If you ask me, a simple roast chicken dinner is a beautiful thing.
My favourite method to achieve delicious sticky, crispy, browned skin is pretty simple.
Take a free range chicken which you have cleaned and patted dry with paper towels.
Separate the skin from the flesh by running your fingers between them. I refer to this as the Jamie Oliver method, after first watching him do this on his second season of the Naked Chef, many moons ago.
I think I first watched this when I was 13 or 14 … which now seems like a long time ago…
To make this particular roast, I mixed a herb butter in place of Jamie’s proscuitto and lemon mix, by blending fresh thyme, sage, parsley and basil with four garlic cloves and some pepper into salted butter.
I prefer using salted butter for this particular recipe as it means I don’t need to add additional salt to the bird before baking.
If you’ve watched the YouTube clip above, you’ll get what Jamie’s method involves – basically stuffing the flavoured butter between the skin and flesh of the chicken.
Once the bird is buttered, I place it in a hot oven (180-200C) for 30 minutes per 500g. I also like to add potato chunks to the baking dish, as they get a really nice flavour from the inevitable melted butter!
Mmm, buttery potatoes
To go with my lovely roast, I also quickly blanched some fresh green beans and broccolini, leaving them just a little crisp for maximum effect. The greens were so good we actually ate them all, even though I cooked extra with the intention of leaving some for J’s lunch the next day!
That looks like the best roast chicken I have EVER seen! Is that a flat 180 or is that 180 in a fan forced oven? So going to try this tomorrow!
Well, thank you!
I think this is probably the most foolproof cooking method for chicken I’ve tried.
If your oven isn’t fan forced, I’d push it up to 200C for the first 45 minutes or so, reducing to 180C after that.
My oven is fan forced and I’ve always found 180 works well for me – enough heat for crispy browned skin, but tender chicken!
Let me know how it goes
I’m obsessed with roast chicken and have tried loads of different methods although generally default back to the slow cooker for the most meltingly tender chicken, I do miss crispy skin though.
Found your blog through a comment you made on damnfinefood and will be following you from here on in.
Thanks for stopping by MBC!
I snooped at your blog too after I read your comment on DFF.
Love the sound of your Bunny Chow curry! I’ve never tried it served in bread before, but it’s an excellent idea!
the bread idea dates back to the time before tupperware and is much the same principle as a pasty, something used to transport the food but I adore them.
hence nameing my dog and by blog after them I guess