Roasting a whole chicken can seem intimidating but it is honestly quite easy if you have an oven, it is cost effective and provides more than one meal. If you are one person you can still roast a chicken and have meal prep for the week and freeze extra portions for a later date.
Begin with a whole chicken. The best chickens are pasture raised and, if fed, are fed organic seed based feed.
Thaw the chicken thoroughly. Any frozen part will cause uneven cooking.
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Remove anything from the cavity of the chicken (sometimes organs or the neck will be stored in here) and rinse the cavity with cold water. Save these for your bone broth or place in the pan with the chicken.
Place the chicken in a large cast iron frying pan or in a baking dish.
Pour olive oil over top and use your hands to coat the entire bird in oil.
Season with salt and pepper evenly over the entire chicken (use any other spice or herb blend to evenly coat).
Place the chicken breast side down (I know this is opposite of what most recipes tell you)
Most chickens take about 1 ½ - 2 hours to roast unless exceptionally big or small.
Put in the oven and roast for 40 minutes… pull out and use a spoon or baster to take the oil from the pan and pour all over the chicken. Gently loosen the chicken with a spatula from the pan if it is sticking.
Put back in for another 40 minutes and do the same basting technique.
Put back in for another 20 minutes.
Pull out and flip the chicken over. I like to use tongs or put a spatula into the cavity of the bird and flip the bird away from myself so I don’t splash oil on myself.
Put the chicken back in for 20 minutes. If it looks nice and browned, take it out. IF it needs some more browning, baste it and put it back in for 15 minutes. Repeat until it looks good to you.
Check the temperature by sliding a thermometer into the breast and then into the leg, not touching the bone. The temperature should read 165 degrees Fahrenheit. If it is not up to temperature, put back into the oven for 15 minute increments until it does.
Now this is the most important and hardest part: let the meat rest on a plate for at least 20-30 minutes. It will cool to a temperature where you can actually handle it and the meat becomes so much more tender and juicy if you allow it to rest.
To cut the chicken, pull the wings off at the joints; pull the legs off at the joint and cut between the thigh and drumstick to separate at the joint. Follow a knife on either side down the centre of the breastbone and cut each breast off the bone. Once you get it separated from the breast bone you can usually use your hands to pull it off one piece. Place on a cutting board and slice. Any other meat left on the bird can be pulled off by hand.
And that’s it! Enjoy. It seems like a lot of steps but when you do it once you will see that it is straight forward and not intimidating.
If you are cooking for one and want to freeze half the chicken, take a pair of kitchen scissors and cut down one side of the breast bone and down the back. Wrap this (cooled) half in parchment and place in a ziplock or airtight container or bag and freeze for 4-6 weeks.
With the bones you can make a bone broth. I have recipes on my blog for multiple types of bone broth:
https://alisonlukyn.com/blog/stocks-broths-and-the-kitchen-sink
