Classic Roast Chicken Recipes

Steps:

• Truss chicken: Preheat oven to 450 F, preferably convection. Rinse chicken and pat dry with paper towels. (Optional: stuff cavity with a whole lemon to prop up the breast.) Cut about 3 feet of twine, lay it flat on a clean surface, and position chicken breast side up on the middle of the twine. Tie the legs together with a single knot. Flip the chicken over, bring twine down the length of the bird, wrap it under the wings, tighten, and tie off the twine behind the neck; trim excess twine. (The goal of trussing is to make the chicken as compact as possible, preventing hot air from circulating in the cavity and drying out the breasts.)
• Season chicken: Lift the chicken with one hand and generously sprinkle salt over it with the other, rotating the chicken to make sure it's evenly coated; place the salted chicken in a cast-iron skillet. Roast until the juices run clear, about 1 hour. (Note: As the chicken roasts at a high temperature, the fat will naturally smoke. Cleaning your oven before roasting will minimize the smoke.)
• Pan sauce: Transfer chicken to a wire rack set over a rimmed baking sheet and let it rest. Meanwhile, put skillet with pan drippings on the stove over medium heat. Peel and thinly slice onion. Use a vegetable peeler to shave off ribbons of carrot until you reach the core; discard the core. Place onions and carrot shavings in the skillet; stir with the wooden spatula, scraping up the browned chicken drippings (or "fond") on the bottom of the skillet. Deglaze the skillet with wine, stir, and allow the liquid to reduce completely, about 3-5 minutes. When it has reduced, add 1 cup of water, stir, and let the liquid reduce again until thickened, 3-5 minutes. Meanwhile, carve the chicken.
• Carve chicken: Cut away the twine and discard. Separate the leg and thigh from the breast by using the knife to pop open the leg joint, making it easier to sever; separate the leg and thigh into two pieces if you wish. Cut off the wings and neck. (Optional: place neck into the skillet while the sauce is reducing for extra flavor.) Run the blade along the breastbone to remove the breasts, leaving skin intact. If you wish, cut the breasts into thick slices. Transfer to a serving platter.
• Optional: Use the carcass to make chicken stock. Place it in an oven-safe pot along with vegetables (such as carrot, celery, and/or onion) and add enough water to cover. Put the pot in a 200 F oven for 6 hours or overnight. Strain the stock and store in a lidded container in the refrigerator or freezer.Once pan sauce has thickened and looks caramel-brown, turn off the heat. Leaving the vegetables in the skillet, spoon the sauce over the chicken; serve immediately.

Steps:

• Heat oven to 190C/fan 170C/gas 5. Have a shelf ready in the middle of the oven without any shelves above it.
• Scatter 1 roughly chopped onion and 2 roughly chopped carrots over the base of a roasting tin that fits the whole 1 ½ kg chicken, but doesn't swamp it.
• Season the cavity of the chicken liberally with salt and pepper, then stuff with 2 lemon halves and a small bunch of thyme, if using.
• Sit the chicken on the vegetables, smother the breast and legs all over with 25g softened butter, then season the outside with salt and pepper.
• Place in the oven and leave, undisturbed, for 1 hr 20 mins - this will give you a perfectly roasted chicken. To check, pierce the thigh with a skewer and the juices should run clear.
• Carefully remove the tin from the oven and, using a pair of tongs, lift the chicken to a dish or board to rest for 15-20 mins. As you lift the dish, let any juices from the chicken pour out of the cavity into the roasting tin.
• While the chicken is resting, make the gravy. Place the roasting tin over a low flame, then stir in 1 tbsp flour and sizzle until you have a light brown, sandy paste.
• Gradually pour in 250ml chicken stock, stirring all the time, until you have a thickened sauce.
• Simmer for 2 mins, using a wooden spoon to stir, scraping any sticky bits from the tin.
• Strain the gravy into a small saucepan, then simmer and season to taste. When you carve the bird, add any extra juices to the gravy.

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
• Place chicken in a roasting pan, and season generously inside and out with salt and pepper. Sprinkle inside and out with onion powder. Place 3 tablespoons margarine in the chicken cavity. Arrange dollops of the remaining margarine around the chicken's exterior. Cut the celery into 3 or 4 pieces, and place in the chicken cavity.
• Bake uncovered 1 hour and 15 minutes in the preheated oven, to a minimum internal temperature of 180 degrees F (82 degrees C). Remove from heat, and baste with melted margarine and drippings. Cover with aluminum foil, and allow to rest about 30 minutes before serving.

