Pre-Holiday Mediterranean Chicken…. And the chicken pot pie which ensued

A word on the title of this post:

A) If you’ve lived in the United States that the retail world seemed to think the “holiday season” begins roughly after (or before) Halloween. I sometimes I resist getting festive before Thanksgiving, but yesterday I found myself singing “For unto us a child is born” from Handel’s Messiah. This is an inspiring soundtrack for your cooking.

B) “Mediterranean” here is not a euphemism for Arab or Middle Eastern, as it sometimes used in the US . I’m referring to the variety of ingredients and flavors I’ve experienced living in France, Spain and Morocco.

Ingredients:

1 whole Chicken

Almond oil

1 large or 2 small sweet potatoes

1 onion

1 large or 2 small eggplants

Parsley

Dill

Garlic cloves

White Wine

Peaches

1 apple

1 orange

Almond slivers

Celery

Beer

Butter

Sage

Fresh ground pepper

Sea Salt

Directions

Rinse the chicken; remove excess fat from underneath the skin and around cavity openings.

In a food processor, blend a handful of dill and a handful or parsley with a few cloves of garlic into a paste. Slide this paste under the skin of the chicken, breast-side up. Apply some salt and pepper

Stuffing: ½ of an onion diced up, peach slices amounting to a few cups, 2-3 stalks of celery chopped, ½ cup of almond slices, and a splash of white wine. Stuff the main opening with these ingredients. You may need to close the main cavity with a few toothpicks. ( I would make this differently if I were to make it again… sautéing the onions and celery and adding an egg and bread…so a more traditional recipe)

In a large roasting pan, line the bottom with almond oil. Place the stuffed bird in the pan.

Peel sweet potatoes, the apple and the eggplants. Slice the apple and stuff the opposite end of the bird with it as best you can. Cut the sweet potato and eggplant into medium pieces. Arrange them in the pan around the chicken.

Peel the orange and slice into thin rounds. Arrange the rounds on top of the chicken. Slice the other ½ of the onion into rounds ad arrange on and around the chicken.

Sauce: In a food process, blend a small peach, ½ cup of beer, ½ stick of melted butter and a few sage leaves. Pour sauce over chicken.

Add salt and pepper to taste.

Roast at 350 F; (20 minutes per pound), periodically, basting the chicken.

*[ Option: In a small crock pot on low heat, cook sweet breads (aka the stuff from inside the bird) in beer, garlic, sage, almond oil, salt and pepper)]

This dinner got mixed reviews from the familial food critics:

Mom didn’t like the oranges, Dad didn’t like the dill. They liked the idea of stuffing the herbs under the skin and the vegetables, especially the sweet potatoes. You too may find there are too many flavors vying for attention. Pick and choose as you see fit.

With the leftovers, I made a pot pie using:

Ingredients

2 pie crusts

left over chicken + *stock and sweet potatoes

liquid from sweet breads

frozen peas

Method

Pre heat the oven to about 425 F/ 218 C.

I precooked the bottom crust.

Add filling

Add top crust

Pinch the two crusts together, scalloping with your fingertips

Cook until the crust browns and the sauce bubbles from the sides of the crust

* Make sure you add enough stock. I thought the pie would be too liquidy but it ended up being too dry and I had to supplement it with additional gravy.