Lemon Garlic Herb Roasted Chicken with Vegetables

If you, like me, live with a small family (especially now, in the age of quarantines and COVID-19, it's just been my parents and me at home alone together for the better part of the last 9 months or so) or are cooking on a tighter budget, roasting a chicken can be just as good, if not better, than roasting a turkey for a special occasion like a birthday, anniversary, Easter, Thanksgiving, or Christmas. Don't get scared by the length of the recipe that follows. It's only this long because I explain not only what to do and when to do it, but also why to do it. Every good chef should know this recipe, and an even better chef can take this recipe and adapt it as they see fit.

Roasting a good chicken starts well before you enter your kitchen; it actually starts even before you leave home to go get the ingredients you need at the grocery store, only starting to roast when you come back home. At least in the US, our Agriculture Department has different classifications based on the age and/or weight of the chicken that can tell you why to buy which kind of chicken. Basically, there are 3 really common categories you'll see in grocery stores nationwide: broilers, fryers, and roasters. Roasters are the biggest of the common categories (but bigger categories do exist), probably coming in at 5 to 7 pounds. Any bigger, and you might as well buy a small turkey, and any smaller, and you might as well buy a broiler or fryer-- but their names indicate their purposes, and we are neither broiling nor frying, so do not buy a broiler or a fryer. If you can find it, I'd recommend a free-range chicken-- it's more humane, lowers the carbon footprint, and actually improves the flavor profile of the chicken. Even more technically, look for an air-chilled chicken rather than a water-chilled chicken. Air-chilled chickens are cooled by cold air, while water-chilled birds essentially sit in an ice water bath. You'll get better color and crispier skin from an air-chilled chicken because the water chilled chicken introduced excess moisture that inhibits what's known as the Maillard Reaction-- the chemical process that gives a great steak, chop, (or in this case, bird) its great color by changing the structure of the sugars and proteins when heat is applied, forming a flavorful crust or creating crispy skin. To summarize: buy a sustainably raised, air-chilled roaster chicken if at all possible.

Now, a few comments on food safety. First, at least in the US, your bird almost certainly will come with its neck, heart, and maybe some other organs (liver, etc.) in a plastic bag inside the cavity. That plastic is not oven-safe and will melt if you follow my recipe. Take that bag out and throw it away-- you won't need it or any of its contents for this recipe. Second, especially among older generations, the conventional wisdom is to wash a chicken. NO! Washing a chicken just increases the potential for cross-contamination and the transmission of food-borne pathogens. Do NOT wash your chicken. What you do want to do is to pat your chicken dry with a disposable paper towel: this removes moisture from the skin. Moisture is the enemy of Maillard browning, so get your chicken as dry as possible. To that end, let your chicken stay, uncovered, in a clean, dry, ventilated place at room temperature for about half an hour before you roast it. Room-temperature birds roast more evenly than refrigerator-temperature birds.

Once you have a good-quality bird, the other half of the battle can begin: deciding on seasonings. I like to be pretty traditional here, so include 3/4 of an onion; a bunch each (1/2 an ounce, 14 grams-- one package) each of fresh rosemary, sage, and thyme; a lemon; a whole head of garlic, chopped open at its equator to open up every single clove (don't bother peeling it); salt; and pepper. These last two, but especially the salt, are often left out by inexperienced home cooks-- and this omission alone might explain why people don't like to cook and/or why they do like their own food. Salt has two purposes: removing moisture and intensifying existing flavored. That whole long list of ingredients will go inside the cavity of the bird. This will serve to flavor the bird from the inside out. Another list (olive oil, salt, and pepper) should be applied to both the breast side of the chicken and its opposite side. This will season from the outside in. Truss the chicken simply by bringing its drumsticks together so they either meet at a point or cross over each other and tie them together with a length of kitchen twine. This does 3 things: ensures the chicken cooks evenly, improves the presentation, and prevents anything stuffed in the cavity from falling out and imparting any burned flavors to the chicken.

Carrots, celery, and onions are some of the classic flavor combinations in innumerable cuisines worldwide. The French call it "mirepoix," the Italians "soffritto," and the Portuguese "refogado." I'll call it mirepoix from now on simply because that was the first term I learned for it. For this, which will form a bed on which to roast the chicken, I use a whole rib of celery (that is, a whole bunch of stalks attached at the root), two onions, two shallots, and a pound of carrots.

Each of these four components is prepared differently. First, the carrots. I cut off just enough from the top to get rid of the point at which the green stems are or would have been connected to the body of the root. Then, cut the carrots each into thirds or quarters depending on their length. If the carrot is particularly thick, cut each piece through its long axis so that the end result is two half-cylinders of carrot which each lie flat on a cutting board thanks to a rectangular base created by this cut. For the celery, make one cut at the top of the whole rib to remove any excessively leafy or woody parts. Then, disconnect every stalk from the whole rib at once by making a cut near where the stalks all meet. Now, cut each stalk at least in half, if not in thirds. For each shallot, peel it, cut off both the stem and root ends, and slice the shallot into halves or thirds depending on its size. For each onion, prepare it in much the same way as the shallots: peeling, removing the stem and root, cutting in half from stem to root to create a flat surface, and cutting each half into thirds pole-to-pole. Season lightly with salt and pepper. Seasoning here can be light since these elements will be indirectly seasoned by the drippings that come down from the chicken.

Lay the mirepoix in an even layer on a roasting pan--I like a 9qt Dutch oven, the biggest roasting-suitable vessel we own-- and then place the chicken breast-side up in the same tray on top of the mirepoix. Having removed all but the bottom rack from the oven and having preheated it to 500 Fahrenheit (or as high as your oven can go—but not engaging the broiler), place the roasting pan in the oven. Leave the chicken in the oven at this temperature for 30 minutes, and then drop the temperature to 350 and cook for about another 15 minutes per pound, or until the thickest part of the thigh registers 165 Fahrenheit. A 6.75-pound roaster like the one I’ll be preparing a few days after this recipe goes live, should be ready in about 2 hours 15 minutes.

Once the chicken is done, move it and the vegetables to a serving platter to rest. Return the roasting vessel with all the drippings from the pan still intact to the stove, adding in a slurry of about a teaspoon of cornstarch in a cup of chicken stock or water, if no stock is available. Also add in a tablespoon or two of low-fat (but not skim) milk. Bring the sauce up to a boil, whisking constantly to disperse the starch and fat granules as much as possible and to prevent any of it from scorching. Once a boil is reached, back off the heat to a simmer and continue whisking until a stage the French call “nappé.” Inexperienced chefs make the mistake of only taking the sauce to a simmer before killing the heat; your sauce will never reach the right consistency if you make this mistake. You know your sauce has reduced enough to reach nappé when you can put a metal spoon in the sauce, drag your finger across the back of the spoon, and see a trail leaving distinct left and right sides. If the sauce comes back together immediately and the trail disappears, keep going; you are not yet at nappé. If the sauce is so thick that you have to fight it to get the trail, you've reduced too far and have now passed nappé; thin out the sauce with more stock or water, and attempt to approach nappé again. Once nappé has been reached successfully, transfer the sauce to the serving vessel of choice.

Serve the pan sauce as an accompaniment to the chicken which is sat on the same bed of vegetables on which it was cooked (and both the vegetables and the chicken are on a platter).

If you make this, be sure to leave a comment down below letting me know!