A 77 year old Sunday Chicken

I’ve talked about my grandma’s chicken many times on this blog.  And I have yet to make it like she did, I probably never will…but I won’t give up trying. 
I recently bought a whole chicken at the store with the intent of using my “must have” Dutch Oven…that I rarely seem to use.  So Sunday was the day (of course).  When Adam got up early to go into practice I pulled my recipe box out and started looking for a recipe for roasted chicken. I found some recipes…but none that sounded as easy as I wanted ( you see this was the same day as the beans fiasco).   Anyway as I was sitting in bed with magazines and clipping all around me I saw this little book on my dresser that my mother had sent me after cleaning out grandmas house.

Do you see that date on there? 1934. This is my grandma’s recipe book from…well 1934?? I don’t know. but it’s old. Apparently her pumpkin pie recipe is on page 53 and the chicken A La king on page 27 is good too.  I love that my grandma left notes on everything. She had a bad memory (most of the time) and always left notes so she wouldn’t forget. I leave myself notes all the time. I guess I get it from her. 
Back to the book.  I gingerly open it and see that it’s basically a 1st times book for everything. How to cook corn on the cob how to make a pie crust  chicken a la king….and Roast Chicken.

can you see it…

The recipe sounded very similar to the one my aunt gave me that grandma used.  I guess this is where she got it.  So I put all my recipes and clipping away and decided to go with the 77 year old recipe for chicken.
I love that there are no listed ingredients. And that they assume I know what dressing a chicken is. And the fact that I first put the chicken in a HOT oven. really? how hot? like 100 degrees? cause I think that’s pretty hot.  But I see that I need to reduce the temp to 350…so hot must mean Hotter than 350. 500 it is.  On a side note the recipe called for stuffing, but I wasn’t up for that, so didn’t do that and instead stuck some fresh basil inside.
After having Adam pull out the inside stuff I prepare the chicken as directed and pop it into my HOT oven.

An hour or so later (after basting every 10 min!) we take it out and determine it’s done.  Sitting down Adam cuts into it and proclaims “mmmmmmm it’s good” And it is. It’s moist and juicy and almost…almost tastes like grandmas. But not quite.