Recipe 9 & 10- Simple Roasted Chicken & House Mashed Potatoes

Recipe 9& 10- Simple Roasted Chicken & House mashed potatoes 

First off, I just wanted to start by saying how EASY this recipe is. When you open your roasting pan and dig into the cooked chicken, you would think you slaved all day in your kitchen. 

After using this recipe, I don't think I will make a roasted chicken any other way! 

So recipe 9 was chosen because I wanted something that wasn't too labour intensive. 

I had an accident while snowboarding 2 days prior and was trying to recover my neck and shoulder. 

This recipe was appealing, as all it is is assembling your ingredients in the roasting pan and letting it cook! 

To start off, I washed, chopped and placed my plum tomatoes and onions in my roasting pan. 

These tomatoes were very fresh and flavourful for not being in season. I was very impressed that I was able to find such nice tomatoes for this recipe! 

Essentially Chef Michael wants you to make a bed for your chicken to rest on. The flavour can then really work itself into the chicken while cooking, and trust me it REALLY does with this method! 

Next, I added some dry oregano and one head of garlic, each clove halved. 

Seriously, it took me forever to figure out what " one head of garlic, halved" meant... oh dear. 

HAHAHA

After everything was in my pan, I gave it all a nice sprinkle of salt & pepper. 

Next, I got out my fresh 5lb chicken. The recipe calls for a 3-4lb, but all I could get my hands on was 5lbs or larger.... I wish I would of went larger, since this chicken was devoured and I would of loved leftovers!

 I thoroughly washed and dried my chicken. One tip that I got from a Chef Michael TV episode, was to dry your chicken with paper towel after washing, this way the skin will crisp as its cooking. I made sure to salt and pepper my chicken well. 

Now, my roasting pan was a tight fit for this 5 pounder, but it worked even with my whole bed of tomatoes! 

Chef Michael suggests 20min per pound for roasting a chicken. 

Lets do some math.... 5x20= 100mins or.. 1hour 40 mins 

Into the oven she went! 

About 15 mins into cooking, this wonderful aroma of garlic tomatoes and oregano started coming from the oven. Oh my, was my mouth watering! I thought "this is going to be a LONG wait to dinner". 

My kitchen and house smelled amazing! 

About 20 mins before my chicken was going to be finished, I started on Recipe 10- House Mashed potatoes. 

I didn't think this recipe would require a whole post, because well.. who hasn't made mashed potatoes. 

Thats what I thought until I made THIS recipe! 

This recipe starts off with a whole lot of options depending on what your potato desire is when complementing your main dish. 

You can choose between "light and creamier texture" "Stronger and Assertive cheesy flavour" or " Distinctive aromatic character" 

WOW ALL THIS FOR MASHED POTATOES!? 

I searched through my fridge to see what I had on hand. I went with the "light and creamy" option.

I had some cream cheese and milk, so I figured that would be a nice complement with my tomatoes & Chicken later. 

Now for me, mashed potatoes are my ULTIMATE comfort food and in my opinion no one makes them better then my mom! 

She goes the traditional method of milk & butter. 

I have never added anything special to my potatoes over the years, so cream cheese was  a new addition, for me at least. 

I washed& chopped my Russet potatoes and got them boiling on my stove. 

And.. whats making mashed potatoes without completely boiling them over and making a mess on your stove? yep.. I did that too! 

Anyways, I chose to leave the skin on by recommendation of chef Michael. 

This is not something I would ever do, but I actually really enjoyed it! 

Now I hope I don't loose you here, but as my potatoes were cooking, my chicken was complete! Was I ever excited to reveal this yummy chicken that I had been smelling for 100 mins... 

Scratch & sniff here ^

This skin on top of  my chicken got a little stuck to the lid of the roasting pan during cooking, I told you it was a tight fit :) 

I am not going to lie.. I dug into that drumstick ASAP! 

The meat was so tender and juicy I couldn't resist waiting another minute! 

I swear that leg came with no chicken on it... 

Even little Emilie made her way to the kitchen to get her taste of the chicken.

Chef Michael suggests taking all the bones out of the chicken and leaving everything together in the pan, thats exactly what I did. 

Now my potatoes were complete and drained. I added in my small brick of cream cheese and then went to heat up my milk. Forget THAT! I have some wonderful already warm pan drippings from my chicken! I strained these out of the roasting pan and put them into a measuring cup. 

While mixing my potatoes I slowly added in some of the warm liquid! 

I even had some leftover drippings, I froze these for later use. 

So here we have it, Simple roasted chicken & house mashed potatoes on ONE plate! 

I garnished the whole thing with some fresh Oregano.

Seriously this was so delicious! The chicken was melt in your mouth and so full of flavour! 

If you love chicken, this recipe is FOR YOU! 

I added the tomatoes and garlic on the side and it just added that little extra to this dish.

And the potatoes.. how could I leave that out.. They were amazing!! 

The drippings gave it that familiar taste of gravy, while the tomatoes and garlic really came through that potatoey goodness. These were a winner for sure, and I can not wait to try the other options of mashed potatoes Chef Michael has shown in this book 

Just reliving this meal through photos, makes me want to make this again soon. This really was a great recipe and I encourage you to make this for your family. You will really enjoy everything that comes with this dish! 

As always, my compliments to the Chef and to you, my friends!