Temporary? Insanity

I am boring in many ways, but I am never so dull as when I am in the kitchen. I have a standard handful of meals I prepare and that’s it. I rarely do anything that takes more than fifteen minutes prep work and making a full meal from scratch is the closest I get to exotic.

Food has never been all that important to me, is the thing. I grew up as a picky eater. When I was at university I lived on a steady diet of grilled cheese sandwiches and french fries, minute maid orange juice, and vending machine fodder. I think the orange juice is the only reason I didn’t die from scurvy. It’s amazing how the human body can adapt though, isn’t it?

I married a man for whom food is love. Not only did he grow up with a grandma who lived to feed her loved ones, but he also served a two year mission for our church in France. The man loves food. And, knowing me to be a picky culinary novice, nothing touches his heart more than when I make more of an effort in the kitchen.

I swear he got teary eyed when I cooked my first roast chicken a few weeks ago. And, it was so tasty that he hummed while he ate it. High, high praise, my friends. Now, either the recipe truly is scrumptious, or the poor man is just so deprived that anything slightly different from the norm is a delight to him. Either way, I’m sharing the recipe here. And, for Neil’s sake, I hope to be more adventurous and have many more to share in future.

Roast Chicken with Lemon and Rosemary Potatoes
from www.jamieoliver.com

Serves 4

Rub the chicken inside and out with a generous amount of salt and freshly ground black pepper. Do this in the morning if possible, then cover the chicken and leave in the fridge until you’re ready to start cooking it for lunch or dinner. By doing this, you’ll make the meat really tasty when cooked. Preheat your oven to 190ºC/375ºF/gas 5. Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil. Cut the potatoes into golf-ball-sized pieces, put them into the water with the whole lemon and the garlic cloves, and cook for 12 minutes {Kim Note: Or just boil the lemon and garlic on their own if you don’t want to make potatoes}. Drain and allow to steam dry for 1 minute (this will give you crispier potatoes), then remove the lemon and garlic. Toss the potatoes in the pan while still hot so their outsides get chuffed up and fluffy – this will make them lovely and crispy when they roast.

While the lemon is still hot, carefully stab it about 10 times. Take the chicken out of the fridge, pat it with kitchen paper and rub it all over with olive oil. Push the garlic cloves, the whole lemon and the thyme into the cavity, then put the chicken into a roasting tray and cook in the preheated oven for around 45 minutes. Remove the chicken to a plate. Some lovely fat should have cooked out of it into the roasting tray, so toss the potatoes into this with the rosemary leaves. Shake the tray around, then make a gap in the centre of the potatoes and put the chicken back in. If using the bacon, lay the rashers over the chicken breast and cook for a further 45 minutes, or until the chicken is cooked and the potatoes are nice and golden. (You can tell the chicken is cooked when the thigh meat pulls easily away from the bone and the juices run clear.)

I like to remove the bacon from the chicken and crumble it up over the potatoes. Then I remove the lemon and garlic from inside the chicken, squeeze all the garlic flesh out of the skin, mush it up and smear it all over the chicken, discard the lemon and rosemary and carve the chicken at the table. Heaven!

Next time, I’m trying it with bacon. Yum!