Jamie Oliver's Lemon Roast Chicken

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Jamie Oliver is one of my food heroes. He’s been a pioneer in moving the western world back toward cooking healthy meals at home and having fun while doing it. His recipes are also generally fail safe and clever, so if ever I google a recipe idea and an option of his comes up, I’m likely to jump on it.

Roast chicken is one of the first meals I ever learnt to prepare, and I still find it one of the easiest ways to feed a large amount of people without spending hours in the kitchen before the event or during. This is a simplified version of the Jamie Oliver recipe, without the roast potatoes. These days I favour kumara and pumpkin as they have a lower glycaemic index, and are less likely to cause blood sugar spikes and inflammation.

Roast chicken is also amazingly versatile. I use the leftover bones to make chicken stock and chicken soup. I save the leftovers of the drier meat to make chicken tacos, chicken salad or chicken wraps. Not a single bite is not utilised!

Chicken is one meat that I’m pretty keen to eat organic. Ordinary chicken is pumped full of antibiotics and hormones to make it bigger and tender, and the residue in the meat has a very negative impact on our gut and hormonal health. Bostocks is the most common organic brand in New Zealand, but hopefully in time there will be more options for the consumer.

Lemon Roast Chicken

Serves 6

Ingredients:

1 whole chicken (organic or free range if possible)

Sea salt

Freshly ground black pepper

1 large lemon , preferably unwaxed

1 whole bulb garlic , broken into cloves

1 handful fresh thyme leaves (optional)

Olive oil

Directions:

  1. Pat the chicken dry and then rub the chicken inside and out with a generous amount of sea salt and freshly ground black pepper. Leave to rest in the fridge for 1 hour if possible and preferably up to 3 hours.

  2. Preheat the oven to 190 degrees celcius on fan bake.

  3. Take the chicken out of the fridge and rub it with olive oil. Quarter the lemon and place that into the cavity of the chicken along with as many cloves of garlic as you can fit in there, and the fresh thyme leaves.

  4. Cook for approximately 45mins on fan bake in the oven, until the chicken is thoroughly cooked. Make sure you use a skewer to ensure the chicken is cooked through.

  5. If you wish to serve with roast veges, add the potatoes, kumara, or pumpkin 10mins into the cooking time. The fat from the chicken will add wonderful flavour to the vegetables.