Winner Winner Chicken Dinner Part 2: Lou's Roast Chicken Dinner

So K had a craving for a roast chicken dinner the other day and it was a Sunday so I acquiesced.  Who am I kidding here, there was no protest at all and I fully went into top gear to get one of my favorite meals together.

Roast chicken is a universal comfort food and ubiquitous in many family's kitchens.  But too many times, without proper love and care, the chicken turns out overcooked, dry and just unpleasant.  I've honed my roast chicken recipes for a few years now and have a pretty good version to call my own. It starts with grain fed, all natural, hormone free chicken.  I always brine my chicken the night before to ensure it stays moist through the roasting process and helps penetrate additional flavors deep into the meat.  I will let the chicken air dry in the refrigerator for a couple of hours to help dry out the skin and ensure a nice crisp.  Next be sure to truss your bird. It keeps everything tight while roasting and ensures a nice even cooking bird.  I baste it with butter to add flavor and help with browning/crisping the skin.  Lastly, I coat the chicken with my own spice rub to add another layer of flavor to that lovely skin.  I know many people are trying to eat healthy and would do all that they can to avoid the fatty skin blah blah blah. I get it, but the skin is what makes roast chicken, thus the extra care to make it special.  Lastly, the secret sauce is the pan gravy.  This is the essence of the chicken flowing down into your roast pan, sizzling and browning with little bits of the rub and chicken caramelizing. It would be a travesty to have all that go to waste.

For this chicken dinner, I serve a variety of sides with it, but for this Sunday's dinner, we had roasted root vegetables.

This recipe takes some time and TLC.  You can skip the brine and the air drying but why go with my recipe if you don't follow the key steps?  Make this on the weekend and ensure you have time to go through the process. I promise it's fantastic.

Lou's Roasted Chicken with Pan Gravy

1 grain fed, free range, hormone free chicken (about 3-4 lbs)
Lou's roast chicken spice rub (recipe below)
5 liter chicken brine (recipe below)
2 sprigs rosemary
2 sprigs of thyme
1 lemon cut in half
2 cups of chicken stock
2 tablespoons of flour
1/2 cup of melted butter

Put chicken in brine and let it brine overnight (at least 8 hours)
Remove the chicken from the brine, pat dry and put the chicken in the refrigerator with no covering and let it air dry for at least 2 hours
Preheat oven to 450 degrees
Take chicken out of the fridge and let it sit for 20 minutes to get the chill out of it before roasting
Stuff the cavity of the chicken with the thyme, rosemary, and lemon
Truss the bird (here's a how to if you need help)
Baste the entire bird with butter
Rub the spice rub all through the bird
Put the chicken on a wire rack in a roasting pan that's stove top safe - breast side up
Put the chicken in the oven, roast at 450 degrees for 20 minutes
Lower the heat to 350 and roast for another 1:10 to 1:30 minutes, depending on size of the bird, basting the chicken with pan juices every 20 minutes
Chicken is done when juices run clear and hits an internal temperature of 165 degrees - careful not to overcook the chicken
Take the chicken out of the oven and keep it warm.

To make the pan gravy, remove wire rack, put the roasting pan on your stove top and turn it to medium high heat.
Discard some of the fat leaving about 3 tablespoons.
Add flour to the hot pan and stir it in with the fat, scraping up the brown bits.
Let this cook to a nut brown color but careful not to let it burn.
Add your chicken stock and whisk it till you get a smooth gravy, add more stock if necessary to get the right consistency.
Season with salt and pepper as needed.

Lou's Roast Chicken Rub
1 sprig of thyme de-stemmed and finely chopped
1 sprig of rosemary finely chopped
1 teaspoon of fennel seeds
1 teaspoon of coriander seeds
1 teaspoon of black peppercorns
1 teaspoon of celery seeds
1 tablespoon of salt

Put all the ingredients into a pestle and mortar and grind it down to a fine rub herb rub.  You can save any extra in air tight container for a week or two and use it for other meats.

Chicken Brine

5 liters of water
1 1/2 cups of kosher salt
1/2 cup of brown sugar
2 sprigs of thyme
2 sprigs of rosemary
1 lemon
6 cloves of garlic, smashed flat with a knife
1 tablespoon of black peppercorns
2-3 bay leaves

Bring 1 liter of water up to a boil.
Add the rest of the ingredients and take the pot off the heat
Stir till sugar and salt is fully dissolved
Add 4 liters of ice cold water to the mixture
Ensure the brine is cool before you put the bird in for brining

Roasted Root Vegetables
1 parsnip
1 yukon gold potato
1 carrot
1 onion
1 sweet potato
1 head of garlic, peeled and cloves left whole
1 sprig of thyme de-stemmed
olive oil
salt and pepper

Chop all the vegetables into even 1 inch cubes, except for garlic left whole
Toss vegetables in olive oil with salt and pepper
Preheat roasting pan in 350 degree oven for 10 minutes to get pan nice and hot (this helps with caramelizing the veggies)
Add the veggies into pan and roast for 35-40 minutes

What we ate for dinner: pollo alla cacciatora

 I love pollo alla cacciatora, aka, the chicken cacciatore.  This hearty italian dish literally means chicken in the hunter's style.  This should tell you that it is meant to be a nice rustic rendition of chicken stew.  I used to prefer a more bastardized version of it where I made this primarily with onions, peppers and tomatoes.  But as I matured, my taste buds also matured and I started refining this dish to where it's a lot closer to its traditional origins.  I love this dish because firstly, I love slow braised meats in whatever form or flavor. Secondly, I love doing easy one pot dishes which makes life easier, prep quicker and leftovers tastier.  I have started to incorporate beans into this dish to make this a true 1 pot dish.  But if you like, you can skip the beans and serve this dish with pasta or some warm crusty bread.  If you are like me, trying to cut down on carbs, beans are the way to go.  I also like using the whole chicken, its more economical, more natural and I like having a variety in different cuts of the chicken. If you want to go all legs or breasts, feel free to do so.

