Food and Recipe's

Deus Irae said:
I still have a hard time with the seed oils claim, given that the orientals use a fair amount and live longer than the rest of us.
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You have to look at the whole picture - high veg diet, lots of fish, walking/biking everywhere, and so much more.
 
Lord Chevy said:
You have to look at the whole picture - high veg diet, lots of fish, walking/biking everywhere, and so much more.
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Sure, but I can't help thinking about how many times we've gotten food "health" wrong. I mean, our government spent something like 40-50 years telling us to eat one way, only to find out that many of the suggestions were wrong, and now that same government (and non-government people as well) harangues people who spent a big part of their lifetime eating less healthy because of the government for both health issues caused by the recommended diet and food preferences based upon those recommendations. And, to this day, we're still getting conflicting claims and positioning.

I also look at the difference between processing methods (in the case of seed oils, it's often pressing opposed to other methods), and wonder how much of the claimed issues might be about that more than the underlying idea.
 
Tonight's dinner was a whole chicken that was oven roasted in a cast iron skillet, cooked on top of a layer of potatoes.


Potato prep:

  1. Took a few regular potatoes, in this case Yukon gold, but red bliss would also have worked, and some "new" potatoes (total amount absolutely no more than just enough to cover the bottom of a cast iron skillet)
  2. Cut the regular potatoes into pieces the size of the "new" potatoes
  3. Made some cuts through the skins of the "new" potatoes
  4. Placed the potatoes in a metal mixing bowl
  5. Whisked together olive oil, minced (or smashed to a paste) garlic, garlic powder, onion powder, Italian herbs, rosemary, paprika, house seasoning, pepper, and a small amount of salt. Made just enough to coat the potatoes generously
  6. Coated all the potatoes with the whisked mixture, mixed well, then set aside for 2 hours

Chicken prep:

  1. Removed chicken from packaging
  2. Removed organ parts from inside chicken
  3. Rinsed chicken thoroughly
  4. Thoroughly dried chicken
  5. Spatchcocked the chicken
  6. Patted dry the newly exposed portion of the chicken
  7. Lightly seasoned the inner cavity side of the chicken with salt and pepper
  8. Flipped chicken over
  9. Separated the skin from the meat of the chicken with my fingers, creating pockets.
  10. Rubbed a compound butter (butter, garlic paste, garlic powder, onion powder, house seasoning) under the skin of the chicken, reaching as much of it with the compound as possible
  11. Lightly oiled the entire skin side of the chicken
  12. Seasoned the skin of the bird with a duck seasoning blend
  13. Folded wing tips behind the bird
  14. Reversed the legs in order to square the chicken

Cooking the dinner:

  1. Placed the cast iron skillet on a rack in the upper middle part of the oven
  2. Set the oven to 500 degrees
  3. Waited for oven to reach temperature, then wait a little more for the skillet to catch up a bit
  4. Placed chicken into skillet, skin side down, making sure to maximize the contact surface of the chicken
  5. Cooked chicken for 5-6 minutes, just enough to get some good browning on the skin
  6. Removed the skillet from the oven. removed the chicken from the skillet and placed the chicken on a plate
  7. Put the potatoes into the skillet, making sure to cover the bottom only in a single layer
  8. Placed the chicken, cavity side down, on top of the potatoes (and added the organ meats wherever the fit on top of the potatoes after that
  9. Returned the skillet to the oven, and lowered the oven temperature to 400 degrees
  10. After 20 minutes, removed the organ meats and rotated the skillet
  11. After another 20 minutes, checked temp, then rotated the skillet again
  12. After 15 more minutes, a temperature check verified that the chicken was done (times will vary depending upon the size of the chicken and how your oven heats)
  13. Removed chicken from the oven and let it rest
  14. Dismantled the chicken, leg quarters first, and served with the potatoes and some Brussels sprouts


The chicken came out moist (even more moist than I'd hoped, given the cooking style and exposure of the breast meat) and delicious. The potatoes were still holding together while also being very creamy in the middle, and having great flavor. The bottom of the pan had the chicken fat, the melted butter, and some of the seasonings from the bird and the potatoes, which allowed for spooning a bit of the sauce over the chicken, for those who wished to do so.
 
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