Broiled Chicken

It's easy to broil a chicken!
Pre-roasted chickens from the store may be less expensive, but I find that I can do so much more with a home-cooked chicken's left-over parts.

So, here is what you need:

- 1 chicken
- 2 carrots, julienned
- 2 branches of celery, julienned
- 1 clove of garlic (I forgot the garlic this time!)
- 1 onion, sliced (I forgot this too. Late night baking makes me forgetful!)
- vegetable oil
- paprika
- 1/2 cup of water

Ingredients

Pre-heat the oven at 400F

Mix the oil and the paprika.

Oil and paprika mixture

Coat the bottom of the roasting pan with the vegetables.

Use this to coat the chicken. Make sure to get every nook and cranny!

Coating the chicken

Put everything uncovered on the 2nd lower rack in the oven. If it's in the middle, I find it's too close to the top element and makes it burn too fast.

Leave it in there for 20 minutes.

After 20 minutes, reduce the oven temperature to 325F. Still keeping uncovered, pour the water into the pan and leave to cook for about an hour.

TIP: Fire alarms usually don't like this stage. They'll go off, even though nothing is actually BURNING. So, be prepared to open a window or air out with a towel.

To check if your chicken is done, check the meat temperature. It is cooked at 180F.
If you don't have a thermometer, the chicken is cooked when the juices run clear.

TIP: Another trick to ckeck how done the chicken is. Grab the thigh bone and try twisting it around. If you feel the meat easily coming off and letting go, it's cooked.

Cooked chicken, out of the oven

You can use the vegetable either as a side or combine them with some BBQ sauce to make a tasty sauce.

Pork Roast with Vegetables

I had never done a pork roast before and while grocery shopping, I saw that they were on sale this week. So I grabbed one and decided to go for it!

What you need:

- 1 tsp of butter/margarine
- 2 tsp of oil
- 1 pork roast
- 3 cloves of garlic
- 2 branches of celery
- 1 potato
- 3 carrots
- Salt, pepper, thyme


First, pre-heat your oven at 350F.

Pork roast

The piece of meat is about two pounds (2 lbs) which is good for one person with plenty of left-overs for lunches throughout the week.

Searing the meat

Over a medium-high heat, heat your oil and melt your better. Sear the piece of meat on every sides for about 30 seconds to prep it for cooking and seal in the juices. Do the top and bottom as well, even though it's awkward holding it.

Seasoning

After that, put your piece of meat aside and season it with salt, pepper and thyme to taste.
Cut up the veggies and crush the cloves of garlic.



You would usually use one hand to press down on the knife blade while the other is guiding the handle, but I had to hold the camera. :P

Vegetables : carrots, onions, celery, garlic.

I cut up about 3 regular size carrots in, 2 celery branches and a medium-sized onion.

Browning the vegetables

Lower your heat to medium. Using the pan you just heated for the meat, drop the onions, garlic and celery in and brown them just for a few minutes, so that they're not raw anymore.

Potato

While the vegetables are heating, cut up a potato. I left the skin on, because I like it, but you should take it off if you don't. It doesn't affect the cooking.

Chicken sauce

The recipe I used as a guide called for some brown sauce (you can get that in a can apparently). But I didn't have any so I looked for recipes to make some. It called for beef concentrate, which I didn't have. I DID have some chicken one though, so I used that instead. So, instead of a brown sauce, it was now a yellow sauce.

6 table spoons of butter/margarine
6 table spoons of chicken concentrate
6 table spoons of flour
1 laurel leaf
Thyme, salt and pepper
Water

Melt the butter and chicken concentrate over medium heat until well blended. Add the laurel leaf, thyme and flour and let simmer for about 20 minutes. Add some water to taste to get a liquidy texture. Mine in the picture was way too thick and I added water later.

Into the pan

Lay your cooked vegetable at the bottom of a foiled pan (makes it easier for cleaning!). Lay the roast over them and put the carrots and potatoes around it. Spread the sauce over the roast.

Covered with tinfoil

Cover the roast and veggies with foil. Don't close it tight, so the steam will be allowed to get out.
Leave in the oven for about 45 minutes or until the center is slightly pink. It's important not to over-cook the meat, because it will become dry and tough.

Letting the roast rest.

When the meat is done, take the broiler out and put the roast aside. Leave it to rest covered in foil for 15 minutes. This allows it to finish cooking and seals in the juices.
Use that time to take out the vegetables from the pan.

Vegetables are DONE!

Roast, done and cut open
The picture makes it look a bit pinker then it was actually.

This was a success, and I'm happy that I could improvise some last-minute changes and it still turned out great!

This is the original recipe I used as a guide. It's in French though. :)