Steps:

• You'll need a pan in which to roast the chicken. A roasting pan with a rack is nice, particularly one with upright handles, which is easy to move around in the oven. But a rimmed sheet pan or oven-proof skillet (like cast-iron) works just as well.Kitchen shears are very useful for trimming excess fat from the chicken's cavity. They also come in handy if you want to spatchcock the chicken.If you can, leave at least one hour for the seasoned chicken to rest in the refrigerator, uncovered, before it's time to cook. Longer is even better, up to 24 hours. The result is noticeably crispier skin. An instant-read thermometer isn't the only way to determine whether your chicken is done, but it is the most accurate way. It's worth buying one.
• There is no consensus on the best way to prep a chicken for roasting; it's all a matter of personal preference and tried-and-true experience. But here are some suggestions for where to start. Try each and then pick your go-to method. And note that there's nothing wrong with leaving the bird as is, salting it and just putting it in the oven.Spatchcocking, also known as butterflying, is an extremely simple move that delivers a gorgeously cooked chicken with crisp skin, and it does so quickly - usually in less than 45 minutes. To spatchcock a chicken, take a pair of kitchen shears or a very sharp knife and cut along one side of the chicken's backbone. Open up the bird so it lies flat. Cut along the other side of the backbone to remove it entirely. Then cook the chicken breast-side up. The only disadvantage to this method is that you'll lose the classic Norman Rockwell presentation of the whole bird. But the speediness and great flavor make up for it. A tip: Don't toss that backbone! A roasted backbone will add more flavor to stock than using a raw backbone. Roast it alongside the chicken, and either serve with the bird (delicious to gnaw on), or save for stock. (You could also just leave the backbone attached, rather than removing it from the bird altogether. Cut along the backbone on only one side of the bird, then open the chicken and roast as is. This doesn't affect cooking time and saves you some knife work.) Splaying yields a chicken with succulent white meat and perfectly roasted dark meat. The thighs, usually the slowest part of the bird to cook through, get a head start by being positioned directly on the burning hot pan. And the technique is quicker and easier than spatchcocking. To splay the chicken, use a sharp knife to cut the skin along the thigh on each side, where the legs connect to the body. Then splay the thighs open until you feel the joint pop on each side. Spread out the thighs out so they can lie flat in a preheated skilletSome people like the nice, compact shape of a trussed chicken, and argue that it helps keep the white meat moist. If you want to try it, the classic method is demonstrated in the video above. For a shortcut trussing method, simply tie the chicken's legs together at the ankles with one piece of twine, and then use another piece of twine to tie the wings to the breast. If you're planning to stuff your chicken, you may want to truss it in the traditional style. Or you can get away with just tying the legs together to keep the stuffing mix from falling out.
• Seasoning the chicken ahead of time is a good idea, so that the flavors penetrate the flesh all the way to the bone. This is true whether you're rubbing the bird with salt, spices and aromatics - a dry brine - or using a more traditional wet brine. Then add other flavors if you like, stuffing the cavity with aromatics (like lemon or herbs) or rubbing the skin with fat (like oil or butter), or both.Dry brine is a combination of salt and spices or aromatics (or both) that you use to season a chicken. It's both easier than submerging a chicken in a traditional wet brine, and it produces a more crisp-skinned bird. And like a wet brine, a dry brine will yield a tender, juicy result. For a dry brine, it's best to season your bird at least 1 hour ahead and let it rest, uncovered, in the fridge (keeping it uncovered dries out the skin, which encourages crispness). But if you have time, up to 24 hours in the fridge is even better. The general rule is 2 teaspoons kosher salt for a 3 1/2 to 4 1/2 pound bird. Add pepper, grated garlic, grated lemon or other citrus zest, herbs and spices to taste. And don't forget to rub the seasonings all over the cavity of the bird in addition to the exterior.That said, though we generally recommend a dry brine, there are some times when you will want to use a wet brine, which is a basic salt-and-aromatic solution in which you submerge the chicken. For example, you can use flavorful brine to add a specific character to its flesh, as in our feta-brined chicken or a buttermilk-brined bird.For the crispiest skin, pat the chicken dry with paper towels after brining. Then place it on a rack set over a plate or baking sheet, uncovered, and let it rest in the fridge for least 2 hours and up to 24 hours before roasting. This will allow the skin to dry out a bit. Another way to add flavor to chicken is via its cavity, stuffing it with whole sprigs of herbs, smashed and peeled garlic cloves, quartered onions, halved and squeezed-out lemon, and the like. Do so just before roasting. The aromatics will permeate the flesh of the whole chicken while it cooks. However, some cooks say it compromises the crispness of the skin, so bear that in mind.Although you don't need to add any fat to a roast chicken, a drizzle of oil or slick of butter before roasting can help brown the skin. Or, stuff the skin with compound butter, made with herbs or whatever else you'd like. Use your fingers to gently pull the skin away from