Recipe. You Won't Want to Miss This!
Roast Chicken with Sausage-Cornbread Stuffing
And below, a side of sweet potatoes with herb butter.
On a cold winter’s night, nothing is quite as comforting as a golden roast chicken.
1 chicken, about 4 lbs., preferably free range
2 sweet Italian sausages, casing removed
1 cup toasted, crumbled corn bread
2 shallots, chopped
1 tbs. wine vinegar
freshly-ground black pepper
olive oil
Rinse the chicken and pat dry.
In a frying pan, sauté the sausage and shallots in olive oil, breaking the sausage apart, until lightly browned. Turn off heat and add the corn bread and vinegar, tossing to combine well. Set aside and let cool.
When cool, stuff the chicken with the sausage-corn bread mixture and close with skewers or thread. Coat the chicken with olive oil, pepper generously, and place on a rack in a roasting pan. Preheat the oven to 400º F. Place roasting pan in the center of the oven and roast for about 1½ hours, or until the juice in the thigh joint runs clear. Depending on your oven, you should probably turn the pan around after 45 minutes to allow for even browning. If the chicken is browning too fast, lower the heat to 350º F. You will have to test every 10 minutes after about an hour. The last thing you want is a dried-out bird. Let rest for 10 minutes before carving.
Despite advice to salt before cooking, you will notice there is no salt in this recipe. The sausage supplies plenty of salt and flavor. Forget the salt and keep your blood pressure in bounds!
A chicken this size, with stuffing, should feed 4 comfortably.
An easy side-dish: Baked Sweet Potatoes with Herb Butter.
Scrub 4 medium-sized sweet potatoes, Place directly on the oven rack outside the roasting pan. Do not puncture. When done, serve with herb butter. You can also microwave the potatoes for 1 potato cycle, then finish in the oven for about 30 minutes.
Herb butter
4 tbs. sweet butter
Any fresh herb—parsley, thyme, sage—about 2 tsp. finely chopped.
Let butter soften and blend with the herbs. When ready to serve, split each potato lengthwise and top with a 1 tbs. butter-herb mixture.
And, only 1 pan to wash!
Tony Meisel
