30 Minute Chicken & Vegetable Dinner
Since I’ve gotten my new Deep Covered Baker, I’ve been wanting to try some recipes and tonight was the 30 Minute Chicken. Supposedly, I can cook a whole chicken in the microwave in 30 minutes. This is my first time cooking a full chicken, so we’ll see how this works. If this works, I’m going to start wishing for a smaller turkey so I can try that as well.
The recipe calls to keep the skin on, but since we’re all about going healthy, I took the skin off – which by the way is not as easy as it seems and yet it is. The skin comes off pretty easily, but getting to all the skin was the hard part. I ended up leaving some skin on, but mainly around the bones and other joints where my knife couldn’t get too. If you want to try this recipe with the skin, then you need to add 5 minutes to the cook time (i.e. 30-35 minutes is really 35-40 minutes).
I am deviating from the original recipe a little. Since I decided to cook some red potatoes along with the chicken, I doubled the spice measurements so I had enough to coat the potatoes as well. Basically, I rubbed the spices into the chicken, but I didn’t use all of it. After cutting up the potatoes, I mixed in the remaining spices to coat all the pieces. This worked really well and I had plenty of spice to do this with. Granted, I was going to add carrots to this mixture as well, but the carrots didn’t like that idea.
The recipe didn’t actually take all that long to prepare and it’s smelled really good right while it was cooking. However, the recipe says to keep the chicken uncovered and it so did not get up to an internal temperature of 160 degrees within the 30 minutes. I ended up cooking it for 35 minutes uncovered and then an additional 20 minutes covered in order to get it to the right temperature. So I’m changing that part of the directions where it says to keep it uncovered.
Otherwise, the chicken came out beautifully. It was moist, fell apart, and even the kid went back for fifths (that’s right, fifths). I’m thinking if I change the directions to leaving the chicken covered for the 30 minutes (which I think I already did), then this recipe will work out beautifully and is very easily modified. I’m referring to the spices. I could so see doing this same thing with the Monterrey Chicken Seasoning or some kind of Italian blend. The potatoes came out alright, but I wouldn’t be against leaving them out next time.
Ingredients:
1 whole chicken (3½-4 pounds)
1 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp all-purpose flour
2 tsp paprika
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp coarsely ground black pepper
1/2 tsp dried thyme leaves
1 cup carrots, cut into 1-inch pieces
3 cups red or russet potatoes, cut into 2-inch pieces
Directions:
- Lightly spray Deep Covered Baker with oil using Kitchen Spritzer. Remove and discard giblets and neck from chicken cavity. Rinse chicken with cold water; pat dry with paper towels. Trim excess fat using Kitchen Shears, if necessary. Tie ends of legs together with cotton string. Lift wing tips up toward neck; then tuck under back of chicken. Place chicken on Cutting Board; brush with oil using Chef’s Silicone Basting Brush.
- For seasoning mixture, combine ingredients in Prep Bowl; mix well. Completely coat outside of chicken with seasoning mixture. Place chicken, breast side up, in baker.
- Combine 1 cup each celery and carrots, cut into 1-inch pieces, and 3 cups red or russet potatoes, cut into 2-inch pieces, in Classic Batter Bowl. Toss with additional seasoning, if desired. Arrange vegetables around chicken.
- Microwave, covered, on HIGH 30-35 minutes or until Pocket Thermometer registers 165 degrees F in thickest part of breast and juices run clear. Remove from microwave and let rest 10 minutes (temperature will rise to 170 degrees F).
Yield: 4-6 servings
Nutrients per serving for the chicken only: Calories 490, Total Fat 29g, Saturated Fat 8g, Cholesterol 165mg, Carbohydrate 2g, Protein 52g, Sodium 450mg, Fiber 0g