Tonight's Dinner: Baked Chicken with Onions, Rosemary, and Garlic

This tasty recipe came from THE ALL-NEW, ALL-PURPOSE JOY OF COOKING. Based on trying the recipe once previously, I modified the recipe slightly, cooking the chicken a bit longer, for 65 minutes; my oven seems to need longer to bake chicken than some recipes call for. (An instant-read meat thermometer is a great investment!) I waited to add the onions to the top of the chicken until after the chicken had baked 15 minutes, to prevent the onions from burning due to the longer cooking time. I found two onions was plenty, rather than the three called for in the recipe. As I've become a better cook, I've enjoyed having the confidence to modify recipes slightly to fit our needs.

The chicken was served with small red potatoes similarly roasted with rosemary and a little fresh minced garlic.

I was married for over two decades before I owned a copy of JOY OF COOKING -- we were sure missing out! It's a classic for good reason. Over the last year we've enjoyed numerous recipes from JOY's pages. The JOY pot roast recipe has become one of our family's favorites.

I'd love to get the facsimile edition of the original 1931 JOY OF COOKING at some point. This fall a 75th anniversary edition will be published.

A biography, STAND FACING THE STOVE, has been published about JOY's original authors, Irma von Starkloff Rombauer and Maron Rombauer Becker.