Help me prove i am not useless! I need your perfect ways to do a roast (chicken)

[MerlinsBeard]

I have never roasted a chicken before please don't laugh - either Sainsbo or DP usually do it. Have the chance to do it in bits during the day tomo while DS1 is at school and DS2 sleeps.

So....I have a chicken currently defrosting in the fridge - will be done by morning...what the hell do i do with it? surely i don't just bung it in?

I have potatoes ready for roasting - again wtf do i do once i have peeled them

If i roast carrots while the potatoes are doing will they be nice? (never had them roasted before) again what do i do?
Thank goodness there are instructions on paxo and that my gravy and yorkshires are coming out of a packet!

Put half a lemon, a couple of cloves of garlic and if you can find it, some sage or other random herbs in the cavity. Maybe half an onion? Then stick a bit of butter or olive oil over the top and bung it in. I give mine half an hour or so and then stick some chipolatas around it and bacon over the top. DO NOT USE PACKET GRAVY!!! Tip the chicken a few times to get some juices out towards the end - thicken with some flour or cornflour and pad it out with stock (a cube is fine) and it will be yummy.
Re potatoes - par boil (i.e. about 5-10 mins) and then drain, either put in around the chicken for about 45 mins, OR - put a baking tray in the oven with a bit of oil for 5 mins, when it's good and hot, toss the potatoes in the oil and stick back in the oven for 45 mins or so. They're more crispy with the latter method, but absorb some chicken juices with the former.

I always cook my chicken upside down as juices will go through onto breast meat making it lovely and tender - I tend to cook for longer on a lower heat than on packet so depending on size nromally mine goes in pyrex dish (upside down) little bit of fat in dish and then cover in foil. Middle tray of gas oven on gas mark 2 for about 4-5hoursthen I take it out about 20mins before dinner ready put on plate and cover in foil and leave to 'rest' for a while before carving.

Roast potatos I parboil for about 15mins and have some fat in a pyrex square tray thing in oven, put potatos in fat and brush fat over them (if going abit fancy sometims put some herbs or garlic on them) then in the oven (gas mark low from chicken cooking) for about 2 hours

Dont know about carrots never roasted them

I meant to say - leave the bacon/sausages for the rest of whatever cooking time you've calculated - it's usually around 1 1/2 hours at 190 - 200 for your average chicken. If they look like they're overdone just remove along the way.

Oooo forgot to say about stuffing the cavity well done hassled

Rinse the inside of the chicken out with cold water.

Pat dry with kitchen paper.

Cut a lemon in half and put it in the cavity.

Wash your hands.

Get a big knob of butter. About a tablespoonful. Spread it all over the skin (don't keep going back to the butter dish with the knife, that way any nasties transfer to the butter in the dish).

Sprinkle the skin with a salt and pepper.

Put in a pre-heated oven at 200 deg (sorry, don't know gas equivalent - about 6?).

Cook for length of time recommended on label on the cling film. If no timings, come back to me. Probably about an hour and a half for a medium chicken, 2 hours for a big one.

Baste the chicken 2 or 3 times during cooking.

After an hour in the oven, put a folded up piece of tin foil over the breast to prevent burning.

Take it out of oven 10 mins before you are going to serve it. Unfold the tin foil and cover the whole bird with it to keep it warm.

Don't ask me about carving though. Mine tend to fall to pieces - all that butter and the lemon inside make the chicken very moist.

it will all end in tears, the last mumnetter who posted this had an affair.

Ensure chicken is at room temperature before putting in oven (ie take it fully defrosted out of fridge about 2 hours).

Heat oven to 230° centigrade.

Put a lemon, cut in half and pricked all over with a fork, inside the chicken, and a bunch of thyme. Rub the chicken all over with butter. Place in a roasting tin breast side down, season with salt and pepper, and put in oven for 30 minutes, basting once after 15 minutes.

After 30 minutes, turn chicken over, baste, and cook for a further 20 minutes at 180°, basting a couple of times.

Check chicken is cooked by putting a knife down the leg joint. If the juices run clear (ie are not pink) the chicken is cooked.

Potatoes - heat lots of vegetable oil (or goose fat or duck fat) in a roasting pan in the very hot oven that the chicken is in. When oil is hot, add potatoes. Turn occasionally.

what's with the lemon?

does it just make it taste a bit lemony? Or is there some chicken magic at work here?

