(energetic music) - [Announcer] Today on
America's Test Kitchen... Julia makes Bridget
broiled chicken with gravy, Adam reviews toaster ovens, Lisa shares some favorite
toaster oven gadgets, and Dan makes Julia
skillet-roasted broccoli. It's all coming up right here on America's Test Kitchen. (energetic music) (upbeat music) - Insider tip: if you want to hear Julia talk
about her favorite recipe, just ask her about roast chicken. (Julia laughs)
- Hey. Do you like roast chicken?
- True. I could wax poetic about
roast chicken for hours. In fact, you've witnessed this. So, today I'm not gonna wax poetic. I'm gonna make it for you.
- All right. - [Julia] And you know, I make
roast chicken all the time. It is my number one favorite meal. I have a handful of
recipes I cycle through. This is currently in the top slot because the cooking method is brilliant. The skin gets so crisp. And while the chicken cooks, you get to make gravy. - And gravy is our favorite beverage. (Julia laughs) - [Julia] All right, so let's get started. This is a 4 lb. broiler. The one thing, again, I
love about this recipe is you make gravy alongside
the roasting chicken. You don't have to wait for the drippings. - [Bridget] Lovely. - [Julia] Part of that is
because we're gonna use what's in this bag. We're gonna use the
giblets and the neck piece. There's a ton of flavor in that. This recipe really makes good use of that. All right. Set that aside. Now onto the chicken. This method uses the broiler exclusively. In order for that to work, the broiler to get that skin crisp, you have to make it a single layer. You have to spatchcock
it, or butterfly it. So what I'm gonna do is
just cut out the backbone, using a good pair of poultry shears. Really, if you do this a lot, you definitely wanna invest
in a good pair of shears. - [Bridget] Agree. - [Julia] All right. So now I'm just gonna take the backbone. I'm gonna cut it into pieces, again, using the scissors. That's more surface area for the gravy. You're going for about one-inch pieces. There's a spot there in the middle that has a big bone that you're not gonna get too small. All right. Gonna set that aside. Now for the chicken. First, we wanna tuck the wings. We wanna get these outta the way, 'cause these will burn
(Bridget laughs) under the boiler. So you just tuck 'em
back behind like that. Now to flatten, I'm just gonna (bone cracks)
press on it. I'm gonna put a little bit of oil on this. This is half a teaspoon of veg oil. We're just gonna put
this on the skin side. Rub it all in there. I pre-measured the salt and pepper because at this point, I'm all chicken-y and I don't wanna get it all over my pepper mill and my salt mill. This is a teaspoon of table salt and half a teaspoon of pepper. One more trick: gonna take a paring knife. You're just gonna poke
holes through the skin about three-quarters of an inch apart. That just helps that fat render and gets the skin good and crisp. Sometimes, there's a little
extra flap down here. The skin? I'm actually gonna cut that off because that's good flavor for the gravy. - [Bridget] Oh, okay. - All right. Now for the backside. I'm just gonna add a little bit of salt. This is half a teaspoon of salt. Last but not least, we're just gonna tie the legs together using some butcher's twine. There we go. That just prevents them from
splaying out during roasting. So it looks a little more
tidy when you carve it. Now here I have a skillet
with a teaspoon of veg oil. If you could heat that up over high heat, that'd be great. I'm gonna go wash my hands. - Sounds good. - [Julia] How's the oil doing? - [Bridget] It's smoking. - [Julia] Perfect. Time to add the chicken. We're using the skillet because we wanna get it good and hot. It'll start cooking the
chicken from the underside. (chicken sizzles) - [Bridget] Oh, good sound.
