Roast Chicken

Preface: This is a long ass post (even for me) but should give you everything you ever needed to know about roasting chickens, the myriad ways to prepare and flavor them, and how to make a good stock out of them. The details are probably excessive, but if you’re bored at work or seriously want some in-depth knowledge of poultry preparation, read on, brave soul. If you find the big blocks of info mind numbing, there are summaries at the end of each section of my personal preferences. Read at your leisure.



Okay, so apparently my last post was popular enough that you guys want a recipe. I'm not really much of a recipe person only because I don't deal in precise measurements (not because I'm that awesome, more because I'm that haphazard). So I'm going to give a few basic guidelines to the utter romance that is a perfectly roasted chicken. You're going to have to feel your way through it from there. After you roast 3-4 chickens, you'll be a pro, turning out perfect chickens every time. If I've inspired you to try some fanciful cooking and stock-making at home, I want to make sure you are at least presented with all the options and know how to do them right.



When Alexander Lobrano interviewed hundreds of French chefs in his epic tour-de-force of Parisian restaurants, he asked each of them what ten dishes most defined French cuisine. Nestled at the top with beef bourguignon and bouillabaisse, was roast chicken. A true French family meal that has enjoyed popularity in the humblest of peasant homes, to the most elegant of royal courts, whole roast chicken is spectacular. But like any "national" dish there are endless interpretations of it, and countless methods of preparation. Some people will defend their recipes to the death, not unlike American barbecued ribs. But there are definitely some reliable techniques that you can use to customize chicken to your liking. Let's start with types of chickens.



Cluck Cluck



People need to respect chickens. Too long have diners consumed poorly raised chickens; mass produced, mass slaughtered and processed. Not only do these chickens suffer poor living conditions, the quality of their meat suffers as well. This can be thinly veiled by a thick, fried flour crust, but once you've had a good chicken I think you'll reconsider.

There are something like 3 chickens for each person in America. Most of these are of the aforementioned prisoner type. Now the overall happiness of a chicken throughout its lifetime might have questionable influence on its quality of taste. But free-range chickens are fed natural diets and get more exercise, so they will develop more flavor for these reasons. The emotional satisfaction of poultry aside, at least consider these more concrete reasons.



There are also heirloom birds that are raised by artisan farmers that have an extraordinary flavor. Such examples are the poulet-rouge chicken and the blue-footed chicken.



Fanciness aside, the most important things you need to consider are quality and size. I already sang the praises of organic, free-range chickens, now you'll want to get one in the "fryer" size category. Fryer chickens are anywhere between 1.5-4 lbs. (depending on market specifications) and are generally the perfect roasting birds with optimal skin-to-meat ratio. A 2.5-3.25 lb. bird will have beautifully crisp skin just as the meat is finished cooking. With poultry I don't think flash-freezing has the same quality as fresh, so I would go as fresh as possible with no obvious defects or bruises on the flesh.



My Suggestion/Preference: Buy a nice, free-range, organic chicken in the 2.5-3.25 lb range.



Early Preparation



These early steps might be a bit much for irregular home cooks, but I assure you they are worth it. You have your choice between brining and salting. I will discuss the merits of both.



Brining is essentially submerging meat in a salt solution. For a textbook definition I'll turn to Harold McGee's On Food and Cooking, which is the end-all be-all of molecular gastronomy and food science.



"Salt disrupts the structure of muscle filaments. A 3% salt solution (2 tbs per quart/30 g per liter) dissolves part of the protein structure that supports the contracting filaments, and a 5.5% solution (4 tbs per quart, 60 g per liter) party dissolves the filaments themselves. Second, interactions of salt and proteins result in greater water-holding capacity in the muscle cells, which then absorb water from the brine. (The inward movement of salt and water and disruptions of the muscle filaments into the meat also increase its absorption of aromatic molecules from any herbs and spices in the brine.) The meat's weight increases by 10% or more. When cooked the meat still loses around 20% of its weight in moisture, but this loss is counter balanced by the brine absorbed, so moisture loss is effectively cut in half. In addition, the dissolved protein filaments can't coagulate into normally dense aggregates, so the cooked meat seems more tender."



Whoo, that was a mouthful. For someone who stopped doing science at non-honors chemistry, my brain hurts but basically brining = juiciness. The only downsides will be that your chicken will be kind of waterlogged and the drippings will be quite salty. You will need to cut back on your seasoning a lot. But a brine is a wonderful thing. Figure a ratio of 20 parts water : 1 part salt and add as many flavorings as you like. Lemons, black peppercorns, herbs (rosemary, thyme), are all tried and true combinations. When it does come time to roast, make sure your chicken is very dry. You can brine for up to 2 days, you can let it dry in the fridge for one night, pat it dry with paper towels and then throw that bitch in the oven. You can't reuse a brine.



