Roast Lemon Chicken with Garlic and Herbs
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If you don't have an open bottle of white wine to use for deglazing the pan, just use some of the lemon juice that gets squeezed over the chicken.
INGREDIENTS
3 to 5-pound roasting chicken
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
Finely chopped zest of 1 lemon, reserve the lemon itself
1/4 cup chopped fresh mint
1/4 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley, or a mix of parsley and basil
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 whole lemon, in addition to the zested lemon above
2 heads garlic, cut in half crosswise
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oilFOR THE SAUCE
1/4 cup dry white wine
About 3-1/2 cups homemade or low-salt chicken stock
2 tablespoons heavy cream, optionalHeat the oven to 450 degrees. Remove the packet of giblets from the cavity of the chicken (save for use in a stock, but don't include the liver, which will make the stock bitter). Pull any loose fat from around the opening. Rinse the chicken inside and out, and pat dry with paper towels.
Rub the outside of the chicken with about 1 tablespoon of the softened butter. Mix the remaining 2 tablespoons butter with the chopped lemon zest and herbs. Rub the butter on the inside of the cavity and under the breast skin. Sprinkle the inside and outside of the bird with the salt and pepper. Pierce the whole lemon with a sharp knife and put it in the cavity of the chicken. Brush the garlic halves liberally with the olive oil and reserve.
Put the chicken, breast side up, on a V-shaped rack, or a flat rack, and set the rack in a roasting pan just larger than the rack. Cut the zested lemon in half and squeeze both halves over the chicken. Roast for 15 to 20 minutes, reduce the heat to 375 degrees, set the garlic halves in the pan near the chicken, and continue roasting for about 45 minutes more for a total of about 1 hour for a 3-pound chicken. For larger birds, add another 10 minutes for each additional pound. The chicken is done when the leg wiggles freely in its joint and when the juices run clear from the thigh when you prick it and from the cavity when you tilt the bird. A thermometer inserted in the lower meaty part of the thigh should register 170 degrees.
Set the chicken on a warm platter, propping up the hindquarters with an inverted saucer, and tent with foil to keep it warm while you make the sauce. Remove the rack from the pan.
Make the sauce from the pan drippings. Carve the chicken and serve the meat drizzled with some sauce and with the roasted garlic on the side.
Makes 4 servings