Lemon and Herb Roasted Chicken

Welcome to our weekly Foodie Friday link up! I’m linking up with Annmarie from the Fit Foodie Mama + Esther from Chocolate Runner Girl to create awesome healthy recipes each week! This week’s theme is Citrus!

Trish and I got together last weekend to make a whole ton of food together! I’m happy to announce that for the first time in my life, I prepared an entire chicken (with expert guidance from Trish :P )! I usually just get chicken breast, but I may seriously have to do this whole chicken thing more often!

Preparing a whole chicken can be intimidating, but it wasn’t as hard as I thought it’d be…unless you’re not a fan of handling meat. (I’ve gone through a good number of anatomy labs by this point in my life/career, so this was not a problem.)

• Remove the neck/innards (will usually be contained in a bag) as well as any excess fat hanging in/around the body cavity. Using kitchen shears, cut the spine out and flip the chicken over breast-side-up into the preferably-shallow baking pan. (This’ll prevent it from trapping steam while baking + making the chicken all soggy!)
• Flatten the breastbone down into the pan as much as possible. (If you’re Trish, you’ll punch it. if you’re me, you’ll smash it down.)
• Ideally, try to chill the (uncovered) chicken overnight to completely dry it before roasting, since that’ll help to make it crispy + brown when you bake it!
• You can separate the skin by running your fingers between the skin/breast meat gently to help the skin to crisp.
• Save the neck/spine and throw in veggie scraps to make your own bone broth! (Hooray for no waste!)

We spatchcocked our chicken! (Previously, I’d only ever heard of spatchcock in regards to a pole dancing move that I cannot do because hello, lack of flexibility :'( ).

Lemon and Herb Roasted Chicken

Lemon and Herb Roasted Chicken

From fairyburger at https://www.fairyburger.com/lemon-and-herb-roasted-chicken/

http://www.fairyburger.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/lemonherbroastedchicken.jpg

You'll Need...

• 1 whole chicken
• 1-2 lemons
• kosher salt
• pepper
• EVOO
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp onion powder
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 1 tsp red pepper flakes (optional)
• 1 tsp tarragon

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
2. Season generously inside + out with kosher salt. Let rest overnight in refrigerator or for at least an hour.
3. Rinse + pat chicken dry.
4. Set the chicken breast-side-up in a shallow roasting pan.
5. Combine the salt, pepper, herbs, zest of 1/2-1 lemon, and extra virgin olive oil together and rub onto the chicken.
6. Slice the remainder of the lemons and place along underside of chicken.
7. Cover with aluminum foil and roast in oven for ~30 minutes. (Insert a thermometer into the thickest part of the thigh but not touching the bone--the temperature should be at least 165 F!). At the 30-minute mark, remove the aluminum foil and let it continue baking for 15 minutes so it can brown.
8. Remove from oven and let rest for at least 5-10 minutes before transferring.

Additional Notes

Spatchcocking the chicken increases the surface area of the meat that's exposed so you don't need to cook it for as long!
Roll up lines of aluminum foil underneath the chicken to help lift the chicken off the surface of the pan. (This prevents the chicken from getting soggy in its on juices!)

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End-of-Week-ish Recap!

• Join me for Travel Tuesday for a snowy New Jersey hike along the Schooleys Mountain Park Trail!
• Check out my review of Amie from The Healthy Apple’s cookbook, Eating Clean!

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• Farrah | blog | facebook | instagram | pinterest | twitter | bloglovin’
• Annmarie | blog | facebook | instagram | pinterest | twitter | bloglovin’
• Esther | blog | facebook | instagram | pinterest | twitter | bloglovin’

Join us next week for International!