A well seasoned and well cooked roast chicken is one my absolute favourite things to have on a Sunday - it's tasty, filling and wonderfully indulgent. This easy but elegant recipe will impress anyone, and is good for special occasions too, such as Valentines Day which I cooked it for the other day. Needless to say, Jason liked it very much!
WHAT YOU NEED
Whole chicken
Chipolatas
Streaky bacon
Broccoli (or any veg you like)
2 carrots
2 potatoes
Butter
Salt
Pepper
Rosemary
1 garlic bulb, split into cloves
1 lemon
Wooden skewers/cocktail sticks
WHAT TO DO
To start, preheat the oven to 180-200°C mix together 4 heaped tbsps of butter with salt, pepper, lemon zest and rosemary (fresh or otherwise, it's up to you). Cut the lemon in half and place one half inside the chicken with a little salt before rubbing the butter mixture generously over the entire chicken. Place in an ovenproof dish, drizzled with a little oil, with the split cloves of garlic and put in the oven for 1 hour 15 minutes.
Meanwhile, wash and peel the carrots and potatoes, then cut into large, even sized chips.
Boil a pan of lightly salted water and part cook them for 6 minutes. Drain into a colander or sieve and let steam dry for a minute or two. Next, lightly oil a baking sheet and place the chips evenly across it, seasoning with salt and pepper and drizzling with more oil. Place in the oven for the last 45 minutes of the chicken's cooking time. Make sure your oven shelf is placed in the best position for vegetable roasting (from the middle to the top), maybe even putting it above the chicken, so they really crisp and brown up properly.
Now prepare the bacon wrapped chipolatas. To make 6, place 6 wooden skewers in a bowl of cold water and leave to the side. Then, on a chopping board, lay out the streaky bacon (2 per chipolata) and run over it with a knife - this will stretch it out and stop it shrinking as it cooks. Place a chipolata over the end of 2 pieces of bacon and roll it up, bending the sausage (carefully!) when done and stick a skewer through to hold in place.
You can use much larger skewers and put 2 chipolatas on each if you want, but I find it easier to have just one as their easier to then place in the dish around the chicken.
Place them in for the last half hour of the chicken's cooking time, and by this time, the chicken should be looking nice and golden and smelling amazing. If you want the bacon to be really crisp, place them in the same time you put the carrot and potatoes in.
The only thing left to do after this is to boil the broccoli. When this is done, everything should be ready to plate up.
And if you're wondering about gravy, fear not, I haven't forgotten it! For an easy, and not from a pre-packed powder, gravy, pour the excess juices (for real indulgence, leave all the fat in the juice) from the chicken dish into a saucepan on a low-medium heat and add some chicken stock and flour until thick and rich.
Pour over everything and enjoy!
Do you have a favourite Sunday roast or special occasion dinner?
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