Salting is a dry method endorsed by Judy Rodgers of Zuni Cafe fame. I don't have much experience with salting chickens, but she suggests rubbing a chicken all over with salt up to 24 hours before roasting. Salt will have the similar effects of brining, but minus the water obviously. Essentially it will be a cure, drawing out some moisture but intensifying flavors (Judy Rodgers claims that after 24 hours, reverse-osmosis will occur and your chicken will reabsorb moisture). You can play around with both and pick out your preferences afterward, but I would definitely recommend doing one of these if you have the time.



My personal input? For a sublime roast chicken, a brine of 2 days with lemon/thyme/peppercorns/copious amounts of garlic, a night hanging dry in a refrigerator, and then sensually massaging dijon mustard into its loins for at least a few hours beforehand, and letting it come to hot and heavy room temperature. Oooh ... that'd be a dirty bird.



Ahem.



My Suggestion/Preference: Brine if you have the time (mua haha, nice rhymes) with citrus/garlic/pepper notes, let the chicken dry, add mustard. Seriously, I was so skeptical mustard was going to make a difference when we did it at Va Pensiero, but I found out it makes for a delicious, delicious chicken with no real overpowering mustard flavors.



Pregame Roasting Rituals



Choose your weapon. In this case, your weapon is a good pan. Disposable aluminum, weak tin pans, are no good. As we discussed in our last chapter of Panda Educational Blogging, you need something that is ovenproof and able to get some fond. I would use a 12-inch, stainless steel pan with vertical edges, also known as a sauteuse. If you have a roasting pan, all the better, but most people don't own such a luxury item in their kitchens. Something that fits the bird snugly will do, including a cast-iron skillet.

 (Presenting a bird on a cast-iron skillet also gives it a lovely rustic and peasant feel to it, don'tcha think?)

To truss or not to truss? Thomas Keller swears by it, Judy Rodgers thinks it's unnecessary. He thinks it makes the bird roast evenly and presents nicely, she thinks it's an archaic practice and she likes the way the bird gets a little toasty in the nether regions. Frankly, I don't think anyone keeps butcher's twine or wants to deal with the hassle of trussing at home so I say forgo it. But again, if you're looking to impress, the beautiful shape the bird roasts in leaves an impression. (Ruhlman claims that trussing reduces moisture loss, which I personally have no experience with. He also suggests if you don’t truss to stuff the chicken with onion, lemon and herbs to even out the heat distribution. If you’re curious enough, google how to truss a chicken and rope that baby up)



To preheat the pan or not to preheat? If you preheat the pan to the point where the bird sizzles on contact, then it won't stick as much and will brown a bit on the back. Some like the skin to stick a bit so you can add it as part of the deglazing process and create more flavor. I generally don't preheat the pan,. Again, experiment but know that either method is acceptable, no way to go wrong.



To lube or not to lube? No, I didn't regress in to a repressed sexual relationship with poultry ... again. We're talking about oil (bitch, you cookin?). Many health conscious folks would steer clear of butter and drizzle extra virgin olive oil all over the skin. Some say don't use any oil, there is enough fat in the skin to aid the browning process in itself. Well I think that any true student of French culinary technique would do it the way they did it. Lots ... o' .. butter. Unsalted, creamy sweet butter, massaged into the bird will do good things. You don't need a lot, just a bare tablespoon probably, brought to room temperature and schmeared on to the breast. And butter in itself is a holy vehicle of flavor. When it's room temperature you can mix it with herbs, shallots, spices, you name it, and all that milky-fat loveliness will find its way into your chicken.



So now you have your chicken prepared as you like it, do you give it some friends to go into the fire with? This is also optional. If you want roasted vegetables as a side dish to your chicken, go right ahead. If you add thick-cut onions, potatoes, whole garlic cloves and mushrooms they will roast alongside the chicken and absorb all the juices, giving you an immediate side dish. The garlic in fact should be completely caramelized by completion time and be sweet and spreadable on a nice hunk of peasant bread. Note that everything will kind of have a one-dimensional chicken flavor though, surprise surprise. But if you want to make a pan sauce, which is personally what I like to do, you can roast the bird alone and figure out the sides later.



My Suggestion/Preference: Snug, ovenproof, 12-inch skillet, rub with herbed butter (thyme, shallots), roast alone or with a few whole garlic gloves, and a sprig of thyme in the pan.



