Ah the roasted chicken. One of life’s culinary treasures. A perfectly roasted chicken is a gem in any cook’s repertoire. This recipe is a simple lemon herb roasted chicken and lends itself to a delicious gravy with a roasting rack made up of onions, lemons, carrots, garlic and compound butter and a lovely white wine.
I am forever surprised at just how many people have never made a whole roasted chicken either because they think it is too much work or they are intimidated by the prospect of cleaning and dressing the chicken. Well rest assured, this recipe includes no giblets, no twine and minimal cleaning. In fact this recipe is one of the easiest roasted chicken recipes you’ll find, you don’t even need a special pan.
Next step is to prepare a compound butter. Compound butters are a great way to impart flavor right in with the fat.
Roasted Chicken
Serves 6-8
Ingredients:
1 6-8lb. roasting chicken
2 carrots, largely chopped
2 onions, quartered
1 lemon, sliced
3/4 stick unsalted butter, sliced rm temp
4-5 cloves garlic, crushed
4 sprigs rosemary, stripped, divided
6 sprigs thyme, divided
kosher salt
olive oil
1/2 cup dry white wine
cooking spray
Directions:
Pre-heat oven to 375°F. Make compound butter: add chopped rosemary and thyme to softened butter with a tsp. kosher salt, mash together. Remove giblets bag from cavity of chicken. Wash and dry chicken and place on a washable mat. Find a roasting pan large enough to accommodate chicken and vegetables.
Create rack for chicken: in the bottom of your roasting pan add in chopped carrots, one onion diced into eighthed cubes, 2-3 cloves of garlic, 2-3 slices of lemon a sprinkle of salt (about 1 tsp) and a swig of olive oil (about 2 Tbs.) and 2-3 Tbs. of compound butter. Add in 1/2 cup dry white wine.
In the cavities of the chicken add in a couple cubes of onion, a couple slices of lemon, 2 cloves of crushed garlic, 1 sprig of rosemary and 1 sprig of thyme. Be careful not to over stuff the cavities of the chicken. Add in 1 Tbs. compound butter to the cavities.
Then making sure the skin of the chicken is dry, place chicken on your vegetable rack in the roasting pan and slather with remaining compound butter. Spray foil with cooking spray. Cover loosely with foil.
Place in 375°F oven for 20 minutes, reduce heat to 350°F for 30 minutes and baste throughout cooking. At this point check temp of chicken breast… overall cooking times will vary, but for planning, plan about 12-15 minutes per pound of chicken. So for an 8lb. chicken you are looking at roughly 2 hours of roasting time. When you are nearing the end of cooking, remove foil for the last 30 minutes or so.
*This is a gluten-free recipe.