The recipes for the Cooking Italy group I chose to make were Roast Chicken with Lemon, found on pages 325 and Braised Leeks, found on page 452 of the cookbook we are using: Marcella Hazan's Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking.
Can you stand another chicken recipe on this blog? I can't help it, we love a roasted chicken here and I never tire of trying new recipes just to see if it is better than the last one. So far, I can't say that any of them are better than the others, they all have their points of love, but I keep looking, and in the meantime, there's just a wonderful array of roast chicken recipes that are all worth making. Marcella's recipe is wonderful! (The picture shows a lovely roasted bird, except that part of the skin was dislodged as I had trouble turning it over because this was the largest chicken ever, like five pounds {which is the sort of thing that happens when husbands run to the store for chicken}, and that's not supposed to happen, so you will do better than I did here on my first attempt, I am sure, and not have part of the skin lurking elsewhere.)
I love the technique as you add no fat whatsoever to the roasting pan, start the roasting with the breast side down after filling the cavity with 2 lemons, salt and pepper, then turning it over to finish roasting on the backside after the given time. This is one very fine roasted chicken. So simple, so delicious. Definitely using this method again and again.
To be honest, I was not sure how well we would like the leek recipe. Skeptical at best, thinking that cooking leeks for 40 minutes or longer was probably going to produce a pan of mush and we aren't all that fond of mush and overly cooked food here at the house.
Surprisingly, we really liked them cooked this way, just a touch of olive oil, salt, and pepper, and braise the heck out of them. I did taste them at about 15 minutes into it and loved them that way as well, so am thinking next time I will stop after that time frame just because I liked the texture and color a little better. That said, the recipe as written was wonderfully delicious. Braised leeks...who knew? Definitely a repeat.
If you would like more information on the Cooking Italy group, want to see the menus and schedules, and want to see fabulous food and photos, visit Angela's site here.