This is the perfect Sunday dinner and all in one pot too! I do love a roast chicken and cooking it like this with all the vegetables is so easy. Enjoy your roast, save any leftovers to make a dish such as chicken fried rice (here), then use the carcass to make amazing chicken soup (here). Three family meals from one chicken – how’s that for good budgeting!
Ingredients
- 1 chicken (about 1.5 kg)
- ½ lemon
- 2 carrots, cut into chunks
- 1 fennel bulb, cut into wedges, length ways
- 2 leeks, cut into large chunks
- 12 small new potatoes
- 250 ml white wine
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 sprig of tarragon
- 6 garlic cloves, unpeeled
- 1 tbsp butter
How to Make It
- Remove the chicken from the fridge an hour before you want to roast it so it has time to come up to room temperature. Preheat the oven to 200°C/Fan 180°C/Gas 6. Pat the chicken dry and rub it with a tablespoon of olive oil. Squeeze over the juice from the lemon half, then put it in the cavity of the chicken.
- Arrange the vegetables in the base of a large flameproof casserole dish or a roasting tin and season them with salt and pepper. Pour over the wine and 100 ml of water and tuck the herbs and garlic cloves in among the vegetables. Place the chicken on top.
- Cover the dish with a lid or a double layer of foil and cook the chicken in the oven for 50 minutes. Remove the dish from the oven and give the vegetables a stir. Melt the butter over the chicken skin and return the casserole dish to the oven, uncovered, for another 20 minutes to crisp up the skin.
- Check to see if the chicken is done the juices should run clear from the thickest part of the thigh when pierced with a skewer. If the chicken isn’t quite ready, put it back in the oven for another 5–10 minutes.
- When the chicken is cooked, put it on a serving platter and keep it warm. Arrange the vegetables around the chicken. Squash the flesh from the garlic cloves and add it all to the liquid in the dish. Put the dish over the heat and simmer until the liquid has reduced down a little to make a thin gravy. Pour the gravy into a warm jug and serve it with the chicken and vegetables and perhaps some greens on the side.
