Roast Chicken Stuffed with Cheese, Mushrooms, and Spinach

This recipe looks deceptively quick when reading it...then again, I am not a speedy cook, as I like to be sure I'm getting everything correct (this does not play in my favor, as you can imagine lol).  At any rate, this recipe was delicious and I will make it again...with some slight changes: 1. add the ingredients for the stuffing a little of each at a time instead of individually, 2. make when I can leave the windows open and not set off the smoke detectors, and 3. leave out the destroying of a basting brush (note to self: get a new basting brush, preferably silicon or other heat tolerant material...)

Here is a link to the original recipe:
http://www.saveur.com/article/recipes/pollo-relleno-chicken-stuffed-with-manchego-mushrooms-and-spinach

(I chose this pic instead of the plated one because this isn't quite so beautiful plated.)

Ingredients:

1 whole chicken (4 1/2-5 lbs.)
kosher salt and coarse ground black pepper, to taste
4 T. unsalted butter
5 cloves garlic, minced
10 oz. sliced quesadilla cheese (or provolone), cut into smaller pieces (like 1"x 1")
6 oz. thinly sliced white mushrooms (I actually used slightly more and had trouble fitting them in)
5 oz. fresh spinach, stems removed/cut off

Instructions:

1. Heat oven to 450°F (I used 475°F as the original directions called for, but had to turn it down to 450° after 45 minutes because it was just creating too much smoke, and I think 475° is too much anyway.)  Season chicken all over with salt and pepper (I also seasoned cavity.)

2. Combine all the minced garlic and 1 T. of the butter in a small bowl. Slide fingers under the skin of each breast of the chicken to make a pocket.  Divide the garlic mixture among the two pockets and do your best to distribute it evenly in the pockets (this was not easy, in my opinion.)

3. Alternating between the three, stuff the breast pockets with the cheese, mushrooms, and spinach (I stuffed one at a time originally and it made getting the end parts in more difficult).  Once the pockets are filled, stuff remainder into the cavity.

4. At this point, the original recipe calls for trussing the chicken with a trussing needle.  Trussing just means closing up the cavity, basically, so, lacking the fancy needle, I opted to simply use cooking twine and some metal poultry pins that I had on hand.  I also looked up a video on YouTube of how to truss a chicken without a needle; I tried to follow the method shown (it looked so easy, much like so many Pinterest projects lol), but with the major amount of stuffing, it didn't work out quite like the video.  Unsexy as it is, I did manage to get it as closed as I could.  You then place it in a 9"x13" baking dish, with the breast side up, and top with the remaining butter:

5. Bake for 1 hour 45 minutes to 2 hours, basting occasionally.  As I did this, I mentioned before that a couple of things happened.  The butter spatters all over, which is what caused my oven to smoke (it's a self-cleaning model) and the smoke detectors to deafen us three times.  After the first time, I lowered the rack from middle to next one down (lower 1/3). After the third time, I decided it could not hurt to tent it with aluminum foil for the remaining baking time.  I think it worked well, but the pan still got quite messy.  Despite my effort of needle-free trussing, some of the filling escaped at around the 1 hour mark; I don't think this hurt anything.

6. Carve and serve with desired sides, enjoy!  I chose chips and salsa, thus why my plate is full of chips :)