Dan, try scalding the skin of the chicken by gently pouring boiling water over it using a pour-over kettle with the chicken on a cooling rack over the sink. The scalded skin will shrink and tighten up. Then spatchcock the bird. Something about scalding the chicken improves the ability of the chicken skin to crisp up. This trick was pioneered by Chinese restaurants that make crispy skin roasted duck. It really works.
Yes, you can do a turkey by spatchcocking and roasting on a sheet tray. I’ve done it twice using birds about 11-13 pounds. The cook time was about 1 hour and 50 minutes give or take, if I recall correctly.
Yes! I don't have big family dinners anymore, so I always choose the smallest turkey I can find so I can spatchcock it and have it fit in a standard oven.
I remember in the early 2000s when I got a recipe for spatchcocked chicken from Martha Stewart's Everyday Cooking magazine ... what a gamechanger for me! I believe I told everyone I knew in Toronto about this method! The best part was suspending the chicken (in a broiler pan) over some sliced potatoes and onions - the chicken juices and schmaltz dripped down during cooking and made a no-effort side dish. Serve with a salad, and that's dinner! So fantastic! After that, I was a chicken evangelist re: spatchcocking! (Plus, it's fun to say!) 😂
I've been using this recipe for a few years, no better or easier way to roast a chicken. I make a trip to whole foods for the bell and Evans chickens, it really does make a big difference
Fantastic job, Dan, with a healthy dose of your wry humor! I wasn't sure why people separate the skin from the meat. You clarified the matter quite nicely. I've been cooking for over 60 years, and I know there's always more to learn.
Forget the kitchen shears. Go to your DIY store and get some pruning shears. Give them a good wash and now you have a cutting tool that works with ease.
I put butter underneath the skin too, especially if I am using conventional chicken which lacks flavour - butter helps to make up for it and then you get the most delicious drippings to make your sauce (if there’s a lot of extra fat I’ll remove some, but I never discard rendered/dripped fat! but keep it for other things)
Best easiest roasted chicken recipe I've been using for years: 3-6 lb bird salt/pepper/olive oil top, bottom and inside 15-25 mins 425 50-80 mins 375 10 minute rest So easy and so delicious.
The great thing about spatchcock is that I use the back bone to make a quick stock to make a great sauce to accompany the chicken. I use Carla Lalli Music’s (sorry ATK😅)
Knowledge is power and great job, Dan and ATK, for all the years of work and sharing! My motto is "Always be willing to learn." I am making this for dinner for my family today, along with the baked potato recipe from ATK.
I roast in the oven with a beer-can stand. Even cooking. More even if you use/have a convection fan. Turn chicken breast side towards front of oven if no fan is used The bowl of beer can stand catches all the juices/fat. less mess and easier clean up.
I like the background music, it adds to the fun of the video. I have always loved watching ATK, they are all about cooking a good meal but still have fun while they are cooking. So leave the music in please. Thank you.
My chicken marinade: - Melted butter - if chicken is not salted yet, use your salt. Presalting is better. - Some poultry demi-glace bought at a store (keeps great in the fridge). Basically a cheat code for anything birdy. - Yellow Curry powder (this is the main herb) - Bit of garlic powder - Bit of msg - Cracked pepper - Add other spices if you want, this is already fine. Assuming youre using a presalted bird. Creates a beautiful brown yellow chicken and the curry powder in butter tastes great. The demiglace gives you master chef level taste like you spent a week making bouillon.
Spatchcocking also puts some slack in the skin, especially at the hip. Since skin shrinks during kicking, a non-spatchcocked bird can sometimes suffer skin splits. The slack from spatchcocking allows the skin to shrink with less risk of breakage because it's not under tension anymore.
"Now something I've been wanting to do my whole life. Flip the bird on TV." Bridget Lancaster, ATK TV S1, E2 - The Perfect Roast Turkey - Original air date: August 11, 2001.
Thank you for this. Small sticking point (@ the 4:30ish mark) - isn’t a pound 454g, not 415? I doubt it changes this recipe at all but wouldn’t want someone to use the wrong conversion elsewhere.
True, but a teaspoon of Diamond Crystal kosher salt is around 3.3 grams. I think they rounded it down to 3 grams to make the calculations easier. If you do the math, 1 tsp (or 3.3 g) of salt per 1 lb (or 454 g) of chicken, is very close to 3 g per 415 g. He could have mentioned this, but there is some math and science that is too boring even for Dan. :)
Buying all my meat now at a great butcher shop. Their chickens are 2.5-3 lbs like they should be. No water in it. I can fry this chicken! That stuff in the grocery store is weird lately. Spatchcocking has been my preferred prep when baking. If you like the skin crispy, this is the way.
@@angelbulldog4934I think the ones at the butcher are raised the way they used to be without all the hormones that create the artificial growth we see nowadays. "Real" birds, not stewing chickens.
If you want to take crispy skin to the next level, make a "glass" chicken by air drying in the fridge for 7 days. The skin goes through an irreversible chemical reaction that can no longer absorb moisture and will stay permanently, shatteringly crispy when cooked. (ChefSteps)
I usually reserve spatchcocking chicken for when it's done with Lebanese or Moroccan type spices. I should really give it a go for a more trad roast - thanks for the inspiration.
This may be common knowledge, but if you're using Morton kosher salt rather than Diamond Crystal, use half of what is called for with Diamond Crystal. Morton is "saltier", so if you use the same amount your food will come out too salty. Bone apple teeth!
