The Countertop Oven Class

Kyl Haselbauer has 20 years of experience working in fine-dining and modernist kitchens, including Bar Cotto and Anchovies &amp; Olives in Seattle. He is also the owner of Bright Spot, a café and coffee shop in Seattle.

Kyl Haselbauer

One of our chefs, Kyl Haselbauer, loves to dip things in ranch. Chicken strips, pizza, quesadillas, fries—you get the point. So, after roasting nearly 80 chickens to enhance our <a href="https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/ultimate-roast-chicken">Ultimate Roast Chicken</a> and create our <a href="https://www.chefsteps.com/activities/the-ultimate-guide-to-roast-chicken">Ultimate Roast Chicken guide</a>, Kyl had only one thing left to do: put ranch powder on a chicken and roast it. He went straight to the source and used the super-condensed flavor bomb of the <a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01H821DZS/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B01H821DZS&linkCode=as2&tag=chefsteps02-20&linkId=cd5a676c6fa735917aa056f2fc59b615">Hidden Valley Ranch powder</a> to blast this chicken with ranch flavor. It turns out his ranch problem made one of the tastiest roasted chickens the staff has ever eaten. Besides, sometimes you want your dinner in under an hour—start to finish—with as little active work as possible. That’s why we decided to pack as much flavor as we could in this chicken, make it moist, and have it be done fast. The secret? Spatchcocking. Spatchcock is fun to say. To do it takes a little work, but not too much. Spatchcocking a chicken means to break down the chicken, take out the breastbone, and lay the chicken flat so the heat of the oven can reach every inch of surface area of that chicken. Kyl took it one step further and scored the chicken, so the skin would be crispy. Besides, that allowed more space for the ranch powder to get into the crevices. He roasted the chicken on a bed of smashed potatoes so the fat and juices that cooked out of the chicken would drip down onto the potatoes, adding an extra layer of delicious flavor.Are you hungry yet? We are. And we have eaten this chicken quite a few times now. So, if you know someone with a ranch problem like Kyl—and it is okay if that is you—make this for dinner. Make someone happy with spatchcocked chicken, crispy smashed potatoes, and ranch.

Ranch Chicken