Chickie for you and me

It turns out that having a Tuesday off isn't so bad after all. Although I would much rather have had Monday off, I'm not going to say no to a day off. I met up with Jim at the gym, where I hit the treadmill. I did the random program, level 8, at 6 mph for 30 minutes. I actually finished my three miles and kept going at a slower pace thereafter. Jim had started a while after me, so I decided to do a long warm down.

I had an overly ambitious plan of hitting up Anthropologie after my workout. It didn't happen. There just wasn't any time for shopping before I met up with my friend T for lunch in Oakland at the Golden Lotus Vegetarian Restaurant. It was also a Vietnamese restaurant, so I was very excited. I was doubly thrilled when I found free parking. Actually, I'm not sure if it was free or not, so to be on the safe side, I bought a 60 cent ticket for parking. It was very odd. Anyway, we got brown rice, bo bia (Vietnamese spring rolls), Thousand Layer Tofu Clay Pot, and Vegetable and Black Bean Chicken. The entire menu was vegetarian, which was really nice. Of course, that left the problem of trying to figure out what exactly to try to eat. The tofu tasted like imitation fish. The chicken was just okay. But overall, the food was pretty good. I want to go back with Jim to try a few other dishes. The lemon chicken especially sounded good.

After lunch, I went to Walnut Creek. Again, I was way behind schedule, so I didn't get to shop like I wanted to. I had all these plans to go to Nordstrom to get some jeans altered, Macy's, Williams Sonoma, and a bunch of other shops. I thought I'd be able to have an hour and a half, but it ended up to be only 30 minutes. The only places I really went were Ann Taylor and Sur La Table. I did manage to find the cutest pair of shoes at Ann Taylor.

I barely had enough time to get my shopping done at Whole Foods and Trader Joe's. For the record, I am that freak who loves grocery shopping. I was on a mission for a chicken and filet mignon, and the meat department at Whole Foods is one of the best. I almost passed out when I saw the whole chickens with the stuff sticking out of them. I insisted that the guy throw away the insides. He thought I was absolutely crazy, but he was awfully nice about it. And he gave me the twine to tie the chicken's legs together upon my request.

My cart was contained some unique combinations. There was tempeh and quinoa for me and chicken and steak for Jim. It was off to TJ's afterwards for a few more things for dinner.

I managed to only be five minutes behind schedule by the time I got home, thanks to rushing in TJ's. That's when the real ordeal began.

When I unwrapped the chicken, the scent caught me off guard. I've cooked with chicken before, but never a whole one, and let me tell you, the smell was a lot stronger. It lay there all nasty and bumpy and I realized my very first problem--I couldn't tell which way was the head and which was the butt. And I didn't know which side went up. I watched the Barefoot Contessa make the recipe, but couldn't remember which way she put the thing in the pan. I read the recipe again, but it provided me no help whatsoever. The Joy of Cooking came to the rescue. With the assistance of the diagram, I was able to figure it out. I had to touch the bird a lot more than I wanted to. Even with gloves on, the thought of touching a dead animal is absolutely repulsive to me. With some tools and the plastic wrapping Chickee came in, I was doing okay until it came time to tuck the wings underneath her.



I'm surprised I didn't wake Jim up with my screaming. Again, I had to use the Joy of Cooking to help me out, because I could not, for the life of me, figure out how to get those suckers underneath. The entire time I was thinking about how much I'd be hurting her if she were alive. I am not a vegetarian for any sort of animal rights reasons, but seeing her all dead and cold like that made me feel a little like crying.


Anyway, I stuffed her insides with salt, pepper, thyme, lemon wedges, and a split head of garlic before tying her legs together. Some additional lemon wedges and garlic surrounded her, and I glazed her outsides with butter, salt and pepper and topped her with strips of bacon before roasting her at 425 for an hour.

While she was baking, I started in on Nigella Lawson's potato and mushroom gratin, which probably doesn't actually qualify as a real gratin. I simmered sliced potatoes in milk, cream, salt, and pepper. It was only supposed to be milk, but since Jim only had non-fat, I figured the dish could benefit from some heavy cream mixed in. While the potatoes cooked, I sauteed cremini mushrooms in garlic-infused butter and olive oil before adding them to the potatoes. I dumped it into a baking dish and topped it with some grated parmesan (my addition).

An hour hadn't yet passed, so I started in on dessert: Barefoot Contessa double chocolate pudding. I creamed six egg yolks with half a cup of sugar until it was pale yellow and thick. I added cornstarch, cocoa powder, and salt to the mixture and then boiled milk.

Naturally, as soon as the milk started boiling, the timer went off to take Chickee out. I popped the gratin in, took the milk off the stove, and poor Chickee sat on the countertop while I paid attention to my pudding. Eventually the bacon came off of her and then she went back in with a meat thermometer until she got up to 165. It ended up taking another half hour.



I put the entire pudding mixture back into the milk saucepan so the eggs could get cooked off before taking it off the burner. Then semi-sweet chocolate, heavy cream, vanilla, and butter were melted into the mixture. I ladled the pudding into my pink Apilco ramekins and placed them in the fridge to cool.

Chickee came to 165 and I pulled her out. I know all of the chefs have this innate knowledge of when the meat is cooked, but I am a huge fan of meat thermometers. It's foolproof and always perfectly cooked with no guessing whatsoever. I tented Chickee and made a quick pan gravy to go with her and steamed some asparagus. Jim did the actual carving since even The Joy of Cooking wasn't going to be able to give me enough help for that. If I never carve a bird, that will be fine with me. For the first time ever, I think Jim admitted to the horrible quality of his knives. A good Chef's knife may have to go on the list above my precious All-Clad.



Anyway, other than setting off the smoke alarm (the gratin bubbled over and the burned spillage caused the problem), dinner was a success. I wasn't patient enough for my pudding, so I'm not sure about the overall texture, but it was rich and thick and chocolate-y. Jim liked the chicken, and we both enjoyed the gratin. The cremini mushrooms gave it a nice rich flavor and the potatoes were perfectly cooked and tender. And although I didn't have time to roast the asparagus, steamed was pretty good.