Rellenong manok (stuffed deboned whole chicken)
Print this holiday recipe!
If you want a delicious and great-looking main dish for noche buena, chicken relleno is a fantastic choice. Tasty, impressive and inexpensive. Yes, inexpensive — if you cook it at home. Just see the ingredients and you’ll understand what I mean. I didn’t think I could pull this off but deboning a whole chicken was surprisingly easier than I thought. I did it in 15 minutes flat and I didn’t nick my hands and fingers with the knife that I used. 
I wasn’t about to let the 2-kg chicken go to waste. It took forever to find a bird that big (most weigh just a little over a kilo) so when I chanced upon 2-kg free range chickens at Unimart in Greenhills two days ago, I decided there and then that I would make chicken relleno. Last night, I did.
The more traditional way of cooking stuffed deboned whole chicken is to leave only the bones in the wings. The thighs and drumsticks are deboned and stuffed as well. But that’s too much for me. I deboned the carcass, and as far as the thigh, but stopped there. BUT unlike most cooks who cut through the chicken breast to make deboning easier (they sew up the chicken during the stuffing part), I did no such thing.
I deboned the chicken the same way I saw Geny Sison do it on TV months and months ago — by using a small knife and cutting between the meat and the bones little by little and using the fingers to push the meat off the bones. I was so worried that the chicken skin would tear by the time I was halfway through the deboning but all’s well that ends well. Imagine taking off a buttonless shirt by pulling it up over the shoulders and then out through the hands and head. That was how I did it. No cutting through the skin and no sewing up afterwards. Very little meat remained stuck to the bones by the time I was through but I kept the bones anyway because I can still make a pot of broth with them.
I wish I could present you with a video of the deboning process but no one was free to shoot. I couldn’t mount the video cam on the tripod and leave it there the whole time because we have cats who just love to play tag between the feet of the tripod. So, there.
The stuffing is a variation of the chicken embutido.
Ingredients:
a large whole chicken, at least 2 kg. in weight, deboned
1/2 kilo of ground chicken meat (you can substitute pork)
1 onion, finely chopped
1/2 c. of finely sliced onion leaves
1 chorizo de bilbao, finely chopped
2-3 tbsps. of sweet pickle relish
3 hard-boiled eggs, shelled
1 egg, beaten
3 slices of day-old bread, cut into small pieces and soaked in 2 tbsps. of milk
salt
pepper
Cooking procedure:
Season the deboned chicken inside and out with salt and pepper. Let sit in the fridge for a few hours.
To make the stuffing, just mix together the onion, onion leaves, sweet pickle relish, ground chicken or pork, chopped chorizo de bilbao, beaten egg and bread. Season with about a teaspoonful of salt and half a teaspoonful of ground pepper.
Take the chicken from the fridge. Lay it flat on a large plate, breast side up. Fold the neck skin and tuck it underneath. Spoon the stuffing into the cavity. When half the stuffing is in, take the hard-boiled eggs and arrange them in a row along the middle of the cavity. Spoon the remaining stuffing in. Pull the skin on the tail end so that very little of the stuffing is exposed.
Carefully slide the stuffed chicken onto the roasting rack. Roast in a preheated 170oC oven for 1 hour and 20 minutes.
Remove from the oven and cool for at least 15 minutes before slicing.
Bookmark at:StumbleUpon | Digg | Del.icio.us | Newsvine | Spurl | Furl | Reddit | Yahoo! MyWeb
More holiday recipes? Try these!
Except for personal use, or as legitimate RSS feeds with link back to this page, NO PART OF THIS ENTRY MAY BE REPRODUCED IN ANY MANNER, whether individually or as part of a collection, without the owner's PRIOR written permission. This blog is a FREE service. Help maintain it by respecting the author's copyright.
Some entries have multiple pages. Most recipes are on page 2; others, on page 3 or 4. Click on the pagination links to view them.
Some entries DO NOT contain recipes.
Sorry, I don't e-mail recipes. However, you may opt to receive a weekly summary of recent Pinoy Cook food articles and recipes by using the form below.
Comments
19 Responses to “Rellenong manok (stuffed deboned whole chicken)”
Leave a Reply
Readers
Recent Comments
- on 'Rellenong manok (stuffed deboned whole chicken)'
- on 'Adobo, quail eggs and rice'
- on 'Rellenong manok (stuffed deboned whole chicken)'
- on 'Bangus belly steaks'
- on 'Corn muffins a la Kenny Rogers'
- on 'Corn muffins a la Kenny Rogers'
- on 'Fried lapu-lapu with pineapple sauce'
- on 'Fried lapu-lapu with pineapple sauce'
- on 'Tilapia fritters with honey-lemon sauce'
- on 'Fried lapu-lapu with pineapple sauce'
very nice pic i guess chicken galantina is the same recipe. I made it last october during our wedding anniversary. I did cut the skin and then saw it up. i marinated the deboned chicken in a brine also i added liver pate in the mixture of the stuffing it tasted so good my neighbor who ate with us thought so too.
just a bit too much work but still a very good dish for special occassions
I think the only difference between relleno and galantina is that galantina is steamed.
