Pollo Arrosto

       Tiring of any type of food, especially when it is good food, can be particularly vexing. Being in Florence, for example, I have come to get tired of pasta (I know I have discussed this before). It is not that I do not absolutely love it, but because it is affordable, easy, and good, I make some variation of pasta almost every night. On my quest for easy, simple meals that can take the place of pasta in terms of versatility, affordability, and good flavor, I have come to discover the wonders of oven roasting. Italian pasta sauces are known for their use of basic, good, household ingredients and I have found that the same ingredients can just as easily be taken out of a saucepot and thrown into a roasting pan thus expanding what one can do with the already flavorful, versatile, Italian staples. Take onions and garlic for example. Almost all Italian sauces start with sautéing these two classic ingredients in olive oil and many roasts start with a coating of olive oil, a bed of onions, and a few cloves of garlic. This may sound simple, obvious, and mundane, but I think that it is important to see the connections between different dishes of a particular cuisine, for these similarities are what distinguish one cuisine from another and understanding and thinking about these connections fosters a greater knowledge and mastery of specific, regional styles of cooking. Furthermore, when you understand what makes Italian food Italian, Greek food Greek, and Indian food Indian (just as an example), you can experiment with combining flavors of different cuisines with a general knowledge base instead of blindly throwing different spices in a pan and waiting to see what happens. Thus I have been roasting away. I had purchased a whole chicken at the Mercato in lieu of my new love for roasting. My ultimate goal was to open the oven door to a really good, moist, pollo arrosto (roasted chicken), so I kept it simple: I rubbed the whole chicken down with oil, salt, and pepper, stuffed a few garlic cloves underneath the skin, stuffed the cavity with lemon and rosemary, and surrounded the chicken in a bed of fennel, onions, rosemary, and a little bit of chicken broth, lemon juice, and white wine. I cooked it covered in the oven for about an hour, taking it out every so often to drizzle some of the juices on top and in between the joints. I undercooked it at first, but that ended up being good because I usually over-cook chicken and so after ten more minutes in the oven, it was perfect. Unfortunately, due to poor lighting, my pictures did not come out as I had hoped but I think you can still get somewhat of an idea.