This is very economical, since you can almost always find chicken for less than a dollar a pound. However, it is more interesting if you use your FREEZER and spread the chicken out over two or three weeks!
1 - BUY CHICKEN. The cheap kind -- either bone - in pieces or a whole chicken (buy the smaller "frying chicken" type since they are usually more tender than the big old "roasting chickens." That said, I usually go for the biggest chicken I can find in the bin!
The rest of this blog assumes you're using a whole chicken, since that's usually what's cheaper. If you find a good deal on bone-in pieces, you can get even more creative (I have a good slow cooker recipe for chicken curry, chicken cacciatore etc) -- I don't know about you, but I am NOT cutting up a whole raw chicken into serving pieces.
2 - ROAST CHICKEN. This is the easiest way to cook chicken, ever. But it does take longer than those super-convenient, pricey boneless, skinless chicken breasts. I usually do this for Saturday evening dinner, since I'm nervous about leaving the oven on while we're at church.
Basically, grease a roasting pan and stuff your chicken in it, in the same position as a tiny Thanksgiving turkey. If you like, smear the chicken with butter or olive oil and seasonings such as salt, pepper, dried herbs and/or lemon juice. The chicken also tastes better if you cut up an onion or some celery and stuff it inside the chicken (a good way to use up last week's wilting vegetables!). Shove that thing in the oven at 375 degrees Fahrenheit and cook it till it's done all the way through. This will probably take at least an hour, and possibly much longer if your bird is big or if you want dinner done at a certain time. If you have guests over, it will DEFINITELY take longer.
This is dinner #1. Just cut off the pieces you want to eat and serve them with some vegetables. You can roast some potatoes in the oven while the chicken is baking if you like!
2 - CUT THE MEAT OFF THE BONES. This is the gross part. Pick the carcass clean. Put the cooked meat in storage containers and refrigerate or freeze until you can make a CASSEROLE, SOUP, CHICKEN AND RICE or something similar. Feeding two people (Dennis usually eats more than one serving, but I usually eat less, so it evens out), we usually have enough meat to stretch over at least three more meals. Favourite uses for the meat include Chicken Enchiladas (great for the freezer!), chicken tacos (like regular tacos, only with chicken instead of hamburger), etc.
3 - BOIL UP SOME CHICKEN STOCK. This is the fun part, and why it's worth paying 80 cents a pound for a bird that includes lots of bones and other inedible parts.
Once you've cut all the meat off the bones, dump the chicken skeleton and any other strange bits into a big pot. Add water to cover (for one chicken skeleton, I usually add about 6 to 8 cups liquid). Then, dump in anything else that you think will make the broth taste good. Celery, onion, peppercorns, thyme, and bay are a good starting point. I think coriander and whole cloves (just a couple!) add a subtle and delicious touch. Again, this is a good way to get your money's worth from the limp vegetables you have left over from last week (Who eats a whole huge stalk of celery in a week anyway? Speaking of celery, don't cut off the leaves if you add celery to your broth pot. They add nicely to the flavour). When you've got everything you want in there, bring it to a boil, then reduce the heat, cover, and simmer for at least 30 minutes (longer is better). If you lift up the lid it smells DELICIOUS. YUM.
Then, you have two quarts of high-quality chicken stock that you can use to make vegetable or chicken soup, chicken and rice, or whatever else strikes your fancy during the week. SO much tastier and healthier than those super-salty bouillon cubes and fake-tasting canned broth. Even those $3.00 boxes of chicken stock don't taste as good! I usually find a use for it all, but if you have extra, chicken stock freezes really well.
So there you are. Meals for a week for two people.
An example menu of how this might work out:
Meal One: Roast Chicken
Meal Two: Chicken Tacos
Meal Three: Casserole
Meal Four: Casserole (like I said, this works better if you use your freezer and spread the meals out)
Meal Five: Chicken and Rice (more exciting if you use cinnamon and turmeric!)
Meal Six: Vegetable or Bean Soup (using chicken broth)
OK, so that's six dinners, not seven, but I usually take leftovers to work for lunch!
like a stone in your throat
1 year ago
You have quite a knack for homemaking. If we lived closer I would ask for lessons :)
ReplyDeleteHave you tried crock-potting a whole chicken? Super-duper easy, and you get the stock when the chicken is done.
ReplyDelete1. I always like to brine any chicken before cooking it - I think it makes the meat taste so much better. Soak whole chicken overnight in brine solution (you can add other seasonings at this point too - dried garlic, dried onion, crushed peppercorns, etc).
2. Pat the chicken dry, put in dry crockpot. Slather with oil if you want, salt/pepper the skin. Dump in any veggies (onions, carrots, etc) or other spices.
3. Crank the heat to low and forget about it until you get home from work.
There will be liquid halfway up the chicken by the time you get home. The skin that is not under liquid will be crispy and yummy. It will fall apart when you take it out of the crockpot because the bones are so soft. You have to strain the stock well to make sure you don't get any bone bits or anything else in it. I think this method tastes almost as good as a roasted chicken. Plus it is much easier.
Yum! I will have to try the crock pot method. Thanks for the tip.
ReplyDeleteEDIT: My mother informs me that a chicken skeleton is properly called a "carcass."
ReplyDeleteGross ... that sounds like road kill to me, but she would know better than I would!