ATK's conversion from table salt to Diamond Crystal kosher salt and Morton's kosher salt is 1 tsp table salt = 2 tsp DCKS or 1.5 tsp MKS. Or further to what @mattsnyder4754 said, with a scale those given amounts will all weigh the same.
I cook the whole chicken in the oven at 200 degrees centigrade. I baste the chicken with butter infused with black pepper. I might add some garlic to the cavity. Cooking time : 30 minutes per kilo. Add vegetables for the last half hour. The chicken is so moist that you will not believe it. I cheat with a spreadsheet that calculates how long to cook the chicken before adding the veg.
The first thing I do is remove the wishbone. It helps with spatchcocking and carving when it’s done. I’ll try your mustard pan sauce next time. Sounds yummy
I was pretty sure I wasn't going to see the method that was inspired by the electricity going off! I have to share this, especially with those who think butterflying and spatchcocking are the same thing! May I ask you to do a video on pyrex vs. PYREX?
"Now something I've been wanting to do my whole life. Flip the bird on TV." Bridget Lancaster, ATK TV S1, E2 - The Perfect Roast Turkey - Original air date: August 11, 2001.
So I did the thing to remove the backbone. I didn’t find much if any difference doing this. BUT, the salting was crazy-incredible! The chicken was the juiciest most tender chicken I’ve ever roasted. I’ll be doing this ALWAYS going forward! Thank you Dan!!! 😃
i dont have kitchen shears so i cut the backbone out with a cleaver lol then i place the chicken on a allcald pan and put that directly in the oven without foil. I want to do this method with the thanksgiving turkey this year but have a 24 hour sugar/salt brine then dry it out in the fridge for another 24 hours. you could have brine'ed the chicken too but i think you actually covered that in another episode.
Another excellent episode. The only difference I would have to say is that my refrigerator is filled with other jars and bowls and packages of other food, while yours looks like a sterile cooling chicken mausoleum from the future.
Thanks, Dan! Great info. I did not know about air chilled vs water chilled. I’m assuming if air chilled isn’t on the packaging it must be water chilled. BTW, I didn’t even notice the music until I read comments! I was too focused on your information.
On a big beast, I'd think if the skin starts getting done before the internal temperature you're aiming for, just reduce the temperature to, say, 300-ish until you hit your temp.
@@yvonnetomenga5726 Seasonal alliums that you can't possibly get unless you can forage them or have access to a serious farmer's market. Leeks or even scallions would be a good substitute.
Spatchcocking is a fool-proof way to get perfectly roasted chicken or turkey (if you have a turkey small enough to fit your oven once you've spatchcocked it). And you save the back for stock.
"Now something I've been wanting to do my whole life. Flip the bird on TV." Bridget Lancaster, ATK TV S1, E2 - The Perfect Roast Turkey - Original air date: August 11, 2001.
None of the grocery stores in my area sell small chickens. It's hard to find one under 6 pounds. I used to be able to get 3 to 4 lb chickens, but they just aren't in the stores any more.
When you put the chicken in the pan, do you Brown both sides or are you just heating the pan in preparation for putting it in the oven? I did not notice any background noise or music. I had to go back and replay the video. Yes there is music. It didn't bother me but I would have no problem with leaving it out. I don't understand why they would add music when someone is speaking. It would be distracting to a lot of people.
In some other countries they spatchcock through the breast. It's easier and gives you a roasted back bone for stock. It also makes it easier to cut off the pieces of the chicken. 🍗🐓
Ooh, I love that because the back is actually my favorite part of the chicken. I never use it for stock - it gets roasted along with the other parts of the chicken and then I chow down on it.
You do not need to separate the skin or poke holes in it to get crispy skin. The skin will crisp up just fine in the oven. Rub it with butter or EVOO, and season it, roast at 375F for 60-75 min. Easy peasy. A lot of recipes will specify higher temps for poultry, but this is unnecessary and can lead to scorching. You also do not need to use kosher salt or sear the chicken before roasting.
So how do you make the beans and also make the sauce? I'm thinking pour off half the chicken juices and build the sauce in the original skillet while doing the beans in a separate pan. What do you think?
Try painting mayo on the bird rather than butter. It does the same job but doesn’t run off like butter. Better yet blend fresh herbs into the mayo. Try it you will love the result.
@@busterfixxitt I would say if you have nothing else go for the beurre monté but else go Mayo. The only benefit the beurre monté would have is that its easier to spread with a brush? Making the beurre monté would be more tedious than I would consider for the benefits it gives compared to butter.
Thanks, Dan. I do like spatchcocking a chicken for the grill or roasting. However, I also like mashed potatoes with my roast chicken, so I want gravy not sauce ... I wish you would have included a gravy recipe
My mother always adds potatoes and onions around the chicken as it cooks so they brown with it and absorb the juices. Is this better or worse than just tossing them in the fat and juices after and roasting separately (other than taking longer overall)?
I wish there was a comment about the differnce between this and the relatively same video Dan did 5 years ago called "How to Make Crisp Roast Butterflied Chicken with Rosemary and Garlic". Why the changes? The older one looks better. Is this better or easier?
About how much time should the chicken (say, 4 pounds) spend in the 400 degree oven? When I cooked at this temperature, the skin didn't crisp. Trying 450 tonight.
It does not appear to be a formal recipe: 0:18 but today I want to talk more 0:20 broadly about the best practices you 0:21 need to know to consistently nail a 0:23 perfect roast chicken So this seems to be an amalgam of techniques pulled from several recipes - no single recipe calls for spatchcocking, separating the skin, poking the fat pockets, salting, leaving uncovered in the fridge for a day, basting with butter, etc. Maybe a couple of them but not all. I found roasting at 400F interesting because it seems most of their recipes call for a hotter oven and cooking until the white meat registers 160F even though they've been talking about carryover cooking for decades.
