Holiday Winner #3: Roast Chicken With Whipped White Sweet Potatoes and Roasted Brussels Sprouts (Redux)

The third winning recipe was submitted by a Brooklyn restaurateur, chef and friend of The Wooden Spoon. He prefers to remain anonymous.

Roast Chicken With Whipped White Sweet Potatoes and Roasted Brussels Sprouts

This recipe relies on the best quality chicken but is incredibly simple to prepare and very satisfying. White sweet potatoes are one of my favorite potatoes and I’m not a sweet potatoes fan. They are creamy and not nearly as sweet as regular sweet potatoes; they are readily available Fall and Winter at many groceries or at Jim and Andy’s Produce on Court Street and Warren. This dish will easily feed a family of four hungry folks and can be prepared in about an hour.

For Roast Chicken:
3 lb very good quality chicken (Murray’s or Bell and Evans are preferable)
2 Tablespoons Kosher salt
½ Cup red wine
4 Cups chicken stock (preferably homemade)
2 Sprigs thyme
4 Tablespoon unsalted butter @ room temperature

8 to 24 hours before you plan on cooking your chicken, liberally salt the birds and place breast side up in a shallow baking dish in the refrigerator.

Preheat oven to 500 degrees. Using your fingers, spread three tablespoons room temperature butter all over pre-salted chicken, applying evenly to breasts and legs. Place chicken breast side up on a sheet pan or shallow baking pan and place in the oven. Cook for twenty minutes and turn oven down to 400. Cook another fifteen to twenty minutes until the juices run clear when you manipulate the drumstick.

Pour the fat out of the baking dish, place on the stove top, add wine and let reduce until there is almost nothing left. Add chicken stock, garlic cloves and thyme and reduce by two thirds. Before serving add remaining butter to sauce and season to taste with salt and pepper.

If you want to serve the whole bird, you can now just pop it in the oven for a few minutes to heat it up or you can carve it up and throw it under the broiler to crisp the skin. Serve it in a shallow baking pan or bowl with the pan juices.

For Whipped White Sweet Potatoes:
[Editor's note: imitation is flattering indeed.]
4 white sweet potatoes peeled and quartered
1 Cup heavy cream warmed on the stovetop
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter at room temperature
Kosher salt and white pepper to taste (white pepper optional)

Put potatoes in heavy bottom sauce pot, cover with water and bring to a boil. Continue boiling for about ten minutes or until potatoes are fork tender. Drain potatoes well, put immediately in Cuisinart and turn on, adding hot heavy cream and then butter until well incorporated. Season liberally with salt and a little white pepper if desired. Serve immediately.

For Roasted Brussels Sprouts:
3 Pints small brussell sprouts, bottoms removed and halved
2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 Tablespoon Kosher Salt
3 Sprigs fresh thyme

In a stainless steel bowl, toss the brussell sprouts with the olive oil and the salt and the fresh thyme. Place on a baking sheet and cook in the same oven with the chicken (400-500 degrees is fine) for about twenty minutes until brussel sprouts are tender and beginning to brown around the edges. Serve immediately.

P.S. I know I've been giving NY a bum rap lately, but I have to give a big shout out to Wes Autry, who is doing it right. I'm also reading The Pursuit of Happyness, which is not about a NYer, but a real mensch of a man. Just before the Holidays, I stopped a man in the subway who had an enormous roach crawling on his shoulder (he didn't see it, thick coat) and actually flicked it off of him. OK, so one of these things are clearly different from the others, but it was what I had to work with. Look for your opportunity to do good; hopefully it won't involve vermin.