I’ve held off on giving you a roast chicken recipe for a while, now. Not because I don’t think my roast chicken recipe is worth sharing – it absolutely is, I make a magnificent roast chicken – but because I’m not sure it’s interesting enough for you. Almost everyone has got a good roast recipe, right? So I’ve held off for all of the five and a half years since I started this website. Until now. Because no matter what your preferred way to roast a chicken, I’m pretty sure you’re going to want to get involved with this.
Sorry to toot my own horn, but in terms of roast chicken recipes it’s a bit of a gamechanger. Toot toot.
This is my orange and garam masala roasted chicken. It’s probably not something you want to serve with Yorkie puds, gravy, and three veg, but it does go beautifully with couscous and pomegranate or grilled mix vegetables or sweet potato fries or a coriander salad. Orange chicken is delicious, and the addition of garam masala gives it a gorgeous kick.
If you can’t find garam masala (I got mine in Morrisons, though, it’s not too unusual) then BBC Good Food has a good recipe for it. Leaving it to rest when it comes out of the oven is essential – I recommend resting the chicken under the foil whilst you prepare the side dishes to go with it. Also, try to resist the temptation to pluck at the crispy skin and taste a little of the orangey chicken flesh when it first comes out of the oven, because I managed to get quite a spectacular burn on my index finger and thumb when I did this. The orangey steam may keep the chicken beautifully moist, but it’s hotter than the sun, I swear.
Have leftovers in salads for lunch the next day, or stir them into curries or soups. Anything but letting it go to waste. I reckon if you boiled the leftover chicken carcass with the orange and the garlic, adding ginger and maybe some star anise, you’d get a damn decent soup you know. If you’re cleverer than me and try that, let me know how it turns out?
- 1.6kg whole chicken
- 1 orange
- A bulb of garlic
- Salt and pepper
- Garam masala (At least three tablespoons)
- Pre-heat the oven to 190C/Gas Mark 5
- Put the chicken in a large roasting tray lined with boil. Cut the orange into quarters and put three of them inside the chicken
- Cut the garlic bulb into quarters and put each quarter in a different corner of the roasting tray. Don't worry if the cloves scatter away from their corner or split from their skins, this is fine. Remove one clove, cut it in half, and rub the cut side of each half all over the chicken. Then toss the halves into the tray with the rest of the garlic
- Rub/spray the chicken with a little oil and season well with salt and pepper. Squeeze over a little juice from the remaining orange quarter. Feel free to enjoy the rest of the orange yourself
- Cover the chicken with foil and put into the oven. After half an hour, baste the chicken with the juices. After another half an hour, remove the foil (but keep it) and baste again. Roast for a final half an hour and then remove
- Sprinkle garam masala all over the chicken. Tightly cover with the foil and leave to rest for 20-30 minutes
I need to stop reading your recipes – I’ve been drooling for the last hour or so! This sounds lovely and right up my street. Can’t believe you waited years to write about it. Personally I find roast chicken rather boring so this is a lovely twist. Stephen