a moving target.) For many retired adults like ourselves, who felt that we were reaping the rewards of hard work, sacrifices made for our kids, monetarily supporting our community, and leading as benevolent lives as possible, we too are having the rug pulled out from under us. Now don’t get me wrong. I am not asking you to feel sorry for me. I’m doing a good enough job of this by myself thank you very much. No, I just wanted you to know that this crisis has affected everyone. There isn’t a rational and informed person alive whom I’m sure hasn’t realized that the economic impact of this pandemic has shattered many people’s dreams. And to all of you for whom shattered dreams is a reality, I offer my heartfelt sympathy. And for those of you who have lost loved ones, I can’t even begin to express how sorry I am for your loss. Now, what can you and I do about making life for ourselves and those around us better.

Well I guess the first step is to realize we are not alone. We are not the only ones hurting. And then – well get our butts in gear and do something to make our own life, and that of our families a little better. And of course you know where this is leading. Cook something yummy. And although I almost always advocate eating healthy, I have to admit that for dessert the other evening we had Cheetos. And if Cheetos aren’t dictionary perfect comfort food “food that provides consolation or a feeling of well-being, typically any with a high sugar or other carbohydrate content and associated with childhood or home cooking”, I need to go back to first grade!

So if you too would welcome a nice old helping of comfort, this chicken recipe is the one for you. It’s simple to prepare. And very, very tasty. And I must confess that after having a big old helping of this chicken, mashed potatoes, and a healthy cucumber and tomato salad, I felt a lot better about life in general. (I believe chicken gravy actually coaxes our body into making more endorphins. Not scientific fact, but it sure works for me!)

As always – stay positive, stay busy, and keep cooking. If nothing else, working in the kitchen takes your mind off the world for a little while. Who can worry about this crisis when they are trying to sauté veggies, bake bread, set the table, answer the phone, not step on your pets delicate paws, and keep kids entertained at the same time? Peace and love to all.

½ c. buttermilk

2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 3 pieces each

½ c. + 3 T. unbleached all-purpose flour, divided

1 tsp. paprika

½ tsp. kosher salt

freshly ground black pepper

1 tsp. poultry seasoning

½ tsp. onion powder

½ tsp. granulated garlic

¼ tsp. dried thyme leaves

tiny pinch cayenne pepper, opt.

2 T. butter

1 T. veggie oil

2 c. chicken broth

1 c. whole milk

Pour the buttermilk into a bowl. Add the chicken pieces. Stir until all of the chicken is coated with the buttermilk. Cover the bowl and place in your refrigerator for at least an hour.

Meanwhile, whisk the ½ c. flour, paprika, salt, pepper, poultry seasoning, onion powder, granulated garlic, thyme, and cayenne together in a shallow container. (I use an 8-inch round cake pan.)

After the chicken has been luxuriating for an hour or so in the fridge, dredge each piece in the flour mixture. Heat the butter and oil in a shallow, oven proof, covered fry pan. (I use my Le Creuset braiser. It’s really just a shallow Dutch oven, and it’s perfect for this type of recipe.)

When the butter and oil are hot, add the chicken pieces. Fry over medium heat until golden brown. (They do not have to be done. They will finish cooking in the oven.) Remove from pan and set aside.

Whisk the chicken broth, milk, and remaining 3 tablespoons of flour together in a small bowl. Add to the fry pan, and stir until all the brown bits have been lifted off the bottom of the pan and the gravy is starting to thicken. If it seems too thick, add a bit more milk.  Add the chicken back to the pan, cover, and bake in a pre-heated 350 degree oven for about 45 minutes. Remove the lid and bake for another 10 minutes, or until the chicken is fork tender.

Remove from oven and serve with mashed potatoes, steamed rice, cooked quinoa, or whatever your big old heart desires.   

