Chef Panda: Cornish Game Hen

I made a game hen. Yay.

This incredibly easy and delicious game hen was made sort-of using this recipe. But I'm not really one for following recipes as I really loathe measuring things. To me, that's only really necessary when baking pastries and the such.

Anyway, here's what I did:

Ingredients:

• 1 cornish game hen
• rosemary, fresh or dried
• 1/2 large lemon, cut into 2 pieces
  
• 1 head of garlic, cut into thick slices (thick to prevent burning)
  
• salt & pepper
• few tablespoons of olive oil
• few tablespoons of white wine
• few tablespoons of chicken broth
• (carrots, optional)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.
   
2. Rinse off game hen and arrange in baking pan. Pour olive oil over game hen. Use enough olive oil to cover the hen and have a nice sheen on the bottom of the pan. Rub salt, pepper, and rosemary over hen. Place thick garlic slices on and around game hen, making sure there is olive oil on the garlic. Leave a few pieces of garlic for the body cavity (eww). Squeeze one quarter of the lemon over game hen and rub it in.
   
3. Stuff a quarter of the lemon, the rest of the garlic, and a good amount of rosemary inside the body cavity (eww).
4. Stick that bird in the oven for 25 minutes.
5. Meanwhile, in a bowl mix together the white wine and chicken broth with some pepper. Leave aside. My mixture came out to be about 3/4 cup but if you like sauces, add some more to the mixture for the gravy.
   
6. (ADDITIONAL CARROTS: 15 minutes or so into the cook time, I placed my 2 chopped carrots around the bird and stuck it back in the oven)
7. After the 25 minutes, reduce oven to 350 degrees F. Remove the hen from the oven and pour the chicken broth & wine mixture over the bird. Use a brush and brush some of the juices that have run to the bottom of the pan over the bird.
8. Stick that bird in the oven for another 25 minutes at reduced temperature.
   
9. Check for any pinkness after 25 or so minutes. If done, change the oven setting to BROIL. Broil on a high temp for 3-5 minutes to get a good brown skin on the bird.You might also want to flip the bird to get the skin on the bottom also crisp. No one likes mushy poultry skin.
   
10. Remove bird from oven & place in serving dish (with carrots, if you chose to make the carrots).
11. Pour the juices & garlic left in the pan into a sauce pan on the burner. Burn on high to evaporate most of the moisture yielding a really nice white wine reduction gravy. Took about 5 minutes for the amount of wine/broth mixture I used.
    
12. Serve hen and carrots with gravy.

It turned out excellent despite my having to partially microwave defrost my hen. Unlike most poultry that tends to get dry, this hen was tender and cooked perfectly throughout! I'm definitely making this again.

Remember, cook times will vary depending on your appliances so just be sure to check for pinkness.