Guns Up, Let's Do This



You ready? You excited? It's game time, bitches. Time to do the dance! I know I've talked a lot about guys impressing girls with roast chickens, but I can't stress enough, if you have a girl coming to eat dinner with you (roast chicken is a perfect dinner for 2) tell her to be there in about 30 minutes because your kitchen is about to smell fucking ... awesome. All the single ladies, if you're trying to impress a dude with your domestic skills then that works also. I'm confident the aroma of roasting poultry will cut through any beer stained kitchen, and I quite literally lived in the king of beer stained kitchens (9:12!).



Dry your chicken. Dry it as much as possible with dry paper towels, especially if you brined it. The more excess water your chicken possesses the more it will steam as opposed to roast. Steaming is not what you want in this situation as it will deter the crisping of the skin.



Now if you brined your chicken, you don't need to add much salt. A very light sprinkle on top and a teaspoon rubbed in to the cavity. If you didn't brine or salt your chicken ahead of time (tsk, tsk) then don't be bashful with the salt. Get .. in .. there. You want to see an almost palpable crust of salt on top and a heavy dose of salt in the cavity. Pepper is always optional, but strongly suggested. Be careful though, as pepper burns. If you haven't rubbed down with dijon or whole-grain mustard yet (I recommend Roland's or Maille's), now is the time to get under the skin with it. You can also slip fresh herb leaves under the skin or thinly sliced cloves of garlic. And since I absolutely love garlic, I will be doing that. Tarragon in all its anise flavored glory is also an excellent choice.



Let your chicken come close to room temperature. It can sit out in the open for 30 min., nothing bad is going to happen, especially with all that salt up in there. If the center of your chicken is as cold as your refrigerator, about 40 degrees, then it's going to cook unevenly and dry out in the wrong places. This is a good step, trust me. (Salmonella is about 1/70,000 and is generally only ever a problem with mass-produced, factory birds)



There isn't too much leeway on oven temperature. If you bought a 2.5-3.25 lb bird it will finish in about an hour at 450 degrees. Don't be scared by the high temperature, the dark meat should just finish cooking as the skin is perfectly browned. Get a good relationship with your oven by, like all good relationships, spying on it. Use a reliable oven thermometer to find out if it's faithful or a dirty, lying whore. Kidding. About the whore thing, I would never be so harsh to my oven. And don't open it too often. I know you're curious to see the magic happen, but if you don't have a window, trust me .. it's happening. Conventional gas/electric ovens take forever to gain back heat, so try to leave it closed, unless...



You are basting. To be perfectly honest, I have no idea if basting does anything beneficial. It doesn't really reintroduce juices into your meat, it only kind of protects the skin which is not necessary in this project. It also makes the skin wet, which affects the crispiness. But I think it's sweet and fun to do. So I will baste once at the half hour mark and then leave it be. Do not baste for the last 20 minutes if you choose to do so. You don't need a turkey baster, just get a big dinner spoon, collect the juices and spoon them over. The golden, herb-flecked pan juices that run hot over the chicken breast are just ... mmm ... so sexy. (I swear I'm not a poultry fetishist)



So remember, you can set it and forget it for the most part. Throw the bitch in the center rack, and let the good times roll. You have an hour to make a side dish. Mashed potatoes, roasted potatoes, wild long-grain rice (not Asian short-grain ... that's just a bad combo in my opinion), cous cous, green beans, whatever. Just don't steal oven space from the chicken because it hatez the taterzzz when they steal heat from it. You figure out your own side dishes, but personally I like a big crusty hunk of bread and a light salad with vinaigrette.



At about the hour mark you can start checking for doneness. It should be firm, but still have a bit of give to it. I don't really have a good way to describe checking for doneness, so use an instant-read thermometer if your personal one isn't so good. You're shooting for 160ish at the thigh, but I think anything from 155-165 is acceptable. Roast one for yourself at first, and if it’s a little underdone you can finish cooking it. After doing that once or twice you’ll get an idea for what is done and what isn’t.



Pull it out, put it on a board, cover it with foil and let it sit on the stove top for at least 15 minutes. Why? WHY!?! Resting roasts and grilled meats is incredibly important! So important I should have included it in my last post about comprehensive home cook skills. Not to get too sciencey, but let me hit you with some knowledge.



Heat causes molecules and juices to move rapidly, and in this case towards the coolest location at the center of your cooked product. If you were to cut into it right now, those juices would rapidly leave the meat and leak onto your cutting board where they serve no good to anyone, unless you let your dog clean your dishes. If you let the meat rest, the temperature and the juices relax and are allowed to redistribute throughout the whole roast. There are better explanations, but basically, if you rest it, it will be juicier.



