OMGRRD! Pie Pan Chicken

I somehow have managed in my endless quest, to find a new way to do chicken. Though I must say, it was not over the top creativity, it was more laziness over needing to do some dishes before embarking on cooking.  I chose lazy.

I like chicken. there, I said it.  Baked, roasted, fried (YEAH! FRIED!), in a curry, in a soup, I'll eat chicken most anytime. But you know, one grows bored with the same methodology and last night I just couldn't make Game Over Chicken again - as wonderful as that is.
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Being lazy I just figured heck, just give it a herb rub and bake it and be done with it. It's a Wednesday night for Gawd's sake.

So I pulled out some bone-in chicken thighs and went to the drawer for a baking dish big enough for 8 of them (dang, that home from college kid can eat a lot) only to find I am a day are so behind on dishwashing and all my baking trays were in the dishwasher awaiting orders.

The only vehicle I could find was a largish glass pie-pan and putting off the only other choice which was hand-washing trays, scooped it up.

Bwango, the 8 thighs fit like the pan was made for it, nestled like little puppies at sleepy-bye time.

The rub was in the general direction of smokey-sweet.
Salt
Pepper
Thyme
Oregano
Spanish  smokey Paprika
Garlic
(and a tiny peench of curry power for twang)

I applied, patted and let it sit, deep in thought for about 5 hours till the rub looked like a Diebenkorn  painting, then just before oven time got the idea to give it a dry sherry shower -  which of course I couldn't stop at just two glugs and ended up with a solid 3/4 of an inch of a sherry pool.  the chicken wasn't floating, but it certainly was getting its feet wet.*

*reminds me of Summertime in Wisconsin,  sitting in a Cedarburg backyard bare feet dangling in a kiddie pool while imbibing iced bourbon and watching the Mid-Western sunset.

I digress......

So what I ended up with was a semi-braise situation.  I decided to go for it, though unfortunately, the pie pan left no room for carrots or taters.  The price of improvisation is high.

I gave it a skin-searing blast of 450 degrees for about 20 minutes, then turned down the oven to 350 for the duration.

Another 50 minutes and perfection happened.  A perfectly crispy and crackly first bite into super moist, tender chicken, just dripping off the bone.

OMGRRD Pie Pan Chicken, my new invention.



Served with some wild rice and freshly baked garlic and Basil Focaccia





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