Friday, February 25, 2005
Bitterness becomes no one, dear friends, and I promise that I am not bitter. What I am is sad, and puzzled, and puzzled because I am sad and should not be. Of all the problems facing the world today, the ubiquity of takeout roast chicken is pretty small potatoes, so to speak. After all, isn't it better to have roast chicken for a week's worth of meals than to rely on a week's worth of fast food? If the price gap between a raw chicken and a rotisseried home-meal-replacement chicken is closing, where is the harm in spending a few extra cents? And didn't Laurie Colwin once write that while you want to procure the best chicken that you can, ultimately any roast chicken is better than no roast chicken?
Well, yes, except that she then followed it up with directions on how to roast your chicken yourself, and according to Julia Moskin's New York Times article, roasting a chicken is another one of those things that we fabulous urbanites are supposed to be too busy to learn how to do:
"I consider the perfect roast chicken my own Holy Grail," said Ly Phan, a Vietnamese-American living in Brentwood, Calif. But, she said: "I don't want to learn to make it. I just want to be able to buy it."
A reliable place to buy a good roast chicken has become an important quality-of-life matter for those too busy to cook. "I buy a chicken here every Sunday, and I eat it all week," Paul Griscom said at the Whole Foods Market at Columbus Circle. "I used to live close to Fairway, and I was nervous about moving away from those chickens. But the ones here are even better." At Whole Foods and elsewhere, the price of a whole roasted organic chicken is almost the same as a raw one.
Roasting a chicken at home may become a domestic throwback, like darning socks or putting up peaches.
Mr. Griscom said that he doesn't know how to roast a chicken. "I know, it's supposed to be so easy," he said. "But how would I know when it was done?"
Now, I know that two anecdotes do not a social movement make, and it's entirely possible that I am not a relic. From where I sit tonight, though, I'm not so sure.
Believe it not I had this same discussion with myself earlier this week. But at my Kroger the precooked chicken was cheaper, but I went ahead and got the raw chicken and roasted it at home. I screwed it up, so I may go with the pre cooked next time
Ever since reading Pam Anderson’s (no, not that one) instructions for easy roasted chicken in _How to Cook Without a Book_, delicious, delectable home-roasted chicken at home has been one of my staple dinners. In fact, the only precooked roasted chicken I’ve ever really liked is from Zankou (an Armenian chain in Los Angeles) and since I don’t live there any more…
I have a 25-yr-old oven that does not hold high temperatures well, and my neighborhood 24-hour gourmet grocery sells 1/2 and 1/4 roasted chickens for the same price per pound as the whole roasted birds. I am embarassed every time that I buy some fraction of one, but I do it all the same.
I’ll let you know what happens after the kitchen remodel.
ah, one of my initial conquests, the whole chicken. sure, it takes a little time and effort, a little ‘watching’. then, then...my bulk store starts selling them for like, three bucks and change. same with bread. too godawfully cheap for me to justify doing it myself instead. they left me no choice. knocked out by the tools of mass production, i sat back down in my plastic chair.
but when it comes down to ‘brasstacks’, i at least know how.
Because of the pace of life, more than one job, evening work, yadda yadda yadda...as with so many things in life, there are a bajillion and one excuses. I occasionally buy a pre-roasted chicken, but not all that often anymore. I used to rely on them much more, until one day, by some miracle, I simply bought a good free-range chicken and roasted it myself. It was so much more delicious than one of those little shrivelled birds whose breast has turned flaky and dry, and whose poor sad legs and wings are rendered virtually inedible by their blistering turns in the rotisserie. And it took an hour—an hour in the oven, no unnecessary watching or basting, during which I could do and did many other things. In addition to fantastic chicken, it also yielded plenty of delicious pan juices, something you don’t get with a pre-cooked chicken. Lesson learned.
