Roasted Cornish Game Hens with a Lemon-Garlic-Parsley Marinade
As I might have mentioned here before, I am just not a turkey person. Just the size alone completely puts me off and the meat is pretty tasteless and dry too. I think it is the most overrated meat ever! If it was any good, wouldn’t people eat more of it throughout the year instead of waiting for the Thanksgiving feast? If it was truly tasty, why don’t I see it in more restaurant menus and not just in the sandwich section of a deli? I just don’t get why people go so crazy over turkey during the Thanksgiving season. I think there is a reason why the Thanksgiving menu features so many sides; all those sides are there just to mask the taste(lessness) of the turkey. Anyway, I guess it might be about tradition more than the taste. But since I didn’t get to experience Thanksgiving until I came to this country, I don’t really care about tradition. I do like the idea of serving a full bird though, there is something very appetizing about the look of a whole bird on the table. And for a small family, Cornish game hens makes the perfect sized meal and is infinitely more delicious than a turkey. So that’s what we had for our Thanksgiving meal.
Since poultry tends to dry out while cooking, it is a good idea to brine the birds before roasting to make the meat more moist. Instead of doing a regular salt water brining bath, I used a buttermilk brine to enhance the flavor of the hens. The hens turned out really tender and juicy. You can try the buttermilk brine before roasting a whole bird using any recipe. I just brined for two hours in the refrigerator and then rinsed out the birds as I was afraid of the birds getting too salty. I have seen recipes where they don’t rinse out the brine too. Also, another way to make sure the birds don’t dry out in the oven is to keep the skin on while roasting. Some people don’t like to eat the skin due to the high fat content, but it is still a good idea to roast with the skin on and discard it after cooking. The skin not only traps the moisture, it keeps the marinade from burning especially when you dry roast a bird. I personally like the skin, if it is browned well. So I browned the hens all around before roasting. It is a little bit extra work, but trust me it truly makes a big difference, you will thank me later!
Anyway, I think I have blabbed enough, let me jump into the recipe. This recipe is more about the techniques. You can follow the recipe for fully grown chickens too, just increase the brining time to 4 hours. You can follow this technique and change the marinade to suit your palate. But this simple garlic-parsley-lemon marinade is pretty good too, if you want a break from your usual marinades.
Ingredients
- 2 Whole Cornish game hens, Skin on(~2lb each)
- Butter, melted ~ 4 tbsp
- Olive oil
- Onions, thinly sliced – 2 cups
- 1 lemon, cut into 8 pieces
- a few sprigs of parsley
- 6 cloves garlic, sliced
- 1/2 cup white wine
- 1/2 cup chicken stock
- 1/4 tsp red chili powder
- Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
For the brine
- Kosher Salt
- 2 cups butter milk
For the Marinade
- Zest from a whole lemon
- 1/2 cup parsley leaves, tough stems removed
- 1 tbsp paprika
- 2 tbsp lemon juice
- Salt and fresh ground pepper to taste
- 6 cloves garlic
Method
Remove and discard the giblets from the hens. Rinse well and pat dry. Rub the hens with a generous amount of kosher salt inside and out. Place in a brining bag or a bowl and pour the buttermilk over. Turn the hens to make sure they are completely covered with the liquid. Cover and refrigerate for 2 hours.
Pre-heat the oven to 400F.
Make the marinade by placing all the ingredients for the marinade in a mortar and bruising with a pestle to make a coarse paste.
Grease a roasting pan with some butter and arrange the onion slices on it to make a bed for the chickens. Season well with salt and pepper.
After two hours, remove the hens and discard the brine. Rinse the hens well under running cold water and pat dry inside and out with paper towel. (I used a hair dryer to get all the moisture out of the skin, as the skin wouldn’t brown well if there was any moisture on it.) Rub the hens all over with butter and season well with salt and freshly ground pepper.
Place a large frying pan on the stove and melt a tbsp of butter along with a tbsp of olive oil. Now brown the hens one by one in this pan, turning with a tong to ensure the skin is browned on all sides. You might want to add a bit more butter and oil after the first one is browned. Remove the hens and keep aside.
To the same pan, add a bit more butter and the red chili powder and stir well. When the powder starts to brown, add the white wine and use a wooden spatula to loosen the brown bits stuck to the pan. When the wine starts to bubble, add the chicken stock and bring to a boil. Simmer for a couple of minutes.
When the hens are cool enough to handle, apply the marinade on the hens inside and out. Carefully lift the skin and make sure some of the marinade is applied under the skin too. Now place a couple of lemon slices, a couple of cloves of garlic and a few sprigs of parsley inside the cavity of each bird. Arrange the rest of the garlic and lemon slices and parsley on the onion bed.
