Food Journal: We like some Chicken please!

What came first: The Chicken or the Egg?

Hello, friends of read. I'm back today to share some delicious and cheap recipes close to my heart ❤️ ✨.

Back to the question above, whichever came first they are both delicious and versatile as they come. I'll confess, I love eggs, chicken eggs, and chicken, gimme some fried chicken, roasted chicken, bbq chicken, give it to me in soups or stews, I love it.

I also have fond memories around chicken, for example, my little brother Carlos, who also loves food, when he started to speak his first words were about food, chicken being amongst them, but he didn't say chicken, he said Pia, like the sound of little chicks, so whenever he saw a chicken leg he shouted Pia Pia, so cute.

My mom used to make delicious recipes of chicken, my favorites were one that was smothered in onions and the other was stewed with beer, ah, so yummy, the meat fell off the bone right away, that was delicious with rice or mashed potatoes, however, the most liked chicken recipe in my family was one of my dad's, Chicken Calderona.

My Dad's Chicken Recipe.

Chicken Calderona was a recipe my dad learned from his mom, which he modified to his taste over the years. That was the only way he ate chicken, and there's a somewhat funny anecdote around my dad's aversion for almost any kind of chicken dish. He spent more than two years without tasting anything with chicken due to a TV show he saw about the factories where they raise and kill and process the chickens and he was traumatized, to the point that he stopped cooking for a time and when he did, no chicken, and if mom or any of the children decided to cook chicken, we had to make him something else.

Later on, when things started to get rough, the only way he ate chicken was with his recipe, the Calderona Chicken, a simple yet hearty stew, and one of the first things I learned how to cook.

For that recipe, you'll need 👇👇

1 kilo of chicken legs

1 big Green Bell Pepper

2 Big Onions

4 cloves of garlic

White Vinegar as needed.

Cumin

Black Pepper

Salt

Brown Sugar (Papelon)

Vegetable Oil

Salt

Water as needed.

This recipe is easy. First, you put in a blender the bell pepper, onions, garlic, cumin, black pepper, and just enough vinegar to jump-start the blend. Don't use too much, it's not sour chicken.

Marinate your already cleaned chicken legs on that mix for at least two hours, overnight is best for the flavors to penetrate the meat better.

In a big pot heat enough oil and add a medium-size piece of brown sugar, or 4 tablespoons of white sugar if you don't have the other kind, and cook it until it gets a hard caramel consistency, at which time you add your chicken piece by piece, removing first any excess marinade they might have. Do not throw away the marinade, please.

CAREFUL! The oil and sugar can burn quite bad so use tongs to put the chicken in the pot, don't do it by hand.

Cook over high heat until the chicken is golden brown and crispy, and at that time add the marinade and enough water to cover the chicken, turn the heat to medium and cook for 45 minutes lid on.

Uncover, add the salt, and turn up the heat for 15 more minutes to get a thick gravy and you're done. Serve with rice or potatoes.

Christmas Chicken.

We don't always cook chicken for Christmas Dinner, in fact, the most popular dish on Venezuelan tables for Christmas is Baked Pork leg. However, it's quite expensive nowadays so we search for alternatives. We had the chicken but I didn't decide how to make it until December 23rth, and here's how I made it and shared it in my Hive Account.

Usually, we do a simple marinade with red or white wine, salt and pepper, and garlic, and stuff the chicken with whole onions potatoes, carrots, and apples. This past year I didn't want to do any of that first to cut expenses and second to make something less difficult and a true time-saver, so what I did was I crushed a bunch of garlic and mixed it with butter, oregano, black pepper, red wine, and rosemary, and stuffed between the skin of the chicken and the meat, and a simple baste while cooking. The meat came out juicy and the skin was very tasty and crispy, a great and simple way to cook chicken, for Christmas or any special occasion.

Here's how I made it 👇👇

2 whole Chickens- between 2 or 3 kilos each.

2 heads of garlic

250gm of softened butter

Dried Oregano

Dried Rosemary

Black Pepper

Dark Soy Sauce

Red Cooking Wine

Take the Chickens and clean them nicely of all excess fat. Slowly and patiently separate the skin of the meat without tearing it. Mash the garlic with the herbs and black pepper and then mix it with 2 tablespoons of red Cooking wine and the butter. Let it rest for 30 minutes and then carefully place this mixture underneath the skin of the chicken and inside the cavity. Marinate as it is for a minimum of two hours. I did it a day in advance.

Preheat your oven at 350°F or 180°C. Cover the chicken tray with aluminum foil and take it to the oven for two hours without uncovering it. After two hours uncover and baste it with the melted butter and brush it with the mixture of Dark Soy Sauce and Red Cooking Wine, 2 tablespoons each. Back until golden brown and serve and bathe it with the butter left in the tray.

Note that I don't use any salt and this has two simple reasons: one, the butter already and the soy salt already have salt, and second, salt dehydrates the chicken pretty fast so, is best to not use salt at all or just add it at the end.

It looked beautiful on the table and the leftovers are great, you can make sandwiches or chicken fajitas, for it tastes like a rotisserie chicken. We ate them with arepas and avocado, yum!

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See you next time.

✨✨Blessings✨✨

@rebeysa85

January 9th, 2022.