- [Julia] That's a good sound. All right. So now we're gonna put this into the oven. - [Bridget] Let me grab that for you. - [Julia] Thank you. Thank you. Now this oven is off at this point, which is good. You're starting in a cold oven. As I mentioned, we're
gonna broil the chicken. The oven will heat up really fast. Gives the chicken time to
acclimate, which is good. You wanna put the pan in
the center of the rack as best you can. We're gonna rotate the
handle halfway through. That way, it gets evenly brown. But the most important thing to note is the distance between the
rack and the broiler element. You want it to be 12 to 13 inches. 12 to 13 is the magic number. That's looking good. Time to turn on the oven. I'm gonna turn on the broiler. If your broiler has multiple settings, use the highest one. (broiler beeps) All right, now we're off to the races. That's gonna roast for 25
minutes before we rotate it. - Okay. - So that chicken is
snuggled up in the broiler. Time to make the gravy. So here are all those bits I saved. The backbone, the giblets, the neck. Into a nice large pan they go. We're gonna create fond using these bits and a little bit of
chicken broth to start. This is a cup of chicken broth. We're gonna bring this
to a vigorous simmer. We're gonna monitor the heat
so it's always simmering. We're actually gonna
reduce this down to au sec. We're gonna dry it out and create a fond with the fat and the drippings that come off the bones. - Okay. - That's gonna be the base of our gravy. Now we're gonna chop up some
vegetables for the gravy. No surprise here. Classic mirepoix, which is generally two parts onion to one part carrot and celery. I'm gonna cut them pretty small to make lots of surface area. I wanna get as much flavor out
of these vegetables as I can during this short simmering time. Whatever the vegetable is, a carrot or celery, cut them into long lengths like this then line 'em all up. Cut right through them
into small little bits. All right. There we have the mirepoix. Here we have one garlic clove, peeled. Just gonna smash this. That'll go in right like that. Then we have some parsley and some thyme. (food sizzling) All right. So it's been about 12 minutes. It smells amazing. - Kinda roasty chicken heaven. - Yeah. It's good. So you can see all the
liquid has evaporated. That fat has come out and now we're gonna get some browning and build that fond on
the bottom of the pot. That is key for making gravy from these little trimmed bits. Oh, that is some good looking fond. - [Bridget] Gorgeous. - I don't wanna let it go any further. Now it's time to add the vegetables. Here are four sprigs of parsley and a few sprigs of thyme. I'm gonna turn this down to medium. I'm gonna let this cook
until the vegetables soften. That can take seven or eight minutes. While that's happening, I'm gonna use all that moisture
coming outta the vegetables to help scrape up the fond. All right. So,
- [Bridget] Wow. - [Julia] Yeah. Look at all that beautiful
fond on the bottom of the pot. - Deep, dark, roasty flavor. - [Julia] Now I'm gonna add some liquid. This is a quarter-cup of white wine. Scraping up those brown bits. Then we're gonna add some more broth. Now I'm adding three
cups of chicken broth. Now's when you wanna take your time. Scrape all that browning into the liquid, and we're gonna let this
simmer for about 20 minutes. It's gonna reduce by about half. Now, time to check the chicken. - [Bridget] Beautiful already. - [Julia] Isn't it beautiful? Now I'm just rotating the skillet so the handle's facing the other way, but the skillet is still in the center. - Smack in the center. - Yep. Closing the oven door. Another 25 to 30 minutes. - [Bridget] Okay. - All right. Oh.
- [Bridget] Gorgeous. - [Julia] I know. She's a pretty bird. - [Bridget] Stunning. - I'm draping the towel over this handle. Handle's hot. Don't burn yourself. Again, we're looking for
an internal temperature of 155 degrees. 156. Perfect. Typically, we cook chicken until the breast registers 160 to 165. So 155 is on the low side, but that's good here because the amount of carryover is gonna be more than usual 'cause we used the boiler. The hotter the cooking environment, the more carryover the meat will have. - Intense cooking, intense carryover. - That's it. All right. Getting this out of the skillet. We're gonna let this rest
for 15 minutes uncovered, letting that skin stay good and crisp. Now I'm gonna take all these drippings. We're gonna pour 'em into a bowl. - [Bridget] That's flavor. - Now we're just gonna
let those drippings sit for about five minutes. Let them separate, and we'll use the flavorful
stuff in the gravy. Speaking of which, here is the broth that
we've been cooking down. I'm gonna strain it into a nice big bowl. Look at that broth. It's crazy.
- [Bridget] Mm-hm. - [Julia] Pressing all
the last little bits of liquid gold out of this strainer. Set that aside. We're gonna make a quick roux with two tablespoons of unsalted butter. We're just gonna melt this
butter over medium heat. (whisk scraping pan) All right. So that butter's melted. Now I'm gonna add two
and a half tablespoons of all-purpose flour. That's just making a roux that will thicken the stock into a gravy. I'm gonna let this roux cook for a good five minutes and let it get nice and toasty brown, 'cause that adds good flavor. All right. You can see
that roux is a nice golden. - [Bridget] Mm.
