Whole Chicken in a Glorious One-Pot Meal

Here’s a cooking question I’ve received several times:

“Can I put a whole fryer chicken in a Glorious One-Pot Meal?”

My response has always been that I had no idea, never having tried it.

Until now, that is.

The other day I decided to test it out for myself and see if it would work. I had a 3-lb fryer thawed in the fridge and knew it had to be used one way or the other. I may have had thoughts of roasting it when I pulled it out of the freezer several days before, but I didn’t feel like roasting that day. (This is why I have trouble remembering to thaw things: by the time the item is thawed, I’m over wanting it!)

Even though I received the patent in 2005 for inventing the Glorious One-Pot Meal infusion cooking technique, I am constantly experimenting and tweaking the method. This was a good day, I thought, to test out the GOPM method on a whole bird. Since I’ve never made a Glorious One-Pot Meal that was completely inedible, I didn’t have a back-up dinner plan in case it didn’t work. Luckily, I didn’t need one.

I preheated my oven to 450F and pulled out my 5.5-quart oval enamel-coated cast iron Dutch oven. The Organic Coconut Oil beckoned to me in the pantry. I’ve been playing around with this health-giving stuff and enjoying the subtle coconut-flavoring it imparts in GOPMs and when sauteeing. About 3 Tbsps. coated the interior and lid of the pot quite liberally.

Then, I rinsed the chicken, especially the cavity, and put it in the pot. I sprinkled it with sea salt and my favorite Lodo Red Adobo red chile spice mix. Then I tossed around it an onion cut in wedges, strips of acorn squash (seeded but still in the skin), halved mushrooms, handfulls of baby spinach leaves, and the contents of a bag of frozen corn kernels.

Finally, I sent my husband out to collect sage, rosemary, and oregano from the garden to set on top in kind of a pile, so they’d be easier to remove before serving. I covered the pot, put it in the oven, and waited for the aroma of a fully-cooked meal to seek me out.

About 1 hour and 20 minutes later, it smelled delicious. The meat thermometer read over 190F in the breast and thigh of the bird, indicating it was perfectly cooked and safe to eat.

And eat it we did. The chicken meat was unbelievably tender and moist. We discarded the skin, as it came out fairly rubbery. I had to use a slotted spoon to retrieve stray corn kernels from the bottom of the pot where they were luxuriating in a liquid bath of chicken fat. I considered hanging onto the fat to use for something in the future (chopped liver?), but my helpful hubby cleaned the pot before I could get to it.

The kids scarfed it down, too, which was gratifying, and tonight I’ll use the leftover chicken to make chicken enchiladas. I declare the experiment an unqualified success!

While you won’t find this recipe in my new cookbook, you will find other new techniques that have not been published before, loads of new recipes, and even new grains to add to your repetoire. It’s coming out January 6th, but pre-order it now on Amazon for more than 30% off!

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