You can also just sprinkle a table spoon of flour into the chicken fat once the garlic and shallots have finished sautéing. This will make the roux right in the pan, so you don't need to make a separate roux.Then, gradually stir in the stock.
So salting... How do you feel about using flavored salt, garlic, onion, celery or seasoned salt as opposed to regular salt for added flavor? A combination of salts?
Garlic salt is awesome, but I would only use it to season right before roasting. It can be a bit intense. So if you’re going to leave a salted chicken in the fridge overnight, just use kosher salt.
Maybe I'm dense but I'm a little bit lost here. He says the "liquid gold" is perhaps more valuable than the bird itself, but then he pours it all off (except for 1T of fat) and never says anything about it again. He then adds aromatics and mustard and then chicken stock (not roasted chicken juices) and butter. What happened to the "liquid gold?" Or is it only for pouring out half and sauteing beans?
ATK/Dan Recent health issues have me on a restricted salt diet. I have looked through the ATK recipes and have found little info on cooking with low/no salt. Any resources you are aware of? My daily intake is less than ¼ tsp/day, so you can imaginge the challenge... Thanks
Given the acknowledged link between hypertension, cardiovascular disease and Type II diabetes, ATK's The Complete Diabetes Cookbook is likely your best bet for lower sodium recipes from ATK.
Do you have kidney damage? Limiting salt might make sense in that case, but I'd recommend going towards a ketogenic diet instead; that's more physiologically and evolutionarily appropriate. It will bring other benefits than just helping your kidneys function better.
@@dejugulators I was just thinking of spatchcocking a brined chicken and not the rest of the process he exolained. Worked great! And I did ever so slighly sprinkle large flake seasalt for that crunchy zinger of flavor
I still don't get how "carry-over cooking" gets heat to go down into a bird (or any other roasted meat for that matter). Heat rises. Cold goes down. So as soon as you remove your roast from the oven and set it in your room temp kitchen whatever heat is there near the surface of the meat is going to start dissipating up, away from the meat beneath its surface. I've checked this many times with an instant read thermometer and the temp inside the chicken (or beef roast, or steak, or meatloaf, or whatever) may hold for a minute or two, but more-or-less immediately starts going down, not up. So, I may be wrong, or my ir thermometer may be faulty, or the meat from the supermarket malfunctions, or whatever, but logically, the idea that heat will go down into meat after removing it from the oven is just odd.
If you stand under a heater, you will feel heat. Yes, hot air rises and cold air sinks, but the adjacent air (and meat) molecules have heat energy transferred to them, even if they are below the warmer molecule.
Temperature will move a long any temperature gradient. With the meat surface being the hottest spot on the chicken it is surrounded by two gradients, the outside air which is colder and the inside meat which is also colder. Some heat will move to the outside air to warm it up, some heat will go to the inside meat to warm it up and it‘ll keep doing that until all three areas are at the same temperature.
I tried this the other day with a ribeye. I took it off my propane grill when the middle of the steak reached 130. The temp near the surface of the steak was 140-145. I put my probe back in the center and over 5-6 minutes it went up about 6 degrees. The heat from the surface radiates in all directions, mostly up but not exclusively.
Think of it this way: whatever meat you’re cooking heats from the outside (heated air) to the inside. The heat transfers from the hotter outer layers through the inner layers of meat. The meat is cooking itself, really. It’s equalizing the temperature by pushing heat to the cooler portions. Additionally, while hot air rises and cool air drops, water is way more effective at conducting heat than air. Think of heating a metal rod or coil. It doesn’t matter which direction it’s pointing; the heat is going to spread through the metal. The same applies to your chicken. At least until it runs out of heat to transfer
Sorry I love to cook but, a Sam’s club $4.99 roasted chicken, 100% the way to go. You can’t beat it they are huge and tasty! That’s not even considered the time effort and price to do what you are doing.
The main problem I see with this method is not being able to make stuffing. It is so much better flavored and textured when cooked in the chicken than when it is prepared on its own.
@opwave79 i haven't done this in a long time but i put potato chunks under the chicken and they were divine. I may buy a bird this weekend because of this video
Best to keep the stuffing separate. The heat can't properly get inside of the stuffing, without overcooking the chicken. That's a risky thing to get salmonella.
I've heard that also, but my experience has been the opposite. My stuffing always gets to the correct safe temperature without overccooked chicken or turkey. I like the idea of putting it under the spatchcocked bird.@dwaynewladyka577
ATK's RUclips folks are a bit inconsistent in providing all the links they should, but how hard is it to find another ATK What's Eating Dan? video? 🤷♂
@@charlieharris3240 Probably not hard at all. I'm just the kind of person that likes to see others do a good job, so mention when they miss something or do something wrong. Always strive for success!
@@OneWildTurkey The promised link to Lan's video is missing too. Mentioning anything in the YT comments does nothing. If you want action, you have to contact ATK directly, but it can be tedious depending on the subject matter. Screenshots may be required.
Why didn't we see your skin care regimen? Hum? I don't do Chicken all that much. An example I bought a chicken and put it in a crock pot. No recipe. 4 hours on high. when I thought it would be done I opened the lid and took a whiff and yuk! it smelled rotten. Suffice to say, I cleaned the pot, then I bleached it, then I washed it again. No more whole chicken, ever. I do have a Chicken thighs in a Dijon mustard sauce I make and another chix thigh recipe that calls for bacon and chopped shallot. And one my sister made that is only breast meat.
