Molly Makes Roast Chicken and Potatoes

Okay, I made you a gochujang chicken,

but also before we dig into this,

I just wanna say that I saved you the best part.

My favorite part.

This is the tail.

Is that what it is?

I call it the butt.

The butt, it's really the chicken's butt.

Isn't there a nice name for it like Pope's Nose?

The Pope's nose.

Pope's nose, but it's a butt.

Everybody always talks about the oyster

on the chicken, and that the oyster is old news.

So earth to world, it's all about

the chicken butt. Chicken butt, chicken butt.

[string bass music]

Here we are, folks, in the Bon Apetit test kitchen.

Today we are making slow roasted gochujang chicken,

which is a recipe that I developed for

eatbasically.com.

It's one of those extremely

low-effort, high-reward recipes.

The other thing that's gonna happen,

while this chicken slow roasts at 300 degrees,

is there's gonna be a bunch of little

baby potatoes that are nestled in the skillet with it,

and they are going to cook in all of the schmaltzy,

gochujang drippings that come off the chicken,

and that might be the best part.

The setup of this goes a little bit like this.

One three and half to four pound chicken.

You always want to pat your chicken dry

so that when it hits the oven,

the skin can immediately start getting crispy.

If there's a lot of water still all over the chicken,

it will impeded browning, and we're looking

for a nice, caramelized, brown skin.

So I'm going to generously season this chicken,

all sides, with salt and pep.

Look, his little wings are already tucked in.

And then it's also great practice

to season the inside of the cavity.

Because that way, you're seasoning it

from the inside out, and not just on the skin.

If you have the time to do this in advance,

season this the night before

and leave it uncovered in your fridge.

It will make a huge difference in terms of

both the texture of the flesh, but also

how juicy and seasoned it is.

Let's put some garlic right inside the cavity.

This will just sort of perfume it.

I'm cutting two whole heads of garlic in half.

Half of it is going to be in the skillet

with the potatoes, and the other half is getting tucked,

here let me spin this around, right in the cavity.

Then I have a little bit of kitchen twine, actually a lot.

This is my preferred method of trussing,

is just take the two legs, cross them,

and then tie them up just with a single knot.

Now for the gochujang rub.

I'm gonna take five tablespoons of gochujang,

which I'm going to approximate.

So my very precise measurement of five tablespoons

right here, and then as you can see it's very thick,

so we're going to add some oil to that

and that's gonna help thin it out

to make it a little bit more slatherable.

I'm gonna stream in approximately

one quarter cup of olive oil.

So this is thinning it out a bit.

The oil is also going to help conduct some heat

and create that really nice golden brown chicken skin.

That feels about right.

So now three cloves of grated garlic on a microplane.

I'm adding about one and half inches of fresh ginger.

So I'm going to break this down into

what I think is about one and a half inches.

So whisking that all in, and now this is

a nice bright red paste that we can

brush all over the chicken.

Pastry brush, very crucial tool here.

I'm coating every nook and cranny

with some of this marinade.

One thing about gochujang is that

there's quite a bit of sugar in it.

That's what makes it very delicious,

and that also helps in the browning process.

Because since we're cooking this chicken

at such a low temperature, it actually

doesn't really have the tendency to get

super golden brown, the way a chicken might

if you roasted it at like 450.

So the added sugar in the chili paste,

is really gonna aid in that process

so you don't miss out on any of that.

Okay, one and half pounds of baby creamer potatoes.

If you can't find potatoes that are this small,

you need to cut your potatoes down

to approximately this size, because that way

they'll cook at the same rate that the chicken does

and when the chicken's done, the potatoes will be done.

They are going into this bowl with the rest

of the marinade, and they're gonna get all coated,

because we don't want to leave any of that behind.

I'm going to add a little bit more oil to that,

just to help them get started in the oven.

Then, once the chicken starts cooking

and all the schmaltz starts dripping down,

the magic will start happening.

They're gonna go straight into a 12-inch

cast iron skillet.

