The Great Greek Chicken Escapade

Oddly enough, while I was in high school, I excelled at English and found myself in the AP English class my senior year.  At one point we were doing a Greek mythology section and to cap it we were all assigned a food dish and Greek god/goddess.  We were to make our dishes, dress up, and attend an end-of-section feast at our teacher's house.  My dish was Greek Turkey.  I followed the original recipe to the letter but have since adjusted it to my own taste.  Don't ask for the original recipe because this was *cough* 17 *cough* years ago in the dark ages of AOL and Prodigy dial-up connections.  My teacher just handed me a sheet of paper with the recipe on it.  What became of it is anyone's guess.  What I can tell you is that whether you use my recipe or go to Google or Pintrest for other versions, it will make your entire house smell like food nirvana.

For today's kitchen adventure however, we start with a substitution.  We are doing Greek Chicken.  I am a single lady and as much as I enjoy cooking for an army, the average turkey is a bit much, so a smaller chicken it is.

Greek Turkey Chicken

 

Ingredients:

 

1 oven - set to 350F

1 roasting pan

1 whole chicken - 8 - 10 labs
3 lemons (plus 1 optional squirt of lemon juice concentrate)

6 cloves garlic

2 Tbsp oregano

1 stick butter

 

Preheat oven to 350F.

 

Wash bird inside and out, then place in roasting pan.

 

Put 1 Tbsp of oregano and 4 whole garlic cloves inside the bird.

Cut lemons in half.  Now, here you have a choice - be neat and juice them into a bowl or do what I do.  Squeeze out juice from lemons onto bird and dump 1 Tbsp of oregano onto it as well.  Rub down the bird.  Take 2 of the used halves and place inside the bird.

Take the other 4 halves and place 1 into each corner of the roasting pan.

Place the bird in the oven.

On stove top melt butter, add 2 cloves of garlic - crushed, and the optional lemon squirt.  This is used for basting.

My preferred basting schedule is as follows:

• After first 30 minutes - baste with butter mixture
• Then, baste every 15 minutes for a total of 1 hour - baste with butter mixture
• Then, baste every 30 minutes until bird is done - baste with own juices.

If you are heavy handed with the basting brush and run out of butter before my suggested end time, don't worry about it.  By the time you run out, there should be plenty of buttery lemony goodness in the roasting pan to use.

I absolutely adore this recipe.  For me, it is simple and easy as long as you have several hours set aside for cooking.  It smells amazing and because the primary flavorings are lemon and oregano, the turkey chicken has a light fresh taste.

If you are wondering about sides, I am a huge fan of the sweet potato.  I would also suggest roasted fingerling potatoes.  Fingerlings roast up pretty quick and can therefore be done while the bird rests.  For greens, whatever is in season is always the most flavorful, but otherwise some salted green beans can add some nice crunch to the meal.  I went with salad on this particular occasion.