Italian Chicken, potatoes, salad, couscous, and fresh bruschetta

Cooking a whole chicken is easier than it looks!!!

WHOLE CHICKEN:

• 3-4 lb chicken
• 1 packet of Italian seasoning
• Olive oil
• Red potatoes

Make sure that your chicken is not frozen at all. I once made the mistake of not having the chicken completely thawed out and in the end......we weren't able to eat the chicken.

When you take the chicken out of the package, if there are any parts of the chicken inside the chicken take them out and throw them away. Get paper towels and completely and carefully dab dry the chicken. (this will help so that the chicken doesn't get dried out while cooking)

Cover the bottom of your pan with a thin coat of olive out. (this will help so that your chicken doesn't stick and burn to the bottom of your pan.)

Pour olive oil onto your chicken and rub it all over so its coated with the oil. You can use as much or as little as you would like of the oil.

Open your packet of dry italian seasoning and pour about half of the packet onto your chicken and then rub all over.  (save the other half of your seasoning for your potatoes)

Heat your oven to 400 degrees and put your chicken in for 15 minutes.

RED POTATOES:

Wash your potatoes and keep the skin on.

Cut them into about medium sized cubes and put them in a bowl.

Pour olive oil over your potatoes and add the rest of your italian seasoning to your potatoes.

Stir until the potatoes are completely coated.

When the  timer goes off for your chicken, take it out and add the potatoes. Make sure that your pan is big enough so that you have room for your potatoes.

Stick it all back in the oven and time for 20 minutes.

After 20 minutes has gone by, take your pan back out of the oven and stir your potatoes. (This will help the potatoes cook a little faster)

Once this is done, put your chicken back in the oven and cook for 45 minutes.

SIDE NOTE:

If you have a meat thermometer, at the end of 45 minutes take your chicken out and put the thermometer in the thickest part of the chicken thigh. Making sure that you don't hit any bones. The thermometer should go up to at least 170-180 degrees. You can also tell when your chicken is done is when you put a fork in the meat and it slides out easily. If its hard to pull the fork out, your chicken is probably not done.

FRESH BRUSCHETTA:

5 ripe Roma tomatoes

3-4 cloves of garlic

Fresh Basil ( about 6-7 leaves)

Olive Oil

Salt and Pepper

1 fresh loaf of a french baguette cut into slices

Cut the tomatoes and fresh basil and add in the Olive Oil. Mince the garlic and then add the salt and pepper to taste. there is no exact amount of these ingredients to add, its all just by taste. If you want to add more of something go right ahead. You can't really screw up this recipe.

As far as the salad goes, I just get pre-packaged salad that I really like and then box of couscous which takes about 5 minutes to cook.