Let me tell you what's awesome: a recipe that uses a skillet's worth of chicken, some olive oil, salt, pepper, fresh thyme, and 40 CLOVES OF GARLIC.
Yup, that's it. Honestly, the hardest thing to do is to peel all the garlic. That's what girlfriends are for:
Actually, Elisa made the whole thing. I kind of hung back, took some photos, and did what she told me to do. This was not a bad thing, because the chicken is DELICIOUS. Seriously, 40 FREAKING CLOVES OF GARLIC, can you imagine how good that tastes?
Ingredients:
- Chicken (we used five thighs)
- 1/3 Cup Olive Oil
- 12 Sprigs Fresh Thyme
- 40 (YES, 40!!!!) Cloves of Garlic
- Kosher Salt
- Black Pepper
Intrigued? Keep reading....
You see that there? That's garlic. Garlic makes me happy.
To start, you'll want to wash and dry your chicken -- thoroughly. This is going to ensure you'll have yummy, crispy skin. You wouldn't think this was such a big deal, until you've tasted it. Sprinkle with kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper.
Your chicken is washed and seasoned, and you'll want to immediately start cooking it. You need to resist that temptation. Pull out your trusty cast iron skillet (we used a Griswold #9). What, you don't have a cast iron skillet? Ok, go to eBay, find one that is approximately 75 years old, and buy it. You'll be thanking me when we blog Shepherd's Pie. In the meantime, you've got all this stuff ready to go, so you need to cook it in something. You can use any heavy-bottomed oven-safe cooking vessel.... the chicken just won't fall apart on the bone and melt in your mouth like it does when you make it in cast iron.
Ok, sit your skillet or alternative vessel on the stove. Pour in a couple of tablespoons of olive oil, swirl in the pan to coat. Once the oil is hot, add the chicken SKIN DOWN. Brown your chicken for 5 to 8 minutes, or until golden brown. Flip the chicken over and turn off the heat. Add garlic, thyme, and some more salt and pepper.
Cover your vessel in aluminum foil. If you have a lid for your skillet, use it! Cover that bitch up. You don't have a lid? It's ok, neither do I. Wrap it up in aluminum foil. You'll be sorry if you don't.
See that over there to the right? That's what 40 cloves of garlic, some thyme, and 5 pieces of chicken look like.
Oh, you should have preheated your oven to 350 degrees at this point. Some people will tell you that this is unnecessary, that modern ovens don't need to be preheated. These people are crazy environmentalists who drive electric bicycles. Do not listen to them when it comes to preheating ovens. PREHEAT YOUR OVEN.
Put you covered skillet into the oven for an hour. Yes, an hour. Don't open the door, don't try and eat some the garlic early. Leave it in there for an hour and leave it alone. LEAVE THE CHICKEN AND GARLIC ALONE.
Ok, your hour is up. Check on that chicken. Pull it out of the oven and remove cover/foil. If the thyme looks like it's going to burn (and there's a good chance that it will), take it out. Yup, take the thyme out. It's TIME for it go. It's done it's job in DUE TIME. It's almost TIME to eat your chicken.
Now, put that chicken back in the oven. Don't recover it, because we want it to brown some more. Yup, we want CRISPY DELICIOUS SKIN, so no more covers. Cook for 15 to 30 minutes. You'll know the chicken is ready when it is CRISPY AND FALLING APART.
Do you see that chicken over there? Look to the right of these words. That chicken is crispy and falling apart.
Garnish a plate with some more fresh thyme (you'll thank me later) and use it to serve the chicken and EVERY CLOVE OF GARLIC. You heard me, grab some tongs and get every single clove of garlic out of that skillet and onto that plate. YOU WILL THANK ME.
Drain the excess oil from the skillet into a serving vessel of some sort. You will thank me. This is great with a big thing of hard-crusted bread. You can sop up excess chickeny garlicy oil with this bread, and then PUT A WHOLE CLOVE OF GARLIC ON SAID BREAD AND PUT IT IN YOUR MOUTH. It's amazing. If you plan on making another chicken dish later on in the week, you can also save the oil for frying. Oil will also form on the serving plate, and mix with that fresh thyme you added before plating. This makes it even more delicious.
Don't be afraid to eat those whole cloves of garlic! Cooking them for this long mellows the bite. They're pretty sweet, and by sweet I mean they are both awesome and sweet to the taste... but they are undeniably garlic. Your chicken is going to fall off the bone if you did this right, melting right in your mouth. I paired this with some hoppy beer (Troeg's Nugget Nectar, one of my new favorites) and it was delicious.
Lastly, our chef, admiring her creation....
We had this with some salad (boston lettuce, fresh olives, and an dressing made with olive oil, rice wine vinegar, minced garlic, fresh lemon, salt, and pepper), and Bruschetta (toast your bread, immediately rub it with a raw clove of garlic -- just pretend the bread is a cheese grater and the garlic is your cheese, topped with some pre-made Bruschetta stuff from the olive bar at the local supermarket).
That's it! Go out there and make some food. And then blog about it.
