Recipe Monday: A Complete Guide to Oven-Roasted Chicken

There’s something about a roasted chicken that seems hazy, dream-like. Whole, oven-roasted chickens can seem like far-off dreams from childhood. To a novice cook, that can make it seem impossible to get a juicy, flavorful chicken with a crisp skin.

It isn’t impossible, I promise. It isn’t an impossible dream. I’m here to make it simple for you.

Ingredients:

1 Whole Chicken
Butter
Salt
Pepper
Paprika

Directions:

PREP-PLACE-SEASON-ROAST-COOK-ROTATE-SEASON-FINISH

1. PREP Preheat oven to 450.
Remove chicken from packaging. Rinse if there is a lot of juice/blood in the package. Pat Dry.
*Make sure you remove the gizzards, etc. They are usually in a package inside the chicken.

2. PLACE Place Chicken, breast-side down in a large roasting pan or oven-safe casserole dish.
*The chicken pictured above is breast side UP. Start with the chicken DOWN–Little wings and legs pointing to the bottom of the pan.

3. SEASON Rub down the chicken with some butter and sprinkle salt and pepper generously. Remember that the skin will keep most of the seasoning out, so be GENEROUS. Cover lightly with Paprika–mostly just for color.

4. ROAST Roast chicken for 15 mins at 450.
After the 15 minutes, reduce heat to 350 with the chicken STILL IN THE OVEN. Cook according to the times listed below.

5. COOK and ROTATE
Use this chart to determine remaining cooking time

Weight	Breast Side Down		Breast Side Up
3 – 3.5 lbs	45 mins	FLIP	25 mins
3.5 – 4 lbs	1 hour	FLIP	20 mins
4 – 4.5 lbs	1 hour	FLIP	30 mins
4.5 – 5 lbs	1 hour 10 mins	FLIP	30 mins
5 – 5.5 lbs	1 hour 15 mins	FLIP	35 mins
5.5 – 6 lbs	1 hour 30 mins	FLIP	30 mins
For any weight, 20 mins per pound in the oven. 1 hour per pound in the crock pot but the skin will NOT crisp.

SEASON-When you FLIP the chicken to breast side UP, season just like you did in Step 3 MINUS THE BUTTER.

FINISH cooking breast-side UP.

PREP-PLACE-SEASON-ROAST-COOK-ROTATE-SEASON-FINISH

Flawless chicken every time.