More Roast Chicken

If there is such a thing as too much roast chicken, that's only because the world also offers roast pork, roast lamb, roast beef and roast turkey. Sharing my last chicken with fourteen hungry musicians etc. didn't satisfy my appetite for bird, so last Monday, when Jason and the Maldives played a show for the CMJ Festival in New York City, I decided the best way to fill my free evening was with, you guessed it, chicken.

Besides roasting things in my cast iron pan, using up all the vegetables from my farm box delivery is always on my mind come dinner time. This recipe pulled from the cleanest corners of the vegetable drawer and was such a winning combo that I had to share it--even if y'all are a little weary of reading about chicken. It features apples and squash crisped in chicken fat and soaked in herbed juices, plus parsnips and leeks to keep everything cozy.

What if I promise to write about a different food group next time? Would you promise to roast a chicken tonight?


Herbed Roast Chicken with Squash and Apples

1 whole chicken, 4 to 5 pounds
1 1/2 cups chopped fresh herbs like thyme, rosemary, sage and chives
half of 1 delicata squash
4 small parsnips
1 leek
1 Gravenstein apple
salt and pepper

Cut the squash in half lengthwise. Seed and peel, then cut it into 1/2 inch slices crosswise. Peel the parsnips and cut them into 1 inch chunks. Cut the leek lengthwise and slice off the tough green parts. Then slice both halves into 1/2 inch chunks. Toss everything with salt and pepper, and olive oil to coat. Set aside.

Core but do not peel the apple. Cut it into 1 inch chunks and slick with olive oil. Set aside.

Preheat the oven 500 degrees. Rinse the chicken, pat it dry with paper towels, remove any innards from the body cavity and snip off the extra fat around the neck. Rub the inside and the outside of the chicken with salt and pepper, then stuff the cavity with all the chopped herbs. Nestle the chicken breast-side up in a 10-inch cast iron skillet and place it in the oven on the center rack so that the legs point toward the back of the oven.

After 10 minutes, take a wooden spoon and slide it under the chicken to make sure it isn't sticking to the pan. Roast for another 15 minutes, then add the squash, parsnips and leeks to the pan so they can roast alongside the bird. Wait another 15 minutes, then add apples. Roast for another 15 minutes, or until the thigh reaches 160 degrees.

Opening and closing the oven so often will make it hard to keep a steady temperature, so be as quick as you can when adding the vegetables. Total roasting time should be around 55 minutes.

Serve family style in the cast iron pan and save the bones for stock.

Doing My Part

It starts with a list, like most of my days. But this list is special. It can tell the future of one person for six hours and ten people for twenty minutes.

The meal I made starts with this menu, printed while I paged through cookbooks at my kitchen table. It was 11 am on Saturday. I'd been awake for an hour and a half and still hadn't showered. My neighbor, the one who called Lindsey "you bitch" for parking in front of her house, walked into her house just as I walked out of mine towards the grocery store. She wouldn't look at me; I wouldn't say hello. This is how you fight with strangers if you live in Seattle.

The meal I made was a meal I promised to Jason and Shawn and Kevin and the rest of the Cosmic Panther Land Band. Have I mentioned that Jason is a musician? When I met him at a Maldives show three Augusts ago, I had no idea with it meant to date a lead singer/songwriter type. I certainly seemed cool, though if Jason had been a meter maid, I still would have fallen for him. Heck, we could have gone for rides around Seattle on his Segway, and that would have been cool too. Being the girlfriend of a songwriter, you think you'd get some sappy songs named after you, right? You'd be wrong. On this album I finally did get a lyric: Kate's got coffee breath. What a romantic.

The perks of dating a musician are sometimes just a different way of looking at the drawbacks. For example, since Jason was recording an album with his new band, I didn't see much of him for three days. But since Jason was recording an album with his new band, I got to hang out at Litho, a recording studio in Fremont, while they concocted their whiskey-happy, foot-stompin', goofy country rock, and I got to drink cheap wine, and watch The Shining, and gossip with Caroline, and watch Alice consider a bag of Irish whistles, and offer my suggestions for the new record's title. Jason thinks "Greatest Hits" is a good idea. Somebody, Kevin I think, suggested "Greatest Tits," but apparently there are three or four "Greatest Tits" albums already. I think they should call it "I Believe." The album cover should be psychedelic purple. Nobody agrees with me.

I got my way, however, when I got to make everybody dinner. While planning the meal, I decided it had to have what my 1965 Farm Journal's Complete Pie Cookbook calls "man appeal." (I should note here that the Cosmic Panther Land, like the Maldives, is comprised of many bearded dudes with one exception: Alice. Brave Alice. Alice, you will never be just "a fucking tambourine player." I promise.) The meal needed to feed eight musicians and producer, a handful of girlfriends and an assortment of friends, and it had to be something cheap. Something familiar. Something only a vegetarian would refuse.

Appetite will rise to meet quantity. A whole chicken can feed four people or it can feed fourteen-- though fourteen will be much happier if cornbread, potatoes and salad are available to fill the other eight-tenths of the plate. It was the end of the pay period (isn't it always?) so all I could afford was that one chicken. It would do just fine.

As for the rest of the meal: cornbread is cheap, easy to make, and a little hardier than a baguette. Potato and green bean salad is tidy--I can dress it hours in advance and not worry about anything wilting or discoloring--and it satisfies the single most important cooking rule my mother taught me, which is to have something green on the plate at all meals except breakfast. Roast chicken could be prepared at my house and roasted in the studio's gas oven. Apple pie is my favorite food in the world an needs no reason or season.

When I said the list could predict the future, I mean me in the kitchen most of Saturday, and I mean the moment when instruments were put down, conversation died out and boys (and Alice!) hunkered over their plates and clustered around the cast iron pan, picking shreds of chicken off the carcass and smearing the pieces with drippings before eating them whole. I mean the clink of forks on plates, the rustle of polite chewing, the silence finally broken by a long enthusiastic gut-deep belch from the mouth of my darling, talented Jason.

When people thank me for cooking, I want to thank them for eating. I guess I'm like a musician who is glad to hear his album blasting out the open windows of a passing car. I'm happy someone besides me can enjoy what I love to make.



Feast for Four or Fourteen
Herb-Roasted Chicken, Potato and Green Bean Salad with Shallot Vinaigrette, Cornbread and Apple Pie

1.

Start with Apple Pie

1 double pie crust recipe (I suggest using one of the recipes you'll find here.)
7 Gravenstein apples (or 4 McIntosh and 3 Granny Smith)
3/4 cup clover honey (1 cup if you like sweeter pie)
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon lemon zest
1/4 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons flour
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon cardamom
1/8 teaspoon allspice

If you have time to make dough the day before and refrigerate it overnight, do it.

Roll out the bottom crust on a sheet of wax paper so it is 1/4 inch thick and two or three inches larger in diameter than the pie plate you're using. Flip it into the pie plate, carefully center it by sliding--don't pull or push the dough around--and peel off the wax paper. Tuck the crust into the plate, leave the rough edges alone and refrigerate it while you prepare the rest of the pie.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

Peel, core and slice the apples to 1/4 inch thickness. Pour the lemon juice and lemon zest over them to prevent browning. Heat the honey on medium low until it flows freely. Sift flour, salt and spices over the apples.

At this point I like to set the apples aside and roll out my top crust, that way the apples don't get soupy while they wait, covered in sugar, for the top crust to be ready. Refrigerate the rolled out crust on its wax paper for five minutes.

Pour the honey over the apples and gently combine. Place the apples in your bottom crust. Place the top crust over the pie, center it, and peel off the wax paper. Crimp the crust into an upstanding ridge and make generous steam vents. You can brush the crust with milk or egg white to help it brown. Sprinkle granulated or demerara sugar over the crust.

