Your best tips for a perfect roast chicken?

[TruXta]

I'd usually give it the last twenty minutes without foil on a higher heat. The hotter oven is good for your roast potatoes as well so it all works out nicely.

How long do you cook it for in total then?

 

[DexterTCN]

Already said that dexter, already said that. Although 4 hours is probably more realistic than 3. Also I'm with you on the taking the chicken out while the oven gets really hot thing... Used to do turn heat up high and leave for 20 minutes+, but it just dries it out.

Never saw, sorry. The basting is the main thing, you basically deep fry the skin. nom

That's an idea.

 

[Spymaster]

Butter under the breast skin, rub skin with olive oil and sea salt. Stick two halves of lemon and any fresh herbs you fancy inside. And you're not sticking anything "up its arse" because that big hole that you stuff is the neck end of the bird.

Top tip: roast it breast down for the first half of the cooking time. It cooks the breast meat slightly slower and cooler and allows it to baste in the butter that you stuffed under the skin. Turn it breast up halfway through to brown and crisp the skin.

 

[Cid]

Never saw, sorry. The basting is the main thing, you basically deep fry the skin. nom

That's an idea.

 

[idumea]

I had some great advice on urban when I asked how to cook my first roast chicken. (Which I can't find.)

Best piece of advice was to slice the skin with a very sharp knife and put some butter under the skin. I mashed up the butter with garlic first I think.

Edit: The perfect roast chicken as per the Grauniad

 

[Cid]

I wouldn't slice it, you can kind of open it up from the end and push stuff under.

 

[SpookyFrank]

How long do you cook it for in total then?

20 minutes per pound at 180 then another 20 at 200.

 

[SpookyFrank]

I can't believe you people all use so much butter to cook a chicken.

 

[tarannau]

I use so much butter to cook pretty much anything, so there.

 

[Cid]

Last time I did I used no butter at all... This is the glory of the slow method.

 

[TruXta]

I've heard, but not tried myself, that if you have a slow-cooker, do it in that (with gravy if desired) for 3-4 hours, then take out and place in mega-hot oven for crispy goodness. Seems a reasonable idea, so I'll have to give it a go soon.

 

[Frumious B.]

No butter in this Nigel Slater method either - but the best skin ever, and about 1 minute of prep http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/feb/21/roast-chicken-recipe-nigel-slater The skin is so good it's a struggle not to eat it all before you carve.

 

[ymu]

Dexter and Cid are right. Lowest heat you can get away with in the time available. I don't know why Cid is worried about gravy though - mine always leak enough concentrated juices to make a gravy without needing stock or a stock cube.

Long and slow is also by far the best way to cook tougher cuts of lamb too. So tender you can pull it apart with a fork instead of carving it. Nomness.

 

[Cid]

I'm not worried about it as such, I just find I get a bit less of it. And I like gravy.

Last time I added ham jelly - my mum rendered it down from the outside of one she had (admittedly this isn't something that happens very often), which was absolutely lush. The skimmed-off ham fat was used on the tatties.

 

[Orang Utan]

Why don't they just sell chicken skin for snacks?

 

[Cid]

<opens stall in borough market>

 

[TruXta]

Why don't they just sell chicken skin for snacks?

Goes off/becomes funny real quick. Could do it from a van I suppose.

 

[ymu]

The quantity doesn't bother me - I like my gravy by the pint, so I'm always going to be adding lots of boiling water to make up the volume. Slow roast chicken is one of the few roasts that doesn't need any stock to help it along.

 

[Cid]

Why not use stock instead of boiling water though?

 

[Orang Utan]

Goes off/becomes funny real quick. Could do it from a van I suppose.

You'd need to sell the rest of the chicken n all

 

[Orang Utan]

I have never added stock to a roast. That's how you make stock!

 

[TruXta]

You'd need to sell the rest of the chicken n all

That's a given.

 

[Orang Utan]

You could have two windows in the truck - the healthy side and passthedefibrilators side

 

[Cid]

You could have two windows in the truck - the healthy side and passthedefibrilators side

Fucking genius. Lean chicken and salad with perhaps a little rye bread on one side, fried skin on thick white bread the other.

 

[ymu]

Why not use stock instead of boiling water though?

If I'm boiling veg, that water gets used. If I'm not, then I'll use stock if I have to. With slow roast chicken, it's not necessary. Desirable, perhaps, but not necessary.

 

[TruXta]

Fucking genius. Lean chicken and salad with perhaps a little rye bread on one side, fried skin on thick white bread the other.

You're forgetting the mayo and hot sauce. With the skin I mean.

 

[Cid]

I have never added stock to a roast. That's how you make stock!

You don't add it to the roast itself, just a little to bulk out the gravy... It's not essential, depends who you're cooking for. Family thing potato water suffices, but last roast I had three mates round (so 4 blokeyblokeblokeeatlikehorseblokeys) and without the ham stock the gravy would have fallen disastrously short.

 

[TruXta]

You don't add it to the roast itself, just a little to bulk out the gravy... It's not essential, depends who you're cooking for. Family thing potato water suffices, but last roast I had three mates round (so 4 blokeyblokeblokeeatlikehorseblokeys) and without the ham stock the gravy would have fallen disastrously short.

Ham stock or ham jelly? Or is that the same thing?

 

[Cid]

Ham jelly, which I suppose is sort of a reduced ham stock.

 

[TruXta]

Cheers, never heard of that before I think.