Got it through my farm share last summer. I’ve thawed it out, and am ready to do . . . something with it. I’m cooking for just myself these days, so things that are easily put into portions and freezable are a plus. The only thing I’ve ever really done with chicken is cook breasts on the grill, or on the pan. I’ve never had a whole bird before.
I suppose I can just put it in the oven (with requisite herbs, etc) and cook it like Thanksgiving turkey? Are there any other good ways to use a whole bird?
Or just dust it with a little salt and/or garlic powder and roast it. Eat what you want, and make sandwiches from the rest. When you’re tired of regular sandwiches, make chicken salad.
Roasting is the way to go, IMO! Here’s the recipe I use. The only tricky part is trussing the bird, and really anything you can do to get it all held together oughta work; the trussing is kind of fun once you figure out how to do it and not really any harder than tying a shoe.
It’ll cook better in the oven if you have a roasting stand. That way you can stand the chicken up while it cooks and the grease will drain out rather than pool up inside the bird. (You should, of course, put a pan underneath the chicken to catch this grease.) Some people use a beer or soda can as a makeshift stand.
Rinse it off and throw it in a big pot of chicken broth/water with some vegetables. Bring to a boil then simmer for a hour. Easy chicken soup that will last for weeks.
Once you get the hang of that you can start cutting the raw chicken first then baking the chicken breast while using the rest to make the soup. Then try experimenting with different vegetables to see what you like. You can also use the leftover chicken broth to make rice or noodles. Very easy.
My favourite variation is to use a whole pineapple as a stand. Chop the leafy top off and trim away enough of the sides so that it fits in the chicken (leaving the bottom 2 inches or so alone as a base). It results in a wonderful moist chicken with a hint of pineapple and you can use the pineapple trimmings to make a pineapple salsa to go with it.
Whole chicken is super easy. It’s one of my go-to meals when I don’t feel like cooking.
I do pretty much what Left Hand of Dorkness said. There’s no reason to put it on a rack or a roasting stand or anything like that; those drippings are delicious, you don’t need to get the bird out of them. If you’re feeling really fancy, you can make a sauce out of them, but most of the time I just eat the bird as is.
I do like to cook it in a cast iron pan. I put the pan in the oven while the oven heats up, then put the chicken breast-side-up in the pan. The idea is that the heat radiating from the cast iron will cook the thighs slightly faster than the breast cooks, which is good because the thighs need to be done a little more. But if you don’t have a cast iron, no biggy.
Do this with the carcass after you roasted and had your fill of the meat. Pull all the remaining meat off, throw the bones in water with veggies, herbs etc to flavor it. Strain it, skim the fat off the top, maybe finish with some lemon, add back the meat, maybe some cooked noodles, and you have a super soup made up of cheap vegetables, noodles, and a carcass you were going to throw away.
This is amazing. I love chicken roasted this way and I usually mix it up with 1 lemon and one lime both quartered. When I’m feeling fancy I rub them over the skin before salting. It’s a mild flavour boost but a delicious one.
Thanks for the suggestions . . . well, mainly the one, to just roast it.
I was expecting to be underwhelmed based on the grocery store roasted chickens I’ve had before, but this was SO GOOD!
Took the chicken, rubbed it with salt, stuffed a half an apple, half an onion, and some thyme sprigs inside, put it in a cast iron pan in the oven for an hour, and that’s it. I made a little gravy with the drippings, and just had the best chicken I’ve ever eaten in my life!
I know, isn’t that simple high heat roast chicken recipe just the best? I use the version that doesn’t stuff the inside, but it’s incredible how something so simple works so well, and yields such a moist product with a crispy, succulent skin (my favorite part!) I used to get fussy with slow(er) cooked birds, stuffing compound butter between the skin, or continually basting and fussing, and there’s no need. This chicken beats them all, for my tastes in roast chicken.
In my experience the onion inside the chicken really makes the difference as is gives a fine flavoring to the meat. For future chickens, you might want to experiment with other kinds of allium - leeks, shallots and especially garlic.
Besides the thyme, marjoram is IMO also an excellent herb to put inside a chicken. A free-range bird simply salted, black-peppered and stuffed with wild garlic, a few rosemary twigs and some crushed juniper berries can also be delicious.
