Thursday, January 19, 2012

Perfect Roast Chicken



Roasting a chicken used to intimidate me. Handling a whole bird and cleaning it properly royally freaked me out. It wasn't until recently that I put my big girl panties on and conquered this feat. Roasted chicken is now a staple on our dinner menu almost every week! It's easy, full of flavor and makes great leftovers for weekday lunches. I have even roasted a chicken on Sundays just for the purpose of eating lunches throughout the week. With a little help from Ina Garten and pulling out years of watching my mom in the kitchen from my elephantish memory, I have developed a great go-to method for roasting a fresh, young bird! The end result is juicy, tender chicken with the flavors of rosemary and lemon. (plus a week's worth of lunches!)

Perfect Roast Chicken
recipe adapted from Ina Garten

One 3-5 lb. roasting chicken
2 lemons, one cut in half, the other cut into wedges
1 clove garlic, cut crosswise
1 large bunch fresh rosemary
2 Tbsp. melted butter
Salt & pepper
Olive oil

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Remove chicken giblets and thoroughly rinse chicken inside and out. Pat dry. Salt and pepper the inside of the chicken. Place chicken in a French Oven or roasting pan. Stuff the bird with half the bunch of rosemary, two lemon halves and the head of garlic. Stuff the remaining bunch of rosemary underneath the chicken skin. Brush the outside of the chicken with the melted butter and sprinkle with more salt and pepper. Place the onions and lemon wedges in the roasting pan and drizzle quickly with olive oil.

Roast for 1.5 hours, or until the juices run clear. Remove the chicken from the roasting pan and let sit for 15-20 minutes.

lunching with leftovers:

1 comment:

  1. not my favorite thing about you- hahahah sorry i had to say it! But you know I love you SO MUCH!

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