Recipe: Love Spell Chicken

This recipe was inspired by "Like Water for Chocolate".  If you're into folk magic and food, I cannot possibly recommend that book highly enough.  The movie is also excellent, but does not include the recipes.  This version is really only tangentially related to the one in the book.  I often make this the first time I cook for a new partner.  It would be good for an anniversary or Valentine's day dinner.

Ingredients

• 1 whole chicken (doves would be better, if you can get them)
• 3 Tbsp butter, softened (so your love will be luxurious)
• black or red pepper to taste (for heat.  I like it spicy, but I seem to date a lot of guys who can't handle that.  I realize as I write that sentence that it is true in every possible way.)
• 1 whole apple, in eighths (make the first cut so you see the "star" in the middle)
• 1-5 Tbsp rose water (rose water varies really dramatically from brand to brand, so you'll have to decide what the right amount is.  better too little than too much.  If you use too much, it will taste like grandma's soap). OR many rose petals.  Do not use florist roses; they're often coated in poison.
• 1 Tbsp honey (for sweetness, obviously)
• 1 tsp smoked paprika (for subtle smokey mystery)
• 2 Tbsp sweet wine (for intoxicating infatuation)
• 3 petals of red roses plucked from a holy place (churches very often grow roses, so this is easier than you might imagine)
• 3 petals of a rose given from lover to lover (be careful to wash these; florist roses are COATED in pesticides).  It is ideal if these are roses given by your father to your mother, but make do.  Roses the partner you're cooking for gave you are also very good.
• 3 petals of a rose from a wedding. 

INSTRUCTIONS

• Awaken each ingredient. Speak to it, and ask it to help bring feelings of love to the service. Speak of its unique properties. Thank it for giving its life to hep you. For example: "Beloved chicken, thank you for your life, that I will take into myself. Oh bird that gives birth everyday, give birth now to love and happiness! Let my lover and I feast in your honor!" You can either do all the awakening before you begin cooking, or (this is my custom) awaken each ingredient as you use it.
• Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.  Awaken the flame, asking it to help your love burn true and strong.
• Massage the butter into the chicken's skin.  Do this in a loving way, pouring as much good feeling and loving "energy" into the flesh of the chicken as you can.
• Mix the rose water, honey, apple sauce, pepper, and paprika.  Enliven the potion.  Remind it to bubble and caramelize, turning sweet and deep and delicious, and to help your love do likewise.
• Chop the rose petals into small pieces, and slowly add them to the mixture, extolling their virtues as you do so.
• Shove the apple inside the chicken.  Make her like it. ;)
• Put the chicken in a baking dish, and pour the sauce over it.
• Roast, uncovered, for 1-1.5 hours, until the chicken is done.  (Exactly how long this is depends on your chicken and your oven.  If you don't know how to roast a chicken, google it.)


I like to serve this with yellow rice and asparagus.