I love your videos, Dan, and enjoy your great personality. Oh, but, please take away the background noise. It is so distracting. It competes with your great narrative. It’s too loud. And it’s not euphonious. I just want to hear you!
It's a lot less than this where I am. Some stores have their own house brand of air chilled birds. I also buy extra when it goes on sale and freeze it.
I'm a big fan but... Dan it strikes me as wrong to cook a chicken and then add more chicken stock to make the sauce. Real households bake a chicken...and then we make the sauce out of all of the drippings. We don't throw that out and we add water and maybe some wine to make the sauce. To put it bluntly, throwing away chicken flavour only to add chicken flavour with stock is silly.
A lot of the drippings are fat. You don't need all that fat for a pan sauce. Dan said to pour off all but a tablespoon of the *fat* - keep the drippings: 7:40 let's whip up 7:43 that pan sauce I'll pour off all but 1 7:45 tblspoon of fat from the skillet then 7:46 I'll soften some shallot and garlic and
I pour my drippings through a fat separator to remove some of the fat, not all of it. I save the extra fat in the fridge to use for something else. I add white wine, butter, and a touch of chicken broth if needed. Then I let it cook down a bit. If I want a thicker pan sauce, I smash flour into butter and stir that in. Yes, I agree, Dan poured off way too much drippings. Sometimes I just leave all the drippings with fat in the skillet. It just depends on how much I want to fuss. 👍
I simmer the chicken back and giblets with onion, carrots and celery while I am roasting the chicken. I pour off and strain the drippings, leaving the tbsp of fat and make the sauce as Dan does with my homemade broth. This is the way my mother and grandmother made theirs.
Dan, try scalding the skin of the chicken by gently pouring boiling water over it using a pour-over kettle with the chicken on a cooling rack over the sink. The scalded skin will shrink and tighten up. Then spatchcock the bird. Something about scalding the chicken improves the ability of the chicken skin to crisp up. This trick was pioneered by Chinese restaurants that make crispy skin roasted duck. It really works.
It works even better with hot fat
"Now you flip the bird..." 😆 2:23. Love it!
Yes, you can do a turkey by spatchcocking and roasting on a sheet tray. I’ve done it twice using birds about 11-13 pounds. The cook time was about 1 hour and 50 minutes give or take, if I recall correctly.
Yes! I don't have big family dinners anymore, so I always choose the smallest turkey I can find so I can spatchcock it and have it fit in a standard oven.
@@jamesz1049 that was almost exactly my cook time for about a 16lb bird a couple Christmases ago
"If Jacques Pépin says this is how you roast a chicken, this is how you roast a f-ing chicken"- Anthony Bourdain
No truer words have ever been spoken.
Word.
I remember in the early 2000s when I got a recipe for spatchcocked chicken from Martha Stewart's Everyday Cooking magazine ... what a gamechanger for me! I believe I told everyone I knew in Toronto about this method! The best part was suspending the chicken (in a broiler pan) over some sliced potatoes and onions - the chicken juices and schmaltz dripped down during cooking and made a no-effort side dish. Serve with a salad, and that's dinner! So fantastic! After that, I was a chicken evangelist re: spatchcocking! (Plus, it's fun to say!) 😂
I lay the spatchcocked chicken on a cookie sheet resting on top of a Le Creuset Dutch oven containing boiled smashed baby potatoes...YUM!
@@BenandJuliasMom My mouth is watering!
So...what time is dinner? 😍
Martha is a celebrity not a chef.
@@Mac-t4y She only won a James Beard Award. How about you?
@@Mac-t4y Naw.
Oh Dan, you remain the cutest and best host on RUclips.
I totally agree. I have a mad crush on Dan! ❤
I've been using this recipe for a few years, no better or easier way to roast a chicken. I make a trip to whole foods for the bell and Evans chickens, it really does make a big difference
Fantastic job, Dan, with a healthy dose of your wry humor! I wasn't sure why people separate the skin from the meat. You clarified the matter quite nicely. I've been cooking for over 60 years, and I know there's always more to learn.
I forgot about spatchcocking a chicken, I agree it makes more since breaking it down this way. Thanks for the excellent instructions and recipe!👍💕
Forget the kitchen shears. Go to your DIY store and get some pruning shears. Give them a good wash and now you have a cutting tool that works with ease.
That works. I've also used tin snips. I wash after use, wipe dry,, wipe with oiled paper towel, then wipe with dry paper towel.
I put butter underneath the skin too, especially if I am using conventional chicken which lacks flavour - butter helps to make up for it and then you get the most delicious drippings to make your sauce (if there’s a lot of extra fat I’ll remove some, but I never discard rendered/dripped fat! but keep it for other things)
Best easiest roasted chicken recipe I've been using for years:
3-6 lb bird
salt/pepper/olive oil top, bottom and inside
15-25 mins 425
50-80 mins 375
10 minute rest
So easy and so delicious.
@@gregvandell Thank you!🙏
The great thing about spatchcock is that I use the back bone to make a quick stock to make a great sauce to accompany the chicken. I use Carla Lalli Music’s (sorry ATK😅)
Knowledge is power and great job, Dan and ATK, for all the years of work and sharing! My motto is "Always be willing to learn." I am making this for dinner for my family today, along with the baked potato recipe from ATK.