Lou's Pollo alla Cacciatora 
1 whole chicken (3-4 lb bird) cut into 10 pieces (legs, drumsticks, wings, breasts cut in half)
flour for dusting
1 red pepper - sliced thickly
1 medium onion - sliced thickly
1/2 cup of black olives (i prefer the sun dried Moroccan style ones, but you can use whatever you like)

mise en place

3 anchovy fillets
1 thick slice (size of pinky finger) of pancetta (about 100g) diced up
6 cloves of garlic crushed
2 sprigs of rosemary
3-4 bay leaves
1 can of premium tomatoes (crushed by hand)
2 cups of nice red wine (italian preferred - i.e. chianti)
2 cups of dried white cannellini (white kidney) beans - soaked overnight
1 cup water
Salt and pepper


1.Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Season chicken pieces with salt and pepper, and dust with flour.
3. Heat heavy oven proof pan with oil to medium high heat (I use my large Le Crueset casserole pan, any large dutch oven will do)
4. Working in batches, brown the chicken pieces on both sides, flipping only once (2-3 minutes each side)
5. Set chicken aside when done
6. Lower heat to medium, add pancetta and brown for a couple of minutes
7. Add garlic, anchovy, olives, onion and peppers and let these carmelize together (about 4-5 minutes)
8. De-glaze with red wine and let it reduce in half
9. Add can of tomatoes you have hand crushed already, 1 cup of water, rosemary, bay leaves, and beans
10. Cover and bring to a simmer
11. Put the pot into the oven and let it braise for 1.5 hours
12. Remove from oven, let rest for 10 minutes and serve.

Enjoy!

Memories and Homemade Wontons

Some of my earliest and fondest food memories came from watching and helping my mom make wontons.  It was more than the food experience or the delicious shrimp and pork dumplings.  It was a family ritual and wrapping wontons with my mom was something my siblings and I loved doing. We would get really excited when we found out that mom was planning a wonton session.  I'm hoping in a few years when Baby A is old enough, she and I will share the same experiences.  In the meantime, I have to practice lots so that I'm well prepared to share my recipe with Baby A.  Since my wife K is allergic to shrimp, I made 2 batches of wontons here.  I have a ground pork and enoki mushroom wonton and a more traditional shrimp with pork wonton.  For the soup base I've deviated from the traditional stock of shrimp shells, pork bones and dai dei fish (dried flounder).  I went with chicken bones, celery, onion, and dai dei fish.  I've provide the recipes for the filling and the stock here.  You can buy wonton wrappers from most supermarkets.  To wrap, there are different methods, but the easiest to do is to put the wrapper in the middle of your hand, fill the middle with a little filling, wet the the sides of the wrapper and fold together and squeeze the skins together to make a little pouch with the filling in the middle.

I like these wontons in the soup on its own with a little scallion and cilantro.  I also like serving these with noodles in the soup to make it a hearty lunch.  Cook the wontons and noodles separately in a boiling pot of water, drain and then pour hot soup over the wontons and noodles.

Pork and Enoki Mushroom Wontons
1 lb of pork shoulder
1 teaspoon of corn starch
1 teaspoon of Chinese cooking wine
1 teaspoon of light soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon of salt
large pinch of pepper (preferably white)
1/2 teaspoon of sugar
drizzle of sesame oil
1 small egg
1 small package of enoki mushrooms coarsely chopped

Hand chop the 1 lb of pork shoulder until its a coarse ground.  You want it almost like ground meat but some little pieces that will give it some bite.  Mix in the rest of the ingredients together and its ready to fill.

Shrimp and Pork Mushroom Wontons
1/2 lb of pork shoulder
1 lb of medium sized shrimps peeled
1 teaspoon of corn starch
1 teaspoon of Chinese cooking wine
1 teaspoon of light soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon of salt
large pinch of pepper (preferably white)

1/2 teaspoon of sugar
drizzle of sesame oil
1 small egg


 Hand chop the 1/2 lb of pork shoulder until its a coarse ground.  Chop the peel shrimp coarsely.  You want it small enough to fit into the small wrappers but still a decent size you to give you a bit of bite.  The shrimps should be cut to about the size of the tip of your pinky.  Mix in the rest of the ingredients together and its ready to fill.

Too cook wontons, bring a pot of salted water to boil.  Put wontons into boiling water, careful  not to overfill or crowd the pot.  Work in batches if necessary.  Once the wontons float, they are ready.  

Wonton Soup Stock
Chicken bone/carcasses from 2 chickens
1 piece of dai dei fish (dried flounder) - found in Chinese herb aisle of most Chinese food markets
2 stalks of celery chopped
1 medium onion chopped
Light soy sauce
Salt and pepper
Sesame oil

Put the chicken bones into a pot of cold water. 
Bring the pot of water with chicken up to a boil. 
Discard the water and rinse the chicken in cold water.
Put the cooked chicken bones, dai dei fish, onions and celery into a pot with 5 litres of water.
Bring to a boil and turn down the heat immediately to medium-low and let the stock simmer for 1.5 hours.
Strain the soup stock and discard the bones and veggies.
Season the soup stock with salt and pepper, soy sauce and sesame oil.