There are a lot of recipes out there for roasting chickens.  Here is what I do.  It’s exceptionally easy and delicious. I tend to make this a lot when we are feeling poor.  It worked better before we had kids as Ruth only eats chicken in nugget form (although she recently discovered that I can make excellent chicken strips and therefore she’s going to let me stay in the family!).

Roast Chicken

• 1 whole chicken
• EVOO (Extra Virgin Olive Oil)
• Garlic (fresh or powder)
• Herbs (fresh if you’ve got ‘em, Italian Seasonings if you don’t)

1. Clean the chicken thoroughly.  Wash it, remove all the innards.  Sometimes I salt it inside, sometimes I don’t.
2. Put it in the roasting pan.
3. Cover it with a nice layer of EVOO.  Just pour it on.
4. If you used fresh garlic, mash it all over the chicken with your hands.  Toss some in the cavity.
   If you are using powder, then just coat the thing in garlic powder.
5. Cover it with herbs.  Personally, I usually use Italian Seasonings and I again coat it in them.  If I’m using fresh herbs then I am more sparing as they have way more flavor.  I do like to go cut fresh rosemary from my yard and stuff it inside the bird — nummy.
6. Cook it at 350F for 1.5 hours.
7. Let it set and then carve and serve.  Utterly delish.

Variations on the recipe — substitute butter for the EVOO.  Bernsteins Restaurant Style Italian Dressing also works great — skip all the herbs and spices then as it’s very flavorful.

But, your work is not done.  After dinner, pick the carcass clean.  Get all the good delish meat off and save them for other meals.  I recommend Chicken Quesadillas.  YUM!

Next, put the chicken carcass and all bones (yes, even the ones from the plates, believe me germs will NOT be a problem) back into the roasting pan with all the drippings and goodies and into a 400F oven for 1 hour.  It will be brown and your house will smell even more amazing than before.  Now, scrape the whole mess into a large pot — be careful and don’t pour hot fat onto the floor (thankfully I didn’t burn myself!).  Cover with water.  Add any vegies you have lying around — celery, onions, carrots, whatever.  If I know I’m making soup, I’ll save peelings and skins from these things in a bag in the freezer.  Put it on high until it boils and then down to low to simmer on your stovetop for 3 hours. Set a timer as you will forget it and finding it at 6 am burnt to a crisp is no treat.  Trust me.

When it’s done cooking, let it cool.  Then strain out all the bones, meat, vegies.  Save any good meat you can for more of those nummy chicken quesadillas!  If you are really being good, you can then strain it through cheese cloth.  Refrigerate the results.  Delish broth that you can use to make all kinds of wonderful dishes with.  For me, I plan to use it as broth to eat the amazing pilmeni that my grandmother makes.  NUM!  I also use it with Top Ramen noodes instead of the crappy packet of flavoring they offer.  Wonderful!  Toss some of those leftover chicken bits in there too.

I know it would be nice if I had a good picture of my roast chicken — sorry, too busy carving it so we could eat it — or my broth or something but really, I don’t take good pictures of food.  So, just imagine how good it must look.  I know that the smell alone of the roasting chicken reduced my 8 year old to a quivering, whining, mess of “BUT I’M HUNGRY!”-ness.  And, Ruth even allowed as how she didn’t hate it. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Oh, don’t miss the latest I and the Bird at Hawk Owl’s Nest . . . I don’t think there are any recipes but I’m sure there are plenty of great posts about birds!  I plan to spend a big ol’ chunk of my day tomorrow reading every word.

Wren posted a shot on her blog that reminded me of this commercial.  Oh, sure the commercial makes it SEEM like the photographer is fine with it all but we all know she’d be stomping back to her car thinking, “Why do I always miss the shot.  Dratted birds!”  [click]

Given my slump, I’m recycling an old favorite photo from last summer.

So, mid-summer.  We were supposed to be heading north to Oregon today.  But, that so didn’t happen.  We’ve scrapped the trip — made that decision a couple of weeks ago when it became clear that the crossroads between gas prices, my lack of paycheck for the summer, and the high cost of the kitchen remodel were not going to meet nicely but rather collide horrifically.  So, we’re in a bit of a slump.  No big vacation.  The kids’ swimming lessons were extended — and Ruth is taking diving lessons rather than continuing on with her basic swimming lessons.  Ruth is going to get a trip up to June Lake in early August.  We extended our camping trip that we are going to do to add on a family leg at Sequoia National Park.

In some ways I’m glad.  I have gotten very, very few of the things on my list done this summer.  Very little writing.  Very little classroom organizing.  And, a lot (although nowhere near enough) household organizing.

So, we’re in the doldrums a bit.  I know, I know.  Life is soooooo hard when the weather is perfect, you aren’t working, you and your loved ones are healthy.  Poor, poor, pitiful me.

Still.  Mid-July is a bit blah!  For Ruby too.  She’s not seeing nearly the squirrel incursions that she did last summer.  Poor dear is a victim of her own success.

Thank you so much to Crafty Green Poet for giving me this award.  Juliet lives in Edinburgh and writes marvelous poetry.  She cares deeply about the environment and that shows in her poetry.  She also publishes the online poetry journal, Bolts of Silk.  I find her work to be inspiring.

For my nominees, I chose blogs that I read regularly even though I don’t comment on all of them.  They add a richness to my life and inspire me to reach beyond my comfort zone to consider the small wild flowers, to look for beauty, to write as well as I possibly can, to open my eyes and experience the amazing opportunities offered by life on this gorgeous planet.

