Cooking away...roasted chicken

I was off yesterday in honor of MLK.  Sunday night my sisters and I got together to play some games and I went to bed really late for me (2:30am!).  I woke up and by 9:30am I started cooking.  Remember one of my resolutions/goals for this year was to plan my meals and actually cook more. I used to all the time when I had someone else to feed, and while I stayed with my parents I cooked a lot.  But these days? It is shameful. 

One of the blogs I follow Cheap Healthy Good had a post about a roasting chicken and 4 recipes that you can make to use the chicken.  See, normally I cook once on the weekend and eat the SAME thing all week lunch and most dinners.  This I thought would be a good way to get back into the swing of cooking.  So, I go to the grocery store and spent $103.  Aside from the food, I also needed some basics.  The article claimed 17 meals for $26.  I was hesitant at first since I spent so much money.  But what it really comes down to is that I bought a sesame oil for $2.99 - but I only used a little bit ~0.36 cents worth and lets say red potatoes were $4 but I only used 4, which was 1/3 of the bag.  So you get the idea on how the money part worked.  I now have some things left over to be used another time.

I cooked the chicken (with potatoes and carrots) first, since that is the main food.  Simple and yummy.  I immediately took off all the chicken and set aside.  My chicken was smaller than she suggested (and way more money) so I decided to use all the meat for the other dishes. Since I want to cook more, but don't want to do it everyday, I decided I was going to make more than one meal and then I can just reheat.  So I made her suggestions of Chicken Picadillo - which was super fast & easy and I made the Sesame Noodles and Chicken Curry.  All these dishes were easy and fast.  And since it is hard to eat with out tasting...I tasted it all.  My favorite of the three was the Chicken Picadillo.  My least favorite is the Sesame Noodles - I mean, it is good, but it is cold and I don't know, lacking something. 

The chicken chili looks really good, but that requires me to do a little more work since I didn't buy canned beans, but the dry ones (to help reduce the sodium) and with dry beans comes more work of soaking - and I am not too familiar with that.

During all this I decided to also make my own chicken broth.  I normally use bullion cubes since it is easy and way cheaper than the pre-made canned variety.  However, since I have high blood pressure, bullion cubes do not come in reduced sodium and those big containers are almost $4 (I just made lentil soup on Saturday and used two of those containers!).  What an undertaking!  I threw all the bones and skin and small bits of chicken that didn't come off in with carrots and an onion.  And that had to simmer for at least FOUR hours.  Holy crap.   I didn't know exactly how much water I could have added to keep the full flavor - and I wasn't prepared as far as freezer space and storage solutions.  But since I had four hours and some of it I was also cooking, I had to call my mom to see if I can keep some of my already frozen food in her extra freezer for a week or two.  When it was finally 'ready' not that I knew what to look like, I put the pot in my sink with ice cold water to bring down the temperature and then ladled the broth into a strainer and then poured that into quart size zip locks (about 2 cups in each bag) and in some Tupperware containers.   It will be worth it and I am actually planning on doing this from now on!  I'll be saving money and it is healthier.

Anyway, from 9:30 am - 6:30pm I spent most of the day cooking for the week and I can't wait to eat some more of this.  Depending on how the next few days go, I might need to not be so ambitious next time (since it is just me eating it all) and maybe figure out if I can freeze part of the cooked chicken (or really how to defrost cooked chicken so it is edible and looks normal).

If you have a yummy recipe that you make that uses a roasted chicken, pass it along!

*oh, and for those that are curious (which I doubt) my mice ate the poison. I am blocking the door with my garbage can since I don't want them to get out & hopefully I won't see a furry thing when I open the cabinet...actually I didn't open it today, my Mom did.