Bake at 425 degrees for 20 to 25 minutes until the crust is golden brown. Rotate the pie front to back and reduce the heat to 375 degrees. Bake until bubbling, about 30 to 35 minutes.

2.

While the pie bakes, clean up the kitchen and get out ingredients for Green Bean and Potato Salad with Mustard Shallot Vinaigrette

2 pounds fingerling potatoes, scrubbed
1 pound green beans, trimmed
1/4 cup chopped mixed fresh herbs like thyme, parsley, chives, mint, or rosemary
1 1/12 tablespoons Dijon-style mustard
3 tablespoons finely chopped shallots
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup champagne vinegar
3/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil

In a large pot, simmer potatoes in salted water until tender when pierced with a fork, about 10 minutes, and drain in a large colander. In a large saucepan boil beans in 3 inches salted water until crisp-tender, about 3 to 5 minutes. Drain in the same colander as the potatoes.

While the vegetables are cooking, make mustard shallot vinaigrette:

In a bowl, whisk together the mustard, shallots, salt and pepper, and vinegar. Slowly add the olive oil in a stream, whisking the entire time.

In a large bowl toss the warm potatoes and green beans, herbs, half the dressing, and salt and pepper to taste. Save the other half of the dressing for a salad tomorrow.

This may be made one day ahead and chilled, covered.

3.

Once the pie is out of the oven, start the Cornbread. My favorite recipe is the one from the back of the Albers Cornmeal box. You can double this recipe, just use a larger cast iron skillet, decrease the baking temperature to 375 degrees and increase the baking time to 30 to 35 minutes.

1 cup cornmeal
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 large egg, lightly beaten

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and put the oven rack in the middle position. Heavily grease a small (8 or 9 inch) cast-iron skillet with Crisco and place it in the oven.

Combine corn meal, flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl. Combine milk, oil and egg in another bowl and mix well. Add the liquid mixture to the solid mixture and stir until just blended.

Remove the hot skillet from the oven and pour the batter into it. Smooth the top with a spatula and put the whole thing in the oven. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes until a wooden toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.

4.

Finally, while the cornbread rises in the oven, prepare the Herb-Roasted Chicken. If serving this meal elsewhere, cook this chicken at your destination. It's too messy and hot to travel. If serving this meal at home, follow this recipe to the letter.

1 whole chicken, 4 to 5 pounds
1 1/2 cups chopped herbs like sage, rosemary, thyme, or chives
salt and pepper to taste

Preheat the oven 500 degrees. Rinse the chicken, pat it dry with paper towels, remove any innards from the body cavity and snip off the extra fat around the neck. Rub the inside and the outside of the chicken with salt and pepper, then stuff the cavity with all the chopped herbs. Nestle the chicken breast-side up in a 10-inch cast iron skillet and place it in the oven on the center rack so that the legs point toward the back of the oven.

After 10 minutes, take a wooden spoon and slide it under the chicken to make sure it isn't sticking to the pan. Roast for 45 more minutes, or until the thigh reaches 160 degrees.

Serve family style in the cast iron pan.

A Tyranny of Plums

Chattering about fall, winter, spring, and summer is a cliche, especially for food writers (pumpkin pie! strawberry shortcake!) but also...how it is. I want to talk about fall. It's here. This morning there was almost a frost on my car, the almost-first of the season. I had to idle with the heat on blast for a good five minutes before driving off to work, and even then the windshield fogged the length of Phinney Ridge except for a fan-shaped spot of clear glass around the defrost vents. Already I'm thinking about winter, Christmas presents I want to make and give, the Soapstone residency. My brain skips over fall entirely and cartwheels into Christmas and January, when I will have time off work, family time, writing time. Of course this is silly. All I have, all the time, is time. I've found that when I feel hurried like this, writing helps slow the day down.

