Roast Chicken with Celery Root

I haven't roasted fowl in quite some time, so I decided to roast some chicken. I added my favorite starchy vegetable, celery root, and some broccoli and herbs from our CSA.

Ingredients:

• Roast Chicken
• Rub
• Ground mustard
• Garlic salt
• Paprika
• Smoked Paprika
• Celery Salt
• Black Pepper
• Cayenne Pepper
• Kosher Salt
• Honey
• Celery Root
• Broccoli
• Shallots
• Thyme
• Garlic Scapes
• Oregano
• Lime
• Apple Cider

Procedure:

First, I mixed up the rub - mostly mustard, then less of the other spices. I added about 2 tablespoons of honey to make it a wet rub rather than a dry rub. The honey also caramelizes and burns easily at oven temperatures. The honey plus the crustiness that mustard based rubs provide means this bird will be dark in color and will have a skin that feels thicker than usual and crispy.

After cutting up the garlic scapes, celery root, and shallots, I put them in the bottom of a baking pan with a chicken roasting rack and seasoned with salt and pepper. I then stuffed the chicken with the herbs and slices of lime. I worked the rub into the chicken and placed it on the roasting rack breast down. I added a little apple cider so the vegetables would have some moisture.

Everything went in the oven at 450 for about 50 minutes total. About 30 minutes through I flipped the chicken to allow the breast skin to brown. After removing it from the oven, I covered it with foil and let it rest for 15 minutes.

Resulting Deliciousness:

I got just what I was going for with the bird. The skin was thick and crispy and flavorful. The pictures make it look burnt, but there was no burnt taste. The meat underneath was extremely moist thanks to the lime and upside down roasting. Roasting fowl breast down helps keep the breast moist and flavorful. This is because most of the fat in chickens is near the back and around the dark meat. Roasting breast down allows that fat to run down over and through the breast instead of straight out of the chicken. Any citrus is great to stuff a bird with. I like a sliced up lime for chicken, or an orange or two for a turkey. The moisture and flavor really makes a difference.

The roasted vegetables were very flavorful, but just a bit greasy. This is a risk when you roast vegetables under a chicken or other meat. The fat from the chicken adds lots of flavor, but if there is too much it can backfire. For that reason, they are often roasted separately. You can also strain the vegetables right after roasting, but I didn't think to do that. This is less of a problem for vegetables that benefit from soaking up moisture and fat, like potatoes. But, celery root is less porous and can't handle as much fat. Everything tasted great, but the excess fat on the vegetables definitely took away from the dish.

Crockpot Ribs and Vegetables

Last weekend, I finished off the last of the forest fed pork I had in the freezer. I was feeling lazy, so I just threw some ribs in a crockpot with a bunch of vegetables. Turned out pretty good.

Ingredients:

• Pork ribs from the forest
• Marinade - about 20 hours
  
• Apple Cider
• Cumin
• Cloves
• Vegetables
• Celery Root
• Green, red, yellow, and orange bell peppers with red onion (I saw a pre-cut pack at the grocery store)
• Carrots
• Seasonings
• Garlic (about a bulb and a half)
• Shallots (diced from a jar)
• Apple Cider (~1/2 cup)
• Kosher salt
• Black pepper
• Red pepper
• White pepper
• Paprika
• Celery salt
• olive oil
• honey
• Sauce
• Drippings from everything above
• Apple Cider (~1/3 cup)
• Cane sugar
• Cloves
• Cumin
• Red pepper

Procedure:

The night before, I knew I'd want to cook the ribs so I threw them in a freezer bag with apple cider, cloves, and cumin to marinate.  The next evening, I took a pre-cut pack of various bell peppers and red onion, put it in the crock pot, added celery root and carrots, all the seasonings, and tossed all that in a crockpot, coating the vegetables with olive oil and seasonings. I then cut the meat into individual ribs, placed them on top of the vegetables, sprinkled on some more pepper, honey, and a little apple cider. That was cooked at about 200-250 for about an hour and a half.

After everything was done, I pulled everything out of the crockpot, leaving the drippings - mostly some pork fat, cider, and garlic, all of which had been flavored by all of the great vegetables. I added a little more cider, a little raw cane sugar, cloves, cumin, and red pepper, then reduced it for about 5-10 minutes. If reducing sounds fancy, it is not - you just simmer it until it gets thicker - the sugars get caramelized and you cook off some water. I then added the ribs back to the sauce for about 5-10 minutes, stirring most of the time to really coat them well.

Resulting Deliciousness:

These ribs were pretty good, but the vegetables stole the show - they were absolutely fantastic. I think this was because I don't have a very good crockpot, I have a multipurpose thing that's mostly good for frying. The low temperature controls aren't very good, so I basically steamed this stuff in an hour and a half instead of slow cooking it over about 4 hours, as I intended. As a result, the vegetables were nicely done, but the ribs had a very slightly chewy texture, not the perfect tenderness you want for ribs. But, they were still really good. If you have a real crockpot or a dutch oven, this would probably turn out better, texturally speaking. 

  

If you want to see some really well-done ribs, check out my Spring Break '08 Ribs.   

Chili

I haven't made chili in a really long time.  Last weekend, my friend James made some and inspired me to do the same.  I think it turned out quite well.

