Juicy roasted chicken

I have recently discovered that I can, indeed, roast a chicken. I'm a little embarrassed to admit that until a few months ago, I had never roasted an entire chicken before. It just seemed so advanced, so grown-up. Well, after becoming educated about how chickens are generally raised for slaughter (in horrendous conditions and pumped full of hormones and antibiotics) I had just about quit eating chicken altogether. I missed it. Chicken is so good, and healthy. Then I discovered that Costco carries a brand of chicken called Coleman's Natural that is organic, antibiotic and hormone-free, and that are fed no animal by-products. It's expensive, though. Really expensive. As one would expect, the full chickens are the cheapest per pound. So I needed to learn to either cook a full chicken or cut up a raw chicken. I went with the former. And guess what I discovered? It's easy. Really easy. Who knew? (Probably lots of people, actually, but not me.) I picked up a simple recipe from Allrecipes.com and made a few tweaks, and I couldn't be happier. Delicious, moist chicken. We always roast 2 at a time, one for eating and the other to cut up for other recipes. Finally, I am a real grown-up cook. (Don't tell anyone, but I've never roasted a turkey either. Maybe now I can take a stab at it. How hard can it be?)


Juicy Roasted Chicken

1 whole chicken, giblets removed.
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup butter
1 stalk celery, cut in sticks
1/2 of a lemon, quartered,
1/2 of a small onion, quartered

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place chicken in roasting pan (a square Pyrex dish works great) and season inside and out with salt and pepper (be very generous). Place 3 Tablespoons of the butter in the chicken cavity. Then stuff the chicken with the celery sticks, the lemon and onion wedges. Arrange the remaining butter, sliced into pats, on the outside of the chicken (see photo below). Bake chicken for 1 - 1/4 hour to 1 - 1/2 hour in the preheated oven. Remove from oven and baste with the drippings. Cover with aluminum foil and allow to rest for 30 minutes before serving. Delish.

New England Clam Chowder

This recipe is a family favorite. As always, the amounts here make a pot of soup big enough to feed a family of 7. Or a hungry family of 5. Possibly a starving family of 3...well, you get the picture. This soup really improves with age, so if you can make it the day before, refrigerate it overnight, and then reheat, it will be even better.

Clam Chowder

1 large onion, chopped
3 Tablespoons olive oil (or bacon grease, if you have it)
1/4 c cooked, crumbled bacon *
~1lb. frozen hash browns (or equal amount potatoes, 1/4" dice)
1/2 cup flour
3 cans clams, drained (reserve juice)
1 c. cream or half and half
3 cups milk
2-3 teaspoons salt

Saute bacon and onions in oil until translucent, about 8 minutes. Add potatoes and stir to coat. Cook about 2 minutes. Sprinkle flour over all and stir to incorporate. To reserved clam juice, add water to make 2 cups. Stir clam juice, cream, and milk into potatoes, stirring well. Add salt. Bring almost to a boil, stirring, until thickened. Reduce heat and cook until potatoes are done, about 15 minutes. Stir in clams, heat through, and remove from heat. Let sit about an hour, reheat, and serve. Alternately, you can refrigerate overnight and reheat and serve the next day.
(*If I have time, I will cut up and fry the bacon before cooking the soup, leaving the appropriate amount of grease and bacon in the pan to saute the onions.)

Per our conversation...

Yesterday at Picnic at the Park, we were discussing cream soups, because it's case lot sale month and everyone wants to stock up. I mentioned I have greatly reduced my canned cream soup use by making my own mix of flour and milk. Here is a recipe I found in the fabulous compilation book, The Complete Tightwad Gazette, by Amy Daczyczn. (This specific recipe isn't one I have made, per se, although I have used the basic premise frequently. The book is highly recommended.)

Cream Soup Mix

2 c. dry milk
1-1/4 c. cornstarch OR 2-1/2 c. flour
1/4 c. chicken bouillon
2 Tbsp. dried onion flakes
1/2 tsp. pepper
1 tsp. thyme (opt.)
1 tsp. basil (opt.)

Mix all ingredients and store in airtight container. If using cornstarch mix, add 1/3 c. mix to 1-1/4 c. water. If using flour mix, add 1/2 c. mix to 1-1/4 c. water. This makes concentrated casserole consistency. For soup consistency, double the water.

If you have a lot of milk, like we do (yea, cow!) you can just put milk in the blender with the flour or cornstarch and use that.

Not only is this soup healthier (especially if you use raw milk for a base, and a good quality chicken bouillon), it is significantly cheaper.
Store brand soup - 69 cents for a 10 oz. can
Homemade soup mix- Recipe makes ten 12 oz. batches at 18 cents each.

You could also get dried mushrooms at the store, and if you wanted a cream of mushroom concentrate, I would just throw some dried mushrooms in a chopper and add to the dry ingredients, or add mushrooms to the other part of your recipe.

For comparison, here is the list of ingredients from a can of Western Family Cream of Mushroom condensed soup: Water, mushrooms, wheat flour, soybean oil, salt, cream, monosodium glutamate, whey powder, soy protein concentrate, modified corn starch, autolyzed yeast extract, disodium phosphate, maltodextrin, spice, garlic powder, natural flavors (contains milk), dried mushrooms, partially hydrogenated soybean and cottonseed oils.