Plums defeated Good Egg this September. My enthusiasm for cooking dissipated entirely after picking a canner-full of Italian plums from Jen's tree, then peeling, pitting and chopping half of them (at least 300) in preparation for jam, then cooking 84 ounces of jam, then giving a quarter of the plums away. Molly Wizenberg's charming plum jam recipe buoyed me through the jam & canning part. I especially like where she writes about how the foam that rises to the top of the jam as it cooks is good enough to save and "wonderful with plain yogurt." Transforming fruit scum into a breakfast delicacy is more impressive to me than that old lead-into-gold sort of alchemy, and just one of the reasons I hope she'll keep writing Orangette. I have a little container of plum jam scum squirreled away in Jason's refrigerator, and when I remember it, I have this vision of his roommate, our friend Dena, picking it up a couple weeks from now when it's even more scummy and maybe a bit moldy, squinting at it and asking no one in particular "what the heck is this?"

What I don't know about canning could fill the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving. The whole time I cooked that damn jam I was paranoid of either burning or under cooking it, as this has been all too easy for me to do in the past. I was not helped by my discovery of the following kitchen mystery: the instruction manual for my new enameled cast iron dutch oven says I should never heat it above medium (says this IN CAPITAL LETTERS, in fact), but the dutch oven recipes I've encountered lately, including Molly's jam recipe, insist on bringing ingredients to a full boil over medium high to high heat. I've been compromising with medium high (turned down to medium once things get bubbly) and watching the pot for signs of scorching. So far, so good. But now I don't know what to take seriously--the manual (assuming manuals always err on the side of caution) or the recipe? The internet is a conversation. Reader, help me out. What do you know about enameled cast iron cookware and high heat?

Once the steam cleared and my jars cooled, signaling their temperature drop and adequate seal by letting off a high, satisfied ping! still, there were plums. A better cook would have made a galette, a cake, a pot roast with them. Me? I let them slowly shrivel and go soft in my fridge, a little less than subconsciously assuring that there would be no more plums to deal with further down the calendar year.

Summer is over; I'm cooking again. And what's good in the kitchen is good for Good Egg. Thanks for sticking with me while I took a break.


Plum Jam
adapted from Orangette

2.2 pounds of pitted and peeled plums
1 pound of sugar
Juice and zest of one half of a lemon
1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon (optional)

Chop the plums roughly. In a dutch oven or heavy-bottomed skillet, combine them with sugar, lemon juice and lemon zest. Let it macerate for 2 hours. Add cinnamon and bring the jam to a boil on medium-high heat. Let it boil for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. As the jam cooks, a pink foam will rise to the top. Skim it off and save it for your yogurt.

Prepare your jars by following the instructions you'll find here.

When the fruit can coat the back of a spoon, remove the pot from heat. Ladle it into the prepared jars, leaving 1/4 inch of head space. Wipe the rims with a clean towel, then place the lids and screw bands on and screw to finger-tight. A batch of jam should fill 4 to 6 jars. I always prepare more jars than I need just in case.

Fill a stock pot or canner with water and bring to a boil. The water needs to be deep enough to reach at least half an inch below the rims. Use tongs to place the jars into the boiling pot. Boil for 15 minutes, then turn off the heat. Allow to sit for a minute. Remove the jars with tongs and allow them to cool on the counter. Their lids should form a concave seal as they cool, but if they don't, press each lid tightly to make sure it sucks down. Tighten the screw bands if necessary. Store in a cool, dry place.

In the News

James Walling of the Prague Post steps into the "Jule & Julia" movie fray with an excellent article, here. If you read the whole thing you'll find a quote from yours truly!

James says I may be "the very first food blogger to post a link to a movie review from a print media source ABOUT a food blogger in which BOTH the food blogger (latter) and food blogger (former) are referred to. Fame & glory..."

And prize money? How about a drink on the house?