15 mins?! That’s really fast Connie! Too bad you weren’t able video record yourself. I’m really bad when it comes to deboning chicken, or anything with bones. I feel that if i attempt this, i’ll end up sewing the chicken in so many parts i’ll have to name it chicken frankenstein!
i wish i could see the deboning process… i don’t know how to debone a chicken… we just ask our chicken guy (from the market) to debone for us.
i usually add dried cranberries in my rellenong manok
I have several customers lately getting from us the big sized free range chickens (almost 2.5-3kilos liveweight) and saying they will roast, relleno, gallantina etc.
After reading this, I have to learn to debone.
Peterb, LOL, frankenstein hehehe.
Misao, I’m thinking of making another for the New Year. Since everyone will be on a break, I’ll nag someone (hubby or daughters) to take a video hehehe
solraya, I just saw your site. Do you sell the chickens on a retail basis? I loved, loved, loved the texture of the meat and the fact that there was very little fat on the skin.
ang ganda ganda naman ng manok mo.
i agree with you on your preference for chicken over other meat. kaya lang kasi ako pg manok e either fried lang o roast lang ang lutong gusto ko sa kanila, plus adobo pala. ayaw ko kasi ng sinabawan sa manok e even yung ma sauce. pero nakakaengganyo yung relyrnong manok mo. kaya lang d ako marunong mg debone. meron kayang nabibiling deboned na? wish i could do this one. ang ganda ganda talaga nya e…
beng, i have special chicken adobo dish coming up.
Connie, we do still have stocks of the big sized ones, as we were using them as demo for growers, and we timed them for the Christmas season too.
We prefer if people bought it live from us, as we don’t really dress. Nothing beats fresh chickens
Our live, ready to slaughter free range chickens can be bought at AANI FTI Weekend Market, AANI Quezon Circle on Sats and Suns, and Mon-Sat at our Fairview outlet.
Yes the meat is firm but not tough…I appreciate the taste and the health benefits.
I made mention of this Rellenong Manok recipe in my blog, mentioned your name and linked it to this page.
I just read that I need to specify a trackback. Not sure how it is done…but I will try to do one
solraya, naku, don’t know how to slaughter chicken.
the trackback URL is below the submit button in small font.
Connie, I cut and paste that trackback, doubt if I got it working. Nevertheless, I made sure proper credits and links to you blog worked
Free range chickens: If you won’t get taas kilay because our dressing is not perfect as everything is done manually…sure we can dress for you
If you need a few, then I can serve you.
I would have referred you to our growers but there is only one now who has the huge chickens in Luzon at this date. If you need a lot and want great perfectly dressed ones, you may try calling Jocelyn at (0929) 244-7746 she also has organic vegetables and rice.
I was thinking more of maybe 2 chickens per week. Will visit the QMC outlet one of these days. Thanks, Solraya.
It looks so good. I want to try this but I am not so brave to debone a chicken with being busy with my baby and all. Hopefully I can find a chicken or even turkey that was already deboned.
HI Janette,
LandMark Supermarket in TrinoMa sells boneless chicken. You just have to ask them.
Sure look delicious!!!!!!!!!!!! nakakatakam. . . . I will try it for Noche Buena, I just hope that the local Safeway or BelAir Supermarket have whole chicken that I will use for my “experiment” hahaha!!!
it’s been a long time curiosity of mine how one debones a chicken w/o tearing it apart and your blog motivated me to just do it–armed only w/ a small knife and a scissor, i was able to pull it off! I even got a photo of it for proof that your cooking instructions is doable and tasty. thanks a lot!!! more power to you
Hi Connie, if you care to get our dressed naturally grown chickens, we are now at Market at the Hills, Corinthian Hills, along Temple Drive every Saturday and Sunday.
You dont have to worry about getting it live anymore
Last week a customer was making it sound so easy to debone chicken, much like the way liz described it.
I am dreaming of good adobo and will search for your mentioned “special chicken adobo dish”.
Thank you for sharing your ideas.
nice recipe.. i really want to know how to debone a whole chicken without cutting it.. can you make a video pls..