A simple but delicious way to prepare a roast chicken.

Ingredients

  • 3.5 lb full chicken approx
  • 4 oz butter
  • 1 lemon (zest)
  • 1.5 tsp fresh thyme leaves
  • 200 ml white wine
  • 3 whole carrots
  • 2 whole leeks
  • 2 onions
  • 2 heads broccoli
  • salt and freshly cracked black pepper

Method

 

  • Pick the thyme leaves keeping the stem and finely grate the lemon, keeping the lemon also.
  • Mix the soft butter with the lemon jest and thyme, season slightly.
  • Create a little pocket from the neck end of the chicken under the skin and place 1 dessert spoon of the flavoured butter under each breast.
  • Season the cavity of the chicken, pop in the lemon which is cut in half and the thyme sprigs.
  • Preferably using gloves rub the remaining butter all over the chicken skin and season generously with salt and pepper.
  • Place the carrot, leek and onion in the bottom of a suitable sized roasting dish then place the chicken on top.
  • Pour the wine into the tray and cover with tin foil.
  • Place in a preheated oven at 190c for 50 minutes, by doing so the wine and natural juices will begin to steam the chicken keeping it moist and gently cooking the vegetables.
  • Now remove the foil, add in the brocolli and allow the chicken to cook for a further 45 minutes uncovered, this will colour the chicken nicely and the skin will crisp up.
  • Allow the chicken to rest a little in a warm place whilst you make a little gravy from the cooking juices that remain in the pan, this can be achieved by adding 1 oz of flour and 1 oz of butter to a saucepan to form a roux, pour in all the cooking juices which will include the flavours of the butter, wine, chicken juices etc to form a nice sauce.
  • This sauce will be pale in colour so you can add a little dash of gravy browning to colour it nicely – this sauce unlike commercial gravies will have a mild flavour to complement the flavours of the roast chicken and not over power it!