In other news, I have once again taken a couple weeks off Good Egg for a very good reason: I've teamed up with Jennifer Borges Foster, a Seattle poet and bookmaker (and badass lady), to make zines and broadsides of my poems to sell at readings this fall. Jen designed, hand tore, and printed them on her Gocco (for more of her work, check out her etsy store here). The first run of zines sold out at Poetry Night in Bellingham. She will print another run soon, and the stack of broadsides is still quite tall. If you'd like to get your hands on a zine or broadside, contact me at kathrynlebo (at) gmail dot com. We'll work something out.

My news department as one more item to report: I've been selected for a Soapstone residency for the winter of 2010! Soapstone is a retreat for women writers, situated a bit inland from the Oregon Coast. The aforementioned Jennifer Borges Foster was awarded a concurrent residency, so we'll be writing, cooking, and keeping out of the rain together. I am going to write a poem a day and blog about the experience here.

A Pinch of Nostalgia and a Pot of Soup

My first cookbook was the Better Homes and Gardens 75th Anniversary Edition. It was plaid, binder-bound, and boasted 6o pages of antique recipes in the back of the book. Desserts like Pfeffernuess (German Christmas cookies with black pepper) and Pineapple Chiffon Cake (topped with pineapple and maraschino cherry pinwheels) that made the idea of spending my Friday nights in an apron, listening to FM radio and cooking seem like a romantic, urban thing to do. I was new to Seattle and had more free evenings than friends, more cupboard space than dishes. I was living alone for the first time in a studio apartment that hovered six stories above I-5. This cookbook was, I felt, just what I needed to fill out the hours my new life.


With color pictures, calorie charts and numbered instructions, it was an easy cookbook to follow. Especially for someone like me, whose culinary masterpieces were, at that point, restricted to chicken quesadillas and TVP chili. I didn't know how to cook, but I did know better than to trust Betty Crocker, whose add-a-can-to-everything recipes made me suspicious. What was I to do if the recipe called for frozen peas, and I hate frozen peas? Cook's Illustrated was too daunting, too full of meat cuts I couldn't identify in the grocery display, too long winded, with instructions that always started from the premise that without their help, the dish I was about to make would totally suck.


Better Homes and Gardens was more modest and trustworthy, calling for canned and frozen food only as a time-saving option, including (short) instructions for how to make the dish fresh. Yes, it had a recipe for Turkey Tetrazzini, a dish invented solely to torture little suburban children who can't leave the table until their plates are empty. But it also had recipes for everything a girl can cook with three scratched Teflon pans, a spatula, and a cookie sheet. Simple but delicious dishes like huevos rancheros, oven-fried codfish, sugar cookies and spaghetti, and what became my end-of-summer tradition, corn chowder.

I've made more sophisticated versions of corn chowder, but this is still my favorite. It takes less than an hour to make and will feed a table of four--or, if you too are the proud tenant of a studio apartment, yourself for four days.


Corn Chowder
from Better Homes and Gardens

6 ears fresh corn, kernels cut off
1 small chopped onion
1 chopped red bell pepper
2 cups chicken broth or one 14 ounce can broth
1 large peeled, cubed potato (a baking potato works well)
4 teaspoons flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 1/2 cups whole milk
3 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled
1 tablespoon reserved bacon fat
2 tablespoons chopped basil or parsley

Fry the bacon in a cast iron skillet on medium-high until crisp. Allow to cool and drain on paper towels. Pour off the bacon fat, reserving one tablespoon. When the bacon is cool, crumble it into small pieces.

In a large saucepan, heat the reserved bacon fat and cook onion and bell pepper on medium until the onion is tender but not brown. Stir in the chicken broth and potato and bring to a boil. Reduce heat. Simmer, covered, for 10 minutes. Stir in corn. Cook, covered, about 10 more minutes or until potato and corn are tender, stirring occasionally.

In a small bowl combine flour, salt and pepper. Stir milk into flour mixture. Add to the corn mixture in the saucepan. Cook and stir until slightly thickened and bubbly. Cook and stir for 1 minute more. Add crumbled bacon; heat through. Serve with basil garnish or shredded cheddar.

