The following recipe and excerpt for rosemary roasted chicken are from “Everyday Chef: Simple Dishes for Family and Friends” by Jeremy Sewall. It’s available for purchase on Amazon.
A simple roasted chicken is hard to beat. Culinary icons like Jacques Pépin have become legendary for their recipes for it, and if you’ve ever eaten Chef Pépin’s chicken, you’ll understand why. Rosemary adds a gentle floral flavor to the chicken both in the cavity and from the basting butter. Don’t be put off by the high oven temperature. When roasting a chicken, I crank the heat up at first to get the skin crisp. It may create a little smoke, but that’s just during the initial push. If you get to the end of the cooking time and the skin is not as crisp as you would like, raise the temperature again for the last 5 minutes or so. I recommend serving this with Scallion Mashed Potatoes (page 171) and Garlic and Lemon Green Beans (page 160). When you find a roast chicken recipe that you love, hang on to it. Hopefully this one will become yours.
Rosemary Roasted Chicken with Pan Sauce
Ingredients
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 450ºF. Place 4 of the rosemary sprigs and the garlic cloves into the cavity of the chicken. Place the chicken on a rack set inside a roasting pan. Rub the canola oil all over the outside of the chicken and season liberally with salt and pepper. Roast in the oven for 15 minutes. Rotate the roasting pan and continue cooking for 10 more minutes.
- While the chicken roasts, remove the leaves from the remaining 2 rosemary sprigs and chop finely. In a small saucepan, melt the butter over medium-low heat and add the chopped rosemary. Cook, stirring occasionally, until fragrant. It shouldn’t take long.
- Remove the chicken from the oven and brush half of the rosemary butter on the chicken. Reduce the oven temperature to 300ºF and return the chicken to the oven. After 10 minutes, remove the chicken and brush with the remaining butter. Return the pan to the oven and continue roasting until the internal temperature of the meat reaches 165ºF, about 15 additional minutes.
- Remove the chicken from the oven and let it rest for at least 20 minutes before carving.
- Remove the rack from the roasting pan and discard the fat. Place the roasting pan on the stove over low heat and add the white wine. Whisk and scrape up any bits or drippings from the bottom of the pan. Raise the heat to medium-high. When the liquid begins to boil, transfer it to a saucepan along with the chicken stock. Add the thyme sprigs, bay leaves, and peppercorns. Simmer for 20 minutes. Remove from the heat, strain (discard solids), and season with salt. Return to the saucepan and keep warm.
- To carve the chicken, make a cut between a thigh and the breast and slice through to remove the leg. Repeat on the other side. Turn the chicken so that the point of the chicken breast is facing away from you and cut along the backbone of the chicken, keeping the skin intact. Slice along the backbone and ribs to remove each breast. Remove the wings. Place all of the pieces on a serving platter and serve with the pan sauce on the side.