mike[space] dot net

What with Brussels, New York and snowboarding (twice), it's been a pretty hectic time of late, and it's been totally impossible for me to offer Claire a Sunday roast. This weekend, I decided to rectify this, offering Claire the roast of her choice. This was, of course, a terrible mistake. I had every intention of cooking a (well practised) joint of beef, but Claire wanted Chicken. I've been deliberately steering clear of the bird side of life, for fear of the dreaded dry meat which seems all too easily achievable. But having made the offer, what else was I going to do.

I already had some courgette (AKA Zucchini) from earlier in the week, so I opted to keep the rest of the meal simple, with roast potatoes (of course), parsnips and carrots. I started off getting the potatoes ready, peeling and soaking them. Whilst I brought so water to the boil, I had the oven on to preheat it to 190C, and then peeled the parsnips and carrots. Given that Claire had got me into this mess, I decided to rely on her advice for the approach to cooking. So I pre-heated the oven to 190C, and in the meantime got a load of butter (it was actually olive oil based margarine, but the principle is the same) and pushed it down between the skin of the chicken and the breast meat. I'd seen Gordon Ramsay do this before, so I knew it wasn't some kind of elaborate practical joke, but it did still seem a little weird. On the plus side it did feel like I was doing something practical to help with the cooking process. I chucked on a load of salt and pepper for seasoning, and the bird was ready. I chucked it in, along with the roasting tin for the potatos (which had a load of oil in it awaiting the potatoes and parsnips). I par boiled the potatoes, and chucked them in the tin, and then left everything for about 25 minutes.

Then it was time for the parsnips. As I brought the water to the boil for them, I brought out the chicken and basted it (i.e. use a spoon to pour all the run off juices back over the chicken). The parsnips then went in for a 5 minute boil, before chucking them in the roasting tin with the potatoes. By this time, the potatoes were quite well done on the base (not helped by being on the bottom of the oven - curse my one shelf), I turned these and made sure I got the parsnips covered. Another basting 20 minutes on and the chicken was smelling great, and looking pretty promising.

After about an hour's cooking time on the chicken, I was getting a bit concerned that it was cooking quicker than expected. I was expecting 80 mins, but it was looking pretty done already. Claire demonstrated how to check that it was cooked (stab it, and then squeeze the wound - if the juices run clear you are all good). I decided another 10 minutes might be a good idea, but I would swap the potatoes and chicken over. Once the 10 minutes were up, I pulled the chicken out and (here's the allegedly important bit), put the bird upside down on the carving tray to ensure that all the juices run back down through the breast meat. I also covered with foil to keep the heat in (fairly obvious, but this is really aimed at cooking dullards like myself, rather than people who know what they are doing ;-)

At this point I just had to prepare the rest of the veg. A little oil and butter to fry the courgettes (on reflection, a little too much oil and butter ... just put in enough to prevent sticking, you don't want puddles!!), and boiling the carrots. Then I just had to carve the chicken, and consume.

Overall, the meal worked out very well - I did get the timing wrong on the parsnips though, which could definitely have done with a bit more time roasting - I think putting them in about 15 minutes later than the pototoes should be sufficient ...

(BTW, chicken cooking time was calculated as 45 mins per KG, plus 30 mins ... which I think would've proven too long)