Thursday, May 26, 2011

Easy Peasy Baked Chicken Leg Quarters

Not too long ago, I bought 10 lbs of chicken leg quarters for $5 at our new local grocery. I packed three to a bag and froze them. I thawed a bag yesterday and got to work on dinner today with two of the three quarters in the bag.


I got out my vintage Pyrex baking dish, got out the chicken and just didn't feel like doing the marinade I had planned. I had wanted to marinate the chicken in sour cream that had been seasoned with a variety of seasonings. So instead, I coated the chicken with the sour cream and then sprinkled the seasonings over the sour cream (I used chili powder, Mrs. Dash's original, paprika, poultry seasoning, Adobo seasoning and salt). Then I covered the dish with foil and put it back in the fridge along with the third quarter I have other plans for.


When it was time to start baking, I got the dish out of the fridge, uncovered it, lightly sprinkled bread crumbs over the now enriched sour cream, poured some chicken broth around the leg quarters and put it in the oven at 350 (with the foil lightly on top). About 15 minutes before taking it out of the oven, I took off the foil and started my sides of peas, corn and microwaved "baked" potatoes. Total baking time (I didn't pre-heat) was about an hour.


Now, I'm not a fan of dark meat, but will eat it. But, this chicken was so moist, so flavorful, so tender, I couldn't believe it was dark meat. I really dug into it. Even my daughter complimented me on it (she's one tough cookie when it comes to being happy with food). The cats were doing everything in their power to be offered pieces, so it must have smelled good to them as well.


The only things I'd do differently the next time is to cut off the excess fat and skin and to leave the foil off for longer so the skin would crisp up really nice. But, as far as flavor is concerned, I'm all about doing chicken this way again in the future. I just wish I'd remembered to take a picture!

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