Kitchen Adventures!

This weekend was all about taking adventures in the kitchen! I had been wanting to roast a chicken because The Label Says Paleo says its easy. And, because I didn't get to go to Vegas, that meant I got to go to the farmer's market to see my meat seller (they're only open every other weekend due to the inclement cold weather)!

So, I picked up my Delaware roasting chicken and tested out my new cheap-o roasting pan from Target.

Roasted Chicken

Olive oil

1 package of herbs (I got the "Poultry Mix" - Oregano, Marjoram, Thyme, Rosemary)

1 orange, halved

1 onion, halved

4 strips of bacon

1 chicken

Salt and pepper

First, I had to take all the "goodies" out of the chicken, which my roommate greatly enjoyed watching. For those of you who are not aware, I was vegetarian for a good part of my high school and then a few college years, and only started eating meat again in November 2008 and then actually touching and cooking it this past August when I started living on my own (hey, that's what boyfriends are for - cooking!). Here are some humorous shots with my "WTF" face:

 

I'm very excited about the chicken having wings

 

I had to back away from the chicken when I realized the heart and stomach were still in there...and that I had to reach into the butt to get it out...

 

Yup, I'm about to reach in there

Once I got over my fear of pulling out all the innards (seriously, about 45 minutes later), I started prepping the chicken for roasting. Preheat oven to 425' F and place the chicken on my roasting pan. I loosened the chicken skin (not very well) by making a few cuts and then sticking my finger under the skin. I'll admit I didn't do it very evenly, but I had to stuff half of the herbs in the skin and I wanted them sort of spaced out. The other half of the herbs went in the cavity of the chicken along with the orange and onion. My chicken was a little too small to stuff the whole orange and onion in there, so I think I only ended up stuffing in half the orange and a quarter of the onion.

Then I rubbed olive oil all over the thing (probably my favorite part) and salted and peppered the top. Layered some bacon over the top and stuck it in the oven for 25 minutes. After 25 minutes, I took out the chicken and removed the bacon (which I later fried in a skillet for breakfast tomorrow), basted the chicken with a spoon, and returned it to the oven for another 25 minutes. It ended up needing another 10 minutes even after that (for a total cooking time of one hour), and then I let it sit for 10 minutes to let the juices settle. Here's what the finished product looked like:

Pretty golden color, despite how smoky it made our apartment!

 

All the meat I got off the carcass - not a whole lot :(

So yeah, my only complaint about roasting the chicken is that the meat I was able to pick of the bones wasn't really worth the time, effort, and money it took to roast the chicken. It was a great kitchen experiment, and now at least I can say I roasted a chicken, but it's probably not something I'll be doing again in the near future. Whole Foods pre-made rotisserie chicken will do just fine for me for a while.

When I recognized that the roasted chicken wouldn't feed me for the rest of the week, I decided to whip up the meatloaf that I was going to save for later in the week. Only problem is that I don't have a loaf pan - so I made "meatloaf muffins" instead!

Meatloaf "Muffins" (Makes ~18 muffins)

1 lb ground beef

1 onion, chopped

2 apples, cored and chopped

1 clove garlic

1 tsp mustard powder

2 tbsp worcestershire sauce

1 egg

Salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 350' F. Mix all the ingredients together well and then stuff into an oiled muffin pan. They don't expand like bread muffins, so jam the meat all the way up to the brim of the muffin pan. Cook in oven for about 18 minutes.

I had a little bite of one once it came out of the oven and it was actually pretty tasty! I forgot to add the salt and pepper, so they may be a little on the bland side for some tastes, but surprisingly not as much as I thought they would be. The apples are a nice sweet touch. And I'll admit, they're kind of cute to look at:

 

My itty bitty meatloaf muffin!

Alright, well that about does it for me, I won't be cooking much the rest of the week!