I roast in the oven with a beer-can stand. Even cooking. More even if you use/have a convection fan. Turn chicken breast side towards front of oven if no fan is used
The bowl of beer can stand catches all the juices/fat. less mess and easier clean up.
I like the background music, it adds to the fun of the video. I have always loved watching ATK, they are all about cooking a good meal but still have fun while they are cooking. So leave the music in please. Thank you.
Spatchcocking is great, but it is crucial that you do not cut off the oysters, which are the best two bites on any bird.
Great video Dan!
Just made this, incredible and so simple. The pan sauce was sooo good. This video made roasting a whole chicken feel simple - thanks, Dan!
Spatchcocking looks to be my most valuable takeaway from this tutorial. Can't wait to try it out this weekend.
My chicken marinade:
- Melted butter
- if chicken is not salted yet, use your salt. Presalting is better.
- Some poultry demi-glace bought at a store (keeps great in the fridge). Basically a cheat code for anything birdy.
- Yellow Curry powder (this is the main herb)
- Bit of garlic powder
- Bit of msg
- Cracked pepper
- Add other spices if you want, this is already fine.
Assuming youre using a presalted bird. Creates a beautiful brown yellow chicken and the curry powder in butter tastes great. The demiglace gives you master chef level taste like you spent a week making bouillon.
Add thyme
Spatchcocking also puts some slack in the skin, especially at the hip. Since skin shrinks during kicking, a non-spatchcocked bird can sometimes suffer skin splits. The slack from spatchcocking allows the skin to shrink with less risk of breakage because it's not under tension anymore.
Simply wonderful as with all his material. Dan is also a gifted writer, or has a good one on staff.
Alway Spatchcock my chicken and turkey, this method works extremely well. Love your videos Dan.
"Next, flip the bird", Bah Ha, Ha, Ha! Nice pun.
"Now something I've been wanting to do my whole life. Flip the bird on TV." Bridget Lancaster, ATK TV S1, E2 - The Perfect Roast Turkey - Original air date: August 11, 2001.
Thankyou.
This was great info!
Thank you for this.
Small sticking point (@ the 4:30ish mark) - isn’t a pound 454g, not 415?
I doubt it changes this recipe at all but wouldn’t want someone to use the wrong conversion elsewhere.
Yeah, anyone who's watched the old Flexall 454 adds shoulda had that number seared, seared, I say, into their memory.
True, but a teaspoon of Diamond Crystal kosher salt is around 3.3 grams. I think they rounded it down to 3 grams to make the calculations easier. If you do the math, 1 tsp (or 3.3 g) of salt per 1 lb (or 454 g) of chicken, is very close to 3 g per 415 g.
He could have mentioned this, but there is some math and science that is too boring even for Dan. :)
@@dcalamThank you for your reply.
Buying all my meat now at a great butcher shop. Their chickens are 2.5-3 lbs like they should be. No water in it. I can fry this chicken! That stuff in the grocery store is weird lately.
Spatchcocking has been my preferred prep when baking. If you like the skin crispy, this is the way.
Yeah, you can’t find a chicken under 5 pounds anymore.
@betsystone5733 Stewing hens are okay for soup and such but that's a frankenbird!
@@betsystone5733 My local Aldi sells Perdue "Reserve" chickens that are 3.5 lbs. for $6.25.
I have never once investigated whether there's a butcher anywhere nearby. Excellent suggestion.
@@angelbulldog4934I think the ones at the butcher are raised the way they used to be without all the hormones that create the artificial growth we see nowadays. "Real" birds, not stewing chickens.
If you want to take crispy skin to the next level, make a "glass" chicken by air drying in the fridge for 7 days. The skin goes through an irreversible chemical reaction that can no longer absorb moisture and will stay permanently, shatteringly crispy when cooked. (ChefSteps)
I usually reserve spatchcocking chicken for when it's done with Lebanese or Moroccan type spices. I should really give it a go for a more trad roast - thanks for the inspiration.
This may be common knowledge, but if you're using Morton kosher salt rather than Diamond Crystal, use half of what is called for with Diamond Crystal. Morton is "saltier", so if you use the same amount your food will come out too salty. Bone apple teeth!
I believe you. He said Diamond Salt is ‘hollow’. That might explain it.
Yes. Unless you’re going by weight instead of volume.
ATK's conversion from table salt to Diamond Crystal kosher salt and Morton's kosher salt is 1 tsp table salt = 2 tsp DCKS or 1.5 tsp MKS. Or further to what @mattsnyder4754 said, with a scale those given amounts will all weigh the same.
To me the price difference between Diamond and Morton is prohibitive. I use Maldon flakes for my "good" salt.
@@mattsnyder4754 And Dan is going by volume. Hence….the difference
Nice method and the bonus pan sauce. Thanks!!!
So how much time on the skillet?
Bell and evens is far superior but WAY More expensive even from the company store,lucky me they are in my home town!
I cook the whole chicken in the oven at 200 degrees centigrade. I baste the chicken with butter infused with black pepper. I might add some garlic to the cavity.
Cooking time : 30 minutes per kilo. Add vegetables for the last half hour.
The chicken is so moist that you will not believe it.
I cheat with a spreadsheet that calculates how long to cook the chicken before adding the veg.
The first thing I do is remove the wishbone. It helps with spatchcocking and carving when it’s done. I’ll try your mustard pan sauce next time. Sounds yummy
I was pretty sure I wasn't going to see the method that was inspired by the electricity going off! I have to share this, especially with those who think butterflying and spatchcocking are the same thing! May I ask you to do a video on pyrex vs. PYREX?