- [Julia] Mm-hm. Now I'm gonna whisk this broth back in. (liquid sizzles) I'm gonna take all these drippings. You can see the fat has
come to the surface. I'm just gonna use a spoon and spoon that fat right off the top. That looks pretty good. Whisk those drippings in. Now we're just gonna simmer this for about five minutes, let it thicken up, and then we can eat. All right. Your waiting time is over. - [Bridget] Thank goodness. - [Julia] Just gonna carve
up this little chicken. I'm gonna do kind of a
rustic family-style carve. I'm not gonna take it off the bone, but I am gonna separate all the pieces. The legs are basically held
onto the chicken by skin. So it's pretty easy to cut them off. - [Bridget] Look at that! Gorgeous. - [Julia] Yes. All right. Cut that off. Score the skin. Beautiful! Oh goodness. I'm just gonna give you the breast. - [Bridget] Okay. - [Julia] I just am. - [Bridget] I gotta say, the
breast is the test, isn't it? - [Julia] Little gravy? - [Bridget] Yes, please. - [Julia] A lot of gravy? - [Bridget] Yes, please. Little bit of meat. Mm. Mm! - [Julia] Mm-hm. - You know the type of gravy that you spend all day in the kitchen? This has that developed flavor. If I hadn't been standing next to you and seen you making this, I would think you had
spent all day doing it. - [Julia] Yeah. It's a clever, clever recipe. - [Bridget] Every bit
of that is juicy, moist, not overcooked at all. This was perfect. I would expect nothing less from the roast chicken queen herself. (Julia laughs) - Thanks, Julia. - [Julia] Thank you. - [Bridget] Well, if you wanna make this soul-warming,
delicious chicken at home, spatchcock the chicken for even cooking. Start the chicken in a preheated skillet, and then broil the chicken on a rack that's 12 inches from the broiler. Meanwhile, make a broth
from the chicken trimmings and finish the gravy
with roasted drippings. So from America's Test Kitchen, a surefire satisfying broiled
chicken with lots of gravy, and I mean lots of gravy. - Your plate's looking a little dry there. Oh yeah. Right on the... - That's what friends are for. - That's a good friend right there. - Yep. Get a straw. (upbeat music) - "I have too much kitchen
counter space," said no one ever. So a big appliance like a toaster oven better be worth the real
estate that it occupies. Lucky for us, Adam's here. He's gonna tell us which
toaster oven came out on top. - We're doing a segment for the lucky few who have the space, but you know what, if
you do have the space, we think a good toaster
oven is really worth having. - Okay. - They can be very useful. We had a lineup of eight toaster ovens. Seven of them are here in
front of us and behind us. We were able to get them
for a range of prices from $43 to $270. We were looking for versatility. So we chose a size that would accommodate six slices of toast or a 4 lb. chicken. - Oh, okay. - The toast tests were first. We used our favorite white sandwich bread. We made batches of a single slice, four slices, and six slices. We were looking for evenness
throughout the slices, also a level of browning that was true to the
setting that we put it at. - Accuracy. - You know, some of them
didn't work out too well. For instance, this one,
at the high setting, went for eight or nine minutes and it turned our toast into charcoal. - [Bridget] It's, I would say, well done. - [Adam] It's really, really done. It also only had three toast settings, where some of these had as many as seven, which really helped us get the level of toasting that we wanted. The other cooking tests were to bake potatoes and sugar cookies, broil asparagus, melt cheese on tuna
sandwiches for tuna melts, one of my personal faves, and frozen pizzas. - Okay. - You can never have enough frozen pizzas. - Makes sense. - Some of these were
not cooking the recipes within the specified times. So we wired them up with thermocouples and we set them to 350 degrees and tracked the
temperature over two hours. Every oven, whether it is a toaster oven or a wall oven or a range, operates pretty much the same way. The elements cycle on and off so that they maintain an average, which is the temperature you set in there. So some fluctuation is gonna be normal, but some of these
fluctuated more than others. The best ones were only
off by a degree or two from that 350 set, and those are the ones that cooked recipes within the specified times of the recipes. This guy, which took up to 30% longer than the recipes said it should, varied by as much as 60 degrees
below the set temperature. - That's enough to ruin a recipe. - Definitely. Now, one of the possible
explanations for this is the type of heating
element that this uses. A lot of them use nichrome, which is a mixture of nickel and chromium. The better ones, that were
closer to the set temperature, use quartz elements, and those heat up and cool down faster. So they're more responsive and able to maintain a temperature - [Bridget] Okay.
