Spatchcock

I decided to make a romantic dinner for my handsome boyfriend and I generally couple this idea with an excuse to cook something that I would never eat myself I’m not the biggest fan of cuisine of the fleshy kind but I absolutely love to cook it and furthermore would love to advance my butchery skills, you never know one day I may even partake in the end product.

Firstly, there seems to be some confusion about what spatchcock is so allow me to clarify if you will. Spatchcock typically refers to baby chicken. Spatchcock is also a cooking term referring to a chicken or game bird that has been split down the back bone and butterflied for grilling or barbequing. On this occasion I was cooking the little wrinkly baby chicken kind. The sides I served it with are really quite simple so let me first talk about the preparation, I decided to quarter mine.

Firstly un-wrap your delicate little bird and you may, as I did, discover that the neck is still attached, you should really remove this even if it’s just for presentation purposes as it looks rather creepy. The next thing to do is open up the cavity of the bird a little and see if you can get a good kitchen knife inside, you want to be cutting down the middle of the back bone. After the unnerving amount of crunching you will have a butterflied bird. You can use kitchen shears for the rest. The wing and breast will come away from the thigh quite easily if you follow the rib line.

To cook your bird you need to first render out some of the fat from the skin by placing it skin down onto a hot pan

Cook the little birdie until the skin is nice and golden then turn the pieces over and pop them into a preheated oven at 180 degrees for about 15 mins but keep an eye out because it really doesn’t take long

I served mine with a sweet potato mash with a hint of freshly grated nutmeg, some quickly wok tossed snow peas with a sprinkle of sesame seeds and a good dollop of my plumb and ginger sauce (if anyone is interested I am happy to post the recipe of the plumb sauce) there was little left on the plate so I reserve the right to conclude it was a success.