Ingredients:

• Ground beef (90/10 lean)
• Ground turkey
• Celery root
• Celery
• Onion
• Roasted red pepper
• Apple cider
• Peas (1 can)
• Corn (1 can)
• Black beans (1 can)
• Pinto beans (1 can)
• Kidney beans (1 can)
• Garbanzo beans (1 can)
• Tomato sauce (2 cans)
• Thyme
• Rosemary
• Sage
• Bay leaf
• Kosher salt
• Raw cane sugar
• Honey
• Black pepper
• Red pepper
• White pepper
• Chili powder
• Garlic salt
• Garlic
• Cumin
• Cloves
• Dry mustard
• Paprika

Procedure:

Chili is one of the easiest things to make.  All I did was cut up the ingredients that weren't canned, caramelized the onions and celery, browned the ground beef and turkey, put everything in a big pot, and let it simmer for about 2.5 hours.  I tasted it from time to time and seasoned it to my taste.  I went heavy on cumin because it suited my palate and my mood.  

Resulting Deliciousness:

This was fantastic chili.  One key thing that some people don't think of is the sugar.  Sugar helps balance the spices and salt and really gets all the flavors to blend together smoothly.  I didn't make this chili very spicy because I didn't feel like spicy food tonight.  Chili, and stews in general, always taste better after sitting around for a while.  I'm really looking forward to eating this for lunch for the rest of the week!

Roast Duck with Celery Roots, Beets, and Asparagus

I recently heard about a new butcher shop in Alexandria, Virginia called Let's Meat on the Avenue.  They specialize in local pasture fed and naturally fed meat.  Obviously, I had to check it out.  It's a great little butcher shop, just what I've been looking for in the area.  The selection is good and you can get custom cuts and order specialty things that they don't always have.  While I went in looking for grass fed beef, I ended up getting a duck.  It wasn't local like most of the other meat (farm raised in Indiana), but I found I was in the mood for fowl.  If you are in northern Virginia or DC and appreciate meat with a traceable source that has put real thought and care into how they farm (as well as a butcher that understands that) this is the butcher shop for you!

Ingredients:

• Duck
• Brine
• Apple cider
• Kosher salt
• Garlic
• Rosemary
• Sage
• Thyme
• Juniper berries (lightly crushed)
• Pepper
• Celery salt
• Paprika
• Rub
• Kosher salt
• Cane sugar
• Paprika
• Cloves
• Black pepper
• Red pepper
• Garlic Salt
• Celery Salt
• Oregano
• Basil
• Celery Root
• Beets
• Asparagus
• Salt
• Pepper
• Olive Oil
• Apple Cider

Procedure:

    Like most of the meat I've prepared in the last year, this started out with a brine.  I took some apple cider, added the ingredients listed, simmered it for about 45 minutes, and let it cool.  I removed the giblets from the duck, cut off a little excess fat and skin, and rinsed it well.  The brine and the duck met each other in a ziplock bag and moved to the fridge, where they together pursued perfection of flavor and texture for the next 24 hours.

    The next evening, I cut up a celery root, three beets, and a bundle of asparagus.  These were covered in olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, and placed in a baking pan with a little cider and a fowl roasting rack.  A fowl roasting rack holds a bird in a V-shaped rack a bit above the bottom of a roasting pan.  This keeps the whole bird in the air and allows the vegetables placed underneath to receive a slow shower of flavorful drippings. If you've never used celery root, I highly recommend it.  It is a large white root vegetable that you can prepare the same ways you can prepare potatoes.  However, they have a nice subtle celery flavor that blows potatoes out of the water.  They are an easy way to take a meat and potatoes kind of meal and kick it up to a higher level.  I only discovered celery root recently and it is my new favorite thing.

    Once the pan was prepared, I mixed up a rub of equal parts cane sugar and kosher salt, plus the seasonings listed above.  I took the duck out of the brine, rinsed it lightly, smeared it with a little olive oil, and covered it with the rub, including the cavity.  Remember that rubs are called 'rubs' for a reason - don't just sprinkle meat with it, really rub it in.  This grinds it into the skin and fat and keeps the rub from running off with the drippings while you cook.  Instead, the flavor infuses the meat and makes the skin slightly crusty and extremely tasty.  Once rubbed, the duck got its cavity stuffed with the rest of my fresh rosemary, sage, thyme, and garlic.

    I placed the duck breast down in the fowl roasting rack above the vegetables.  I've started cooking birds breast down whenever I remember to.  This lets all of the fatty, flavorful drippings seep through the prime meat, making it juicier and more succulent than when baked on its back.  I roasted the duck on the bottom rack at 325 for about 2 hours.  I then flipped it on its back and roasted another 30 minutes breast up because the back was perfectly done and the breast needed a little more heat.  

    While this description is long, roasting like this is quick and easy.  You only have to roughly chop the vegetables and the meat preparation is very fast.  The only time consuming part is the actual roasting, but that's a fairly passive undertaking.  

Resulting Deliciousness:  

    This duck turned out exactly how I wanted it to.  The skin was just a little crusty and had a powerful flavor that complimented the meat.  The celery root, beats, and asparagus were delicious - they held their own and did not just taste like drippings, as could easily happen with things like potatoes and carrots.  I was really happy with the way this turned out.  

    Duck is a naturally fatty and flavorful meat, and if you cook it too fast or don't let it drip, you risk ending up with a greasy meal.  This was not greasy at all.  The fat that did not drip off to enhance the vegetables stayed with the skin and took on the flavors of the brine and the rub.  That flavor made the difference between feeling like you were eating a nice piece of meat with a nasty strip of fat, and feeling like you were eating a well balanced, flavorful, well prepared cut.