http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/21/dining/roasted-chicken-recipe-figs-peppers.html 2016-09-16 19:14:39 Roasted Figs and Chicken for a Sweet (and Savory) New Year This easy yet elegant sheet-pan recipe is fitting for a Rosh Hashana celebration. === Before an arctic blast killed I never got that many, so I’d nibble each precious fruit as it ripened, preferably still hot from the sun, bursting with sweet pulp and crunchy seeds. Now I buy my figs at the supermarket. And because they have ceased to be part of some imagined Mediterranean idyll, I’ve actually been cooking with them more than ever. I’ve sautéed them, grilled them, poached them. But my favorite is roasting. Roasted figs have a condensed, caramelized sweetness. Even mediocre figs turn into glistening, jammy puddles after a brief stint in a very hot oven. In this recipe, I pair the soft roasted fruit with crisp-skinned chicken to make a slightly fancy and exceedingly easy sheet-pan supper. Figs are what make it fancy. Cooking everything at once on sheet pans makes it easy. It’s become my new favorite dish for early autumn entertaining, especially as Rosh Hashana rolls around. The intense syrupiness of the figs is especially apropos for the holiday. Traditionally, Jews serve Before roasting, I like to marinate the chicken with citrus rind and rosemary to increase the savoriness of the dish. Thinly sliced chiles aid the cause, providing a welcome bite. If you’re worried about upsetting small children and other chile-avoiders, you can leave out the chiles, or add them to just one of the two sheet pans. But they do mellow as they roast, so even the most mouth-burning serrano won’t be the scorcher that it was. The recipe calls for bone-in chicken parts, and you can use any type you like, or a whole cut-up chicken. If you do use a combination of white and dark meat, arrange them on separate pans so you can pull each one from the oven as it finishes. White meat cooks more quickly than dark. Then when fig season ends, you can try this dish with other soft, juicy fruit like grapes or plums. Maybe you’re lucky enough to be able to pick them from your arbor or orchard. But rest assured that you can work wonders with supermarket finds. Recipes: