Easy One-Pan Roast Chicken & Vegetables and other simple comfort foods
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It’s funny how a meal can stop time for a moment.
This past weekend, I was moving slowly around our kitchen… our actual kitchen… chopping vegetables, wiping my hands on a towel, opening the oven more often than necessary, just to check. Nothing fancy, nothing rushed. A small roast chicken, a pan of root vegetables, red cabbage steaks darkening and crisping in the oven, and a humble gratin bubbling away in a clay dish.
Somewhere between slicing pumpkin, flipping cabbage, and helping my husband carry in crates of books from the barn (a task we’ve been putting off since our shipping container arrived from the U.S… in June), it occurred to me that this would have been impossible a year ago.
This time last winter, we had only been living in Germany for about two and a half months. The house was quiet and untouched, but still full of promise. We weren’t settled enough to think about paint colors, let alone the renovations upstairs that inevitably needed to happen. There was no usable kitchen, as we had eagerly started taking it apart in pieces, full of anticipation, but without any real plan for what would replace it. We had a questionable toilet that only flushed every third Thursday, and a few radiators that pretended to heat rooms but really just filled with air pockets and huffed at us in the middle of the night, as if they were laughing at our ambition to take on this project. But it wasn’t bad. I was still happy just to be here at all.
My cousin Natalie, who lived upstairs before us, was a single mom working full time and feeling a little swallowed by a house this size for just her and her son. I completely understand that now. My husband and I often joke that a house like this feels like a full-time job, but honestly, that’s exactly what I love about it. My grandparents built this place to function as a home, a dairy farm, a space to raise a family, grow food, and keep animals. Naturally, it was a full-time job, and everyone played their part.
With the upstairs kitchen “in progress” for most of the first year, we cooked downstairs in my grandmother’s kitchen on the first floor. That space holds so many memories that it practically hums. The smell of coffee in the mornings, drawers opening that hadn’t been reorganized in decades, the low grumble of my grandfather sitting in the corner banquette, and the quiet comfort of cooking in a room that had fed generations of friends and family.
It was grounding. And also (if I’m being honest) mildly inconvenient. (There are only so many times you can carry ingredients up and down a flight of stairs before you start considering installing a dumbwaiter.)
Now, a year later, I’m standing in a kitchen that is finally beginning to feel like ours. The layout makes sense. The light hits the counters just right. We know where everything lives. The cast iron pan has a permanent home. It’s the kind of space that invites you to cook without thinking too hard about it. It’s still a work in progress, of course, but at least it’s ours.
So for today’s post, I want to talk about a simple winter meal that feels deeply comforting. The ideas came from pages of a vintage French cookbook I photographed during our last visit to Alsace. Adapted, tweaked, and made our own. A small chicken roasted in cast iron with celery root, potatoes, and carrots. Nothing revolutionary, but exactly what the moment called for.
Alongside it, red cabbage steaks brushed with olive oil and mustard powder, finished with a drizzle of balsamic and roasted until their edges nearly blackened and their centers softened into something sweet and earthy.
And then there was the gratin. Pumpkin, kohlrabi, and mushrooms layered gently, bathing in a light cream sauce, baked until bubbling and golden.
What I loved most about this meal is that none of it needed the others. The chicken and vegetables could stand on their own. The gratin could easily be dinner by itself. The red cabbage could just as easily be simmered in broth and served over greens or mashed potatoes on another night.
While everything cooked, snow fell outside.
Proper snow. The kind that actually sticks. Which, if you know this part of Germany, doesn’t always happen. Winters here tend to tease nowadays with gray skies, cold air, and layers of endless fog. I don’t actually mind that version of winter either since I find it oddly romantic. But this year, we’ve got snow. The kind I hadn’t seen here since I was a teenager.
Cooking this meal felt like taking stock. Not in a dramatic, end‑of‑year‑resolution way, but in a quieter, more honest sense. We’ve built something here. Slowly… imperfectly… but with patience.
This kitchen didn’t exist for us a year ago, and this rhythm didn’t either.
So here we are, feeding ourselves well, standing barefoot on cold floors, listening to the oven click as it cools, grateful in a way that doesn’t need to announce itself.
If nothing else, this past year has taught me that progress doesn’t always look exciting while it’s happening. Sometimes it looks like a roast chicken, a snow‑covered garden, and the quiet realization that you’re finally cooking in a place that feels like home.
Cast-Iron Roast Chicken & Vegetables
Ingredients
1 small whole chicken
1/2 small celery root (celeriac), peeled & chunked
3 to 4 potatoes, cut into large pieces
2 to 3 carrots, cut into thick chunks
1 small onion or shallot, quartered
3 cloves garlic, smashed
Olive oil or butter
Salt & freshly cracked black pepper
Fresh thyme and rosemary (sage and oregano also optional)
1 lemon (optional but seductive)
A splash of white wine or broth (optional)
Kitchen scraps (carrot tips, celery tops, onion skins, etc.)
Prep
Heat the oven to 200°C / 400°F
Season the chicken
Use your fingers to lift sections of the skin away from the flesh around the breast, thigh and back
Mix softened butter or olive oil with fresh herbs, salt and pepper, and any spices of your choice and smear underneath the skin of the whole chicken
After you’ve chopped your vegetables, use the scraps and stuff the cavity with those aromatics (carrot/celery/onion, etc.) along with herbs, and half a lemon
Season again with salt and pepper inside and out
Place the chicken breast-side up in the center of the pan
Spread vegetables around the chicken and drizzle with some olive oil, salt, pepper and a few sprigs of herbs
Roast
Roast 20 minutes at 200°C to kick-start the browning
Lower to 175°C / 350°F and continue roasting 35–45 minutes, until the skin is golden and juices run clear (or internal temp hits about 74°C / 165°F at the thigh)
If the pan looks dry, splash in a little wine or broth halfway through.
Rest (important)
Take it out and let rest for 10–15 minutes before cutting
Have a glass of wine while you wait
Optional upgrades (because of course)
Brush the chicken with honey + Dijon during the last 10 minutes
Add paprika or smoked paprika to the vegetables
Finish the veg with a squeeze of lemon and flaky salt
Pumpkin, Kohlrabi & Mushroom Gratin
Ingredients
300 g pumpkin (Hokkaido or butternut), thinly sliced
1 large kohlrabi, peeled and thinly sliced
200 g mushrooms, sliced
1 onion or shallot, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
200 ml cream
grated cheese (such as Gruyère, Emmental, or any other mild cheese)
1 tbsp butter or olive oil
salt & black pepper
fresh thyme or rosemary
nutmeg, a pinch
breadcrumbs or extra cheese for topping (optional)
Instructions
Heat the oven to 190°C (375°F)
Butter a small gratin or casserole dish
Sauté onion and garlic in butter or oil until soft
Layer the pumpkin, kohlrabi and mushrooms in the dish
Pour cream mixture over everything, and sprinkle a tiny pinch of nutmeg
Top with grated cheese (and breadcrumbs if using)
Bake uncovered for 40–45 minutes, until bubbling and golden and a knife slides in easily
Rest 10 minutes before serving
Optional upgrades
Add a teaspoon of Dijon mustard to the cream
Substitute the cream for 50/50 crème fraîche and milk (this is what I did)
Roasted Red Cabbage Steaks
Ingredients
1 medium red cabbage, cut into thick steaks
olive oil
1 tsp mustard powder (or grainy mustard)
½ tsp smoked paprika (or sweet paprika)
½ tsp garlic powder
salt & pepper
balsamic vinegar or honey
toasted walnuts or hazelnuts, chopped (optional)
prep
Heat oven to 200°C / 400°F
Place cabbage steaks on a lined tray or cast-iron pan
Whisk olive oil, mustard powder, paprika, garlic, salt, and pepper
Brush generously on both sides of each steak
Roast
Roast 20 minutes, flip carefully.
Roast another 15 minutes until the edges are caramelized and the centers are tender but still structured
Finish
Hit them hot with a tiny drizzle of balsamic vinegar or honey
Top with flaky salt and chopped nuts if using
Note: Red cabbage can sometime be very hard and rubbery when undercooked. If you have a hearty cabbage, don’t be shy to pour a thin layer broth to the baking tray to for the cabbage to bathe in while it cooks.