One Pan Chicken and Rice - In Your Cast Iron

Good, beautiful week everyone!

Because it drives me insane to have to slog through someone’s entire life story when all I want is the recipe, I’m going to cut to the chase and give you just that. So let’s jump into it.

If you're a more visible learner, you can watch my Reel where I made this recipe.

Ingredients

• 6 chicken drumsticks – thawed
• 1 1/2 cups white rice
• 3 cups chicken broth – can be substituted for 3 cups water and seasonings of choice
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped – optional
• 3 Tbsp cooking oil

 

Seasoning Mix

• 4 Tbsp Kinder’s Buttery Steakhouse Rub
• 1/4Tsp Salt
• 1/4Tsp Black Pepper
• 1 Tbsp Italian Seasoning
• 3 Tbsp parmesan cheese

 

 

Mix seasonings and generously coat each drumstick.

In a pre-heated 12-inch cast iron pan set at medium low, add your cooking oil and sear the drumsticks until you have a golden color on each side.

Don’t worry about cooking the chicken fully because we’ll be finishing everything off in the oven.

Remove the drumsticks and set aside, add additional cooking oil if the pan is dry, and then the chopped onion. Cook roughly 3 minutes before adding the garlic, then for an additional 2 minutes. You don’t want to add your garlic in too soon, because onion takes a little longer to cook and you run the chance of burning the garlic if you put them in together.

Add your rice and mix into the garlic and onion.

We’re going to toast the rice for 5 to 7 minutes, stirring frequently, before adding the broth (or seasoned water).

Bring the rice mixture to a low simmer and cook for 8 to 10 minutes or until most of the moisture has been absorbed, then remove from the heat. While the rice is simmering, pre-heat your oven to 400F.

Lay the drumsticks on top, carefully cover the pan with aluminum foil and move the pan to the oven.

Cook covered for 30 minutes, then for another 5 minutes uncovered.

Voila, dinner is served!

 

That’s all for today! Hope you have a freaking awesome rest of your week, and I will see you all next time!

 

-Alyx

Homesteading in the Winter

Hello everyone!

Goodness, it’s been a hot minute since I hopped on here.

With the insanity surrounding the holiday season, and the chores and projects and everything else piling up, it was a necessary break.

Even so, I didn’t slow down with making any videos, so if you’re interested in checking out what I was up to the last few weeks, you can check it out here 

Just because it’s winter doesn’t mean that the life of a homesteader slows down! There are several things you can do during this time to prepare for Spring.

 

My go-to winter projects fall under three categories:

 

Preparing for Spring

Starting seeds isn’t quite necessary right at the moment, since we are still in January. It’s normally safe to move plants outside in May in the zone we live in, so I generally wait until late February or mid-March to start most of my seeds inside. But if you have an excessively short growing season, now might be a good time to plant longer growing plants, like tomatoes and many types of squash and melon. I’m actually tempted to start a couple watermelon plants now, since our growing period is just long enough to tease me every year into thinking my plants will produce, and then a cold snap will kill the plants just short of the fruit becoming ripe enough to eat.

Since I still have time before starting seeds, I take the time to go through what I have and order seeds that are running low or have run out. You could also use this time to start shopping for fruit and nut trees and for poultry. Right now is the perfect time for this, because you’re beating the rush of orders once the weather starts to turn nice.

Since a lot of us are more confined to inside the house and are cooking more, it’s also a great time to start a compost heap. This time of year also offers a lot of moisture for us, so I don’t have to worry about consistently wetting the compost. The biggest problem I face is whether or not I can actually get to the heap, since mine is situated in a spot where winds push through and create huge snow drifts and berms during heavy precipitation.

 

Maintenance and repairs

If you have a chicken coop, rabbit hutch, or fencing, now is a good time to do some mending of any damage. It’s also a good idea to winterize your coop or hutches to protect your animals from harsh weather. This can be anything from stacking hay bales on top of or around the coop and hutches, or adding plastic sheets as wind and moisture barriers. I added a heat lamp to my chicken coop to encourage the birds to roost in a particular area that was more protected from the weather.

This is also a good time to check out your pots and raised beds, if you have any. Check them for cracks, weak points, and areas that need to be repaired so they’re ready for Spring planting.

Just like fencing, tools also need to be repaired occasionally. Sharpening, cleaning, and repairing your tools will help them last longer and replacing old or broken ones with new right now is also ideal, since there should be some in stock. Again, by doing this now, you’re missing the early spring rush.

 

Learning new skills

Even with all the things listed above, you’ll still probably still have plenty of down-time. I use mine to learn new skills.

Winter is generally the only time of the year when I break out the sewing and knitting projects, since I’m too busy or it’s too warm to work on them the rest of the year. You’ll also see me with a stack of homesteading guidebooks and my notebook, working on garden planning and strategizing for upcoming projects.

Since winter is a cooler season in most place, a couple other skills to test out would be cheesemaking, canning, and soapmaking. You need cooler temperatures for cheese and soapmaking during the aging period, and canning is always a hot job to take on in the kitchen.

If you have any animals, they'll all still need to be fed and watered during the winter! Potentially even more than before, so be sure to keep that in mind when planning where to keep your animals. Because of where I built my chicken coop, I have to trudge through a snowdrift almost every day during the winter to feed and water them and collect their eggs.

 

I hope this gave you a good idea of some things you can expect to do if you plan on making any changes toward becoming a homesteader. It’s a lot of work and dedication, but so far it’s been incredibly rewarding.

Thank you all so much for checking out my blog, I hope you have a freaking awesome rest of your week, and I’ll catch you next time!

-Alyx