Roast Chicken

The recipe for this roast chicken is Thomas Keller's. If you don't know who Thomas Keller is, look up The French Laundry.

At Albertson's, I could only find 3-4 pound chickens. What the heck? Where are my hormone-injected, crazy steroid-taking 7 pound chickens?

Oh well, the recipe calls for a 3 pound chicken anyways, and it works best with smaller chickens because the oven stays at 450 degrees the whole time. Try that with a bigger chicken, and you'll have a dry, burnt outer layer while the insides are still uncooked.

I wanted to make a whole dinner, so I made two sides--mashed potatoes, and green beans with bacon.

Of course, the green beans were sautéed in bacon fat.

Here's the chicken out of the oven, and there's a nice, crispy skin! If you look at the wings, you might be able to see that I tucked them back, which is recommended. I also wanted to tie up the legs (aka truss the bird), but uh...I still don't have floss/kitchen twine.

You can see that I set it on a mirepoix, so that it doesn't end up sitting in its own juices. Why don't you want it sitting in its own juices? Well, unless you like crispy chicken on the top and a soggy chicken on the bottom...

Also, the mirepoix has another purpose besides lifting the chicken off the bottom of the pan--it flavors the chicken juice, which makes for a great chicken gravy.

The plating: Roast chicken, green beans and bacon, mashed potatoes with chicken gravy.