“In cooking school, they used to tell us that you could tell everything about a cook based on their roast chicken, so I became a bit obsessive. And you are going to benefit from that.” – Love Quinn, You.
I know I’ve been on a bit of a taco and flatbread kick as of late, so let’s break up the pattern with a new take on an old fashioned recipe. I’m talking about recreating that “perfect bite” of roast chicken made by Love Quinn from Netflix’s You. Shall we go a virtual food tour on how I brought this dish from stream to table?
Click here to skip to the recipe for Love Quinn’s Roast Chicken.
The Perfect Bite
The TV adaptation of Caroline Kepnes’s You novel series opens its second season in Los Angeles. We see Joe Goldberg taking on a new name in an attempt to turn over a new leaf and be a better person — or so we think. His latest obsession, a beautiful kitchen manager Love Quinn, steals both his and our hearts with her kindness—and her jokes about peaches looking like butts.
Unlike the first season, though, we find the stalker becomes the stalkee. After a failed follow attempt, Joe sleeps himself into a wicked LA sunburn. Love, his coworker and boss’s sister, shows up at his apartment to soothe his wounds with apple cider vinegar. Saying that now he’s had one initiation to Los Angeles, it’s time that they find his “perfect bite” among the city’s powerfully diverse food culture.
They first go to a taco truck, then an Indian restaurant, and finally, they eat freshly made bao buns by the Hollywood sign. Having enough research, they go back to their workplace, where she starts cooking. She says:
“You are not a snob. You are just old fashioned. You like things that are real, made right by people who care. You like strong flavors. Gimmicks don’t seduce you. What seduces you is the real thing. Therefore, roast chicken.”
She makes a spatchcocked roast chicken surrounded by fresh orange slices, serves him a plate, telling him to grab a bite with skin, carrot, and crispy potato. It is the perfect bite. Not just because it’s the flavors he likes, but because she made it for him alone.
Love Quinn also says that you can learn about a cook based on their roast chicken. It makes sense, though, right? Chicken is versatile, and its flavor changes to something new with every preparation. In cooking roast chicken, Love wants to show Joe what kind of person she is–but also how she can be everything he wants her to be.
Now that’s some foreshadowing you can taste!
An Old Fashioned Taste
So for this recipe, I wanted to deconstruct the flavors presented and make it fit with the themes present. We see oranges, garlic, carrots, potatoes, and some kind of red reduction. We also see Mexican, Indian, and Chinese eateries. To figure out how these go together, we need to observe the situation like Love Quinn.
Figuring the chicken and oranges into account, I’m betting the taco truck served up Sinaloa style chicken. This preparation involves marinating chicken in orange juice and apple cider vinegar. Considering that scent connects with the memory center of the brain, apple cider vinegar is a pleasant reminder of Love treating Joe’s wounds.
I decided not to include any Indian cuisine ingredients because Love believes it lacks resonation with Joe. The taco truck is where I figure she chose her aromatics, but not the spice. The second restaurant was part of the elimination process. Steamed Bao, however, is choc-full of Chinese 5-Spice powder and garlic — which both, coincidentally, taste marvelous with citrus.
Then we come to the reduction. I decided not to go with a balsamic reduction as there are already two different types of intense acidic flavors present in our marinade. The clue I went for was when Love told Joe he’s “old fashioned.” Old Fashioned cocktails consist of bourbon, sugar, cherries, and citrus rind. Why not go literal? So with that, I made my reduction using port wine, bourbon, brown sugar, cherry jam, and the leftover marinade.
The rest of the dish marries itself by roasting all on one pan. The potatoes and carrots soak up that rich chicken fat and balancing orange juice while crisping to the touch. Old fashioned, but inventive, brimming of strong flavors while remaining true to its natural taste.
And if you get what I’m saying, you can also see what Love Quinn does when she cooks specifically for a person. Not only can you know about the cook with roast chicken, but you can also learn about the person for whom it was made.
Sing for your Supper!
If you plan to cook the recipes off the site, keep scrolling. However, while access to recipes on the blog will always be free, I now have printable PDF recipe cards and thematic cook-along Spotify playlists as rewards for those who choose to support the blog.
The printable recipe cards and playlist for Love Quinn’s Roast Chicken will be available as a $2 donor reward on my Ko-Fi page until Monday, March 30th, 2019, at 8 pm EST.
-OR-
You can instead join my Patreon community at the “Sing for your Supper” level ($1/month) for access to the playlists or the “It’s All in the Cards” level ($5/month) or higher for access to ALL of my blog recipe cards and playlists. Patrons of all reward tiers will even receive a welcome gift of my Lord of the Rings recipe cards and playlists from January 2019 to get you started.
recipe
In the Kitchen of Love Quinn
Love Quinn's Roast Chicken
Equipment: Oven, cutting board, poultry shears, gallon-sized ziplock bag, citrus juicer, large sheet pan, aluminum foil, stovetop, saucepan, and wire whisk.
ingredients:
- 4-5 lb whole chicken
- 4 gold potatoes, 1-inch diced
- 4 carrots, 1-inch diced
- 2 oranges
- 3 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
- 3 tablespoon canola oil
- 1 tablespoon kosher salt
- 2 tablespoons Chinese 5-spice powder
- 1 tablespoon garlic powder
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar
- 3/4 cup Port
- 1/4 cup cherry jam
- 1/4 cup bourbon
- chicken stock cube
- 2 teaspoons cornstarch
Instructions:
- Juice one of the oranges and mix it in a dish with the apple cider vinegar and a tablespoon of canola oil. Toss the kosher salt, 5-spice powder, garlic powder, and brown sugar in another bowl and set aside.
- Remove the giblets (if there are any) from the cavity of the chicken. Flip the chicken, breast side down, on the cutting board. Cut out backbone from tail to neck using poultry shears alongside each side of the spine, staying as near as possible to keep the skin attached.
- Flip the bird breast side up onto your cutting board then turn the legs inward. Then press with one hand over your fist down on the breast—hard enough to dislodge the center bones and flatten out the bird.
- Drop the bird into the ziplock bag and pour the marinade over. Seal the bag and let marinate for at least 30 minutes while gathering and prepping your other ingredients.
- Preheat the oven to 425°F. Line a large sheet pan with foil and coat it with cooking spray. Remove the chicken from the marinade and place on the sheet pan, patting the skin dry with paper towels. Coat the chicken with 1/2 of the spice rub.
- Toss the potatoes and carrots in a bowl with two tablespoons of canola oil and 1/4 of the spice rub. Spread them around chicken, then cut the other orange into slices make a slit halfway through each one. Twist the orange slices and arrange them among the vegetables.
- Place the tray in the oven and bake 45-50 minutes or until a meat thermometer registers 165°F in the thickest part of the breast.
- Transfer the chicken to a carving board and tent with foil to rest. Tent the vegetables with foil to keep them warm.
- During the last 20 minutes of the chicken cooking, pour the marinade into a saucepan with the port, bourbon, cherry jam, 1 cup of water, the stock cube, and the remaining spice mix. Bring to a boil on the stovetop, then lower the heat to simmer 12-15 minutes until reduced by half.
- Stir the cornstarch and a tablespoon of water in a separate dish, then whisk it into the reduction to cook 2-3 minutes more to thicken.
- Pour an equal amount of sauce onto each serving plate and distribute the vegetables over it. Cut the chicken into quarters and place one on each plate. Garnish with an orange twist, then serve.
