Menu:
Roast Chicken*
Cheesy Rice and Peas*
Tossed Salad
Biscuits
Apple Butterscotch Crisp*
Recipes:
*Roast Chicken Recipe
Remember how I told you to roast your turkey breast side down at Thanksgiving? Well, do the same thing when you roast a chicken. Here is a very basic but yummy recipe. You can also put this in a crock pot to slow cook all day.
1 (3 lb.) whole chicken
Salt and pepper to taste
1 Tsp. onion powder
1/4 cup margarine ( You may use lite margarine)
1 stalk celery, leaves removed
Season the whole chicken inside and out with salt, pepper and onion powder. Place breast side down in pan placing margarine and celery into cavity. Bake at 350° for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until internal temperature is 180° (82° C). You can baste with juices or melted margarine once or twice. Remove from oven and cover with foil for 30 minutes and let it rest before cutting.
You can easily adapt this recipe to your own likes and dislikes. For example, you might use garlic powder instead of the onion powder, you could slide slices of lemons or garlic cloves or even onion slices under the skin. Try other seasonings, too.
The main thing that makes this recipe great is cooking it breast side down, which makes it extra juicy.
*Cheesy Peas and Rice
2 1/4 cups rice, cooked
1 (10 oz.) pkg. frozen peas, thawed
1 (6 oz.) can of mushrooms, drained
6 oz. Velveeta, cubed*
Combine all the ingredients in a greased 1 1/2 qt. baking dish. Cover and bake at 350° for 20 minutes.
*I didn’t used to buy Velveeta because it used to be more expensive than other cheeses, but it is the same price or less than cheddar now, so I buy it more often.
*Apple Butterscotch Crisp
This recipe is good served with ice cream or for something different, try a slice of cheese or a dollop of sour cream.
6 cups (5 large) baking apples, sliced and peeled
1 cup brown sugar (may adjust to apples’ tartness)
1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup quick cook oatmeal
1 pkg. (3 1/2 oz.) cook and serve butterscotch pudding
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 cup butter or margarine, cold
Place apples in a greased 9×13 pan. Mix everything else in a bowl, cutting in the butter until it resembles coarse crumbs.* Sprinkle over apples. Bake at 350° for 40-45 minutes or until apples are tender.
*Whenever a recipe says to cut in something, that means to take a pastry cutter and mix the butter, margarine or shortening in with the dry ingredients until the mix gets crumbly looking. (I just use my fingers. It is easier for me to wash them than a pastry cutter.)
Photo By: TheDeliciousLife
That sounds so delicious!!!!! Mmmmmmm and a nice thing to try now that the weather is starting to cool down. Thanks for the ideas and recipes!!
Hello sweeties! I love your cookbooks. :) I’m a terrible cook and I am successful when using your recipes which makes my family so very happy. I typically try to use a rotisserie chicken when making some of the dishes because I am afraid of handling raw chicken. I even get freaked out buying it at the store. Yes, I’m embarrassed — I avoid it like the plague because my typically mild OCD kicks in HARD and I end up spending an hour cleaning and re cleaning so I thought I would just ask because I’m ready to deal with it. LOL It started when people kept pushing the narrative that it’s dangerous to your health. Funny thing is, I don’t care if it kills me — it’s the effect it might have on my family or animals. What is the safest way to handle raw chicken (wash it/don’t wash it)? Can it be cooked from frozen in your dishes? If so, how? There are so many different opinions online and they make me worse. :D But, I trust you Tawra and Jill so I thought if I do what you tell me is safe, then maybe I can get over this. You never thought you would have to deal with psychological issues for cooking did you? LOL Thank you so much for all of your help teaching me to cook and how to save money!
LOL Sheila. First thank you so much for letting us know how much you like the cookbook and so glad to hear it is helping you. Second of all you aren’t as crazy as you think. There really are many people who can’t stand touching a raw chicken. My neighbor down the street was just like you so anytime she fixed a chicken she would call me and I would run down the block to her house to put her chicken in the pot for her. LOL I have had a couple of friends like that. First of all this is one of those things that if you read too much about it on the internet it can turn into a huge monster ready to attack and wipe out your whole family if you aren’t careful. The reality is that it is a very tiny monster you can easily slap up the side of the head with one hand and have it taken care of. : )
All raw meat you just need to be “slightly” careful of after handling. Wash your hands after you handle it and the counters or cutting board it was on. Most of the time hot soapy water takes care of it but I do like to add about 2-3 capfuls of bleach to my sink of soapy water and just use that to wipe my hands and the cutting board. That will take care of everything. Now the number one mistake most people make is man handling it way more than they need too.
1. Have your pan you are cooking it in sitting on the stove or counter.
2. I open a plastic grocery bag and place it on the counter close to the pan.
3. Set the chicken in the center of bag. Cut or tear wrapper off of chicken
4. Have a container sitting close by and pull out the package in the cavity that holds the heart, gizzard etc. I use those myself but you can just leave them in the plastic bag with the wrapper if you are afraid of them and don’t need the container then. : )
5. Now don’t wash it or anything more* just plop it in the pan, step to the sink and wash your hands, pull up the edges of the plastic bag with the chicken wrapping in it, tie it up and place it in the trash.
7. Wash your hands in your soapy water again and wipe the counter down.
*Do not wash a regular store bought chicken. This is where the problem comes in. People are so afraid they wash it and handle it too much. So they spread any “germs” there might be all over the kitchen and themselves. Just unwrap and plop straight into the pan. Wash hands and you are done. They have actually done studies on this and say the worse thing you can do is wash these chickens.
One thing to remember putting the chicken in an oven or cooking on the stove at high temps and boiling kills every thing. It makes this food almost more sterile than a a surgeons instruments. I know it will be hard the first couple of times but just pick it up or touch it but just use 2 fingers of each hand to touch it and after 3-4 times you will be surprised how much you get use to it and it won’t bother you as much after awhile. Just hold your breath and you can do it. You will be so proud of yourself too when you do. : ) : ) and be sure to let me know of your success. As far as cooking it frozen you can and it won’t hurt as far as germs go because once again you are cooking it at a hot temp. This again has been studied and proven. It depends on your recipe you are using but you need to just adjust the cooking time and temp. It usually takes about 1 and 1/2 times as long to cook and you need to lower the temperature a little.
Oh and you would be so surprised to know that 50-75 percent of the time we are dealing with psychological issues in cooking more than anything. I know that maybe surprising but it so true. Just tell you that so you will know you are perfectly “normal” LOL