Beef, then Chicken

I tried my first package of ground beef from Open Space Meats last night, and made a soup, sort of adapted from a recipe I found online. (Sorry, didn't bookmark it.) The soup wasn't that great, I think I put a bit too much beef bouillon in, so it was a bit strong, even after adding water. My brother, who politely shared it with me, said it was more like chili. Robert, if you're reading this, it was better today than yesterday... :)

Anyway, the meat browned very nicely. In fact, I could be fooling myself, especially since I didn't do a "side-by-side" test, but I think the juices from the browned beef looked darker than I'm used to seeing, and that seemed like a good sign.

Today, at Farmer's Market, I bought a whole "organic, free-range chicken". Once I got home, I feared I had bought it more whole than I was intending. I noticed that the head and the feet were still attached. Yikes! I started reading blogs about how to dress chickens. Actually, I found some excellent resources on the web, some of whom reference Joel Salatin, so they have to be okay. (Right?) Here is one I was planning to follow like a Bible when I thought I was going to have to do all the evisceration, etc, of this chicken: How to Butcher A Chicken. Very thorough, detailed, pictorial series of steps, not as much about butchering as about dressing and preparing for use as a meal. I learned a lot. Which fortunately, I ended up not having to use. (Thank goodness!) Even thought the head, neck, and feet were still attached (including the funny little bill and disturbingly lifelike toes) the insides had been taken care of for me. I really think I prefer my chickens this way! But who knows, someday I may be "doing my own", so it's great to have a website reference for that.

Meanwhile, I have never done a whole roast chicken before (though I have done a turkey, but always in a bag), so I looked up a couple of cooking sites, and found these two, which I sort of put together for what I did: All-Recipes, which recommends soaking the chicken in a brine solution, which I did, and Taunton Fine Cooking, which has a nice section on deglazing. It took about 5 min to start the brining, then the bird sat in the fridge in the brining solution for about 4 hours. After that, I took it out, chopped off the head, neck, and feet (should have done that earlier), rinsed it thoroughly, and patted it dry. This took another 10 min, then back in fridge for another hour. Rubbing with butter, applying salt and pepper, and inserting lemon, rosemary, sage, and garlic took another 15 min (I'm new at this and slow), by which time I had the oven pre-heated to 450 F. The 3 1/3 lb chook went in for 30 min at 450F, then 375 F for about 40 min. Anyway, it was all very good. The roasted veggies I did simultaneously were all from farmer's market this morning: onions, potato, yam, red potatoes, butternut squash, carrots, and beets.

Here are some pics. Next time, I should have a dinner guest. :)