Buck Buck....

There are a thousand ways you could prepare a whole chicken, but sometimes sticking to the basics can be the most rewarding. This recipe actually came from one of our Jamie Oliver cook books, and it turns out perfect almost every time.  I used the leftover meat to make chicken soup the next day in our crock pot.  Slurp slurp!

Ingredients

• 1 x whole chicken 
• 2 medium onions 
• 2 carrots
• 2 sticks of celery
• 1 bulb of garlic
• olive oil 
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 1 lemon 
a small bunch of fresh thyme, rosemary, bay or sage, or a mixture

Directions

• Preheat your oven to 475°F
• There’s no need to peel the vegetables – just give them a wash and roughly chop them 
• Break the garlic bulb into cloves, leaving them unpeeled 
• Pile all the veg and garlic into the middle of a large roasting tray and drizzle with olive oil 
• Drizzle the chicken with olive oil and season well with salt and pepper, rubbing it all over the bird 
• Carefully prick the lemon all over, using the tip of a sharp knife (if you have a microwave, you could pop the lemon in these for 40 seconds at this point as this will really bring out the flavour) 
• Put the lemon inside the chicken’s cavity, with the bunch of herbs 
• Place the chicken on top of the vegetables in the roasting tray and put it into the oven 
• Turn the heat down immediately to 400°F and cook the chicken for 1 hour and 20 minutes 
• If you’re doing roast potatoes and veggies, this is the time to start them – get them into the oven for the last 45 minutes of cooking 
• Baste the chicken halfway through cooking and if the veg look dry, add a splash of water to the tray to stop them burning 
• When cooked, take the tray out of the oven and transfer the chicken to a board to rest for 15 minutes or so 
• Carve and nom nom nom....