more consistently. We also tried those 4 lb. chickens. We wanted to roast a
whole chicken in here, which was sort of an extreme test. That showed us that if there wasn't enough
space above the chicken for air to circulate, the skin just did not brown. In terms of capacity, testers were also looking for these to accommodate a 13x9 baking pan and a quarter sheet pan. Controls varied among them. One of them, for instance, instead of having buttons
that were labeled clearly, like "bake" or "broil", had a bunch of squiggly lines. Kind of hard to figure
out what was going on. Some testers likened
these to hieroglyphics. - You need a Rosetta Stone. - [Adam] You need a Rosetta Stone! Some of the toaster ovens actually had beautifully
clear labels, like this one, said "bake", "broil". Intuitive, easy to set. In fact, this is our winning toaster oven. It's won before and it's winning again. This is the Breville Smart Oven. We got it for about $250. It's got a quartz element,
so it's responsive. It made great food. It's easy and intuitive to use. So, you know, if you're lucky enough to have the counter space, we think a Smart Oven
is really worth having. - All right. Well, if you wanna pick up the winner, it's the Breville Smart Oven. We bought it for $250. (energetic music) - Cooking in your toaster oven is handy, but most full size pans won't fit. Any pans that come with the oven tend to be minimal and super flimsy. So we rounded up cookware that fits these compact ovens and we put it to the test. First, we love these
quarter-sized rimmed baking sheets by Nordic Ware Naturals. They're about $13. This stainless steel cooling
rack by Checkered Chef, it fits right inside and it's about $12. They're sturdy and they're perfect for broiling, baking,
roasting, and reheating. Next, Le Creuset's Heritage
Petite Au Gratin Dish is about six inches long. It holds about six ounces. It's made of enameled stoneware and it costs about $15. This not only heats
evenly and broils safely, but it looks really
great for serving, too. Finally, this Williams-Sonoma
Goldtouch Pro Muffin Tin, about $26. It bakes just six muffins or cupcakes. This gold-colored non-stick finish helps baked goods brown beautifully and release perfectly. The extended rims help with easy handling, and unlike some models we tested, it had plenty of space between the cups. So cupcakes didn't all run together. With any of this scaled-down cookware, you're ready to cook,
roast, broil, and bake right in your toaster oven, without sacrificing sturdiness, practical features, or dependable results. (energetic music) - I have never been a fan of broccoli, in large part because it's
hard to cook properly. Either the florets are overdone and mushy or the stalks are fibrous and tough. But today, Dan is not only
gonna show me a new method, but he promised to show
me how to add some flavor. - That's right. I was in the same camp
as you for a long time. I thought broccoli was always overcooked and not that great. Then I had roasted
broccoli for the first time and I was a total convert. So today, we're gonna make
a skillet-roasted broccoli, which is even easier. You don't have to turn your oven on and you get that same beautiful browning, crisp, tender results on the inside. - [Julia] All right. - [Dan] Now, when we're looking
for browning on anything, we need a nice flat surface because that flat surface
is gonna make good contact, whether a skillet or
roasting pan in the oven and get beautiful browning. - [Julia] Mm-hm. - [Dan] This doesn't
have a lot of flat sides. - [Julia] It surely doesn't. - [Dan] Right? So we have to make some nice flat sides. For smaller crowns like this, that are up to four inches, we're gonna cut them into four pieces. If you have bigger ones, that are kind of four to five inches, you wanna go into six wedges. - [Julia] Okay. - [Dan] So what I like to do is first make my cut here
to split this and pull it. You get less degree of broccoli
flying all over the place. - [Julia] That's a good trick. - [Dan] Yeah. So we'll just pull that. We get there. I have five tablespoons of oil in a 12-inch non-stick skillet. - Okay. - That is really a key to
anytime you are roasting, is having enough oil to make great contact with the bottom. So this technique of
starting in a cold pan, we tend to call it cold searing now. It's something that we do
all the time with proteins and with vegetables. What's really nice about it, obviously, this is cold, very easy to arrange everything in here. I can add a couple tablespoons of water. - [Julia] Aha. - [Dan] Without a big steamy mess and splattering and all of that. That water's really important. It's gonna help create
a lot of steam in there and help tenderize the
broccoli in this first step. I also have three-quarters of
a teaspoon kosher salt here. So I'm just gonna season these up. Great. We're gonna put the top on here and I'm gonna put this over high heat. We wanna create lots of steam there. We're gonna jump-start that browning and get a lot of steam from that water. This stage here takes about four minutes. - [Julia] Okay. - [Dan] So now we're gonna do a topping. I mentioned that we're gonna
get really great broccoli, but then also a flavorful topping for it. We're actually gonna make
a really nice dry topping. - [Julia] Ooh. So you got
the mortar and pestle out. - [Dan] Mortar and pestle. You could also use a
spice grinder for this. I love the mortar and pestle. I always have it on the counter. It's just such a great
thing to work with here. We have two tablespoons of sunflower seeds that have been toasted. I've got a tablespoon
of nutritional yeast. - Nooch! - Nooch. So is it something that you
use a lot in your kitchen? - I have it. I put it on popcorn, 'cause it makes popcorn taste incredible. - It's incredible stuff. It's cheesy, umami. It's deactivated yeast. You cannot leaven your bread with this. It adds a ton of savoriness, and it's dry, so that's a good thing. A half-teaspoon of grated lemon zest for some really nice brightness and then a quarter-teaspoon
of smoked paprika, and finally, just a quarter
of a teaspoon of kosher salt. All right. So I'm gonna
get my mortar in here. I like to first go pretty gently. - So things don't fly out. - Exactly. Work my way around, break some of those sunflower
seeds into smaller pieces. All right. So now that it's broken down, I can kind of run my
pestle around this way, get it to a nice even consistency. This is our topping. We're gonna take a third of this mixture and put it on the bottom here so that every piece is totally coated. - [Julia] I like it. - [Dan] We'll set this aside. Now we've got about a minute
left on the broccoli here. - [Julia] Okay. Dan, it smells like broccoli. - Yes! Oh, you're not happy about that. - Smells like steamed broccoli. - It has been steaming. There's also a little bit of browning. It's been about four minutes. We're gonna take the lid off. At this point, as you can
see, some of it shrunk down. - Yep.