The “flip the bird” joke was an all-timer for me on this series lol 😂
"Now something I've been wanting to do my whole life. Flip the bird on TV." Bridget Lancaster, ATK TV S1, E2 - The Perfect Roast Turkey - Original air date: August 11, 2001.
Dan,,,one of your best videos.
So I did the thing to remove the backbone. I didn’t find much if any difference doing this. BUT, the salting was crazy-incredible! The chicken was the juiciest most tender chicken I’ve ever roasted. I’ll be doing this ALWAYS going forward! Thank you Dan!!! 😃
Dan is a national treasure
i dont have kitchen shears so i cut the backbone out with a cleaver lol then i place the chicken on a allcald pan and put that directly in the oven without foil. I want to do this method with the thanksgiving turkey this year but have a 24 hour sugar/salt brine then dry it out in the fridge for another 24 hours. you could have brine'ed the chicken too but i think you actually covered that in another episode.
Another excellent episode. The only difference I would have to say is that my refrigerator is filled with other jars and bowls and packages of other food, while yours looks like a sterile cooling chicken mausoleum from the future.
It's in a food lab...of course it looks empty!
Thanks, Dan! Great info. I did not know about air chilled vs water chilled. I’m assuming if air chilled isn’t on the packaging it must be water chilled. BTW, I didn’t even notice the music until I read comments! I was too focused on your information.
You can spatchcock a small turkey too.
And large ones
Thank you, Dan!
Is it ok to do the same method with a small turkey? I'm thinking of Thanksgiving and how to cut time cooking the turkey
I did my turkey this way a few years ago. A 12 pound bird was cooked beautifully in 90 minutes! Best turkey I ever made.
@@kathywright15 wow, thanks for your input! Did you put it in brine or just same as this chicken?
On a big beast, I'd think if the skin starts getting done before the internal temperature you're aiming for, just reduce the temperature to, say, 300-ish until you hit your temp.
@@thohangst you're right, thank you!
Definitely!
Wonderful video! Thanks for the great information!
Would a cast iron frying pan be okay?
Well you'll remove a lot of the non-stick seasoning of cast iron if you make acidic sauces in it.
Absolutely OK. Toss some ramps in the rendered fat towards the end of roasting, and you'll be in heaven.
@@bostonbesteats364 • What are "ramps"?
@@yvonnetomenga5726 Seasonal alliums that you can't possibly get unless you can forage them or have access to a serious farmer's market. Leeks or even scallions would be a good substitute.
@@theodore6548 • Thanks for the information. 👍
Add butter to your sauce off the heat to avoid breaking your emulsion!
Spatchcocking is a fool-proof way to get perfectly roasted chicken or turkey (if you have a turkey small enough to fit your oven once you've spatchcocked it). And you save the back for stock.
Flip the bird! Dan, I laughed out loud! Love it. Thanks.
"Now something I've been wanting to do my whole life. Flip the bird on TV." Bridget Lancaster, ATK TV S1, E2 - The Perfect Roast Turkey - Original air date: August 11, 2001.
None of the grocery stores in my area sell small chickens. It's hard to find one under 6 pounds. I used to be able to get 3 to 4 lb chickens, but they just aren't in the stores any more.
When you put the chicken in the pan, do you Brown both sides or are you just heating the pan in preparation for putting it in the oven?
I did not notice any background noise or music. I had to go back and replay the video. Yes there is music. It didn't bother me but I would have no problem with leaving it out. I don't understand why they would add music when someone is speaking. It would be distracting to a lot of people.
I usually don’t brown both sides since spatchcocking makes the top flat, facilitating an even browning in the oven.
They add music to mask the background noise, some people find it unpleasant.
In some other countries they spatchcock through the breast. It's easier and gives you a roasted back bone for stock. It also makes it easier to cut off the pieces of the chicken. 🍗🐓
So just cut down the middle and splay with each breast half at the sides? (Just creating a visual in my head to be sure I understand.)
Ooh, I love that because the back is actually my favorite part of the chicken. I never use it for stock - it gets roasted along with the other parts of the chicken and then I chow down on it.
You do not need to separate the skin or poke holes in it to get crispy skin. The skin will crisp up just fine in the oven. Rub it with butter or EVOO, and season it, roast at 375F for 60-75 min. Easy peasy. A lot of recipes will specify higher temps for poultry, but this is unnecessary and can lead to scorching. You also do not need to use kosher salt or sear the chicken before roasting.
I know what I'm making this Sunday.
So how do you make the beans and also make the sauce?
I'm thinking pour off half the chicken juices and build the sauce in the original skillet while doing the beans in a separate pan.
What do you think?
Try painting mayo on the bird rather than butter. It does the same job but doesn’t run off like butter. Better yet blend fresh herbs into the mayo. Try it you will love the result.
I learned that from a clip from the NYT. Amazing technique.
What about using a beurre monté? It would probably run more than the mayo, though. ☹️
@@busterfixxitt I would say if you have nothing else go for the beurre monté but else go Mayo. The only benefit the beurre monté would have is that its easier to spread with a brush? Making the beurre monté would be more tedious than I would consider for the benefits it gives compared to butter.
Yeah, no thanks. I'd rather avoid the industrial seed oils in mayo. You can consume motor oil, however.
Thanks, Dan. I do like spatchcocking a chicken for the grill or roasting. However, I also like mashed potatoes with my roast chicken, so I want gravy not sauce ... I wish you would have included a gravy recipe
Where can I find this recipe Dan just made?
