Cooking for one is depressing. I hate when I have to make dinner for just me. Give me the chance to cook for friends, family, boyfriend, whatever, any day….please. Everyone has their own way of expressing love and enjoyment to other people, be it music, art, sports, whatever. For me, I connect to others through cooking. And, if I do say so myself, I’m pretty damn good at it!
As a child, I was raised in the kitchen by my family. My mom, dad, two younger sisters and I made a habit of making meals together. I remember marathon days where the galley slaves (us girls) would chop and chop and chop mountains of vegetables to add to a soup pot as tall as we were. Granted, we’re all pretty short girls, but still!
From this habit, certain traditions and goings-on developed. We were one of the few families we knew, to everyone else’s detriment, who had to eat dinner at the same time. Together. Of the same food. At the table. Every day. Also, holidays! O the holiday traditions! We now, thanks to me and Jamie Oliver (more on this in another post), have a dish for every major holiday that we celebrate as a family. I mean, a complete menu that is involved and way too much food for ten armies, much less the tableful that we manage.
Sadly, as time goes on, we girls get older and our family is more and more spread out. College, activities, moving, all try to keep us apart. However, through it all, we’ve been able to maintain the traditions and the closeness that meals and cooking bring to our family.
Nowadays, the most important meal to my family is Sunday dinner. Every Sunday, all of us (who can) gather to enjoy a meal together….let me rephrase…usually my mom and I gather to cook the meal, we all sit down to eat and talk and catch up and everyone else (non-cooks) has to clean after we eat, hehe. This meal is a touchstone, a connection point that keeps our family together and eating.
This Sunday, I got to cook my rendition of “Roast Chicken.” This is probably the first meal that I owned. It’s easy enough to roast a chicken but to be able to roast a chicken consistently and for it to be yummy is a skill! One I have acquired! But that is only one important skill for this dish that I have learned by example and through trial and error. The, arguably, more important skill that this dish taught me is how to make a goooooooood gravy. My mother, born and raised East Texan, was taught how to make gravy by her grandmother. I’m lucky enough to have mastered (nine out of ten times) the art of gravy-making. And to not make a gravy from the drippings of a roast chicken would be sacrilege.
I start out with a chicken (duh), some onions, garlic, fresh thyme, a lemon, some carrots and potatoes. I chop up the carrots and potatoes into one inch pieces in an attempt to get them to cook evenly…..good luck, but the crispy ones will be fought over. I then steam those for fifteen minutes while I prep everything else. Season the chicken well both inside and out, then throw in five or six smashed cloves of garlic, a handful of thyme sprigs and a lemon – usually I roll the lemon on the counter a bit to get the juices a-flowin’.
Then I lay the chicken on top of a comfy bed of sliced onion rounds.
Toss the veggies in olive oil (to coat) salt, pepper and some thyme, spread those around the chicken in the pan and put in a 425 degree oven for 30 minutes. Turn the oven down to 375 for another hour and out comes a delicious roast chicken and veggies.
On to the gravy. I put the chicken on a board and tent it with tinfoil so it will rest and recombobulate. I take the veggies and onions and put them into a bowl and put some foil over that too so they’ll stay warm. Then I deglaze the pan. Since I use a pan that can be both in the oven and on the stove, I have it made and can just transfer directly to the stove.
This is my secret in these kinds of gravies, shhh, don’t tell my mom’s grandmother, but I deglaze with sherry. Not too much, but it adds a richness to the end product that has converted my family with no fight at all! So, deglaze, add flour to make a roux, cook the raw flour taste out, add milk, verrry slowly to decrease the likelihood of lumps and season to taste. There you have it! My roast chicken and vegetables with yummy gravy.
To complete our Sunday dinner, though, we always include a salad (Caesar in this case), bread (baguette), and a green vegetable (steamed broccoli). That way everyone has something they love and something they can complain about!
Next Sunday dinner, I get to participate in a marathon soup making process. I’ll be joining my dad to learn his secrets for his beef and vegetable soup. I’ll take copious notes and if I perform the secret handshake right, I’ll be able to share “Dad’s Vegetable Soup” with you, so keep an eye out for it!
This may surprise you, but I love good gravy. I come by this affection naturally, from years of watching my mom do the “Good Gravy Dance.†This dance only occurs when the Gravy Gods smile upon the roux and meat drippings and incorporation of milk and salt to create a gravy that is so darn good that you cannot help but boogie*.