Via Cook’s Illustrated (the Saveur for technically inclined non-conspicuous consumption types such as myself) I have found a terrific way to roast a chicken in not so much time: cut up a whole chicken, brine it for 1/2 hour, brown the pieces in a skillet, then roast the cut-up pieces in the skillet at 450 degrees for 15-20 minutes. Then deglaze the pan with vermouth, chicken stock and thyme, reduce and stir in some butter and voila: delicious dinner, with sauce. Add some rice and greens and you’re eating much better than some Kroger rotisserie chicken in under an hour.
Kroger rotisserie chicken? Feh. I’d rather cook my own, even badly. But the roasted organic garlic chicken from the Wild Oats chain near me is pretty darned tasty and a lot less effort than cooking my own when I’ve got a cranky family to feed. Convenience will get it every time, which is why we (as a society, not merely my little family) have become dependent on fast (or at least sightly quicker) foods.
Fwiw, I have less guilt feeding my children the roasted organic chicken from Wild Oats than I do when I cook any form of Tyson chicken whatsoever at home, no matter how much effort I put into it and how cheap the chicken.
Oh, Snow, I’m with you all the way. I have bought my share of takeout when I’ve had too much going on to cook—usually this involves working late or being in the midst of some big baking project—and I would take the roasted chicken from Wild Oats over the home-roasted Tyson chicken any day of the week. I think I was just feeling punked out last night because once again I find myself reading an article that relegates home cooking to a time sink, a frittering away of energy best spent elsewhere. It is hard enough to read this in “straight” news pages and feature articles, but when I read this in a newspaper food section—and not just any food section, but arguably the most influential food section in the country—I get a bit despondent, probably more than I should.
I do think I’m going to take ejm’s advice and make that tagliatelle and chicken recipe, though. I’ve made it dozens of times, with all different variations, and it never fails to make me happy. I make it with pasta sheets from our local pasta place, which I cut into ribbons for pappardelle. Add an endive salad and a bottle of wine, and despondency melts away. 
In no way am I endorsing Kroger or Tyson, natch. But I’ve not heard of Wild Oats, and the closest thing ‘round here is Whole Foods (who I detest for their weird mishmash of wooey Utne Reader crunchiness with high dollar bullshit). I’d really like to be able to get a chemical free chicken anywhere, and my point is to echo Bakerina’s dismay at the idea that roasting a chicken is just too damn hard/time consuming/archaic.
Uh, I have never roasted a chicken before. I have choked a chicken, but that is an entirely different story and not appropriate for this discussion. Yet when I go to Boston Market and buy chicken, it is always good to me. They do it it right.
Cooking is such an art, my wife cannot cook beef. She is fine with chicken. Not great, but good enough. But she just can’t get beef right. The other night she broiled some steak tips. They came out like rocks. To her, she thinks subconsciously that the beef is not cooked if you see any pink or any juices. Hogwash! They should be singed on the outside, warm on the inside, soft and juicy, melting in the mouth.
Now Bakerina, if you could write a book on how to cook steak, I would be forever in your debt.
Wow...there IS such a thing as a collective unconscious. This morning I woke up thinking about this post, and the next thought in my head was roasting a chicken for Tagliatelle with Chicken From the Venetian Ghetto. Not tonight, too many other things in the house to eat, but soon...with a thyme-and-Meyer lemon variation, I think, since those are in the house…
What a great idea to cut up lasagne sheets! We make our own egg noodles, using a handcrank pasta maker and generally do the final cut at fettucine width.
And I know what you mean about Nigella’s Venetian chicken. It never fails to cheer me up either. We usually flank it with steamed sugarsnap peas. I do love that chicken! (and truth be told, instead of a whole chicken, we generally buy two chicken legs and roast them in the cast iron frying pan)
Julie, I often think about that chicken and whenever I hear people say they think Nigella Lawson is useless, I remind them of that chicken recipe. It’s just too fabulous.