My Suggestion/Preference: Dry chicken, season, slide garlic cloves under the skin, let it come to room temp., throw in a hot oven, baste once, make side dish, let it rest for 15 minutes.



The Magic of Pan Sauce ... MAGIC PAN!



Here comes my favorite part. Making a pan sauce. It's so beautifully efficient. You are going to clean up your pan and make a delicious sauce out of every ounce that this bird had to give you. And of course it includes deglazing. Ready? Let the magic begin.



Use some kind of long wooden spoon or tongs and slide it through the chicken’s cavity to gently lift it on to a plate or board. Some juices will leak out of it, make sure you can reserve these. Now observe your pan. If you roasted it with just a few items, then remove those and note the browned bits on the surface (if you didn’t preheat the pan, there should be a lot of tasty skin stuck to the surface). Tilt the pan and spoon off all but about 2 tbls of the fat. Throw in some veggies (onions/carrots/celery) and any extra meat your chicken came with, gizzards, neck, just not the liver. You can also add the wing tips from your roasted bird for extra flavor. Let them brown heavily, you can take it far so long as it doesn’t burn.

I think you know what’s about to happen. Time to de-fucking-glaze. Get yourself a cup of dry white wine (anything but a Riesling really. For those of you at Buckingham Thanksgiving, the gravy was too sweet because Kevin gave me Riesling when I asked for anything but … sorry to put the crosshair on you, buddy) and drop it in the blazing hot pan. Start vigorously scraping up the bits with a wooden spoon. Now you’re going to let the wine reduce thoroughly, so much so that your pan starts crackling again. Now here’s where you can do two different things.

You can add a good homemade chicken stock. Now if this is your first chicken venture I guess you won’t have that yet, so you can use store bought. Or…

You can use water. It won’t be as good and you will need to thicken it more, but you’re essentially making a quick stock with water.

Either way, also add any juices your chicken has given up and reduce it thoroughly.

Now you will need to thicken it. You can either make a roux in a pan on the side, or make beurre manie. A roux is equal parts butter/flour when cooked slightly is a powerful thickening agent for liquids. Ideally you should only ever add cold liquid to hot roux, or hot liquid to cold roux to avoid lumps but it shouldn’t lump up on you too badly. A beurre manie is another option. It is essentially a roux, but instead it’s just equal parts butter/flour kneaded together at room temperature and whisked in to the liquid of choice. Whichever one you choose, add it to the pan and start whisking madly.

Once you have a smooth sauce you should taste it and adjust your seasonings. If it’s too watery you can “mount” more butter in to it, by whisking in a few knobs of butter or you can let it reduce further. If it’s too thick you can add a little water/wine/stock to it to loosen it up. You can also add fresh herbs at this point. A classic combination of chopped parsley/chives/chervil/tarragon makes a sauce called fines herbes that is spectacular.

Pour your sauce off in to a gravy boat or just ladle it all over your chicken and sides. I can’t give a good lesson on cutting up a chicken over text, so google it if you want a perfect presentation. Otherwise whatever your common sense and knife hand can accomplish is adequate for your purposes. Bon appetit.

My Suggestion/Preference: Rest your chicken and collect its juices, spoon off most of the fat and reserve, heavily brown mirepoix vegetables, deglaze with dry white wine, reduce until crackling, add stock and juices, thicken with roux, finish with chives and a squeeze of lemon juice.

It’s Not Over Til the Chicken Hits the Stockpot

Eaten your fill? Couldn’t resist and ate the whole thing? Still got leftovers to last? Whatever the case, strip your chicken of what good meat it has (I would eat the chicken butt .. crispy, fatty, juicy, oft-neglected … it is the girl with low self-esteem eager to please you) and store it in the fridge. Don’t leave your chicken carcass naked. The skin around the joints, the cartilage and spare back meat or going to be important to building your stock. You can freeze it now and wait until you have more chicken to work with, or you can make a small portion of stock right now.

If you’re using one chicken carcass make sure you have a tall, skinny pot that will minimize evaporation and fit your stock making produce snugly without excess water. As long as it is taller than it is wide, then you are good.

Add enough cold water to just cover your chicken (cold because hot water carries more impurities from the pipes, hence its sometime cloudy nature). Set it on medium to low heat and walk away. For the most part. Check on it here and there, but don’t stir it, only tinker with the heat if necessary. It should barely simmer with bubbles lazily rising to the surface intermittently. It should not, I repeat NOT boil. Boiling is a violent process and draws out fat and impurities from the chicken, and then emulsifies them in to the liquid where they are hard to get rid of. If you are simmering gently then those impurities will rise to the surface in a scummy cloud where they can be easily skimmed off. Skimming is not essential for home cooks, but if you have the time, why not?

