Chicken Roaster Trial Run

Well I finally got the fabled chicken roaster out of the kiln and we put it to use!  Learned a few things along the way but all in all, I'd say the design is about 85% there.

And here we go.

Here's our first look at it all nekkid.

Here's what we're going to stuff into the chickens butt.  Mostly lemon lime soda, a dash of worcester (I'm so not looking up the spelling for that), some garlic, and fresh rosemary.

Woo hoo!  It fits perfect!  The chicken slid right on so it was small enough to fit, and the chicken holds itself up with no problem so it's big enough to support the weight.  Awesome.

Hubby added some olive oil, salt and pepper to the outside of the chicken to get a nice crisp skin.

And it's time to go into the oven.  It's best to put pottery into a room temp oven and let it warm as the oven heats up rather than to put it straight into a hot oven.  Severe temp changes cause thermal stress and can lead to cracking and overall shortening the life of the pottery.  Just a little tip for you there.

Here's what we see after a half hour at 400 degrees.  Notice some of the juices flowing into the pan.

Ok, not very visible, but trust me, there were juices.

After the first half hour, hubby lowered the temp to 375.  So, after an hour and a half in the oven, hubby added some zucchini and potatoes.

And back into the oven for a half hour.  Oh boy, here it comes!

Oops!  A little spill.  That's because there was a lot of juice from that chicken and the walls of the pan need to be a bit taller.  And the handles need to be a little wider to make it a bit more stable when pulling it out of the oven.

That's a good lookin bird.

Carve right there on the roaster.  Can be carved at the table if you're so inclined.

Look at how juicy that sucker is!

Ok, this next pic is a bit gross.  This is what's left on the roaster after carving the breast.

And here's my dinner! 

So, conclusions!

1)  For a prototype, this is awesome.  Works just fine.  We're gonna keep it.

2)  Some of the moistest chicken I've ever had.  Seriously.  It wasn't stringy at all.  By the time I got my plate to the table, it was swimming in juices.

3)  If it hadn't been so late, hubby could have easily made gravy right there in the pan.  There was about 2 cups of chicken drippings in the pan.  Tasted them (to see if it was from the chicken or from the soda dripping into the pan) and he said it was a perfect chicken stock.  That's in the fridge now for cooking with later.

4)  The walls need to be a little bit taller.  They are about an inch high on this one and should be about 2 inches high to properly hold all the juice.

5)  The handles should be wider.  Having them narrow and centered made it a little wobbly taking it out of the oven.  And wider handles would be easier to grip with oven mitts on.

6)  Need a stronger flavor.  We'll be expermenting with various marinades and alcohols and sauces to see what flavors work best.  The lemon lime was a good idea but the flavor was too subtle so you didn't really taste it in the chicken.  But damn that chicken was moist.

7)  It cleaned up really easily.  All the hubby did was rinse it off and it looked ready to use again.  And it fit in the dishwasher with no problem.  I hate those things that take up 1/4 of the bottom shelf of the dishwasher.  This was able to sit on its side so more stuff could still fit.  Awesome!

All right!  So now all I need is some heat in my pottery studio and a couple of months to get some of these made with the new design improvements and we'll be in business!