Have any of you tried putting dried fruits (apricots, prunes) into the cavity of a roasting chicken? It’s really fantastic. Throwing an onion cut in half onto the roasting pan about half an hour before the finish of roasting is also great. The resulting gravy is fantastic.
-Elizabeth
That is odd, I roasted a chicken yeaterday. Because it was a huge one, 7-8 pounds, it took a couple hours, but it was on sale for 5$. Now I go on top of the burners tonight with the parts.
I’m weighing in for the roast chicken buyers here. But only because I grew up in a house with an ill parent and it was often roast chicken from the grocery store around the corner or not much of anything at all. Since packaged food had still not been invented, as far as we were concerned, the roast chicken sufficed.
As for that final comment (in the article, not anyone here), I can only wonder how someone manages to even eat chicken (nevermind cooking it), if they don’t know when it’s done. I’ve always considered that a basic survival skill. Apparently not.
dearest bakerina,
i hope i can be forgiven for shelling out my pennies for organic roasted chickens. as you know, i’m a vegetarian. but dear, sweet, wonderful clyde was not. and he ate organic chicken every night for dinner. along with organic vegetables. he LOVED his organic chicken and vegetables when he wasn’t being spoiled with his nana’s spaghetti.
but remember, i’m a vegetarian. so i couldn’t quite bring myself to actually purchase an uncooked organic chicken and roast it in MY OVEN. so i bought whole roasted organic chickens. and pulled off all the meat. and made up zip lock baggies of dinner sized portions that included the vegetables. and then froze them. one month at a time. and then each evening, i would boil in organic chicken broth. and serve to the ever deserving and grateful clyde.
i loved my dog. but not enough to actually roast a chicken. i hope i can be forgiven.
Oh, sweet jen, you have done nothing that requires forgiveness. If anything, you have earned your reward in a thousand afterlives, buying chickens for that darling Clyde even though you are a vegetarian. He must have been over the moon at every meal.
Dear friends, I’m feeling a bit sheepish about all this. Let me clarify: there is absolutely, positively no reason to apologize for buying a roasted chicken from the market of your choice. When I first moved to New York, I was a regular takeout customer at the Dallas BBQ on 8th Street and University Place; I would buy their barbecue chicken, skip the barbecue sauce and just eat the chicken with a baked potato or cornbread. Eventually I worked up the nerve to try roasting a chicken in my tiny scary oven in my tiny scary kitchen, and only then did I regularly buy my birds raw.
My point wasn’t that buying pre-roasted chickens is a bad thing, honestly. My point was that it’s getting a little dispiriting to hear the food press announce the Death of Home Cooking. This isn’t the first time, and it won’t be the last, but for some reason, this week it really landed a blow on my whiny self. But now that I have a nice fat (13-pound!) capon sitting in my fridge, waiting to be stuffed (maybe with the dried fruit that Elizabeth recommends?) and high-heat-roasted, I’m getting my good thing back.
nmi, sweetheart, I’m afraid that there just isn’t a steak book in me. I can recommend this one, though.
Kudos to C.JoDI for the quote that made my day:
and the closest thing ‘round here is Whole Foods (who I detest for their weird mishmash of wooey Utne Reader crunchiness with high dollar bullshit).
I do shop Whole Foods sometimes, because they have the most beautifully-stacked produce I’ve ever seen, and good selection of seafood, cheese, etc. But most of the stuff in the aisles comes in overpriced, overdesigned packages. And sometimes you just want a bag of Doritos.
I have a restaurant and just turned it into Organic and I was wondering about the cost of a roasted chicken (which we do) Would you pay 7.99/lb for these? We also quarter them for the same price. Thanks for your input.
i would like NIGELLAS roast chicken pasta with pinenuts
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Believe it not I had this same discussion with myself earlier this week. But at my Kroger the precooked chicken was cheaper, but I went ahead and got the raw chicken and roasted it at home. I screwed it up, so I may go with the pre cooked next time