Roasted Chicken with Balsamic Rosemary Vinaigrette

Earlier this year, we were gifted with beautiful Misty Knolls organic chickens from Vermont.  I believe I have expressed my general ennui when it comes to chicken in the past.  Friends, it is because I so often am thinking of boring old chickens.  These are not those sort of chickens. 

When presented with a beautiful chicken, too tasty to fail, I do get excited.  My plan has long been to attempt to feed us for a week on one such roast chicken and figure out all of the exciting things I can do with one bird.  That challenge will still come, but this time, I marinated the chicken in a lovely balsamic, rosemary (and ramp oil!) and garlic vinaigrette a la Giada DeLaurentiis. 

I abandoned the one chicken, many meals idea because I thought this marinade was too flavorful and distinct to lend itself to a number of different meals.  I was essentially proved wrong daily.  Below I've listed the variety of meals that I pulled together over the course of the week. 

Possibilities aside, as a stand-alone dish, this chicken does not disappoint.  I marinated a whole chicken, cut into pieces (thanks to my mother-in-law for her chicken selection as well as her chicken butchering skills), in a savory mix of ramp oil, balsamic vinegar, garlic cloves, dried rosemary, sea salt and pepper. The chicken marinated for about 15 hours, although you could get away with a couple of hours. 

The resultant chicken is juicy and flavorful.  Not boring at all.  As the rosemary was my own addition, feel free to omit or adjust as you see fit.  My hefty handful made rosemary the shining star of the marinade.  In my opinion, this makes the chicken slightly less versatile than a lemon, garlic chicken or something more simple, but no less delicious. 

Our uses for the roast chicken (and pl.ease leave notes in the comments if you come up with more uses): 

• Cold chicken breast with pan drippings, fresh rustic bread and green salad (with scallions! )
• Roast chicken quesadilla with  Vermont-grown baby spinach, smoked gouda and caramelized onions
• Pasta with shredded chicken, marinated mozzarella, cherry tomatoes and homegrown basil
• Chicken Sandwich with Vermont-grown baby spinach and homemade Spicy Stout Mustard 

Roasted Chicken with Balsamic Rosemary Vinaigrette (adapted from Giada DeLaurentiis)

• 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
• 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• a good handful of fresh rosemary, chopped
• 2 tablespoons olive oil (or ramp-infused oil)
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 (4-pound) whole chicken, cut into pieces (giblets, neck and backbone reserved for another use)
• 1/2 cup low-salt chicken broth
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest
• 1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley leaves

1. Whisk the vinegar, mustard, lemon juice, garlic, rosemary, olive or ramp oil, salt, and pepper in small bowl to blend. Combine the vinaigrette and chicken pieces in a large resealable plastic bag; seal the bag and toss to coat. Refrigerate, turning the chicken pieces occasionally, for at least 2 hours and up to 1 day.
2. Preheat the oven to 400F. Remove chicken from the bag and arrange the chicken pieces on a large greased baking dish. Roast until the chicken is just cooked through, about 1 hour. If your chicken browns too quickly, cover it with foil for the remaining cooking time. 
3. Transfer the chicken to a serving platter. Place the baking dish on a burner over medium-low heat. Whisk the chicken broth into the pan drippings, scraping up any browned bits on the bottom of the baking sheet with a wooden spoon and mixing them into the broth and pan drippings. Drizzle the pan drippings over the chicken. Sprinkle the lemon zest and parsley over the chicken, and serve.

Pork Banh Mi Meatball Sandwiches

Bon Appetit says that 2010 is the year of the meatball.  I say, what year isn't? But I do appreciate the number of twists on the traditional Italian meatball or the Chinese lion's head meatball that I generally think of when I hear the word. 

One take on the meatball that they offered up recently was the Pork Banh Mi Meatball.  Before you say that Banh Mi is so 2009, just remember that now we're talking meatballs.  A refreshing twist, then, on both the meatball and Banh Mi. 

This recipe caught my eye even before the Tigress Can Jam started, but it immediately popped into my head the other day when I wanted to come up with more uses for my Vietnamese Carrot and Daikon Pickles.  Let's face it, this dish is what my pickles were meant for in the first place!

The complete recipe in the link above shows you a quick way to achieve a similar result in case you don't have jars of Vietnamese pickled vegetables crying out for a spicy meatball sandwich.  I haven't given it a try, but I'm sure they will do. 

I made a double batch of these meatballs and they kept very well in the fridge, feeding us for at least 6 meals.  Next time around I'll try freezing them.  I meant to do that this time, but they were so good that we just kept eating them! I ran out of bread part way through, but these were equally excellent in a bowl of rice with pickled vegetables, cilantro and sriracha. 

Also, I skipped the mayo mentioned in the original recipe because I am a no mayo sort of lady.  That may be banh mi blasphemy.  I just used extra sriracha since that can never be wrong, but you may want to check out the original recipe if you're into that whole mayo thing.

Pork Banh Mi Meatball Sandwiches (adapted from Bon Appetit)

• 1 lb ground pork
• 1/4 cup fresh basil, finely chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 3 scallions, finely chopped
• 1 tbsp fish sauce
• 1 tbsp sriracha
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 2 tsp cornstarch
• 1 tsp fresly cracked black pepper
• 1 tsp sea salt or coarse kosher salt

• 4 individual baguettes or sections of baguette
• Vietnamese Carrot and Daikon Pickles
• Fresh jalapeno or other chili slices
• Fresh cilantro sprigs

1. Gently mix all ingredients before baguettes in a large bowl.  Roll tablespoon-sized amounts of meat mixture into meatballs.  (Can be made 1 day ahead.  If so, place on large baking sheet, cover and chill.)
2. Heat sesame oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat.  Add half of meatballs.  Saute gently until brown and cooked through, turning frequently.  Be careful not to over-brown.
3. Cut each baguette or baguette section horizontally in half.  If using hot chili mayo, spread over shell.  If not, add as much sriracha as you might be able to stand - a good drizzle will do. Arrange jalapenos, then cilantro on the bottom of the bread. 
4. Add 1/4 of the meatballs to each baguette.  Top with carrot and daikon pickles.  Enjoy!

Meatless Monday: Chinese Marbled Tea Eggs

I've been focused on big batch cooking to keep our take-out to a minimum both to save money and eat more healthfully in general.  It's no secret that a hard-boiled egg makes a good quick snack with lots of protein.  It probably is also no secret that they can get a bit dull. The answer to that in our house is to make our hard-boiled eggs Chinese-style.

To make hard-boiled eggs a more interesting treat, I went to Steamy Kitchen.  Her recipe calls for you to crack the already hard-boiled eggs by tapping lightly with the back of a spoon (keep the shell intact, just crack it all over).  Then place the eggs in a pot of hot water with soy sauce, two black tea bags (there could be a lot of tasty substitutions here if you want to get creative), star anise and peppercorns.  Simmer for 40 minutes and then let the eggs steep for anywhere from a couple of hours to overnight. 

When the eggs are ready, they have a built-in sweet spicy salty flavor and are beautifully marbled, making them very pleasing to the eye and the palate! The inside of the shell is particularly artful even in the early stages of steeping and the eggs themselves get more dramatically marbled the longer they are in the tea mixture.  Our first egg  (below) was tested after about four hours of steeping.  I let them continue to sit in the tea overnight, but those eggs got gobbled up to quickly to document.  All in all, very successful and so easy to snack on in the afternoon.