If you would be so inclined to vote for me today in the Aiming Low recipe contest, I would be oh so very grateful. I would think you were an awesome person. I would invite you over to my house for honey bourbon chicken, I promise.
And in case you were unconvinced of the awesomeness of this recipe, allow me to walk you through the marinade process. It’s easy, I promise.
Here’s everything you need to make this recipe. Assembling the ingredients before I start means I don’t fuck up and forget something important or get some step out of order. Cause I am very scatterbrained easily confused busy multitasking and being awesome.
Squeeze the lemons to render out at least a third cup of lemon juice. Acid is important to a marinade, because it helps to ensure tenderness, and lemon juice is the best damn acid I can use because I love the bright, citrus flavor it adds. It took two pretty good sized lemons to get the juice I needed for this recipe. If you have a lot of leftover juice, you can use it as a cleanser. No shit. Lemon juice is a very good natural cleanser, couldn’t be more green and environmentally friendly, and I use it on my shower tiles. Housekeeping tip from me to you, free of charge.
Squeeze the little bear until you get a quarter to a third cup of honey. This recipe is very fluid, adjust it to the size of your chicken breasts. These are some Dolly-esque chicken boobies here, almost two pounds. So I used a third cup of everything. These two breasts, by the way, will easily feed four people, and the package only cost a little over $4. Split chicken breasts are usually a better deal than the boneless, skinless variety.
Pour the honey into the lemon juice. You will likely have to scape the honey out of the measuring cup. If you are good at eye-balling amounts, you could just squeeze the bear directly into the juice. The honey in this recipe will not only add flavor, but it will help the skin caramelize later in the cooking process. So if you want to go a little heavy on the honey, you go right ahead.
Now it’s cocktail time! Add in an equal amount of bourbon as the honey and lemon. I am calling on my good friend Jimmy Beam, but Jack or Johnny could easily stand in for Jim. If you aren’t a bourbon drinker, and I confess I am not, you can buy the little airplane sized bottles at the liquor store. They only cost a couple of bucks and you aren’t investing in a booze you don’t drink.
Whisk the shit out of this concoction. You want the honey to dissolve into the juice and the booze. Then rest the chicken skin side down into the bowl. Cover it and put it in the ‘fridge until you are ready to cook it. The longer it soaks the better, so I did this at noon and will pop the bird in the oven around 6 p.m.
Next entry: The chicken goes into the oven and comes out delicious.
