Lemon-Honey Chicken and Stuffing

I wrote this post on Monday or Tuesday and forgot, with all the excitement of Independence Day, to post it.

When I was still staying with my brother’s family (we have since moved into our own place), I asked him what he wanted me to make for dinner. He looked through a bunch of my recipes before pointing to this one. It’s a recipe that I’ve had forever. I’m not sure what the original source was. All I know is that one Mother’s Day (or maybe it was mom’s birthday), mom handed me a clipping and asked me to make the recipe that was printed on it.

I remember loving this dish, particularly the stuffing, but I haven’t made it often as an adult because it’s just underwhelmed me. But maybe it was time to try again.

While I was putting it together, my brother was making baby food. The baby supervised.

To start off, open a can of chicken broth (I used low-sodium) and put it in a pan to warm up.

Making this in the past, I always grated carrots. This time around, I just bought these.

Put them in the chicken broth and bring it to a boil, softening the carrots.

Finally, stir in 4 cups of stuffing. We used the kind with herb seasonings. Press the serving into a big casserole dish.

Then decide that you should have doubled it, since you’re serving 4 and want leftovers, so go back and do it all again.

The recipe says to lay chicken breasts over top of the stuffing and bake until it’s mostly done. The past few times I’ve made this, I’ve been disappointed by the boring, dry chicken, so this time I thought I’d try it with thighs, since they have more flavor and are more moist. I used a lot more than I really needed to.

And then pop it in the oven. You’ll pull it out with about 10 minutes to go and brush it with a lemon-honey drizzle. It’s just a bit of honey…

… and a bit of fresh lemon juice…

…and a bit of parsley. I’d always used dried, but this time I thought I’d use fresh.

When the chicken is almost done, pull it out of the oven.

Brush it with the lemon-honey-parsley mixture.

And pop it back in the oven for a few more minutes, and it’s good to go.

Finally, this last bit is just a garnish and something I usually skip, but I went for it this time. While the chicken was finishing up in the oven, I sliced up a few lemons to lay on the chicken when served.

When you pull the chicken out for good, garnish with those lemon slices and you’re ready to serve.

*sigh*

Still not what I was hoping for. Chicken thighs are juicier than breasts, but they still need seasoning. They should be seasoned with salt and pepper at the least. But even then, they’d probably still be boring. I wonder if the chicken should be marinated in the lemon-honey mixture for a few hours. The lemon juice would tenderize it and they’d be more flavorful and juicy. And the problem with thighs is all that fat, most of which I cut off but of course some remained.

Still, the chicken was okay and the stuffing was yummy.

The leftovers were my first meal in the new apartment. I ate them with a plastic fork, sitting on the floor since we didn’t have furniture yet. A lot healthier than running to McDonald’s, which is probably what I would have done otherwise.

Recipe is here.