  

I made this dish for dinner last evening. It was sensational. Easy to prepare and definitely guest quality. Of course because of the coronavirus we are currently unable to have guests over for dinner. But as soon as we can once again socialize without masks and be within 6 feet of each other, you can bet your last roll of toilet paper that I will be making this dish for friends. It is exactly that delicious.

I found the bones for this recipe on the Saving Room for Dessert site. Thank you Tricia for posting such a wonderful recipe. I changed things up a bit to reflect my own taste preferences, but also to accommodate what I had on hand. Like I said in a previous post, I’m really trying to avoid unnecessary trips to the grocery store.

So if you have all or at least most of the ingredients listed below in your home right now, I would say don’t hesitate. Make this dish ASAP. I served it with white rice. Not my first choice, but I had served a pasta dish the night before, and we had no white or gold potatoes available. We had a purple variety, but I didn’t think a purple potato mash would look very appealing alongside the chicken. And I always take presentation into consideration. Well that and it’s really easy to slam rice and water together in a rice cooker. And frankly I had already spent a bunch of time in the kitchen yesterday. I had started some sourdough bread and made an apple crisp for our dessert. And no, we don’t usually have dessert.

But these are desperate times. And as the expression attributed to Hippocrates goes – “desperate times call for desperate measures”. In his work Amorphisms he wrote: “For extreme diseases, extreme methods of cure, as to restriction, are most suitable.” Very applicable to what is happening right now throughout the world.  

So with Hippocrates’s very relevant words running freely through my consciousness, I’ve decided to adopt, at least for the present, (and with abject apologies to the dead Hippocrates) the following addendum: “And when restricted to one’s own domicile is mandated for the good of all, a daily end of dinner treat is to be encouraged.”

Stay healthy dear friends. Stay positive. And keep cooking.

2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts  

½ c. all-purpose flour

½ tsp. kosher salt

freshly ground black pepper

½ tsp. granulated garlic

8-oz. button mushrooms, cleaned and thickly sliced

4 T. (½ stick) unsalted butter, divided

1 T. extra virgin olive oil

2 garlic cloves, finely minced

¼ c. thinly sliced onion

1½ c. chicken broth

½ c. dry white wine

½ c. whole milk

½ tsp. fresh thyme leaves

½ tsp. finely chopped fresh rosemary

1 tsp. Dijon mustard

2 tsp. cornstarch dissolved in 2 tablespoons water or broth

1 T. chopped fresh parsley, opt.

(Sorry about all the space between the ingredients. I have yet to figure out how to create a list after the latest “upgrade”. Grrrrrr)

Pat the chicken breasts dry with paper towels. Cut each breast in half diagonally into 2 thinner cutlets. Then cut each piece in half. (Will have 8 pieces if you have done this step correctly.)

In a shallow container (I use an 8-inch cake pan) combine the flour, salt, pepper, and granulated garlic. Set aside.

Add 2 tablespoons of the butter and the olive oil to a large skillet. Heat over medium until the butter is melted. Dredge the chicken pieces in the flour mixture, coating both sides, shaking off the excess flour. Add the coated chicken to the skillet and cook until lightly browned, about 5 minutes. Turn and cook another 3-5 minutes. When the chicken is done, remove to a plate and cover to keep warm. Repeat until all chicken is browned.

Add remaining 2 tablespoons butter to the pan and heat until melted. Add the sliced mushrooms and cook until well browned. Add the onion to the pan and cook until softened. Add the minced garlic and sauté for 30 seconds or until fragrant.

Meanwhile whisk the chicken stock, wine, milk, thyme leaves, chopped fresh rosemary, and Dijon mustard together in a medium sized bowl. Add to the pan after the garlic has cooked for 30 seconds. Bring to a boil and cook for 5 minutes. Stir in the dissolved cornstarch. Bring the sauce back to a light simmer and add the cooked chicken. Heat and simmer for 5 minutes or until the sauce is thickened and the chicken warmed through. Taste and adjust seasoning. Garnish with parsley and serve with rice, potatoes, or noodles.