Spicy Roasted Chicken and Gravy

Need an excuse for spending an afternoon in your kitchen? Other than waiting for the repair guy to show up to fix your dishwasher? A long, slow roast for a couple spicy-rubbed chickens is reason enough for me to camp out for the afternoon at home.

My birds were looking naked when I brought them home from the grocery store. I did my usual web surfing to locate a way to roast up the poultry in a new way. Over one gazillion recipes, by my count, are available on the internet for roasting my chickens. I was working on recreating a roasted chicken similar to the ones constantly going around in circles on the rotisserie at Costco. I combined a few recipes and came up with a version of my own. All rubbed with seasonings and ready for the oven, the chickens roasted for 4 hours at 250 degrees.



I'll rate this recipe as a ****1/2 out of a possible *****. The chicken was moist and the seasonings were divine. The drips made a gravy with a little zip; a nice change from my usual sage gravy. An added bonus is I have enough chicken for several meals over the next few days.



Spicy Slow Roasted Chicken and Gravy

for chickens -
2 (7 pound) whole chickens
4 teaspoon salt
4 teaspoon paprika
2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
2 teaspoon onion powder
2 teaspoon thyme
1 teaspoon pepper
½ teaspoon garlic powder

for gravy -
1/4 cup of pan drippings from chickens
1/4 cup flour
2 cups chicken stock
1 cup milk
salt and lots of pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 250 degrees. Place chickens in a large roasting pan or two small roasting pans. Set aside.

Combine all the spices in a small bowl. Remove the giblets from chickens and rub the spice mixture on the chickens, both inside and out.

Roast the chickens, uncovered, at 250°F for 4 - 4 1/2 hours or until the internal temperature is about 170 degrees. After the second hour, baste the chicken occasionally (about every 30 minutes or so) with pan juices. The pan juices will start to caramelize on the bottom of the pan and the chicken will turn golden brown. remove the chickens from the oven and cover with foil. Let the chickens rest about 10 minutes while you make the gravy.

Meanwhile, for the gravy, add the drippings to a saucepan over medium high heat. When heated, whisk in the flour and cook for about 1 minute. Gradually add the stock and milk and whisk to combine. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer until gravy thickens. Season to taste with salt if necessary.

To serve, carve chicken and place on a large platter. Pass gravy with chicken.