Monday, April 04, 2005

Ode to a roasted bird!

I've been reading Dr. Biggles site for a while. A man and his grill, wife and kids......It's a beautiful thing! He roasted a chicken a few posts back and I was inspired.

He does something a little different, he cooks the bird in 'dry heat'. I always throw in some wine, some stock and it steams up with the cover on after a nice browning!

The Dr. uses a trivet, I only have a roasting rack, remember those items that we all must have bought many moons ago, it cradles your bird. My rack has been gathering dust, I gave it a hot rinse and put it to work.

There my Label Rouge Bird sits, propped up high and proud. Cooking magnificently in my new oven. I threw in some potatoes to brown (under the rack), seasoned with some fleur de sel. I rested my bird for about 15 minutes and he was juicy.
So.....Biggles.....I'm a trivet convert!

7 comments:

Guy said...

Hey Melissa!

It took me a while to find you. You neglected to mention where you were. I checked my hit statistics and traced you down !!

In any case, I think I figured out why your bird wasn't quite as brown as mine was. At least I believe that's what you mentioned, eh?
First off, it looks as though the walls of your roaster are a bit too high. You may want to find something far lower, maybe only a few inches tall. It really helps when the sides of the bird have direct access to the searing heat. And I can't be sure, but the moisture from the potatoes you added could have hindered the brown crispy skin. This is a guess on my part. I know I know, potatoes roasted under any kind of meat are heavenly. I would try the lowering of your roaster sides first.
Meat racks & trivets ROCK.

Tootles

Banlieue Blog said...

Alright! Good suggestions, my vintage roasting pan can be replaced for the sake of crispy skin! Thanks for tracking me down! As far as the roasted pototoes go, it was the 'lazy' option!
Thanks, Biggles!

Guy said...

Oh my, don't replace it. Put it in a place of high ranking order. Then go shopping for a new one, it's fun. Or use an old cast iron skillet, everyone has one of those. Or any oven safe low edged skillet. This surely deserves a round 2. I'm going to do a round 2 and stuff smoky bacon under the skin, over the breast. Nothing makes better gravy than chicken that's had bacon roasting in it. YEAH !!!

Anonymous said...

Hi Melissa - your chicken looks good! We also had a roast chicken last night (1.5kg one for 2 people!), I love putting pancetta under/top of the skin like Dr Biggles suggests, but recent favourite is roasting with harissa paste.

Banlieue Blog said...

Keiko,
Harissa Paste, that sounds very interesting!

PS....your brown bread ice cream looks outstanding!
(I will figure out how to respond to a post soon, instead of writing a new post! Always learning!)
Melissa

Guy said...

Hey Melissa,

I did another one last night, perfection. The smells from the oven were amazing. Skin was delectible. Wings were amazing. Good for the old cast iron skillet too, loves the fat action.
I hope all is well,

Biggles

Banlieue Blog said...

Ok, Dr. B! Round 2 it will be, but not before Sunday.
Mom (me) needs a couple nights off from stove. I've still got 'roasting' weather here in France, we don't have your lovely Cali' warmth here, just yet!
On the menu for Sunday, a farm-chicken, roasted 'Biggles Style'!
Later!