Flattened Brick Chicken

Cooking a whole chicken in the summer seems daunting, long, and hot - but not if you do a flattened brick chicken! Flatten out a chicken and cook it in a hot skillet with weight on top and it cooks quickly and evenly and has a great crispy skin and juicy meat. Great leftovers for chicken sandwiches. Very tasty!

Ingredients:
1 2-3 pound chicken
spice rub
olive oil

Directions:
Butterfly the chicken. To do this, use kitchen shears to cut out the backbone. Turn the chicken over and press against the breast with your hand until it flattens (you'll probably hear a crack). Cut out the breast bone. Cover the chicken in a spice rub and let sit for half an hour or so.

Heat a large skillet (or grill pan) and add a little oil, then put the chicken in breast side down. Weight the chicken down with either two bricks wrapped in tin foil or another heavy skillet. (I used a pot full of water.) This helps the chicken cook evenly.

Cook on breast side until crispy and brown, about 10 minutes. Flip the chicken (wiping the bricks/skillet/pot) so it's skin side up and put the weights back on, cooking another 10 minutes or so until juices run clear. Let the chicken sit on a cutting board for about 5 minutes, then cut it up and serve! Juicy and delicious. I served it with steamed haricots verts.