It's pretty important that you use a 12-inch skillet

because what we're going to do next

is place the chicken in the middle of the skillet

making sure that none of the potatoes

are actually under the chicken,

because any potatoes left under the chicken,

and I know this because I tested it out

several times, will be so insulated by the chicken

that they will take much, much longer to cook

than any of the potatoes around the outside,

and everything will cook unevenly.

Basically, just scoot these little guys out

and make space for your chick, so that

everything is finished at the same time.

Sorry for the messy.

There we go.

It really truly is the same color,

or like a more intense version of it.

We're gonna put this sunset bird

in the oven at 300 degrees for anywhere

between two and three hours, depending on

how big and how hot your oven is,

and what else is in there.

My oven at home takes three full hours

to cook a chicken this way.

These ovens in the test kitchen are huge

and very powerful, and although it's set to

the same temperature, the birds finish sooner

in these large, industrial ovens.

So you'll start checking around two hours.

Okay, it has been five minutes,

because there's another chicken that's

been in the oven the whole time.

I don't wanna lie to you guys any more,

it doesn't feel right.

So let's go check on the chicken that's

been in the oven this entire time, because

it has been in there for two and a half hours.

And she's looking real nice

Okay, there's a lot of really delicious,

schmaltzy gochujang drippings down here.

Wow, I mean, wow, pretty stunning.

Okay, let's just do a quick potato doneness test.

I just wanna make sure that when I

put a little bit of pressure on it,

the potato gives and smushes, which it has done.

I could even break into it, as I just did,

with just a spoon.

So it is tender.

Let's bring this over and, as with all

roast proteins, let it rest for about ten minutes.

Meanwhile, we'll slice up some scallions.

I'm gonna cut them on a very extreme bias

so that they're nice and angular and geometric.

I'm gonna cut both of these limes in half

and actually, one of them I'm going to

cut into wedges for serving,

so that people can squeeze to their liking.

But I will say that the potatoes are

going to need a little bit of lift

and a little brightness and acidity,

and that's going to come in the form of

scallions and lime juice.

We'll transfer this to the cutting board.

What we're gonna do now is smash

all of the potatoes, just enough to split them open

so that the insides are exposed, and give them

a chance to soak up all of the juice

that's at the bottom, 'cause we wouldn't want

to waste any of that.

And they're basically like little potato sponges now.

Don't those look nice and fun?

Oh my god, look at that frigging garlic.

Would you look at it?

We're going to add about two teaspoons.

I'm not gonna measure it, it just seems silly.

I'm gonna do a drizzle of about

two teaspoons of honey, the juice of two limes.

Oh, such a juicy lime, what a pleasure.

And then some of these here scallion

get tossed in, and then finally

we're going to carve this chicken.

Okay, so there's all of our parts.

Then the way that I like to serve this

is just straight out of the skillet,

because the presentation of it

is really pretty that way.

And the skillet has now cooled down a bit.

So just nestling all the pieces

right back in there, and just throw it

on the table and that's your centerpiece.

What can I offer you, like in terms of

dark, light-- I would love a thigh.

A thigh? Yeah, a thigh.

No problem, coming right up.

Wow, thank you, mm, what service.

And then can I give you some schmaltzy peas?

Yes please.

'Cause those are maybe the best part,

second only to, wait for it,

please check this out.

[Cook] That came out very, that's pretty excellent.

[Molly] It's excellent-looking garlic, right?

[Cook] It looks beautiful.

Mm, delicious.

I very, like, barbecue-y.

Like Korean barbecue-y?

I was thinking more KC Masterpiece.

What is that?

[bleep] [muffled speech off-camera]

KC Masterpiece, is that the name of the--

The really bad barbecue sauce that you buy.

But this is like that, all grown up.

[Molly] Okay, say fine.

[Cook] Great work.

[Molly] Thank you.

[mumbles]

Namaste.

[muttering]

That's a good one.

[Man Off-Camera] Yeah, I just came up with that.

[laughing]