Two of My Favorite Things

Roast chicken and farmer's markets. No correlation to each other, I know, unless you count that one is a food and the other contains food. Or that I discovered wonderful renditions of each this weekend. I have no pictures to speak of, which is perhaps in poor food blogging taste, but I feel I must document this so you can all run to each of these locations as soon as you can.

First, roast chicken. Anyone who knows me well knows that I love roast chicken. I'll even eat medicore roast chicken (dark meat only please) just so I can get some well-rendered chicken skin and tender meat. I've gone through the gamit of roast chicken: college dining hall roast chicken, bland but reasonably juicy if gotten during a modest lunch hour; Boston Market, tender but boring with no complexity to speak of other than some sweetness and saltiness on the skin; takeout chicken from the Greek place by work, with absolutely no browning of the skin to be found, but a steal at $2.50 for a dark meat quarter. Lately though, my obessession has been Peruvian roast chicken. This chicken is roasted whole over a fire after running through a complex spice mixture that my taste buds just can't define. With some fried yucca to fill out the starch quotient, this can be one satisfying, finger-licking meal.

After an afternoon of wine tasting, two bottles, and some Wii bowling on Saturday, food was on the agenda. At our friend T's house in Highlandtown, there really was no question of where we should seek out our dinner. T lives a block away from Chicken Rico (translated as Chicken Tasty), a Peruvian roast chicken chain that finally made its appearance in Baltimore last year. Situated in the heart of Highlandtown, an area poised as the newest Hispanic community in Baltimore, the smell of cumin and fire-roasted chicken wafting a block away to T's can not be denied. I have been scheming of ways to head over to T's since that fateful day a month ago when I walked from my car to his house with the smells lapping at my nostrils.

At 8:30 p.m., it's a good sign when practically all the customers are Hispanic. A specials menu on a little white board lists the especial del dia, in Spanish, of course. The line moves quickly and we quickly nab ourselves the "Family Special 1", a whole roasted chicken, cut into quarters with a pair of scissors, two sides (fried yucca and mashed potatoes for us), and three cans of soda for the budget-friendly price of $14.95. By the time we walk back to the house, the juices from the chicken have run out of its styrofoam box into the bag...and there are a lot of juices. The skin is crisp and dry, fully rendered of all its fat. The meat is unbelievably juicy and I, a hater of breast meat, cannot help but notice that the white meat is exuding juice (devouring the breast meat leftovers for lunch confirmed this). To top it off, little containers of a green sauce and a very yellow-y mayo are provided for the dipping. I can do without the mayo but the green sauce is jalepeno incarnate. Hot and incendiary with perhaps a little water to thin it into a sauce. So good.

Onto my second topic of the day, I present you with the Baltimore Farmer's Market. This Sunday farmer's market is held during the warmer months under the Jones Falls Expressway (JFX or 83 to you Baltimore folks). In all my years in Baltimore, I have never once frequented this farmers market. I guess part of it was snobbery. After all, for many years, I lived within rolling distance of the Waverly Farmers Market, where I could walk down to the market with crusts in my eyes and stinky breath and find coffee and a delicious pastry to wake myself up. Why would I need the biggest farmer's market in the area when I had a great one by me? I am now a woman reformed. Yesterday, I was greeted with more breakfast options than I could imagine. Crepes, Creole-inspired breakfast sandwiches and gumbo, grilled sausages, pit beef, pit turkey, falafel sandwiches, grilled mushroom sandwiches...the list goes on. It took me a full twenty minutes and two times around the farmers market before I could even make a decision and I still hadn't bought any groceries for the week. In the end, Pat got an egg and andouille sandwich and I got a crepe with prosciutto, onions, olives, oregano and feta. Oh, and we also managed to pick up some broccoli raab, spinach, strawberries and a hunk of young garlic and chive cheddar.

Did I mention that you should visit these two Baltimore gems as soon as you can?