Whole Lemon Garlic Roasted Chicken
Print RecipeIngredients
- 1 5-6 lb organic free range chicken
- 2 springs rosemary
- organic parsley bottom stems from 1 head
- 1 head of garlic
- 1 preserved lemon cut into pieces
- 1 fresh lemon cut into pieces
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- salt and pepper
Instructions
Have all the ingreidents to stuff ready to go. So start by cutting the lemons into pieces and setting aside, then take a head of parsley and cut the bottom 3 inches of stems and place that with the lemons. With the garlic skin still on, cut it in half.
Remove the chicken innards if there are any and clean the chicken with fresh water a few times. Heavily salt the inside and outside of the chicken and place neck side down on a meat cutting board. In the cavity of the chicken, place the garlic, parlsey stems and lemon. Use a kitchen twine to tie the legs together tightly and make sure none of the stuffing is poking out.
Place the chicken on a roasting rack and drizzle the outside skin with olive oil. Salt and the pepper the skin and then place the chicken into a cold oven.
Set the oven to 425 degrees and once it reaches the temperature set your timer for 1 hour and 10 minutes. Once the time is up shut the heat and remove the chicken, pan and all. Use a big spoon to get any of the schmaltz and baste the skin before placing it bake into the oven and letting it rest for 20 minutes.
Notes
Serve with a dash of lemon for a light dish or a homemade dijon mayo to French it up!
My finger tips are still slightly numb from attacking the chicken carcass with my bare hands. While I would like to tell you that I can elegantly slice and dice an entire chicken, I really can only get the chicken breasts off nicely and the rest is a fucking free for all. Exhibiting semi masochistic behavior, I tend to do it while the chicken is still warm on the outside, which means it pipping hot on the inside, even after letting it sit to let the juices re plump up the bird. But its totally worth it.
Lemon, garlic, olive oil and parsley infuse the aromas all over the meat. When cutting it, its so juicy that you will still have delicious broth goodness running on your cutting board. Save that by either throwing it with all through a fine mesh sieve and on top of the leftovers before storing. The leftovers are so tender and succulent that even if you reheat it in the microwave, you’ll still have chicken juice running down your chin. As for the skin? Look at the picture. The crispy chicken skin I usually munch on and eat by myself as I shred the rest of the chicken meat and this one that is bathed in its own fat and juices is browned and crunchy like a fine cracker topped with chunky salt and pepper it could be saved as a fancy salad topper if your not into it for the moment. The best part about this? Once the chicken is assembled which takes about 15 minutes, you are basically done cooking.
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