How to cook a goddamn chicken

A long time ago, a stranger on a train asked me t̶o̶ ̶k̶i̶l̶l̶ ̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶w̶i̶f̶e̶ how to cook food. He was a new freshman at university and he'd literally never cooked in his life. Recipes can be intimidating with their exact amounts and timings.

*This* is not exact, not confusing, and hopefully not intimidating. There are no measuring cups, no teaspoons. It's all hand-wavey and you'll have a very hard time screwing this up.

I've been told this is called "spatchcock" chicken. You don't need to know that, except to impress a date with fancy words.

All the shit we need.

1. A whole chicken.
2. A bunch of things that grew underground. It doesn't matter which ones. Here I have some onions, some garlic, potatoes, and some carrots. Buy what you enjoy, or whatever is cheap.
3. Olive oil. Or vegetable oil. The chicken doesn't care.
4. Salt, pepper, and (optionally) some rosemary. Rosemary is pretty fuckin' baller with chicken, but again, make it up as you go.
5. Tools. A big pan or baking sheet to cook everything in. Some cutting boards. A big ass knife. Peeler is useful for carrots. Foil will make cleaning up easy. Oven mitts to not burn your hands.

6. Not pictured, but later remembered: A sharp pair of scissors, and a bowl.

Pre-heat that oven to 375F, 190C.

Foil up that sheet. When you're done, cleaning will take seconds, not goddamn hours.

Now wash your dirty goddamn hands. Seriously, how many terrible things have you touched today? You don't want that shit on your food. Get the soap in there, wash all the way up your wrists.

Okay, we got a chicken. What will we do with it?

We'll rip out it's goddamn spine, that's what. Grab your sharp (CLEAN) scissors, and cut down along one side of the spine.

And then cut along the other side.

Boom, it's as spineless as you when you chickened out of chatting up that sexy person that one time. Also insert "brutal" gif because you just cut the spine out of an animal.

What do you do with the spine? If you're a pro chef dude, you use it to make stock or some shit later tonight. Me? I throw it the fuck out.

Flip that chicken over and press it as flat as you can. You're breaking something in the chest as you do this, but that's fine. A nice flat chicken will cook faster. Then hit it with some oil. Rub that oil everywhere like it's SPF50 and you're taking the chicken to the beach.

Then wash your hands again, because yeeggh, chicken goo isn't good for anyone.

Salt, pepper, rosemary. Don't even have to touch the chicken, just drop it all over it. Both sides if you want to go really wild.

And boom, she's on the pan and ready to cook. She just needs some company.

Not-an-idiot-tip: clean as you go.

You'll actually want that cutting board later when the chicken is cooked, and if it's covered in raw chicken goo you'll wind up poisoning your chosen sexy person and yourself, which will ruin the mood at 3am when you both shit the bed.

Hey, remember that shit-that-grows-underground? Let's cut it into bite-sized-ish bits.

Taters and Garlicks.

Un-yuns.

Carts (peeled first)

Get it all in a big bowl.

Oil, salt, pepper. Just a bit, then mix it all up.

But wait mabbo, this is a huge bowl of stuff and there clearly isn't room on that baking sheet with the chicken!

Life, uhhh, finds a way.

I lifted up the chicken, dumped it all on the sheet, then put the chicken on top of everything. Now my chicken juices are going to drip all over those veggies and holy shit you want that to happen.

In she goes. Your oven will probably be hot enough at this point.

Woah, what a horrible mess.

Boom! It's gone! Because we clean as we go 'cause we're not dipshits!

Timer, 30 minutes. Now hold on tiger, we don't get to eat in 30 minutes, we just need to stir it a bit then.

I do a favour to future-mabbo and I get everything ready for the next steps.

And then as a reward, I get a lovely beer.

30 minutes later, what do we got here? It's a half-cooked chicken.

Stop a moment, and just smell that joy pouring out of the oven.

Now shake the pan up a bit, make sure nothing is sticking to the foil, and then get that bastard right back into the heat.

Let's give 'er another 25 minutes.

And maybe a second reward because god *damn* do I love this brewery (http://collectiveartsbrewing.com, I have no affiliation with them beyond being a satisfied customer).

Time's up!

Well don't that look peachy.

Now, if you're a brave man you might just say "It's been cooking nearly an hour, it's probably fine". I am not so brave, so I have a meat thermometer. 160F is good for chicken. Seriously though, if this thermometer were dead I wouldn't sweat it- an hour is probably good to go.

Potatoes are soft to a fork.

Oh wow, a whole chicken, how are we going to carefully slice pieces off of that?

Boom, we don't give a shit so now we have 6 pieces of chicken!

Bonus points: these veggies are cooked, but you know what would be cool? 5-6 more minutes on broil to add some crispiness.

Yeah, that's the shit.

Throw it all on a platter, look like a goddamn legendary chef, and get many sex for your effort.

How to win all the brownie points? "Darling, don't worry about cleaning up, I've got this".

You were cleaning as you went because you're not a moron. There's nothing left to clean but the plates. They don't know that of course. You clever bastard.

Some additional notes:
* Go crazy on the garlic if you're into it. You're cooking it for an hour, which will really smooth out the flavour, sweeten it, and make it incredible. I've done this before with 20 cloves, no joke. I didn't even cut them up. They're like candy when they're done.
* I always over-do the oil and never learn my lesson. You'll know it if you do the same, but don't worry as it's still delicious.
* Cutting up the chicken, you'll learn by the 4th or 5th time that there are tricks to it to make it easy. The legs especially cut off really easily with no cutting through bones, etc. But you'll fuck it up the first few times. Don't sweat it, still tasty.

Hope that some poor freshman reads this, makes a chicken and impresses the pants off their date.