My nominees are:

1. A Mark On My Wall — Vicki shares her life, her thoughts, and the animals at the zoo.  She makes me think . . . a lot!
2. Gardenpath — Sandy has the most amazing vision of the world of wildflowers and dragonflies and poetry.
3. The Marvelous in Nature — Seabrooke shares the natural world around her — even when it is flamingos.
4. Somewhere in NJ — Laura also makes me think a lot.  She takes the most amazing photographs.  Her musings on the world are wonderful.  And, she has rabbits.  And a goofy lab.
5. The House & other Arctic musings — Clare shows his readers the world — large and small in the Arctic.  I am constantly amazed by his writing.
6. Birdchick –Sharon fuels my love of birds and my secret, voyeuristic love of bees.
7. Julie Zickefoose — Julie seems to live a magical life full of birds, art, music, familial love, and a wonderful Boston Terrier.  Her writing is also inspirational to me.
8. New Dharma Bums — Robin Andrea and Roger are like a conscience for the world — they don’t post everyday but their thoughts are always meaningful.

I at once love and hate blog awards like this.  It feels so good that someone selected your blog out of all the ones they read to give a big gold star to and yet when you are “passed over”, it feels a bit deflating.  And, then if you are chosen, you have an obligation to pass it along which at times can seem overwhelming and take all the fun out of it.  I want everyone to know that I don’t want to pass along any of those feelings of sadness, guilt, or burden.  Please know that I read more than 40 blogs a day in several different categories.  I am really picky and cull my list of blogs regularly if I ‘m not getting benefit from them.  I read some blogs with millions of readers and some where I may be the only reader!  :)  I benefit from every blog I read and consider you all to be inspirational.  Furthermore, I will not be offended if you are either unimpressed with the whole weblog award thing or simply don’t have the time or energy to respond with your own list of amazing blogs.  Honest.  Blogging without Guilt!  It’s a good thing!

The Rules:

Please take this as the honor it is and pass it on to some of the sites you enjoy. The rules of accepting are as follows:
1) Put the logo on your blog.
2) Add a link to the person who awarded you.
3) Nominate at least 7 other blogs.
4) Add links to those blogs on yours.
5) Leave a message for your nominees on their blogs.

Many cultures have
a rite of passage for girls
Pierced ears mark her age

fibonacci, artist: Rick Mobbs

A
spark
of light,
the spiral,
the hand of a child,
numbers spin and reveal a world.

Ekphrasis is a type of poetry wherein the author describes another work of art — think Keats’ Ode to a Grecian Urn.  The poem I wrote is a Fib poem which was inspired by the subject matter of the poem.  Thank you to Rick Mobbs for sharing his artwork as inspiration.
More ekphrasis poems at read write poem.
All content written by Liza Lee Miller unless otherwise noted.
© 2008, Liza Lee Miller.

Sun’s opposite, ruler of the night
Control the seas, hope in the dark,  sliver moon

Shares the sky with the sun
Delicate white light, half moon

Full, round, lush, sky-filling light
Pregnant with power, full moon

Mysterious glow, elusive light
Sparkles through tree leaves, harvest moon

Ghazal is an Arabic form of poetry.  When the form is translated into English, it becomes a series of couplets that share an ending word or phrase.
My attempt at Ghazal is far from traditional or typical.  Learn more about this form by visiting The Ghazal Page and reading some really good ones.
More Ghazal poems at Totally Optional Prompts.
All content written by Liza Lee Miller unless otherwise noted.
© 2008, Liza Lee Miller.

So, it turns out that I’m not alone in caring about birds — but you probably knew that, didn’t you?  Here are a couple of pieces that show how others care about birds, too.  Yes, it’s a bit of a cop out — my mother is visiting.  She brought my son home — he’s been staying with them for a week and a half.  So, just now, my focus is elsewhere.  You understand!

• Bluebirds thrive in SoCal
• Cute Overload - Ducklings in Danger
• Coast Guard Saves Condors

Enjoy!

Poor little Bewick’s Wren (Thryomanes bewickii) got into a tussle with another bird — perhaps a house finch, I’m not sure.  In escaping, it ran into a window at my mother-in-law’s house.  Rebounding from that, it ran into a net that keeps the plum trees (see trees behind) from dumping all their leaves into her pool.  I worried about this net when they put it up but it’s been more than a year and we’ve never had a bird get caught in it.  I think they can see it just fine (it’s the same kind used to keep birds off fruit trees) but this one was in a panic.  Repeating silently in my head, “Tom can do this, so can I!  Tom can do this, so can I!  Tom can do this, so can I!“, I gently extracted the bird from the netting.  I held it carefully while checking to see if it had any blood or other obvious signs of injury.

In a moment, it wanted to sit on my hand (and poop, clearly) so I let it.  As I held it, I quietly asked Ruth to get my camera and she took these first two pictures.  I figured it was a House Wren but I’m pretty sure it’s actually a Bewick’s Wren (Lifer! Nope, not a lifer — saw one at Elkhorn Slough before!) That strong white eye stripe is pretty telling.

Ruthie gave the camera to Greg who captured what happened next.  The little darling didn’t want my hand anymore but must have felt safely camoflauged on my shirt — how clever of me to dress like a Wren that day).  It stayed on my shirt for a few minutes.  I actually walked over and sat in my chair — we were having appetizers and cocktails by the pool when all this happened.  It stayed with me for a few minutes and then flew off — it was still a little dazed and managed to flounder back into the net — I got up and went over but it slipped through the net (clever bird) and flew into the plum tree to rest some more.  We let it be — clearly it had recovered.

I felt so lucky to hold this delicate creature — it was like holding air — and that it trusted me enough to let me give it the time it needed for recovery.  I’m so grateful that my daughter got to see it — although she didn’t get touch it as she wanted to.  An encounter like that with nature will stick with a child (and a grown woman) forever.  Thank you, little wren!