I always cook my Costco rotisserie chicken this way. Game changer. So good. 😋
My mother always adds potatoes and onions around the chicken as it cooks so they brown with it and absorb the juices. Is this better or worse than just tossing them in the fat and juices after and roasting separately (other than taking longer overall)?
Let's go to the comments section and check in with our experts 🤦🏼♂️
Great Video Info.
What is the link for the salt video? I don't see it anywhere.
When you spatchcock, you should also tuck the wingtips underneath. The video shows this, but the dialogue doesn't mention it.
What's eating Dan? Nothing. He's at the top of the food chain... (from The Lion King)
I wish there was a comment about the differnce between this and the relatively same video Dan did 5 years ago called "How to Make Crisp Roast Butterflied Chicken with Rosemary and Garlic". Why the changes? The older one looks better. Is this better or easier?
And what of the potatoes roasted underneath the chicken and the drippings? And vegetables?
Can you link to the USDA chart? I looked but couldn't find it.
About how much time should the chicken (say, 4 pounds) spend in the 400 degree oven? When I cooked at this temperature, the skin didn't crisp. Trying 450 tonight.
@ 2:20... priceless! 🤣🤣
When you spatchcock a chicken, how do you avoid losing the oysters?
Woah… I just got enough to get some ramen
The AI got the text wrong, about the salt. It should said "3 grams of salt per 415 grams of chicken". It should have been "450 grams".
Is this recipe on their site? Doesn’t appear to be one of those listed.
It does not appear to be a formal recipe:
0:18
but today I want to talk more
0:20
broadly about the best practices you
0:21
need to know to consistently nail a
0:23
perfect roast chicken
So this seems to be an amalgam of techniques pulled from several recipes - no single recipe calls for spatchcocking, separating the skin, poking the fat pockets, salting, leaving uncovered in the fridge for a day, basting with butter, etc. Maybe a couple of them but not all. I found roasting at 400F interesting because it seems most of their recipes call for a hotter oven and cooking until the white meat registers 160F even though they've been talking about carryover cooking for decades.
Try spatch cocking with a bread knife if you don't have good scissors
I am not much of a cook, but I am trying to learn. Could I add rue to the sauce and make it a gravy?
Yes, definitely. (Roux)
You can also just sprinkle a table spoon of flour into the chicken fat once the garlic and shallots have finished sautéing. This will make the roux right in the pan, so you don't need to make a separate roux.Then, gradually stir in the stock.
So salting... How do you feel about using flavored salt, garlic, onion, celery or seasoned salt as opposed to regular salt for added flavor? A combination of salts?
Garlic salt is awesome, but I would only use it to season right before roasting. It can be a bit intense. So if you’re going to leave a salted chicken in the fridge overnight, just use kosher salt.
Protip: brush your chicken with mayonnaise. Thank me later
Maybe I'm dense but I'm a little bit lost here. He says the "liquid gold" is perhaps more valuable than the bird itself, but then he pours it all off (except for 1T of fat) and never says anything about it again. He then adds aromatics and mustard and then chicken stock (not roasted chicken juices) and butter. What happened to the "liquid gold?" Or is it only for pouring out half and sauteing beans?
Yeah I just use all the fat and store it if it's too much for sauce.
ATK/Dan Recent health issues have me on a restricted salt diet. I have looked through the ATK recipes and have found little info on cooking with low/no salt. Any resources you are aware of? My daily intake is less than ¼ tsp/day, so you can imaginge the challenge... Thanks
Given the acknowledged link between hypertension, cardiovascular disease and Type II diabetes, ATK's The Complete Diabetes Cookbook is likely your best bet for lower sodium recipes from ATK.
Do you have kidney damage? Limiting salt might make sense in that case, but I'd recommend going towards a ketogenic diet instead; that's more physiologically and evolutionarily appropriate. It will bring other benefits than just helping your kidneys function better.
This should work with a brined chicken, right? Just add less salt before roasting I would think
I wouldn't add more salt to an already brined chicken, since this is essentially a dry-brine that he's doing.
@@dejugulators I was just thinking of spatchcocking a brined chicken and not the rest of the process he exolained. Worked great! And I did ever so slighly sprinkle large flake seasalt for that crunchy zinger of flavor
I still don't get how "carry-over cooking" gets heat to go down into a bird (or any other roasted meat for that matter). Heat rises. Cold goes down. So as soon as you remove your roast from the oven and set it in your room temp kitchen whatever heat is there near the surface of the meat is going to start dissipating up, away from the meat beneath its surface. I've checked this many times with an instant read thermometer and the temp inside the chicken (or beef roast, or steak, or meatloaf, or whatever) may hold for a minute or two, but more-or-less immediately starts going down, not up. So, I may be wrong, or my ir thermometer may be faulty, or the meat from the supermarket malfunctions, or whatever, but logically, the idea that heat will go down into meat after removing it from the oven is just odd.
If you stand under a heater, you will feel heat. Yes, hot air rises and cold air sinks, but the adjacent air (and meat) molecules have heat energy transferred to them, even if they are below the warmer molecule.
Temperature will move a long any temperature gradient. With the meat surface being the hottest spot on the chicken it is surrounded by two gradients, the outside air which is colder and the inside meat which is also colder. Some heat will move to the outside air to warm it up, some heat will go to the inside meat to warm it up and it‘ll keep doing that until all three areas are at the same temperature.
I tried this the other day with a ribeye. I took it off my propane grill when the middle of the steak reached 130. The temp near the surface of the steak was 140-145. I put my probe back in the center and over 5-6 minutes it went up about 6 degrees. The heat from the surface radiates in all directions, mostly up but not exclusively.
