This simple, delicious recipe for Lemon-Roasted Chicken and Vegetables uses five ingredients, not counting the salt and pepper! Once roasted, cut the lemon in half and squeeze the juice over the chicken.
Ingredients
- One 4 to 5 pound farm-raised chicken
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 1 whole lemon, washed and dried
- 2-3 tablespoons olive oil or melted butter
- 3 or 4 thin-skinned potatoes, scrubbed and cut into quarters
- 2 cups small carrots or 3 whole carrots, peeled and cut into 2-inch lengths
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 450°F. Rinse the chicken, then dry it very well with paper towels, inside and out - the drier the chicken, the better.
- Salt and pepper the cavity, Stuff the cavity with the whole lemon - it will keep the shape of the chicken. Tie the legs together (use string or dental floss).
- Brush the chicken with olive oil or melted butter and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
- Toss the potatoes and carrots with olive oil or melted butter and sprinkle with salt and pepper. (You can add other vegetables, too, if you have them - mushrooms are nice roasted or cherry tomatoes or diced eggplant, unpeeled of course.)
- Place the chicken on a rack in a roasting pan and surround it with the vegetables.
- Roast for 50 to 60 minutes or until a leg moves easily or the flesh tests 165°F.
- Remove the string from the legs and the lemon from inside the cavity. Cut the lemon in half and squeeze the juice over the chicken and vegetables. Makes 4 servings.
