Zuni Cafe Roast Chicken

Post by Chad

Roast chicken is one of those meals that everyone should know how to cook, mainly because its easy and when done properly, is 1,000,000 times better than the $5 chickens you get at Costco or Sam’s.

The Zuni Cafe in San Francisco, has a famous roast chicken, and their recipe is probably the most blogged about roast chicken recipe out there. (See Smitten Kitchen for a great example) This is probably due to the fact that Palena has not released their secret recipe for roast chicken.

If you get a chance to go to the Zuni Cafe, I highly recommend it, I also suggest asking for a table facing the kitchen, its a great view to see how they get everything done.

The recipe in the Zuni Cookbook, details all the steps required for their roast chicken in great detail, its a good read, if you’re into that sort of thing, if you’re not, I have simplified the process here.

A few details are key.

• Get the best possible chicken you can. Organic, Grass Fed, etc go all out.
• Get your oven hot, really  hot.
• Dry Brine your chicken 1-3 days in advance.
• Use a cast iron skillet. Not mandatory, but it works great.

The key to the crispy skin and a juicy chicken is dry brining the bird. A few days before you going to eat the chicken, take it out of its packaging, dry it off, and separate (loosen) the skin from the meat.  Then liberally apply salt and pepper all over the bird. This will give you room to insert herbs to flavor the chicken.  Dry brining is a great technique, and is much easier and less messy than a wet brine. I have used this method on Thanksgiving Turkeys as well as Fried Chicken and it works great while taking up substantially less room in the fridge.

Zuni Cafe Roast Chicken
Adapted from the Zuni Cafe Cookbook

Ingredients

1 small 2.75-3.5 pound organic chicken

4 sprigs of a fresh herb of your choice (rosemary, thyme, sage, or any combination)

3/4 teaspoon sea salt

3/4 teaspoon pepper

Season the Chicken (Dry Brine)

1 to 3 days before serving, dry the bird off and gently loosen the skin from the meat as much as you can by sliding your fingers between the skin and the meat. Then season the bird liberally with salt and pepper all over and slide your herbs underneath the skin, (1 sprig on top of each breast and thigh) Refrigerate until you are ready to eat.

Day of Serving the Chicken

Preheat your oven to 475. When your oven is almost ready, start heating up a cast iron skillet on the stove top. The skillet should be hot and your chicken should be dry. This way you will form a nice crust and it will not stick to the pan. Place the chicken in the pan, breast side up and then slide the chicken in the oven.

Check on the oven after 20 minutes, if the skin is not bubbling, turn up the heat, if its starting to char, turn down the heat. After about 30 minutes, flip the bird over and roast for 10-20 more minutes depending on the size of the bird, and then finish with the breast side up for the last 5-10 minutes to crisp up the top of the bird.

(if you have a remote digital thermometer, its extremely helpful)

Let the chicken rest before serving, and enjoy.