Thanks for all the helpful explanations. I'll keep trying to get it.
Think of it this way: whatever meat you’re cooking heats from the outside (heated air) to the inside. The heat transfers from the hotter outer layers through the inner layers of meat. The meat is cooking itself, really. It’s equalizing the temperature by pushing heat to the cooler portions.
Additionally, while hot air rises and cool air drops, water is way more effective at conducting heat than air. Think of heating a metal rod or coil. It doesn’t matter which direction it’s pointing; the heat is going to spread through the metal. The same applies to your chicken. At least until it runs out of heat to transfer
What about the dark meat? Isn’t it still very undercooked at 150 degrees in the breast?
Water Chilled poultry doesn't even exist in France. Actually, I think it's illegal.
Sorry I love to cook but, a Sam’s club $4.99 roasted chicken, 100% the way to go. You can’t beat it they are huge and tasty! That’s not even considered the time effort and price to do what you are doing.
Only mid week. Weekends I always roast my own. And I can control the flavors if I want to add some other things than salt and pepper.
The quality is probably terrible. Not organic and pumped with hormones.
Wow. Just salt and butter. You know your audience😂
The main problem I see with this method is not being able to make stuffing. It is so much better flavored and textured when cooked in the chicken than when it is prepared on its own.
Just stick the stuffing under the spatchcocked chicken. ATK did that 20 years ago and recently did the same with a turkey.
Agree re stuffing underneath the spatchcocked chicken. I’ve done stuffing, veggies, even potatoes under the chicken.
@opwave79 i haven't done this in a long time but i put potato chunks under the chicken and they were divine. I may buy a bird this weekend because of this video
Best to keep the stuffing separate. The heat can't properly get inside of the stuffing, without overcooking the chicken. That's a risky thing to get salmonella.
I've heard that also, but my experience has been the opposite. My stuffing always gets to the correct safe temperature without overccooked chicken or turkey. I like the idea of putting it under the spatchcocked bird.@dwaynewladyka577
2:21
Salt's hidden talents video? Link 'under' the video?
ATK's RUclips folks are a bit inconsistent in providing all the links they should, but how hard is it to find another ATK What's Eating Dan? video? 🤷♂
@@charlieharris3240 Probably not hard at all. I'm just the kind of person that likes to see others do a good job, so mention when they miss something or do something wrong. Always strive for success!
@@OneWildTurkey The promised link to Lan's video is missing too. Mentioning anything in the YT comments does nothing. If you want action, you have to contact ATK directly, but it can be tedious depending on the subject matter. Screenshots may be required.
Why didn't we see your skin care regimen? Hum? I don't do Chicken all that much. An example I bought a chicken and put it in a crock pot. No recipe. 4 hours on high. when I thought it would be done I opened the lid and took a whiff and yuk! it smelled rotten. Suffice to say, I cleaned the pot, then I bleached it, then I washed it again. No more whole chicken, ever. I do have a Chicken thighs in a Dijon mustard sauce I make and another chix thigh recipe that calls for bacon and chopped shallot. And one my sister made that is only breast meat.
I love your videos, Dan, and enjoy your great personality. Oh, but, please take away the background noise. It is so distracting. It competes with your great narrative. It’s too loud. And it’s not euphonious. I just want to hear you!
Air chilled is up to $30+ per chicken... vs a Foster Farms 4% water infused at $0.79 per pound on sale or
It's a lot less than this where I am. Some stores have their own house brand of air chilled birds. I also buy extra when it goes on sale and freeze it.
Carryover cooking is real. Carryover cooking of 15 more degrees is NOT real.
It'll depend on how massive your chicken is. Even at 3lb., 8°F is a fair assumption.
Also depends on how hot and fast you cook it, the hotter the oven, the more carryover cooking
So sad Dan used a volumetric salt ratio. 😢
He said BOTH tsp and grams actually.
@@bostonbesteats364 he did? My apologies to my hero Dan. I'll have to rewatch it. My bad.
@@jameshobbs At least in the graphics posted. I'm not sure about verbally
I'm a big fan but... Dan it strikes me as wrong to cook a chicken and then add more chicken stock to make the sauce. Real households bake a chicken...and then we make the sauce out of all of the drippings. We don't throw that out and we add water and maybe some wine to make the sauce. To put it bluntly, throwing away chicken flavour only to add chicken flavour with stock is silly.
A lot of the drippings are fat. You don't need all that fat for a pan sauce. Dan said to pour off all but a tablespoon of the *fat* - keep the drippings:
7:40
let's whip up
7:43
that pan sauce I'll pour off all but 1
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tblspoon of fat from the skillet then
7:46
I'll soften some shallot and garlic and
I pour my drippings through a fat separator to remove some of the fat, not all of it. I save the extra fat in the fridge to use for something else. I add white wine, butter, and a touch of chicken broth if needed. Then I let it cook down a bit. If I want a thicker pan sauce, I smash flour into butter and stir that in. Yes, I agree, Dan poured off way too much drippings. Sometimes I just leave all the drippings with fat in the skillet. It just depends on how much I want to fuss. 👍
I simmer the chicken back and giblets with onion, carrots and celery while I am roasting the chicken. I pour off and strain the drippings, leaving the tbsp of fat and make the sauce as Dan does with my homemade broth. This is the way my mother and grandmother made theirs.
What? He used some of it for a pan sauce and the rest to cook the green beans...
Stop the music!!!!!!!!!!!
You ok?