A Crispy Tasty Chicken

A roast chicken is always delicious but imagine if you can make it more so. How? By creating a crispier , tastier skin that only adds to the flavor. There are several different ways but one that stands out.

Melissa Clark delved into this in yesterday's New York Times Food issue. She devoted her  A Good Appetite to creating the perfect skin for a roasted chicken.Like most of us, she prefers a crispy skin, with the crackle and crunch of potato chips.There are all sorts of strategies to achieve this. Some are crazy as in blasting it with a hair dryer (seriously???) to traditional like leaving the bird in the fridge overnight. Professional and home chefs also swear by rubbing down the chicken with salt and even baking powder or a combo of both. Others painstakingly separate the flesh from the fat or poking holes to release the fat. All these methods do work to varying degrees. Yet Ms. Clark wanted a sure fire method. She turns to her own recipe of Parmesan fried eggs and J. Kenji Lopez-Alt's one for frico roast potatoes.It's relying on Parmesan cheese  to create a crust. The cheese needed should be a finely ground one. Timing is everything. Ms Clark has found out that adding it early  and it burns a little. This leaves the meat with a scorched flavor. Sprinkle it on too late and you wind up with a leathery skin. It has to be added on halfway through for the perfect texture.

It's an easy recipe otherwise that comes with a light sauce made from the chicken's drippings. It starts with other flavorings such as lemon zest and fresh rosemary, the last used because to her it seemed like a natural fit with the chicken and Parmesan. She also added plenty of freshly ground black pepper and a pinch of red pepper flakes to add heat and the astringency necessity to cut some of the richness. All of this should be rubbed inside and out of the chicken.It should then be left to sit for twenty minutes at room temperature. If you have the time then set the chicken, uncovered, in the fridge overnight. The bird is roasted in a high oven of 425 degrees F and it can be roasted in a skillet , roasting pan or a sheet pan. The chicken's cavity should be stuffed with rosemary sprigs and then drizzled with olive oil. It's roast for thirty minutes and then the Parmesan is sprinkled all over the bird. Continue roasting until the birds juice run clear (pierce the flash with a knife for this) about thirty minutes more. As for the sauce, use the drippings and the juice from the zested lemon, seasoning with more red pepper flakes and salt. You could serve this with grilled veggies or crispy potato wedges.

A crispy roasted chicken is delight. Imagine making it better with even crispier skin. It can be done, thanks to the addition of Parmesan cheese.