Preparing a Low-Stress Chicken Dinner

Long cooking times can deter time-stressed moms, but the truth is you sometimes need a bit of extra time to create a healthy meal. That said, you don't have to make your schedule any more hectic than it already is. The suggestion below is easy to create, but requires that you organize your schedule creatively to get everything finished on time.

Preparing a Roast Chicken Dinner

Roasting the bird. I place a seasoned, trussed 2-1/2-pound chicken to roast in a 350 degree F oven two hours before dinnertime -- plenty of time to have it cooked and ready. I wash, peel and dice a large turnip, sweet potato, onion, carrot and celery, and arrange them around the roasting chicken after it has been cooking for about 45 minutes. This means the vegetables are tender and nicely caramelized by the time the chicken is done cooking -- when it reaches an internal breast temperature of 165 degrees F.

Quick gravy. After draining the fat, I use the drippings in the roasting pan to make a quick pan gravy and we're sitting down to eat approximately two hours after I started preparations.

Healthy portions. Serving size is important, both in terms of nutrition and meal planning. Adults receive a 4-ounce serving of meat while the kids get a 2-ounce size. Get more kid-size portion tips. After dinner I store the leftover meat to be used in another meal later in the week.

Leftover plans. To get a jump on another future dinner, I begin the preparations for a chicken stock, placing the bones into a 3- to 6-quart pot along with with large-cut veggies such as a medium-sized onion (that's been washed and peeled), carrot and celery stalk. I cover it with plastic wrap and refrigerate it until I have time to simmer it -- probably tomorrow.

Though the two hours spent on this dinner may seem like a lot, because the roasting time is long, my experience is that it leaves plenty of time to help the kids with their homework or to tidy the house.