Recipe: Roast Chicken (Cornish Hen) and Corn Pudding

Our dinner went remarkably well. I had a chicken-- a great treat for us in those days-- stuffed with oysters, boiled potatoes, corn pudding, some of Momma's canned beans, rolls, and a hot peach cobbler.

okay, here's another confession-- this is the second recipe i have tried for this book. the first one was she-crab soup, which just... wasn't good. i suspect this is because i couldn't find an actual crab, so i had to use fake crab. i also couldn't add sherry as the recipe suggested, which i'm sure took something away from the flavor. if you want to try it for yourself, i definitely encourage it! i tried a recipe located here.

now, on to the recipes i actually did make!

roast cornish hen
serves two

• 1 cornish game hen
• 1 Tbs butter (softened)
• 1/4 tsp poultry seasoning
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1/4 of a lemon
• 1 sprig fresh rosemary
• 8 cloves garlic
• 2/3 cup low-sodium chicken broth
• 1 tsp champagne vinegar

directions

1. preheat oven to 450 degrees f.
2. mix butter and poultry seasoning. rinse hen and pat dry. gently separate the skin on the breast from the meat. slip softened butter between the skin and the meat over the breast.
3. drizzle hen with olive oil. lightly season inside and out with salt and pepper. place lemon wedge, rosemary, and two cloves of garlic in the cavity. tie the legs together with string. arrange in a baking dish and arrange remaining garlic cloves around the hen. roast in preheated oven for 25 minutes.
4. reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees f. in a mixing bowl, whisk together chicken broth and champagne vinegar (the original recipe called for 1/3 cup of white wine and 1/3 cup chicken stock. you can try that, if you’d prefer!). pour over hen and continue roasting about 25 minutes longer or until the juices run clear. baste every 10 minutes.
5. transfer hen to a plate. skim almost all of the fat off of the pan juices. pour the juices into a saucepan and boil until it reaches sauce consistency. (you can add a slurry of cold water and cornstarch too, if you’d like it a little thicker.) pass the sauce through a sieve, pressing the garlic through. cut hen in half lengthwise and arrange on plates with sauce.


corn pudding
serves three

1 15.25 oz c
an whole kernel corn
1 Tbs salted butter, softened
1 Tbs (or a little more) evaporated milk
1 egg
1 Tbs butter, melted
1 Tbs white sugar
2 Tbs milk
1 Tbs cornstarch

directions

1. preheat oven to 400 degrees f. grease three ½-cup ramekins.
2. drain corn. pour ½ can into a blender. add softened butter and evaporated milk and pulse until it reaches a coarse consistency similar to creamed corn.
2. in a large bowl, lightly beat egg. add melted butter, sugar, and milk. whisk in cornstarch. stir in corn mixture and the remainder of the whole corn. mix well. pour mixture into ramekins.
3. bake for 1/2 hour.