A staple protein that’s almost always in my fridge is roasted chicken from the grocery store. For only 6 bucks, this chicken is the foundation for a lot of my easy-peasy go-to recipes like chicken pot pie and avgolemono (Greek lemon chicken orzo soup).
Still, I sometimes wonder what it’s like to roast an entire chicken— is it worth my time and effort? Then reality hits, and I’m reminded that I have nothing better to do than binge watch Too Hot to Handle on Netflix. So I bought a whole raw chicken. Not gonna lie, I totally felt like a real cook when I picked this up. Lol.
I vaguely remember reading an article that Meghan Markle was roasting a chicken for Prince Harry when he popped the question. After some digging, apparently the recipe she used was Barefoot Contessa’s Perfect Roast Chicken. This was the basis for my first go at roasting an entire freaking chicken.
(As an aside: if you told me a few months ago that I would be roasting chicken for dinner on a random weekday night, I’d have thought you were trippin.)
Ingredients (mise en place really helps with prep time!!!)
1 whole chicken, patted dry
A bunch of thyme
1 lemon, quartered
1 Jimmy Neutron-sized head of garlic, cut crosswise
TONS of salt and pepper (to taste)
1/2 stick of butter, melted
1 large onion, sliced thickly
2 large carrots, sliced thickly (optional: roast on a skillet beforehand)
2 stalks of celery, sliced thickly
A string of twine
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425°F.
- Salt and pepper the heck out of the chicken’s cavity.
- Stuff the chicken with lemon, garlic, and thyme.
- Brush the chicken with all that good good butter. Go big with the butter or go home. Wait. You’re already home. Just don’t skimp on the butter.
- Salt and pepper the heck out of your chicken’s outsides.
- Ina wants you to truss the chicken so it cooks evenly. Take the twine, wrap it around your chicken’s legs, and tuck the wings in.
- Dump onions, carrots, and celery on a roasting pan and place your trussed up chicken on top. Heh.
- Roast in the oven for 1 and 1/2 hours.
- Freak out at how beautiful and amazing your chicken looks.
- Check that your chicken is cooked thoroughly by slicing between the leg and the thigh. If clear juices run out, that means it’s good to go.
- Wait an agonizing 20 minutes before serving or use in other recipes!
This recipe was honestly so easy and fool proof. Any recipe that takes less than 20 minutes to prep and utilizes the oven is A+ in my book of apartment living. Ovens are the best with no stove top messes to clean up!
I cubed some of this roasted chicken for a chicken pot pie also inspired by our Contessa Ina. I even used the chicken wings as garnish for my weekend Bloody Mary fix. Yes, I went there.
Hope you make this recipe, and have a cocktail (or three) on me this weekend! As always, stay safe.
-Mimi 🙂
