What's for Dinner? Oprah's Roasted Chicken

Ok, so it's really not Oprah, but some guest she had one a few months ago (which with our cable could very well mean it was on last year) but anyway, I've had a frozen chicken in my freezer for awhile and needed to make room for our Thanksgiving turkey so I decided to cook it last night.

I followed this recipe which I thought might be interesting because of the soy/dijon/lemon juice marinade you pour on top, but surprisingly, it just gave them chicken a light lemony flavor. I didn't really taste the dijon. I only made 1 4 1/3 lb chicken so I halved everything and I only used 2 lemons because if you can fit 6 lemon halves in to a 4 lb chicken, you should get a prize. I also could only find rosemary at the commissary so the rest I used dry herbs instead of fresh. I also stuck some of the rosemary under the skin of the chicken which helped add flavor as well.

I learned a few things while roasting my first ever whole chicken-

1. A meat thermometer was key. I was afraid I would under cook it, but the thermometer (which has a oven proof cord that connects to the thermometer out of the oven and even has an alarm when you get to your temp) was super helpful in making sure it was cooked just perfect.

2. No one ever taught me how to carve a whole bird. Or at least I never paid attention. The legs and wings were easy, but the breasts? Yeah, that was pretty much a hack job.

3. I bought a baster for my chicken because I figured we'd need one for Thanksgiving also (got the last one at the home store- bonus! I haven't yet learned the word for baster in Japanese. They'd probably look at me like I was crazy because their ovens are the size of a shoe box usually) which was very helpful in..well, basting the chicken. Never done that before!

4. Lastly, I'd like Glenn to come home now because I'm going to have to eat chicken for the next week. Four pounds? What was I thinking?