Not Sorry at All

If I've been a little reticent on Good Egg lately, it's not for lack of writing. In my non-virtual life, I'm a poet. I write on pen and paper, usually with a cup of coffee close by. This summer I've been writing lots of poems to for my first chapbook manuscript.

Every now and then I get published and do a poetry reading. I'm excited to tell you that "every now and then" will happen a lot this fall.

Two of my poems, "Not Sorry" and "The Cure for Headaches," will be published in the next issue of Crab Creek Review, and they're finalists for CCR's annual poetry prize. Can I say how nice it is when someone else likes your poem enough to publish it? It's really nice. I'd like to make the editors a pie.

On September 28 I'm featuring at Poetry Night in Bellingham. Admission is free and the crowd is rowdy. There's an open mic, so if you're poetically inclined please come join me onstage (Ahem, Elizabeth. Ahem, Marie). The ever-effervescent Elissa Ball will be co-featuring with me. 8 pm at the Anker Cafe, 1421 Cornwall Ave Bellingham, WA.

On October 8 I'll be one of the featured poets at the Crab Creek Review and A River and Sound Review reading. Other readers TBA. 7 pmish at Richard Hugo House, 1634 11th Ave Seattle, WA. I'll have more details in a couple weeks.

And on November 5, me and three other lucky readers (also TBA) are going to help Brian McGuigan celebrate his birthday by heckling him from the stage at Cheap Wine and Poetry. We'll probably read some poems too. Admission is free and wine is a buck a glass. 7 pm at Richard Hugo House.

The photo above is by Heather Malcolm. She doesn't call herself a poet, but she could if she wanted to. See more of her visual poetry on This Tornado.

So Much Summer

Elissa called me on the way from Spokane with a present. “Thank you for being my Seattle hostel! I got you some peaches. They're so good they're this close (I heard her hold her index finger and thumb an inch apart) to going bad,” she said. “Eat ‘em quick.” She arrived a couple hours later with twenty softball-sized peaches at the precipice of ripeness. A couple had already formed a light green rind of mold. They were good--thickly fuzzed the way grocery store peaches never are, orange with a ring of pink flesh just beneath the first bite. The kind of peach with juice that runs all over your face and trickles down your elbow so that after the last bite you resemble nothing more than a happy, slobbery baby. So good that when I threw the moldy peaches out, Elissa retrieved them from the trash, cut off the offensive parts, and ate the rest.

I fantasize about peaches like this all year. But twenty? This close to going bad? What's a peach lover to do, assuming the peach lover already has a belly full of peaches? Cook them with sugar and spices until they thicken into butter and heat-seal everything in jars, of course.

Spicy Peach Butter
adapted from the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving

5 peeled and pitted peaches (2 and 1/2 to 3 cups)
1/4 cup water
zest and juice from one small lemon
1 cup brown sugar
big pinch salt
big pinch nutmeg
pinch cinnamon
cayenne pepper to taste

In a large stainless steel saucepan, combine peaches, water, lemon zest and juice. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat and boil gently, stirring occasionally, until peaches are soft, about 20 minutes.

Transfer peach mixture in batches into a food processor and puree into a smooth consistency. Don't liquefy them. You should have about 3 cups of peach puree.

In the stainless steel saucepan, combine the peach puree, spices, salt and sugar. Stir until sugar dissolves. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring frequently. Reduce heat and boil gently, stirring frequently, until mixture thickens and holds its shape on a spoon. This will take much longer than you think it will. 45 minutes is probably not too long.

Meanwhile, prepare canner, jars and lids. Excellent instructions from the National Center for Home Food Preservation are here.

Ladle hot butter into hot jars, leaving 1/4 inch headspace. Remove air bubbles. Wipe rim. Center the lid on the jar and screw the band down until it is fingertip-tight.

Place the jars in the canner so they are covered with water. Bring to a boil and process for 10 minutes. Remove the canner lid. Wait 5 minutes, then remove the jars, cool and store.

Makes three 8 ounce jars of peach butter.