Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
You Guys. YOU GUYS! This is it. We’re going to roast a chicken today. It’s going to be so easy. It’s going to look so pretty. It’s going to make your house smell delicious and incidentally it’s gonna taste good (if you’re into that sort of thing).
Here’s what you need:
Ingredients:
A Whole chicken about 5 lbs. (This seems to be the best size to feed a group and still have leftovers. Which you will then turn into yummy chicken salad with cranberries… or you know, something you want).
Lemon (1 large or small or medium. Just buy a lemon guys, and stop worrying).
Butter melted or softened. 1 whole stick (yup).
Salt. About 1 and ½ Tbsp. salt (Chicken NEEDS salt kids. It wants to marry it and have babies. It’s not weird. It’s beautiful).
Pepper. Let’s go with two tsp. or so… (Yeah that works).
Fresh Rosemary, two sprigs or so.
Fresh Thyme, a good bunch (which is about as technical as I care to get thank you very much).
1 large onion (I’ll commit to a size this time. Feel better?).
1 Small piece of kitchen twine (pre-cut this and set aside, you will thank me later).
NOTE: The most important step you’re going to take in this recipe, is setting up everything in advance. There is really nothing worse than trying to prepare food and season it, when your hands are covered in raw chicken.
So here is what we need to do:
-Cut your lemon into four quarters.
-Place two of these quarters at the bottom of your pan. (I use my cast iron enameled Dutch oven, but you can use a roasting pan, a casserole dish or even an iron skillet. You just need to make sure it’s big enough to come up on the sides of the chicken and catch all the yummy delicious chicken drippings).
-Cut your onion into quarters, and just as you did with the lemon, set aside two pieces, and place the other two in the bottom of your pan.
-in a microwave safe bowl, place your 1 stick of butter. Microwave for about 20 seconds. Depending on your microwave, this should make it super soft, almost completely melted, but not completely melted (I know, I know here I go again with my super specific and technical instructions. I’m such a gem no?).
-add half of your salt, half of you pepper, and the leaves from two or three sprigs of thyme to the butter and mix well.
NOTE: To remove the thyme leaves from the sprigs, just pinch and slide your fingers against the natural flow of the leaves (if that makes any sense at all. If it doesn’t then just google it). This will allow you collect a good portion of the leaves with very little effort (we like little effort).
-set aside.
-Take the remaining thyme, and add place it with the unused lemons and onions that you didn’t put in the pan (these are going to go inside your chicken cavity. And yes that’s as weird as it sounds).
-At this time, remove the chicken from the wrapping, remove the gizzards from the cavity, and rinse the chicken thoroughly (Does this sound gross? Yes. Is it gross? Yes. But it’s necessary, and we’re just gonna get through it).
-Pat the chicken dry (We need a dry chicken so the buttery coating will stick. You need the buttery coating to stick, because we need the skin to get crispy. We need the skin to get crispy because it’s delicious. End of story).
-Use the remaining salt and pepper to thoroughly season the inside of the cavity (Here she goes talking about that damn cavity again. We do this because this is how we season the inside of the chicken. Again, we don’t love the process, but we love the outcome).
-Place the onion, lemon, thyme, and a rosemary sprig inside the cavity, and tie the legs with the small piece of twine (you know the one you’re thankful you cut and set aside because your hands were gonna be all chicken-filled?).
-Add the remaining Rosemary sprig to the pot with the other items.
-Lay the chicken on top of the onions and lemons, breast side up (I mean that’s how I do most things in life, so my chicken should do the same right?).
-Take the butter mixture and pour over the top of the bird. Using your hands (as we have talked about, these are your best tools, even though it’s soooo stressful when they’re messy), smoosh (super technical term) the butter ALL over the chicken, getting it everywhere you possibly can.
-Wash the hell out of your hands, like six times or until you feel better about the whole thing.
-Place your pan in an oven preheated to 425 degrees (If you have read enough of my posts, you may have noticed our ovens are always preheated. Preheat your ovens kids! It’s the law).
-Bake at for 20 minutes per lb. In this case it would be about an hour and a half or so.
NOTE: When fully cooked the juices will run clear, and the internal temp between the breast and thigh (being careful not to touch the bone… hehehe that’s what she said) should be at least 165 degrees.
OTHER NOTE: A meat thermometer is an excellent investment if you don’t want to catch that pesky salmonella. It’s not just from Romaine lettuce… only mostly.
-Remove from the oven and loosely place a piece of tinfoil (this is called tenting) on top of the chicken, and allow to rest for about 15-20 minutes. This step is important because it allows all the juices to run back into the chicken (or at least that’s what they tell us on TV all the time. We all know if it’s on TV or the internet, it’s true).
-Once the chicken has gotten her much needed beauty rest, carve up that gal and enjoy!
This is what she looks like before she is golden and glorious! If she looks like this going in the oven, you're getting it right) (oh I added potatoes here. You can do that too...
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