Place the birds breast side up on the onion bed in the roasting pan and pour the wine-stock mixture all over the birds. Place the roasting pan in the oven and cook for 55 minutes. Half way through the cooking (after about 30 minutes), remove the pan from the oven and baste the chicken with the juices from the pan and return to the oven. Hens will be cooked through when a meat temperature inserted into the fleshiest part registers 180F, or if the juices run clear when you insert a fork into the fleshiest part of the birds.
Remove from the oven and let the birds rest for 5 minutes. Remove and discard the lemon-garlic-parsley from inside the cavities and the lemon slices from the pan. Serve warm with rice, we had ours with wild rice cooked with peas and spring onions. Delicious!
What was your Thanksgiving menu like?
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Thanks for the roasting tips Sig. Every time I roast a chicken, the top browns beautifully and the skin turns crispy, but the underside is always soggy. I’m planning to roast a duck tomorrow – a belated Thanksgiving + b’day dinner – will follow your tip of browning on a pan first. I was also thinking of using a roasting rack so the juices collect in the pan.
We were out of town this weekend, so our Thanksgiving dinner was in a restaurant.
Perfect Sig. They look absolutely juicy and delicious.
Gosh Sig, have some mercy on those of us that are hungry! I love cornish hens but they are ridiculously expensive over here
I have never tasted Cornish hens, seen them so much on Food network. Yours look sooo tempting. I am drooling….
I don’t like Turkey. I wish I ate this on Thanksgiving
looks absolutely delicious.
great tips….they looks delicious
you’ve made me curious now… have to go and read about the connection of turkey to Thanksgiving.
My mom tells me this is what she used to cook chicken curry with many years ago in the US. I like well-browned skin too, guilty pleasure.
my SIL used to make a whole stuffed chicken. at that time, I was only interested in eating it so i didn’t pay much attention to how she made it. all i know is, it had bread in the filling and it was yummy!
looks so delicious …
hugs and smiles
Awww, lovely!
We don’t like turkey either… I roasted a whole chicken this thanksgiving…
I have to say sig, I have nver seen a much more moist bird than this.
Looks so so super yumm.
I totally agree I hate turkey too.
But for the tradition here i make them but then i use only the turkey breast.
This just looks too good!
I love cornish, but I mostly cut them in pieces to make a gravy. As much as I love the bird, I cannot bring myself to roast it full, I am pathetic, I feel some guilt down there when I see it cooking whole !!!
It is another story that I have no second thoughts eating it.
i beg to differ… turkey when cooked right is really awesome.. for the fact we tried it for the first time it turned out great .
Obviously not as tasty as cornish hen .. which is like a small tasty dynamite waiting to explode..
Sure Turkey is a big bird and can repel someone with its size on the dinner table ,looks aside , this beautiful bird when marinated right and cooked right turns out exceptional.. again it depends on your preference though..
We had Cajun turkey this year (the South does it right!) and its the best way to have turkey. Ever. Or possibly the ONLY way to have turkey.
I do agree with you. Turkey is a flavourless meat. And those darn birds look a little daft to begin with.
I wanted to do a chicken roast this year, but when the guest count crawled to 28, I would have needed 4 ovens to pull off that feat.
I am a turkey person, but could go for some of this, the marinade looks amazing!
This whole chicken looks lovely. Days are gone when my grandma would roast a whole chicken before treating it as if in a spa with so many marianades. Now we rarely eat chicken! I love these ideas in roasting!
For being a vegetarian, I love your pics
Also, I came in to tell you that I absolutely vicariously experienced your Italy trip through your pics. Beautiful!
I brined my turkey for a whole day and it was fabulous! I added cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and star anise to the brine and sage in the cavity – yum!!!
Till yesterday I would’ve totally agreed with you on the turkey. I used to hate it because it was so flavorless and tasted like sawdust.
But my roomie roasted a 15lb turkey today and it is the best I have ever eaten!
He brined it for 2 days and seasoned it liberally with compound butter (even seasoned it under the skin) and baked it for 4 hours at 350F.
I cannot wait to eat the leftovers tomorrow!
Isn’t that some roasted hen in the picture. I have not trying roasting so far..reading the procedure for this one..i feel lazy
hi
Good looking recipes.
I want to throw some light on “turkey”. You cant cook it the indian way with the masalas . Thats the worst thing to happen to turkey.
People dont eat it as often as chicken because of its enormous size.
Its tasteless when overcooked.But do it right, chicken stands no chance. Try roast turkey at Cracker Barrell or at BBQ restaurants. You’ll change your opinion.
Hello just thought i would let you know something.. This is twice now i have landed on your blog in the last 2 days looking for completely unrelated things. Spooky or what?