You can let it cook for up to 12 hours, but generally 3-4 for one chicken body is more than enough. In the last hour or two of cooking throw in your aromatics. Throw in 2 onions, a carrot (peeled) and a few ribs of celery all roughly chopped. I like to split a whole head of garlic, remove the excess paper and drop it in also. A handful of peppercorns cracked with the bottom of a saute pan, and any tough herb stems you might have are also good. Generally you don’t add salt to stocks, for reasons I will discuss later.

Taste your stock often. You will learn how the flavor develops from hour to hour. It won’t really taste like much, just like a very light chicken broth because there is no salt. Once all the aromatics have given up their flavor, the stock should have much more body and potency. Strain it and cool it rapidly. You can let it sit out, but all health departments will note that this is the optimum time for bacterial growth. It’s generally not really a problem, but if you like to play it safe then pour your stock in to several separate containers, and then place them in an ice/water bath in your sink. Once they are cool you can then move them to your freezer. You can throw your stock straight in to the freezer or cooler, but they will be very hot and heat up your fridge considerably.

My Suggestion/Preference: Start with cold water, gently simmer chicken carcass for 5-6 hours, add aromatics in the last 2 hours of cooking, strain once to remove obvious solids, strain second time through cloth or coffee filter to purify, chill and freeze.

The Versatility! Oh, the Versatility!

As we have discussed before, stock is a foundation of culinary technique from where you can go to any place and any height . If you’re so inclined, beef stock and veal stock can take you even further, but they are less economical for a home cook as they tend to not have tons of cow bones lying around. But chicken stock will be more than enough to not just elevate your cooking, but transform it. As long as you are aware of a few simple techniques and have the bravery to experiment, you can do some magical things.

Reduction is the first thing. Chicken stock on its own doesn’t have a ton of flavor. It should have a clean, distinct flavor, but not a powerful one, not like a good chicken soup would. Reduction is the means by which you can intensify the flavor without adding excess salt (which many store-bought brands do). Pour in a pint or more of chicken stock in to a pot, set it on medium high-heat and watch the water bubble away. Make sure it doesn’t scorch and when it reaches a thick, satiny consistency, you can whisk in a knob of butter and add some salt/pepper. It will be rich, flavorful and have a wonderful mouth feel. The French test for the right consistency is when it coats the back of a spoon. This state is called nape. Dip in a metal spoon and observe the sauce coating the back. You should be able to run a finger through it, leaving a clean streak on the back of the spoon. That’s when it’s ready. Put it on anything, grilled chicken, grilled asaparagus, any sauteed vegetables, it’s all good.

As I’ve talked about before, well-made stocks have a lot of collagen/gelatin stolen from fresh chicken bones. Connective tissue, cartilage and skin around the joints are the best for giving up this stuff. As a sauce reduces, the water leaves and intensifies the concentration of collagen/gelatin and makes your sauce thick and satiny. They are literally long strands of proteins that are suspended far apart in a unreduced stock, but when the water leaves they come together and tangle each other up. But when you take out water, everything else gets magnified as well. Any salt, impurities and undesirable flavors will present more boldly in a reduced stock, so it is important that you have the cleanest ingredients in mind when making one and season after reducing.

You can customize it to your liking.
-Add fresh herbs and lemon juice for a light, refreshing sauce on grilled chicken.
-Add tomato paste, molasses, brown sugar, apple cider vinegar, chili powder, paprika for a shotgun BBQ sauce.
-Add chili powder, paprika, garlic, cayenne, dried ancho chiles for a taco seasoning sauce.
-Add butter, garlic, parmesan cheese and chili flake for a smooth and simple pasta sauce.
-Add soy sauce, mirin, Sichuan peppercorns, rice wine vinegar for an Asian inspired stir-fry sauce or glaze.

It is a blank canvas on which you can paint a beautiful picture (bahahaha ... lame sentence).

You can freeze any of those customizations in ice cube trays and when you need a little bit to enhance a sauce, just throw in a cube or so.

You can start a plethora of soups. Use your leftover chicken to make an extraordinary chicken noodle soup. You can make a great cream of tomato soup as well. I could go on and on but I will let your own curiosity and the power of Google to take you there.

And you can make onion pasta.

Caramelized onions, tomato fondue, pancetta, fresh herbs, butter and parmesan cheese are all it takes, Paul. And Ted.

Hope that covers everything. Sure as hell is long enough. Happy roasting.

EP #6