Friday, August 12, 2005

Roasted Lemon Garlic Chicken

Roasted Lemon Garlic Chicken
Adapted from The Barefoot Contessa on FoodTV
Prep time: 5 minutes
Roasting time: 1 hour or so

Serves 4

Ingredients:
1 roasting chicken, cleaned
2 large heads of garlic, cut in half horizontally exposing the cloves. Do not peel
1 ½ lemons, cut in wedges length-wise
1 bunch of fresh thyme
¼ tsp each Kosher salt & freshly ground black pepper (to season the cavity)
1 tbsp olive oil
4 cups of mixed mushrooms, quartered (I used shitake – without the stems, small portobellos and cremini)

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 375°F/190°C

2. To prepare a chicken for roasting, I do some additional cleaning of the bird, removing any pin feathers left and taking out that huge lump of fat. Gone are the days when my grandmother and mother used to save the chicken fat and skin to make schmatz (think ghee or clarified butter, but from chickens. Now I just throw it out.)

3. Season the cavity with salt and pepper and put ½ the bunch of thyme, 1 head of garlic and ½ the lemon in the cavity. Tie the legs together and pin the wings under the bird.

4. Line a small roasting pan with foil (you don’t have to, but clean up is so much easier) and put the rest of the thyme down as a bed for the chicken.

5. Lay the chicken, breast side up and rub with olive oil and sprinkle a little more salt and pepper.

6. Put the rest of the garlic and lemon wedges around the chicken and roast for about 45 minutes.

7. Add the mushrooms and toss with the juices and oils in the pan. Add a little more oil if needed and continue to roast for 20 minutes.

8.Test the chicken with a meat thermometer for an accurate read. It’s ready at 190°F/87°C.

9. Place the chicken on a platter and cover with aluminum foil for 15 minutes or so. It keeps the chicken juicy.

I served it with some steamed spinach and just added some of the roasted garlic to it.


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6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm going to try making this tonight. I bought a "bunch" of thyme in the market, hope that my "bunch" is the same as your "bunch" =)

This will be my first roast chicken without help from my mom. Wish me luck =)

Ruth Daniels said...

Danielle, I hope it worked out well for you. I'd love to hear.

Thanks for dropping by.

Anonymous said...

Thank you for posting this! I also enjoyed reading about the north building at St Lawrence Market, where I was today.

I managed to make a nice juicy chicken, but it took me 2 1/2 hours! The skin was kinda hard and some of the garlic turned blue, but otherwise very tasty and juicy.

I served it with butternut squash with pepper nutmeg butter and honey, and oatmeal cookies and beer for dessert.

Ruth Daniels said...

Danielle, how big was the chicken that it took so long?

There are 2 ways to roast a chicken - one at high temperature (425 degrees) and low temperature (325-350 degrees). The higher temperature cooks much faster. The skin usually comes out crispy, but not "hard".

The garlic sometimes turns blue from the acid of the lemons...not bad for you, just funny looking.

A "bunch" of thyme us usually about 1-2 inches in diameter.

Anonymous said...

I used the 350 temp because I was cooking other things too. The bird was 3.5lb so I was expecting it to take 1.75h... but I have no meat thermometer, so I was trying to jiggle the leg like my mom does to get an idea of when it would be done.

I might have overcooked it a bit, perhaps that's why the skin was hard. I just kept checking it and jiggling the leg so probably it took longer because I was checking it so much.

That's weird how the garlic turns blue!

Thanks again for the help! I always find cooking meat on my own a bit daunting. It was a lovely weekend meal.

Ruth Daniels said...

Danielle, glad it all worked out in the end.

You do make me smile - it's like talking to my younger daughter. She, too, is always worried that the chicken or meat will not be cooked enough.

Drop by any time.