Video Attempt: Rosemary Chicken, Caesar Salad, and Helping Terry Gross

I know this video focuses mostly on the chicken (and helping out Terry Gross), but it's worth noting that this is a delicious take on Caesar salad that doesn't call for a raw or coddled egg. G'head and try it!

Caesar Salad slightly adapted from Salad for Dinner
Serves 4
1/3 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 tablespoon minced anchovy fillets
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
6 tablespoons olive oil + more for croutons
½ teaspoon kosher salt + more for croutons
black pepper
grated Parmesan
2 heads romaine hearts, washed and chopped (TIP: If you were hoping to serve 6, just throw in an extra head of romaine as I had leftover dressing with using the 2 heads.)
½ a baguette (day old is great)

For the dressing:In a small bowl, whisk together the lemon juice, anchovies, garlic, mustard, and Worcestershire sauce until blended. Gradually add the 6 tablespoons of olive oil until emulsified. Whisk in the ½ teaspoon salt and some cracked black pepper. Set aside in the refrigerator until you’re ready to toss the salad.

For the croutons:
 

Preheat the oven to 375F.

Cut the bread into bite sized squares. Toss these pieces onto a baking sheet. (A quarter baking sheet works well.) Drizzle the pieces with olive oil, just enough so that each square gets at least one stripe of oil. Then, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Using your hands or a utensil, stir the bread around on the pan so that each piece becomes lightly coated. Pop into the oven for 7-10 minutes, or until lightly browned. (If you remember, halfway through cooking time, toss them around in the pan to give the other sides of the bread some face time with the pan.)

Fill a large bowl with the chopped romaine. Top with room-temp croutons. Sprinkle with a few tablespoons of grated Parmesan. And just before you’re ready to serve, toss with the dressing.

Rosemary Chicken and Roasted Potatoes*

Serves 2

1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary
2 skin-on boneless chicken breasts (They usually sell these as bone-in, skin-on breasts, but again, I just ask the butcher to cut out the bone.)
1 pound (or a little more) of fingerling potatoes, scrubbed, patted dry, and chopped into bite-sized pieces
1 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
kosher salt
pepper

* It dawned on me after I made this for the video, that this isn’t exactly a perfect recipe for entertaining, in that it typically takes the potatoes about 15 more minutes in the oven after the chicken is done. When it’s just me and Matt, this is fine as I can deal with chicken that is no longer piping hot (Crispy potatoes, in my opinion, are always worth the wait.), but if dinner guests were involved, I might roast the potatoes separately and instead use all of those delicious pan juices for another purpose, like say, sautéing some mushrooms, which would only take 2 to 3 minutes in the hot skillet.) OK, on to the recipe:

Preheat oven to 425F.

Season both sides of the chicken breasts well with salt, pepper, and the chopped rosemary, pressing the latter into the skin. In your largest oven-safe sauté pan, heat butter and one tablespoon of olive oil over medium heat until hot. Place the chicken breasts skin side down in the skillet (if the pan is hot enough, it should make a sizzling sound) and leave it there for 6 to 7 minutes or until the skin is nice and golden brown. Flip the breasts to their other sides and add the potatoes to the pan, making sure to really toss them around so each potato gets coated with the oil/butter/chicken fat combo. Give the potatoes a few pinches of salt as well. Continue to cook the chicken and potatoes for a couple of minutes on the stovetop.

Using oven mitts, transfer the whole pan to the pre-heated oven. Now, the chicken breasts I got this last time were quite large. Using oven mitts(!), I pulled the pan out of the oven and checked them after about 6-7 minutes, but they were still pinkish. So back in they went for at least another 4 minutes. The good news about this way of cooking your skin-on chicken breasts? It’s pretty hard to overcook them. When I pulled the pan out (with oven mitts!) the second time, they were done. I put them on a plate, very loosely covered them with foil, tossed the potatoes around in the pan and put them back in the oven for what ended up being about 15-20 more minutes until they were browned and crisped. Aaaand, you're done.

Note: While serving yourself your delicious potatoes, you might want to turn the scalding hot handle of the pan so that it’s facing as far away from you as possible as I managed to burn my forearm on it whilst plating. (If you notice in the video, that’s why we didn’t get a shot of me raving over how delicious everything is—because I was too busy whimpering and icing my arm.) But like I always say: anything for you, Terry!