Garlic Roasted Chicken

Are you drooling yet? If not, let me tell you how I make my Garlic Roasted Chicken.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In a roasting or casserole pan, place quartered potatoes (scrubbed, with skins on=vitamins!), onions, carrots (also scrubbed and unpeeled -it's called rustic) and celery.
Side Note: Every time I work with celery, I think of my Grandma Helen. She always insisted that we peel celery before serving it.

Back to the recipe. Trim up Mr. Chicken (That's what we call a whole chicken at our house before he's cooked. After he's cooked, we call him GOOD!) and remove neck bone and gizzards. Put all this stuff into your larger sized saucepan along with a quarter of an onion, some celery and definitely some carrots (that's what makes your stock have the beautiful color) and water and simmer covered on the stove until the neck meat comes off. You may add herbs to this, if desired, but I would use fresh for this. This can take several hours. When it is done and has a pretty golden color, strain into a canning jar or two leaving about 1 inch headspace and freeze for later use.

Meanwhile, place Mr. Chicken on top of the vegetables breast side up. Add 6-8 oz. chicken broth, white wine or water to the bottom where the vegetables are to keep them from getting dried out. Drizzle olive oil on chicken and brush to coat with a silicone pastry brush (don't use your natural fiber pastry brush for meat if you can help it). Then, take a whole HEAD of garlic, not a clove, a HEAD of garlic, and separate the cloves, rubbing them in your fingers to get most of the skin off. Don't peel or anything. You want these cloves intact.

Place all but one clove into the pan on top of the vegies and peel the remaining clove and rub all over Mr. Chicken and place it under the skin of the breast.

Roast for 1.5 hours at 375 degrees, until juices run clear. When done, remove from oven, carve up and serve the roasted garlic with baguette slices. The garlic should squeeze out of their jackets onto the bread slices, where you can spread it like butter and eat it. It is SOOOO good.

Now, I realize not everyone is a garlic eater like me. I chalk that up to my Italian heritage. Honestly, I can't eat it like I used to after this many babies. But this is something worth trying. And you don't really have to use the garlic in this recipe. But it is very healthy, especially this time of year, so think about it. WARNING: Your body might emit a garlic odor for a few days after consuming this dish.

And, nope, I do not peel my celery. I am too lazy for that.