Happy Holidays!

Every year on Christmas eve, I roast a whole chicken. Though an uncooked whole chicken alone is more expensive than a fully cooked whole rotisserie chicken sold at a grocery store, cost isn’t important on Christmas. Besides, it (usually) tastes much better if you roast one yourself.

This year, I bought an organic whole chicken (4.2 lbs) at a nearby Whole Foods market at $19.

Other ingredients:

  • 3 carrots, 3 celery stalks and a medium-sized onion
  • fresh herbs - thyme, rosemary (and sage this year)
  • butter (25g)
  • garlic 3-4 pieces
  • olive oil (25g), salt and pepper

On December 23rd or 24th, thyme and rosemary are in demand and tend to disappear from grocery stores. Last year, I looked for 3-4 grocers before I found rosemary. This year, I wasn’t able to find thyme, so I gave it a shot with this herb blend. The blend has mainly thyme, and a twig of rosemary and sage each. How convenient! I might want more rosemary, though.

Herb & garlic butter

First, make herb & garlic butter. Just mix:

  • butter 25g
  • minced garlic 3-4 pieces
  • olive oil 25g
  • salt (1/2 tea spoon) & pepper
  • minced herbs (thyme, rosemary and sage)

Keep a few rosemary and thyme twigs untouched. They will go inside chicken later with chopped vegetables.

Chop vegetables

Chop carrots, celery and onion into small (eg, 1cm) pieces. Later, try to put as much of vegetables as possible inside chicken. The remaining will be under chicken when roast it.

Clean chicken

Remove whole chicken from the package and rinse it with cold, running water. Try to remove giblets as much as you can. After that, dry it with paper towel.

Rub herb butter to chicken

Rub herb & garlic butter inside and outside of chicken. Put your hand under skin and rub butter there. Salt and pepper chicken. Put and rub lots of salt especially around breast and thighs.

Then, put herb twigs and chopped vegetables inside chicken. Stuff them as much as possible. Remaining veggies will go under chicken while it’s roasted, but they will be blackened and won’t be edible. After that, tie the legs with string or a (bamboo) skewer.

Put chicken into the fridge and rest for 3 hours.

Roast it!

Remove chicken from the fridge an hour before putting into oven. Preheat to 380F (190C) degrees, put the chicken and leave it for 30 min.

After 30 min, remove it from oven, check if you see juice/oil from chicken on the plate. Put the juice/oil to all over chicken with a spoon. If you don’t see juice/oil yet, use olive oil instead. And then put it into oven again.

After 30 min, do the same. You should be able to use juice/oil this time. Put it to oven again and raise the temperature to 430F (220C) degrees.

After 30 min, do the same. Put chicken into oven again, and turn off the oven. Rest it for another 30 min in the oven.

Remove the chicken from oven. It should be ready to eat!

Serve

Cut thighs, wings, etc. The chicken was well made this year, tender and juicy.

When we have a roast or rotisserie chicken, my wife and daughter always want juicy thighs, so I go for wings and breast instead.

Chicken breast is not popular among us because it’s dry and less juicy. We prefer chicken to turkey from the same reason. Perhaps it’s simply that we haven’t had good turkey dishes before, though.