the breast, loosening it just enough to smear butter between the meat and the skin. Take care not to tear the skin.Another way to add both fat and flavor at the same time is to drizzle the bird with olive oil, or a combination of olive oil and lemon juice during the last 20 minutes of roasting. You can spike this with the likes of grated or mashed garlic, fresh ginger, red chile flakes or powder, dried oregano, thyme or mint. (Don't use fresh herbs here; they will burn.)Glazing a chicken adds flavor, a rich dark color, and shine to the skin. The key is to use a mixture that combines some kind of sugar with an intense condiment or seasoning. The sugar adds a caramelized brown color and shine, while the condiment adds flavor and mitigates the sweetness. Some possible combinations include: honey, lemon and soy sauce; maple syrup, hot sauce, and black pepper; brown sugar, lime juice and mustard; hoisin and rice vinegar. Mix and match as you see fit. To glaze the bird, brush on the sweet mixture during the last 10 to 20 minutes of cooking, and watch it carefully so it doesn't burn. If the glaze starts to burn before the bird is done, simply cover it with foil to finish the cooking. A note for crisp-chicken-skin fanatics: glazing a bird moistens the skin, making it shiny and flavorful, but less crisp.
• It's time to put the bird in the oven. Here is what you need to know about the pan, temperature and timing. Different pans yield different results, though many different types work well.A roasting pan with a rack allows air to circulate under the bird and helps brown the skin all over. Plus, you can add potatoes and other vegetables to the pan under the bird, which will catch the flavorful drippings. If you have a roasting pan but no rack, use vegetables (carrots, celery, sliced onion) to prop the chicken off the pan. Or place the chicken directly in the pan, where it will roast up perfectly well, though parts of the skin may stick to the bottom of the pan. (Our colleagues over at The Sweethome have an excellent round-up of the best roasting pans.) You can also use a rimmed sheet pan to roast a chicken, either with a rack or without one. A sheet pan has the advantage of lower sides, which lets more of the chicken skin crisp.Or try roasting in an oven-proof skillet, cast-iron or otherwise. If you preheat the skillet (either in the oven or on the stovetop) and lay the bird into the hot pan, the dark meat will get a head start while the white meat cooks more slowly. This gives you a very evenly cooked bird. But you can also roast in a skillet without any preheating, in which case it acts as a roasting pan, but smaller and more compact. (One great thing about roasting a chicken in a skillet is that it makes it super easy to make a quick pan sauce. Just deglaze with wine or water, and whisk in some butter or cream or crème fraiche and simmer until thickened.)You can successfully roast a chicken at pretty much any oven temperature, though the timing and results will vary. Go low and slow for a very tender, falling-off-the-bone flesh and softer skin (say, 300 to 350 degrees for 1 ½ to 2 hours or so). Or roast it fast and furiously for less time for crisp, dark brown skin and firmer, chewier flesh (between 375 and 500 degrees for 45 minutes to 1 1/2 hours).The safest and easiest way to check for doneness is to use an instant-read thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the thigh. (Take care not to touch the bone with the thermometer.) It should read 165 degrees. If you don't have a thermometer, use a paring knife to make a small cut into the thigh going all the way to the bone. If you see any red flesh, put the bird back into the oven. You can also pierce the thigh with a knife to see if the juices are running clear, which indicates that it's cooked through. But this tends to be less reliable than cutting to the bone.
• Here's a method for carving the chicken so that everyone gets a little skin along with their meat. If you have the wherewithal, heat up a platter for serving. The easiest way is take it hot out of the dishwasher, or run it under very hot tap water for a few minutes, then dry. Placing the just-carved meat on a heated serving platter is the most elegant way to go.Transfer the roasted chicken to a cutting board, tent it with foil, and let it rest for 5 to 15 minutes.Begin carving by removing the legs. Pull a thigh away from the chicken and then cut it off by slicing through the joint. If you want, you can pull down on the thigh until the joint pops before you cut; this makes it even easier to cut through (you'll be able to see exactly where to position the knife).Once the legs are off, cut through the joints that connect the drumsticks to the thighs. The joint will be soft and not offer much resistance to the knife. If you're having trouble locating it, move the knife around a bit, wiggling it slightly until you find it.Next, cut the wings off by pulling down the wings and cutting down through the joints. You can use the same popping maneuver as with the thigh if you like to make the cutting easier.Now remove the breasts. Slice along the breast bone on one side, going as deep as you can with the tip of the knife so that it hits the cartilage. Cut around the breast meat so that it comes off the bones of the rib cage, then cut through the skin attaching it at the back. Be careful not to rip the skin. Repeat on the other side. If you'd like, you can slice the breasts crosswise, across the grain, into pieces.Finally, turn the chicken over and find the "oysters," the small, succulent knobs of meat next to the back bone behind where the thighs used to be. Use the tip of your knife to pry them out. You can also slice off the tail if you like.

