Fully cooked chiecken, opened up and checked for completeness.
The Whole Chicken!
If you have the time, an hour and a half can give you the basis for several meals throughout the week. I usually get 8 servings from a whole chicken dish. Two from each breast, one from each leg/thigh, and another from the two wings, and another from what is left on the body.
My technique is very simple:
- Chop a potato and onion (sweet-potato or regular potato)
- Chop a carrot or other vegetable (adding mid-way)
- Remove the stuff inside the chicken (neck and giblets and things).
- Open the chicken into a pot to make the sauce from the uices (orange-peel sauce in this case)
- Spice the outside of the chicken, decorate with some oil.
- Cook on it's back at 400°F for 20 minutes (or until browning).
- Flip over, Cook breast-up at 350°F for 45 minutes (or until browning). Add secondary vegetable at this time such as carrots.
I don't do the fancy rub stuff under the skin, or basting, or brining. It just goes in and comes out delicious, with the expectation that I add flavours in other parts of the dish, in exchange for less prep-time. I use the juices from the chicken to make a sauce on the side and use the chicken in recipies throughout the week.
Fully cooked chiecken, opened up and checked for completeness.
Starting ingredients.
Flipping the chicken part-way through cooking.
The orange-peel suace, made from the chicken juices when it was opened.