Engagement Chicken in the news
I have read all about it, and I still think the concept behind engagement chicken is crazy. Publications including Glamour magazine and even one Fox News entertainment writer are convinced that there’s a magical dish called Engagement Chicken that will inspire your significant other to get down on one knee.
However, everybody’s buzzing about this alleged wonder dish today, and sometimes the only way to find out if something works is to try it.
Don’t get in over your head
Of course, it doesn’t hurt to be a bit cautious in the Engagement Chicken experiment. Engagement rings can be very expensive. Just in case the rumors are true, and engagement chicken does inspire your boyfriend or girlfriend to pop the question, make sure you are in a stable enough financial position to afford a several-thousand-dollar investment in a a rock and metal band.
You might need a personal loan to be able to pay off an engagement ring, and everyone knows that once you’re married — usually long before that — his finances are your finances and vice versa.
Is Engagement Chicken the real thing?
Fox News entertainment reporter Jennifer D’Angelo wrote:
In its January 2004 issue, Glamour printed instructions on how to make Engagement Chicken (search), a dish that at that time had inspired the boyfriends of three women to pop the question.
Since then — in a case of what came first, the chicken or the ring? — the magazine has received 21 letters (and counting) from women who say this simple meal was the magic trick that got them a rock.
“I made Engagement Chicken for my live-in boyfriend and less than two months later, I’m wearing a wedding band. This chicken is serious stuff. But please keep me anonymous — my husband doesn’t know he was reeled in by a chicken!” a Woburn, Mass., woman wrote to Glamour recently.
Two months later, eh? I admit, I am very skeptical as to whether the Engagement Chicken actually had anything to do with inspiring this “live-in boyfriend” to spend thousands on a diamond and enter into a commitment for time and all eternity. Still, if you want to know the magic recipe, here it is, from Glamour magazine.
Engagement Chicken
Adapted from Marcella Hazan’s More Classic Italian Cooking
- 1 whole chicken (approx. 3 lb.)
- 2 medium lemons
- Fresh lemon juice (1/2 cup)
- Kosher or sea salt
- Ground black pepper
Place rack in upper third of oven and preheat to 400 degrees. Wash chicken inside and out with cold water, remove the giblets, then let the chicken drain, cavity down, in a colander until it reaches room temp (about 15 minutes). Pat dry with paper towels. Pour lemon juice all over the chicken (inside and outside). Season with salt and pepper. Prick the whole lemons three times with a fork and place deep inside the cavity. (Tip: If lemons are hard, roll on countertop with your palm to get juices flowing.) Place the bird breast-side down on a rack in a roasting pan, lower heat to 350 degrees and bake uncovered for 15 minutes. Remove from oven and turn it breast-side up (use wooden spoons!); return it to oven for 35 minutes more. Test for doneness—a meat thermometer inserted in the thigh should read 180 degrees, or juices should run clear when chicken is pricked with a fork. Continue baking if necessary. Let chicken cool for a few minutes before carving. Serve with juices.
Alright, there is no way that chicken recipe is THAT good. Although, if you think about it, isn’t a chicken recipe used to coerce a marriage proposal technically a case of Fowl Play? (Oh that’s a cheap joke.) Seriously, there’s no way. It’s a coincidence, and that’s it. If these guys proposed, it meant they were already planning to do so. You don’t do something like propose marriage off of one chicken dinner. Steak, maybe – and we’re talking one heck of a steak, here – but definitely not chicken.
I’m going to give it a try and see how it works.. will it work for a broken relationship? will this beautiful man come back to me?
I’ll let you know what happens