So it looks like my blog about my family, is turning into more of a food blog. But they go hand in hand. Food, mealtimes, are a big part of our family. We sit down at the table as a family every night for dinner. We often go to breakfast at Mr. C's parents house. We often eat dinner with my parents. So mealtimes are a family affair.
I had a request for my crock pot rotisserie chicken. And as luck would have it, that's what was for dinner tonight. I even remembered to take pictures.
Start with a whole chicken, a roaster/fryer. They are often on sale for 79cents a pound. This one was a 4.3lb bird. Defrosted, washed, patted dry.
In the bottom of the crock pot, place potatoes wrapped in foil, or foil balls, if you don't want potatoes. (but seriously, they turn out so yummy when all the juices from the chicken drip all over them)
Then I make a seasoning mix to put on the bird. I used olive oil, parsley, garlic, onion, salt, pepper. Really you can use whatever you want. I never use the same seasonings twice.
Then rub it all over the bird, under the skin, in the cavity. Also stuff the cavity if you have stuff. I use onion, lemon, carrots, celery. Today I had nothing but an orange, so that's what I used. Turned out fine!
Stick the bird on the potatoes and turn the crock pot on. I usually do low for 6-7 hours. Today, I forgot to thaw the chicken out all the way, so I turned it on high for 2-3 hours, then back down to low the rest of the day. The first time I did this recipe, I put it on at 7am and took it out at 5pm. And all the bones fell out of the chicken. I just had to fish the meat and potatoes out of the crock pot. It was still yummy, but if you want a whole chicken to come out of the crock pot, I would do a little less time.
I put foil around the sides, if the chicken touches the sides, it will get done too fast. Especially if the bones of the legs touch the sides.
Tonight I made a
cheese sauce with broccoli in it to go over the potatoes. It was excellent.
Whenever I make a whole chicken, I use the carcass to make chicken broth. After you take off all the meat, throw the bones back in the crock pot (don't even need to wash it out), cut an onion in big chunks and throw it in, carrots, celery. Turn it on low all night. Then the next day, strain it out and put it in the fridge. Skim off the fat, then put it in single serving Ziploc bags and freeze. It makes a ton of chicken broth, for next to nothing!
Look how much extra chicken we had left. Usually I make chicken fajitas, or
Cajun chicken linguine, but this week we are having BBQ chicken sandwiches.
Tonight the girls had homemade Popsicles for dessert. We just got new Popsicle molds because Ryann threw one of the old ones away instead of putting it in the sink! So, I'm cool and got them
rocket ship shaped ones. They each got to choose what flavor to make them. Mary choose apple blueberry, and Ryann chose tropical fruit. I just used a jar of baby food fruit and
Silk coconut milk.
Weston didn't get a Popsicle, but he had some
coconut milk yogurt instead.
