Ina Garten-Inspired Roasted Lemon Chicken
Half of every roast chicken recipe tells you to put a lemon in the cavity. It is worth knowing how little that does.
The cavity is a hollow space full of steam, and steam carries lemon oil out of the vents and into your oven, not into the meat. Flavour transfers by contact. Slice the lemon thin and slide the slices under the skin, flat against the breast, and they spend seventy-five minutes pressed to the meat they are meant to season.
Keep the halves for the cavity if you like — they help the bird hold its shape. Just do not expect them to be doing the work.
Jump to the recipe ↓Ina Garten-Inspired Roasted Lemon Chicken
Serves 4 · Main
- Prep
- 20 min
- Cook
- 1 hr 15 min
- Total
- 1 hr 35 min
Easy7 steps
Ingredients
- 1 whole chicken, about 1.8 kg
- 2 lemons, one sliced thin, one halved
- 2 tbsp kosher salt
- 1 tsp black pepper
- 50 g softened butter
- 4 sprigs thyme
- 1 head garlic, halved across
- 2 onions, thickly sliced
- 2 tbsp olive oil
Method
- Salt the chicken all over and refrigerate uncovered overnight.
- Take it out before roasting. Heat the oven to 220°C (200°C fan).1 hour
- Loosen the breast skin with your fingers and slide the lemon slices, thyme and butter underneath, flat against the meat.
- Put the lemon halves and garlic in the cavity. Tie the legs together.
- Sit the bird on the onion slices in a roasting tin. Oil and pepper the skin.
- Roast at 220°C, then drop to 190°C for 50–55 minutes, until the thigh reads 74°C.20 minutes
- Rest before carving. Squeeze the roasted lemon halves into the pan juices.20 minutes
Dry skin, and the salt goes on the day before
Wet skin steams and stays pale. Salt the bird and leave it uncovered in the fridge overnight: the salt seasons the flesh and the moving air dries the skin into something that will actually crisp. This one step separates good roast chicken from most roast chicken.
Truss it, or accept uneven cooking
Loose legs sit away from the body, cook faster than the breast, and force you to choose which part to overcook. A single loop of string round the ankles keeps the bird compact.
Test the thigh, not the breast
The thigh is the last part to come up to temperature and the part that is genuinely unpleasant undercooked. Probe the thickest part, avoiding bone. If the thigh reads 74°C the breast will be a little above 65°C, which is exactly right.
Storing
Three days. Strip the carcass while it is still warm — it comes away far more easily — and keep the meat in some of the pan juices so it does not dry out. The bones make good stock.
Questions people ask
Does lemon in the cavity flavour the chicken?
Barely. It scents the steam. Slices under the skin, in contact with the meat, do the work.
Why salt it the night before?
The salt seasons the flesh right through and the open air dries the skin, which is what lets it crisp.
What internal temperature?
74°C in the thickest part of the thigh, away from bone.
Why rest it for twenty minutes?
The juices redistribute. Carved straight away, most of them end up on the board.
More like this
Ina Garten-Inspired Beef Bourguignon: Garnish ApartThe onions and mushrooms are cooked separately and added at the end. Simmered in from the start they are what turns it into ordinary stew.
Ina Garten-Inspired Beef Stroganoff: Not Stewing SteakStroganoff is a fast dish and stewing beef needs hours. Use fillet or sirloin, seared in seconds, or it turns grey and tough.
Ina Garten-Inspired Beef Tenderloin: Tuck the TailA whole tenderloin tapers from thick to thin. Fold the narrow end under and tie it, or that end is well done before the middle is warm.