- Hey, I'm John Kanell and
today on Preppy Kitchen, we're making a perfectly
delicious roasted chicken so let's get started. First off, preheat your
oven to 450 fahrenheit. Grab a big roasting dish and we're gonna prep our chicken. You should have a three to
four pound roasting chicken and it shouldn't be ice cold. If it is, it's gonna really
have a difficult time baking properly, so just
let it warm up a bit and also drain any juices
that are left inside. You want to pat your chicken
dry with paper towels. It shouldn't be wet because
we're gonna be covering this in delicious things, including butter and I need that to stick. This chicken's had its giblets removed. I actually saved the livers
because roasted chicken liver is one of my secret favorite things that you know about now. Roasted chicken is delicious
and I love the crispy, like, nicely seasoned skin. But you want the meat to be flavorful too. You can't just put flavors on
the outside of your chicken, you have to put it under the skin as well. So, with your clean hands, you're going to carefully separate the skin from the meat. You wanna lift the skin away from the meat without tearing the skin. It's great to keep it intact 'cause it's going to keep
all those flavors in there. So many delicious things will
be placed inside of here. If you tear your skin,
that's okay, it happens, don't worry about it,
it'll still be delicious. Just a little tear, ah. You also wanna lift the skin
away from the thighs as well because it's going to
be flavored all over. We're gonna set our chicken aside, wash your hands very well
and onto the next step. (classical orchestral music)
(faucet water running) - [Narrator] Running water
is an important element since it acts to flush
farm material off the hand. - In a smallish bowl, I'm
combining about two tablespoons of unsalted butter with one
tablespoon of olive oil. Gonna melt this in the
microwave over 50% power. And while it melts, I'm
heading out to the garden to grab some fresh herbs and a few onions. We planted a lot of things
in the garden this year, among them onions. I'm using some fresh onions. Fresh tarragon is amazing, so is rosemary. You could use any of your
favorite herbs in this chicken. For this recipe, you want
at least one medium onion, but I love onions with roasted chicken so I'm gonna add one medium and two small. Just giving this a nice slice, it's about half an inch thick. They'll roast up and
they won't dissolve away but they will cook through it and caramelize in all those
amazing rendered juices. You know the best part about
onions fresh from your garden? No tears. Oh my gosh, look. It's like nothing, there
are no tears at all. It's only the onions that have
been in cold storage forever. They're really aged and
they're just so potent. This? Look, nothing. Nothing. It's amazing. Sorry. Grab a head of garlic. We're gonna cut it in half cross ways. Whoa, careful, careful. This isn't garden fresh so
it has all the papery skin. Perfect. Slice a lemon in half. If you're adding any herbs
to your butter like I am, make sure you separate
the stems from the leaves. This will go under the skin too and no one wants to chomp
into like a woody stem. So all the soft parts, please. Oh my gosh. This tarragon smells so good. Highly recommend with chicken. I'm gonna give this a nice fine shop. Every Sunday my family gathered for a big dinner with our grandparents and we would have all sorts of dishes. We'd often have this dish and making it just reminds me of my family. It's like a warm memory to go
with a warm, delicious meal. I'm adding about a tablespoon or so of my chopped tarragon
right into my melted butter. I'm also adding in one and
a half teaspoons of salt and about half teaspoon
of cracked black pepper. All right, stir that together
so it's nice and mixed up. Now for the fun part. We get to rub this all over our chicken, under the skin and over to. I was just thinking like, hmm, should I stitch this skin back together? But it was gonna give some major Nightmare Before Christmas vibes and I didn't wanna do that to you. So get that all in the cavities surrounding the breast,
surrounding the thighs. It's actually really easy and painless if you just use a spoon
to add this in here. I'm also gonna spoon this butter mixture all over the skin, over,
under, in, and out. And now it's time to get
our chicken together. Grab your onion. I'm gonna just have a little bed of sliced onion all around it. My garlic goes into the chicken cavity along with about three sprigs of thyme this will give it a nice aromatic hit. I'm also squeezing one
lemon all over the chicken. A lot of it's going to like just roll off but it's gonna be in the pan as well and the onion will cook in that and it's gonna be really nice. I love making roast chicken because the chicken's cooking
in the skin, in the fat, and it's really gonna
be so moist and tender. And once you just prep
it, it's in the oven, you don't have to worry
about it until it's done and it smells amazing. Pop the lemon halves right
into the chicken as well. You wanna fold the wings under
the body so they don't burn. Now I'm gonna grab some kitchen twine and tie the legs together. This will help everything
cook nice and evenly. If those wings or the
legs were sticking out, they would really burn while the rest of your chicken was
trying to cook through. I have a little bit more
thyme, about three sprigs. I'm gonna lay that around
with the onions as well. Time to wash those hands one more time. - [Narrator] The water
temperature should be that which is comfortable to the skin. - If you wanna make a whole
meal out of this, have at it. You can add little baby potatoes here. You could add like fuyu
persimmons if it's in the fall. So many amazing things
can get roasted here, sliced carrots, everything. If you are adding something
like baby potatoes or whatever else in here, I
will say you should season them and add some olive oil. So a little drizzle of oil
all over those veggies. A sprinkle of salt and pepper. I also pop the chicken
liver into here as well. It's one of my favorite things to eat. If that's weird, you can
let me know in the comments. I think it's delicious, but
some people are like aghast. This is ready to go into
the oven which is at 450. But as soon as you close
that door, reduce to 425. it bakes for about an hour
and 15 to an hour and 30 or until it's golden brown. And a thermometer inserted into
the thickest part reads 165. But don't cut it open yet, we'll talk about that when it comes out. (upbeat music) We're gonna baste this
chicken every 30 minutes in its own juices. We want to keep it nice and
moist and not dried out. Out of the oven in a temp perfectly. My chicken's done cooking,
but it's not ready to touch. It needs time to rest so let it sit for about 20 minutes. All those juices are gonna be reabsorbed and your chicken's gonna be perfect. If you cut it right now,
you'll lose all the juices and your chicken, which is perfect, will actually be dry so just give it the time it needs to rest. In the meantime, you could make a salad, set the table, or kick
your heels up and relax. I'm serving this chicken up for dinner. I've been sneaking bites left and right and I've almost finished
all the caramelized onions and the liver's gone too. That chicken is melt in your mouth tender, packed with flavor. And the potatoes, and the onions are caramelized to perfection. Even the lemon comes through throughout. I hope you get a chance
to make this recipe and if you like this video,
check out my dinner playlist. (upbeat music continues)
