The Working Family – Rotisserie Chicken

Rotisserie Chicken is the food of the lazy Gods! But, if you really try you can squeeze several meals out of just one chicken. That’s right, choke that chicken for everything it’s got.  Some days you’ll be able to stretch it farther than others, it all depends on how hungry you are on that first day and how large the chicken is that you scored.

One – Eat that warm juicy chicken straight out of the plasticky home in which it resides. Just grab your fork and dig in, grab that hot sauce and go to town. We’re all family here!!

Sometimes I’m really organized and actually prep a side dish before I hit the grocery store. My go to side dish these days is Roasted New Potatoes and Asparagus. I’m not a huge fan of Italian seasoning though so I sub that with Greek seasoning instead, OPA!

Two – Eat like a civilized person. Sit at the table with your family, your chicken and your kick ass side dish. The hot sauce can come too.

Three – Separate the meat from the bone and place half in a freezer bag (to freeze of course) and the other half in the fridge for later.

Four – Toss the carcass and all bones/scraps (but NOT the skin or you’ll have to skim a lot of fat off later, unless you like fatty broth) into a large pot and fill it with water. You can add some salt if you like but i usually add salt to taste when i use the broth later on. Put it on the stove on low and forget about it for awhile. Go do your nails, or play some video games or something.

Five – Oh ya, I have something on the stove! Turn off the stove and let it just sit there to cool. Go to sleep or something, it takes awhile.

Six – Strain the broth into a bowl and start picking through the bones like a vulture. This part always grosses me out but it’s surprising how much meat is on there so it’s kind of worth it. I put all of the meat scraps into a medium freezer bag with one cup of broth and then measure out the rest in one or two cup increments into freezer bags, fold them to make them more manageable and then put them all into a large freezer bag and toss them in the freezer.

Seven – Make a rotisserie chicken sandwich for lunch.

AND/OR

Eight – Make some Farmhouse Bistro Pot Pies for dinner.

All the fridge chicken should be used up by now! If not then you had an awesomely large chicken.

Nine – Make some Easy Cheesy Chicken Noodles.

Ten – Make some chicken fried rice (this is how we do it)

• cook some minute rice
• cook an egg and slice into strips, set aside
• heat up the frozen chicken with some frozen peas in a skillet or wok
• add the rice and egg
• add soy sauce and green onion to taste

Eleven – After a few times your freezer chicken stash might be starting to get a little large.  Why not make some Chicken and Dumplings and cut out a lot of that prep time in this recipe?