One chicken, three meals

For my posts in 2014, I thought I would try to give you all some insight into how my food brain works: mainly, how the heck I decide what I'm going to cook on a weekly basis.

It all begins when I get a food craving: one particular week, that craving was for roast chicken (and stuffing and mashed potatoes...instead of the usual turkey I had lamb for Christmas, and I was consequently going into a bit of roasted bird withdrawal).  So I say to myself, "Self, we're going to make a roasted chicken this week."

Now, my absolute favourite roasted chicken recipe of all time is forty clove chicken...because anything that literally involves three bulbs of garlic can't not be absolutely delicious.  Along with adding flavour, the brine helps to keep the meat nice and moist, which means that you're safe to leave it in the oven a little bit longer (ensuring that your roast chicken is cooked and that no one at the table gets food poisoning)....if you want you can increase the cooking time to 25 minutes per pound instead of the typical 20.

I like to add a clove or two of roasted garlic to the mashed potatoes...and I also like to puree some into the gravy.

Since brining the chicken requires buying a bunch of celery, I thought that I had better find a way to use the rest of the bunch (I find that celery goes floppy quite quickly in my fridge, and I absolutely despise wasting food).  My answer: stuffing.

Every family has a slightly different recipe for stuffing, and every child is certain that their mother's is the best.  I am no exception to that rule, and firmly believe that my mother's sausage and raisin stuffing is the benchmark against which all other stuffing recipes should be measured.  The problem with using recipes from our mothers, however, is that moms tend not to really measure ingredients once they've been making something for awhile...and mine is no exception.  So the quantities here suggested are just that, suggestions...feel free to modify the recipe to suit your own taste buds.

Ingredients

-2 stalks celery, chopped

-1 large onion, diced

-1/2 pound pork breakfast sausage (casing removed if using links)

-1 cup raisins

-1 loaf of bread (I personally like sourdough), cubed

-1 or 2 cups of chicken stock (more or less depending on how "wet" you like your stuffing)

-1 or 2 tbsp poultry seasoning 

-salt and pepper to taste

First, brown the sausage in a frying pan.  Add the veggies, and cook until they are beginning to soften.  Combine the vegetable and sausage mixture with the remaining ingredients in a slow cooker; cook on high for 2-3 hours (adding more liquid if necessary/desired).

Doesn't that look delicious?  Don't worry, there are plenty of leftovers...

Once the chicken is roasted and that meal is finished, the next thing to figure out is exactly what to do with the leftovers (of which there are plenty, even once you have put some aside for lunch the next day).  Chicken soup is an obvious solution...and the carcass of a forty clove chicken makes a particularly flavourful stock.  

To make the chicken stock, first pull all the remaining meat off of the bones and put it in the fridge for later.  Then add the chicken bones, all the aromatics (celery, garlic, etc.) that were inside the chicken while it was roasting, one of the bulbs of roasted garlic, one coarsely chopped onion, one coarsely chopped carrot, and one coarsely chopped piece of celery to a large soup pot.  Cover everything with water and bring to a boil; then lower the heat and simmer for an hour or two.  Strain out all the bones and veggies and add salt and pepper to taste, and then you have a deliciously flavourful stock.  At this point it is quite easy to make soup: all you need to do is add the leftover chicken meat (chopped up or shredded into fairly small pieces), some finely chopped carrots and celery, and some noodles (or rice, or pearl barley).

Soup was not was I made, however.  Instead, roasted chicken day 2 involved simply sauteeing the leftover chicken with the leftover gravy and serving it over the leftover stuffing I had warmed up in the oven...I had better plans for the stock.

Since the stock that this chicken makes is so strongly flavoured, I decided to use it to make a delicious risotto.

I've talked about risotto one this blog once before, but I cannot stress the deliciousness of this creamy rice dish.  Sure it's involved and you have to spend basically the entire cooking time standing at the stove and stirring...but the results are worth it.

Ingredients

-1 tbsp olive oil, divided

-cremini mushrooms, sliced

-small onion, diced

-2 cloves garlic, minced

-2 cups arborio rice

-1/2 cup dry white wine

-6 to 8 cups of chicken stock

-1/2 cup grated parmesan

-1 cup frozen peas

In a medium sized pot, bring the chicken stock to a gentle simmer.

First (using half of the olive oil), saute the mushrooms in a large, heavy bottom pot.  Set aside.

In the same pot (over medium heat), use the remaining oil and saute the onions and garlic until they just begin to soften.  Add the rice and mix well.  Cook for about 2 minutes.

Turn down the heat slightly, and add the white wine, stirring until the liquid is almost absorbed.  Add the chicken stock, 1 cup at a time, stirring until the liquid is fully absorbed.  Continue that process (add liquid, stir until absorbed) until the rice is al dente (tender, yet still firm...but not crunchy)...the process should take 20 to 30 minutes (but don't panic if it takes longer).

Stir in the parmesan cheese, mushrooms, and frozen peas; mix well.  Season with salt and pepper if desired.

"Vegetarian"...full of vegetables, though it uses chicken stock as the base.  Could easily be made truly vegetarian if vegetable stock were used instead, though that would change the flavour.  You could even add some shredded leftover roasted chicken to make it a truly balanced meal...

The rich, roasted garlic flavour of the stock comes through in the rice, and marries quite well with the roasted mushrooms and parmesan.  The green peas give a burst of freshness (and a much needed serving of veggies)....serve with a salad and a glass of the white wine that you used in the recipe.  Enjoy!!