Roast Chicken on a bed of vegetables.....served with butter rice

The success and satisfaction of a job well done, egged me onto to try out a simpler chicken roast unencumbered by a deluge of ingredients and sauces. While at it, habit led me to google and amongst the various Chicken roast recipes, it was this recipe  which appealed to me due to its simplicity and ready availability of all ingredients....of course slight changes, modifications were made here and there.

So here goes my version...

Ingredients :

Whole chicken with skin on - 1.4 kg

Rock Salt

Pepper

Chili flakes

Lemon juice - of 2 medium sized lemons

Dried oregano 

A mix of dried thyme-basil-rosemary-parsley 

Lemon - 1 whole 

Vegetables - lots of roughly diced vegetables. I used carrot beans, baby corns, potatoes

Mushrooms  - about 12 button mushrooms

Garlic cloves - 10-12

Coriander leaves - a handful of chopped coriander

Butter - about 40 gms.

Procedure

1. Mix lemon juice + rock salt +pepper+chili flakes + dried oregano+herb mix and rub the it all into every possible surface of the chicken and also inside the cavity.

2. An hour's marination is adequate but the longer the marination the better. I marinated it for 24 hours, unplanned and unintentionally.

3. While dicing the vegetables and mushrooms, switch on the oven (I used OTG) for preheating, at 250 deg C.

4.Spray/smear the baking tray with butter/olive oil

5. Arrange the diced vegetables on the tray. Sprinkle salt and pepper and drizzle/brush on some butter/olive oil on the vegetables.

6. Smear semi melted butter all over the chicken and also inside its cavity.

7. Take a lemon, prick it all over. Microwave it for 15-20 seconds and then push it into the chicken cavity along with some chopped coriander and garlic cloves.

8. Place the chicken on the vegetable bed. 

9. I used 'BAKE MODE' of the OTG for 50 minutes first.

10. Place the chicken on vegetables into the oven. After 10-15 minutes (till the chicken has a crispy golden coating), reduce the temperature to 200 deg C.

11. After lapse of 45-50 minutes, turn the chicken around. Baste the chicken and toss the vegetables around. Sprinkle some water if they are darkening/burning

12. After turning the chicken around, cook at 200 deg C for another 40-50 minutes....making it a total of 90-100 minutes cooking time..

13. Take it out of the kitchen. Keep it completely covered for about 10 minutes (I covered with my large wok upside down)

While the chicken was cooking and the aroma of melted butter wafted from the kitchen, my olfactories started working overtime, and suddenly I felt  a craving for rice.....took out some cooked rice leftover from the lunch and in a wok, melted a tbsp of butter, threw in a bay leaf, peppercorns, pinch of sugar & salt. Added the plain white rice, tossed it around to coat the butter-salt-sugar-pepper mix uniformly and hey presto! a heavenly butter rice to go with the chicken and vegetables, was ready!

This post is off to Sudeshna's Blog (COOK LIKE A BONG) ' s CHRISTMAS EVENT

Pan(fried) Pseudo Pizza!!

It looks like a small sized pan pizza. Tastes quite like one....well, almost! But the difference doesnt make it any less tasty! Inspired by Indira Mukherjee, I have adapted to make it simpler and faster. This recipe suits me fine on the "Onno kichhu khaabo" (Something different from regular stuff!!) days.

Here goes the recipe :


Ingredients : yielded 4 nos. 1/2" thick 6" dia pseudo pizzas
All purpose Flour (Maida) & Milk in 1:1 ratio
Egg - 1 for 1 cup Maida:1cup milk (200ml cup)
Any Grated / finely chopped vegetables like carrot, bean, cabbage, capsicum, cauliflower/broccoli florets, babycorn etc
Garlic - 3-4 cloves - chopped
Salt
pepper
Chili flakes
Oregano & dried herbs-I used FabIndia's Chili-Oregano & Italian seasoning
Grated Mozzarella cheese - 1 bowl (200ml)
For topping -Boiled corn kernel /Chicken sausages/nuggets/mushroom/paneer cubes/soya chunks etc etc
Diced Onions - 1 medium

Procedure :

1. Mix Milk and Maida and add the egg, Salt & pepper Mix well with a hand blender. The batter is thick but of pouring consistency.

2. Add the chopped garlic and all the grated/chopped vegetables.

3. Keep the topping ready (the choice is yours...I used paneer cubes+diced onions on one occasion and chicken sausages+corn kernels+diced onions on another) stir fried or sauted.

4. A small pancake frying pan makes the base preparation a cake walk. Pour a ladle full of veggie mixed batter and spread it to cover the whole pan. Pour some more to increase the thickness of the base. Cook on minimum heat. While frying the base on gas stove top, keep the oven ready for next step by preheating oven (I used my OTG) at around 225-250 deg C.

5. Flip the pancake pizza or pseudo pizza base and let the other side cook.

6. Now on a flat ovenproof plate, place the (Pseudo) pizza base, arrange the toppings and sprinkle desired quantity of grated mozzarella. Sprinkle the italian seasoning and dried oregano and other herbs of choice.

 7.Place it in the preheated oven on Grill mode at 225-250 deg C for around 5-7 minutes or till the cheese melts and gets a golden colour!

Ready to serve!!

Whole Chicken Roast...

My first try at making whole roast chicken and it was a super success! But the credit goes completely to the awesome Barbecue sauce used to marinate the chicken and of course to me for following the recipe to the 'T', which is so very uncharacteristic of me....The few variations are due to non-availability of the ingredients and not an intentional attempt at deviation! ;)

The recipe and procedure which I followed so sincerely, are here. However noting the variations/improvisations in the ingredients as follows:

Dry Bay Leaf instead of fresh bay leaf
Regular Vinegar instead of Balsamic Vinegar
Sunflower Oil instead of Canola Oil
Kashmiri Chili powder instead of Smoked Paprika

Some personal notings for future reference :

• I used an OTG at a temperature of 200 deg C.
• The Chicken was approx 1.3 kg. 
• Time of roasting was aroung 1 hr 20 min. But could be around 10 minutes less as the top of the chicken was slightly charred, but that definitely added to the taste.
• I marinated the chicken overnight instead of the suggested 5-6 hours.

I served the roast chicken with a side dish of mashed potatoes (with dill-garlic-cheese) and some steamed and (butter) sauted vegetables.

The mashed potato: (Boiled 1 potato per head)

1. Heat 1 tbsp of butter in a wok and season with crushed pepper corns, chopped garlic.
2. Add chopped dill and the smoothly mashed potato.
3. Add a large cup of milk and stir it well to mix with the mashed potato.
4. Add grated cheese, salt to taste, chilli flakes and pepper and mix well.

Serve...

This recipe is off to Sobha Shyam's Event COOK IT HEALTHY PROTEINicious @ Good Food