One Hand Cooking Episode 3: Hearty Mains
illustration by Michelle Lassaline for our book How to Grow a Baby coming September 21, 2021
I live in the Great Basin Desert and it is HOT in the summer. If you’re thinking you need to turn on your oven to make these meals, you don’t! In our region, we can’t use our charcoal grill right now because of fire danger, but we can use a gas or wood pellet grill and I like making these meals even more on the grill.
These are my fail-proof, year-round, go-to dinners. If you have sweet potatoes and some ground meat plus some toppings like greens, cheese and/or fresh herbs, you’re just a few steps away from a simple and nourishing meal.
Then there’s chicken. Chicken’s got my back. It’s a crowd pleaser, sure, with it’s crispy skin and tender meat, but the thing I really love about it, the reason I feel like it goes above and beyond for me, is because one chicken goes such a long ways. After roasting the chicken, we eat that chicken, pick off the rest of the meat for future chicken tacos, and then save the bones for future chicken stock (I make the stock when I have at least 3 carcasses frozen), which then transforms into soup, curry, or congee.
I’ve been stuck on seasoning my chicken with this Magic Salt from Curio Spice Co. and this Okinawan brown sugar along with sea salt and olive oil. This mix is totally magical and addictive and while there are so many ways to season a chicken, this is my (current) favorite. Before we get to the video and recipes, let’s revisit the rules.
One Hand Cooking || Three Rules:
Safety. Otto will find the danger! The job is to keep the danger from getting him!
Let go. I know, I know. Life is too busy, there is no time, believe me, I KNOW! But have you ever sat down on the cold tile in your house cross legged in the kitchen while chicken roasts in the oven and closed your eyes and felt with all your senses the cool tile on your legs and inhaled the smell of the roasting chicken while birds chirped outside your window and noticed after you took a few deep breaths with your eyes closed you felt SO. MUCH. BETTER?
Accept help. Dear helpers, I love you, I owe you everything.
Click on the video below to watch the episode and scroll down for the recipes!
roasted sweet potatoes with ground lamb, queso fresco and cilantro
3-4 large sweet potatoes
1 lb. pastured ground lamb
1 bunch bok choy, dirt rinsed off and chopped (or other hearty green)
1 handful fresh cilantro
1 handful broccoli sprouts
1 handful queso fresco
Sauerkraut
Extra virgin olive oil
Sea salt
Elmendorf everything blend (optional, but highly recommended)
Sauerkraut for serving
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. Give the sweet potatoes a rinse, place on a baking sheet, and score the tops a few times with a sharp knife. Roast in the oven until they are completely tender and your house smells like sweet potatoes, about 2 hours. Sometimes, I’ll forget about the sweet potatoes for even longer and as long as they are big enough, they are still always delicious, maybe even more delicious, when I neglect them. If they are on the small side, you need to watch them more closely, but otherwise roast away. When the potatoes are totally soft, pull them out of the oven, cut them in half, drizzle them with olive oil and sprinkle with a bit of sea salt. Turn your oven to broil and put the potatoes back in the oven until the skin is crispy, about five minutes, then remove them from the oven and set aside.
Next, heat a cast iron skillet over high heat. Drizzle in a bit of olive oil, then press the ground lamb into the skillet. Season generously with salt and let the lamb get really browned before flipping and browning the other side. Once the lamb is properly crispy, move it all to the side, or use another skillet, and quickly stir fry the bok choy, seasoning it with a little oil and salt.
To serve, put a sweet potato in a bowl, load it with the lamb and bok choy, then finish it off with a crumble of queso fresco, some sprouts, cilantro, a drizzle of yogurt, a big heaping spoonful of sauerkraut and, for extra credit, a generous sprinkle of this crazy delicious Elmendorf everything blend for Curio spice. I put it on everything. If you order it, do yourself a favor and order the 1 lb. bag!
sweet, salty and spicy roast chicken with potatoes, and crispy greens
1 3-4 lb. pastured, organic chicken
Sea salt and pepper
1 teaspoon Magic salt
1 teaspoon Okinawan brown sugar (or coconut palm sugar)
1 pound purple potatoes, fingerlings, or other potatoes
1 pound hearty greens like kale, bok choy, chard, mustard greens
Extra virgin olive oil
Generously salt and pepper the chicken inside and out, then season it with the magic salt and sugar and allow to come to room temperature for one hour before roasting.
Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F. Place your chicken in a roasting dish or large cast iron skillet. Scatter the potatoes around the chicken, then sprinkle salt on them. Drizzle everything with extra virgin olive oil and pop it in the oven,
Roast for 1 1/2-2 hours, or until the chicken is golden and crispy, stirring the potatoes about half way through.
When the chicken has about 20 minutes left in the oven, prepare the greens. I like to cook mine in a cast iron skillet first then put them in the oven to crisp. To do this, heat a cast iron over medium-high heat with a healthy glug of olive oil. Toss the greens in, season and cover until they are wilted, about 5 minutes. Then, give them a stir and put them in the oven, stirring once or twice so that they get crispy.
Take everything out of the oven. Allow the chicken to rest at room temperature for 10 minutes. Then serve the chicken, potatoes, and greens with any extras you want like sauerkraut, a drizzle of plain whole fat yogurt, and fresh herbs.
book updates
You can now take a peak inside the book and read the first chapter! Click here to check it out.
Also, I have a discount code! From now until the release date (9/21/2021) you can pre-order the book for 30% off from Roost Books by entering the code HTGB30
Please share this code with anyone you think would love a book about growing a baby—both the science and practical bits.
Something about a discount code, the book listed on my publisher’s website, and author profiles for Michelle and me is making this whole book coming out thing more real and I’m hyped.
Click here and enter HTGB30 to pre-order your book. Thank you!