Steps:

• Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.
• Remove the chicken giblets. Rinse the chicken inside and out. Remove any excess fat and leftover pin feathers and pat the outside dry. Liberally salt and pepper the inside of the chicken. Stuff the cavity with the bunch of thyme, both halves of lemon, and all the garlic. Brush the outside of the chicken with the butter and sprinkle again with salt and pepper. Tie the legs together with kitchen string and tuck the wing tips under the body of the chicken. Place the onions, carrots, and fennel in a roasting pan. Toss with salt, pepper, 20 sprigs of thyme, and olive oil. Spread around the bottom of the roasting pan and place the chicken on top.
• Roast the chicken for 1 1/2 hours, or until the juices run clear when you cut between a leg and thigh. Remove the chicken and vegetables to a platter and cover with aluminum foil for about 20 minutes. Slice the chicken onto a platter and serve it with the vegetables.

Steps:

• Let chicken and 1 tablespoon butter stand at room temperature for 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Remove and discard the plastic pop-up timer from chicken if there is one. Remove the giblets and excess fat from the chicken cavity. Rinse chicken inside and out under cold running water. Dry chicken thoroughly with paper towels. Tuck the wing tips under the body. Sprinkle the cavity of the chicken liberally with salt and pepper, and set aside.
• In the center of a heavy-duty roasting pan, place onion slices in two rows, touching. Place the palm of your hand on top of lemon and, pressing down, roll lemon back and forth several times. This softens the lemon and allows the juice to flow more freely. Pierce entire surface of lemon with a fork. Using the side of a large knife, gently press on garlic cloves to open slightly. Insert garlic cloves, thyme sprigs, and lemon into cavity. Place chicken in pan, on onion slices. Cut about 18 inches of kitchen twine, bring chicken legs forward, cross them, and tie together.
• Spread the softened butter over entire surface of chicken, and sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper. Place in the oven, and roast until skin is deep golden brown and crisp and the juices run clear when pierced, about 1 1/2 hours. When chicken seems done, insert an instant-read thermometer into the breast, then the thigh. The breast temperature should read 180 degrees and the thigh 190 degrees.
• Remove chicken from oven, and transfer to a cutting board with a well. Let chicken stand 10 to 15 minutes so the juices settle. Meanwhile, pour the pan drippings into a shallow bowl or fat separator, and leave onions in the pan. Leave any brown baked-on bits in the bottom of the roasting pan, and remove and discard any blackened bits. Using a large spoon or fat separator, skim off and discard as much fat as possible. Pour the remaining drippings and the juices that have collected under the resting chicken back into the roasting pan. Place on the stove over medium-high heat to cook, about 1 minute. Add chicken stock, raise heat to high, and, using a wooden spoon, stir up and combine the brown bits with the stock until the liquid is reduced by half, about 4 minutes. Strain the gravy into a small bowl, pressing on onions to extract any liquid. Discard onions, and stir in the remaining tablespoon of cold butter until melted and incorporated. Untie the legs, and remove and discard garlic, thyme, and lemon. Carve, and serve gravy on the side.