Whole Chicken

Everyone should know how to roast a chicken. It's a life skill that should be taught to small children at school. The ability to properly prepare a moist yet thoroughly cooked bird, with nicely crisp skin, should be a hallmark of good citizenry—an obligation to your fellow man. Everyone walking down the street should be reasonably confident that the random person next to them is prepared, if called upon, to roast a chicken.

This two-ingredient chicken relies on nothing but kosher salt—lots of it—to yield crisp skin and juicy meat.

This cumin and paprika-spiced number gets added punch from a tangy green sauce and an avocado and cucumber salad.

All the rejuvenating powers of your grandmother's chicken stock, plus a head-clearing kick of chile. Reserve chicken for Spicy Feel-Good Chicken Soup or another use.

The real magic here is in the pool of schmaltz, AKA rendered chicken fat, sizzling in the pan.

The leftovers from this wholesome, spiced-up chicken dinner are just as good as the meal itself.

This is how we make chicken bone broth at home. If you'd like, you can switch out the herbs and vegetables for others you prefer. For example, you could add leeks, celery, or a different type of onion. Roast the vegetables first for added depth of flavor and color. Be sure to keep the ingredients covered by adding water just to cover through- out the simmering process. The pot can be left overnight to simmer on your stove; however, be sure there is enough liquid in the pot before you go to bed, and keep the flame low. Too much evaporation will result in a burnt batch.

Two chicken halves won't fit in a standard 10-inch cast-iron, so this recipe calls for both a pan and a baking sheet. If you have a 14-inch pan, you can go straight from stovetop to oven.

Coming soon to a kitchen near you: an escapist fantasy set under the sun, starring spicy-fruity glazed chicken. (Spoiler alert: Your opinion of pineapple could change forever.)

Packed with nutritious greens and zesty lemon, this gorgeous soup is just the thing to perk you up on a chilly weeknight.

One of the centerpieces of Butch Anthony's outdoor dining room is a massive firepit-grill outfitted with vintage Dutch ovens, which were buried in embers to cook these chickens. We've adapted the method for a regular oven.

When lacquered with a rich, complex sauce and roasted, chicken becomes a delicious crowd-pleaser. There's enough chipotle here to make your lips hum, but not so much as to overshadow the balancing act created by the other ingredients—toasty garlic, onions, and ketchup, plus a kiss of brown sugar and cinnamon.

It's all about the paprika in this warming, saucy chicken dish.

These spiced-up dinner bowls feature rice noodles, kale salad, and a deeply flavorful poached chicken.

The key to grilling large pieces of chicken is patience. Starting with the skin side up reduces flare-ups, and medium heat gives you browned (not blackened) skin and juicy flesh.

Once cooked, slick fried chicken with a potent spiced-chile oil, for an extra punch of heat and flavor.

Spatchcocking (or splitting and flattening) this Italian-flavored chicken before grilling helps it cook more quickly and evenly.

The Zuni roast chicken depends on three things, beginning with the small size of the bird. Don't substitute a jumbo roaster—it will be too lean and won't tolerate high heat, which is the second requirement of the method. Small chickens, 2-3/4 to 3-1/2 pounds, flourish at high heat, roasting quickly and evenly, and, with lots of skin per ounce of meat, they are virtually designed to stay succulent. Your store may not promote this size for roasting, but let them know you'd like it. I used to ask for a whole fryer, but since many people don't want to cut up their own chickens for frying (or anything else), those smaller birds rarely make it to the display case intact; most are sacrificed to the "parts" market. But it is no secret that a whole fryer makes a great roaster—it's the size of bird favored for popular spit-roasted chickens to-go. It ought to return to retail cases. The third requirement is salting the bird at least 24 hours in advance. This improves flavor, keeps it moist, and makes it tender. We don't bother trussing the chicken—I want as much skin as possible to blister and color. And we don't rub the chicken with extra fat, trusting its own skin to provide enough. But if the chicken is about method, the bread salad is more about recipe. Sort of a scrappy extramural stuffing, it is a warm mix of crispy, tender, and chewy chunks of bread, a little slivered garlic and scallion, a scatter of currants and pine nuts, and a handful of greens, all moistened with vinaigrette and chicken drippings.

The super-seasonal, crowd-pleasing chicken your Passover Seder needs.