It sounds really hard

Upside down? so thats how to get it yummy on the top then?!

Baste? .... scoop up the juices and pour over the chicken?

Do i need to put anything in the roasting tin first?

Says 1.5 hours on the wrapper

i usually cook the chook upside down and coverd for about 3/4 hour then uncover and turn over for the last 20 minutes.this ensures nice juicy breast meat and crispy skin.

re spuds; parboil for 20 minutes .drain and cover with the lids.give them a good shake.
stick the rossting dish on the hob and pt in some oil to heat up.carefully place the spuds in the oil and toss them about to cover. shove in the oven with the chook.

all I do is put it in the oven at 180 c for the time ti says on the wrapper but sprinkle with salt first pour the fat out of it a couple of times during cooking take out of the oven an leave to rest for 10 minutes on a plate before carving or it will break up

I don't p[ar boil the roasts just stick them in the dish with the chicken wne there is about an hour or a bit more left of cooking

toss them a couple of times in the fat

leave them in the dish when you take the chicken out for the extra 10 to 15 minutes at the end

Its not hard mainly just getting timings right - personally I like chicken cooked longer on lower heat.

If its easier write yourself a timescale so fir example dinner at 6pm I would

1.15 put chicken in oven (upside down and foil)

3.45 parboil potatos (put fat in oven at same time)

4.00 put potatos into fat and baste them

5.30 - put stuffing in oven

5.35 - put veg on (cooking on hob in this house)

5.40 - get chicken out of oven and put on plate right way round and keep covered in foil

5.55 - cut chicken up

6.00 - potatos/veg/stuffing etc all done and on plates and enjoy!!

there is no need to rinse out the chicken cavity first.

There are lots of ways to roast your chicken but if you want to start off simple then bung in tray cover with foil, remove foil 30 minutes before cooking is finished. Once you get the hang of it you can go all fancy.

Make sure you use the meat juices for the gravy. Packet gravy only suitable for putting on dogs dinner imo!

why foil? i only use that for turkey because it is so big

well I don't use foil cause I use stone dishes but always used to with tins no idea why just did as my mum did!

Pointy - the lemon, or an onion, or a potato (at a push) just gives a bit of moisture inside. Chicken doesn't taste unduly lemony, just nice and juicy.

Eandh must have her oven on very low to put it in at 1.15 and serve it at 6!! For a medium chicken served at 6, I'd put it in at 4pm at the earliest! And I am truly paranoid about food poisoning.

Lol. What do you do with your Christmas turkey? Put it in on Christmas Eve? Not criticising - each to their own .

juiciness, ok.

yes, I did wonder at the almost-5 hour prep time. I would have to be in nearly all day.

I'm with Daphne on the timing.

I put one in the oven at 3pm on Sunday, took it out just after 4 covered it with tin foil to keep warm and left it to rest

whilst I finished off the rest of the meal. Gravy is made with the juices.

We sat down to eat at around 4.30. Chook was big enough to feed family of 6 and enough left over to make a chicken pie on monday

here is how i do mine:

rub bird with olive oil, and cover with parika and tarragon and rock salt, odd mix, but works!

then make a slit between the breast meat and skin and stuff with slices of butter

but some cut up onion and garlic in the cavity and put in the oven

baste frequently and let it rest before carving

Last but not least, do not serve it up on glass plates...

And don't forget to serve with aunt bessies yorkshires, mint sauce, horseradish and redcurrant jelly as well as bread sauce to suit all palettes

I have to put in oven at lunchtime as often out for best part of the afternoon (have a slow cook thing on oven!) actually alot of the time I tend to cook chicken breasts rather than whole chicken as noone likes leg/dark meat in this house so more economical to just buy pack of chicken breasts!

thank you for all this

Am about to put the oven on (want to do chicken now so i have time to get a cooked one if it goes horribly wrong!

Would just like to pointout that at 21 weeks pg and still suffering the occasional vomit episode there is NO WAY i am pushing anything under the skin!

i cant cook - at all.

but i can tell you this

if you stick a couple of lemons in the hole

its magic lemon chicken - SHIT ...you ...not

like the sound of the magic part!

Somehow i knew there would be more to it than washing it and bunging it in for a couple of hours