- So I can get those pieces that weren't touching to touch. Just use my spatula
here and press them in. Okay. Great. Everything is flush to the
surface as I possibly can. We're gonna put the lid back on and continue to cook. We're gonna get great
browning on that bottom side and keep steaming it through a little bit. Takes about four to six minutes. - Okay. - [Dan] All right. It's
been about five minutes. We're gonna take a look here. I think we've got beautiful browning on that side.
- Ooh! - [Dan] So I'm gonna take this
off the heat at this point. Slide it up here. This makes it really easy
to just turn them all. So we want that second cut side. Remember, we made wedges. We want that second cut side to get really good browning as well. Just shifting that over. All right. I'm gonna put this back on the heat and we're gonna get this
second side gorgeous and crispy just like the first. This takes about three to five minutes. - Covered or uncovered? - I'm gonna uncover it now. We've got plenty of steaming, so plenty of tenderizing. From time to time, I'll just use my spatula to make sure I'm getting really good contact. - [Julia] Okay. - That is good-looking broccoli. - [Julia] That is good-looking broccoli. - [Dan] Right? We have got gorgeous
browning on both sides. I was just checking. See that? - [Julia] Ooh. Okay. - [Dan] Beautiful, right? - [Julia] I'm in.
I'm in, so far. - You're in, so far? - Yeah. - Now we're gonna transfer it over to our topping-covered platter. - Well, the way you're
arranging it on the platter with the topping, I
mean, it just looks cool. - [Dan] Right? - [Julia] It's elevating this
lowly brassica a little bit. - [Dan] Then we will sprinkle it on. That color is beautiful, too, isn't it? - [Julia] That looks pretty cool. Oh, I can now smell the sunflower seeds and that lemon zest
hitting the hot broccoli. - [Dan] And you get
that smoked paprika too. - [Julia] Yeah. - [Dan] Let's get you
some really nice pieces. - [Julia] Mm-hm. I appreciate
you picking out the good ones. - [Dan] Lots of flavor on there. - [Julia] Well, I must say it's the prettiest-looking
broccoli I've ever seen. All right, Dan, the true test. That's pretty darn good. I'm gonna hafta try it again. It's that topping. I'd put that on anything. - It's good, right? We actually have some
other toppings as well. You can find those at our website. - [Julia] I mean, that
cooking method's amazing. - [Dan] Yep. - [Julia] Because the
florets are perfectly cooked. They're not mushy, but
they're not fibrous. And the stem... Mm-hm. - Nice and tender, like crisp-tender. - Mm-hm. Dan, I can honestly say this is the best broccoli I've ever eaten. Thank you. - [Dan] You're welcome. So if you wanna make
what is, in my opinion, the best broccoli, cut broccoli crowns into wedges, start it in a cold pan with
oil and a splash of water, and serve with an aromatic topping. From America's Test Kitchen, a great new method for
skillet-roasted broccoli. You can find this recipe and all the recipes and product
reviews from this season, along with select
episodes, at our website, AmericasTestKitchen.com/tv. I'm going back for a third bite. - Yes.
- Unheard of. - Unheard of with broccoli. - Thanks for watching
America's Test Kitchen. What'd you think? - Well, leave a comment and let us know which recipes
you're excited to make, or you can just say hello. - You can find links to
today's recipes and reviews in the video description. - And don't forget to
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