Roast Chicken Recipes

As I have blogged before, I'm a big fan of chicken and more specifically roast chicken. Nothing beats the smell of a crisped, browned, juicy chicken coming out of the oven. So recently I found a few new recipes that I wanted to try out and here are the results.

The first chicken I made was the Barefoot Contessa's Lemon and Garlic Roast Chicken. The only thing I did different compared to the recipe was I rubbed Hawaiian sea salt and black pepper underneath the skin. All you do is loosen the skin from the body and then rub in the salt and pepper. I feel the chicken comes out juicier and more flavorful.

The chicken, stuffed full of a few halved heads of garlic, fresh thyme, halved lemons, salt, and pepper. The obvious draw to this recipe is the fat layer of bacon that coats the chicken throughout most of the cooking process. Also I was happy because I was able to utilize our All-Clad baking dish which was on our registry specifically for meals like this.

The golden, brown finished product, which came out juicy with a great garlicky, lemon taste from the heads of garlic and lemon that were baked with it. However I made an amateur mistake and only took the internal temperature from the thigh and not from the breast, so unfortunately I pulled it out of the oven too early and it wasn't cooked all the way through. We ended up eating the dark meat and some of the white meat and I used the rest of the chicken for what turned out to be a great chicken noodle soup.


Greyson my guinea pig.

Meal #2 was the Chicken with Roasted Grapes and Shallots. I found this recipe in Bon Appetit. I made this meal for Emi and my parents at their house.

I included dark purple grapes, red grapes, and green grapes in this recipe. After the grapes bake they give you a very unique flavor. They retain their sweetness, but also gain the flavors from the chicken, seasonings, and shallots.

The finished product, chopped up, and ready to be served.

My Mom provided the salad and soup, and we provided the wine and chicken and the after dinner clean up.

Emi also tried out her new ice cream maker (gifted by one of our very generous friends) and made a simple vanilla ice cream.

The ice cream went perfectly with my Mom's homemade pumpkin pie which was a great way to end our feast.

Of the two recipes, I think the Lemon and Garlic Roast Chicken was the best. However the 2nd dish was super easy to make, so if you have the time go for the first one and if you don't have as much time the 2nd one is the way to go.

- Kyle