Slow-Roasted Garlic and Lemon Chicken

Our very first post on Heronearth was the wonderful roast chicken recipe by Nigella Lawson, the drop dead gorgeous British food network star.  This is another of her recipes that as she puts it, you just can’t make once: that’s to say, after the first time, you’re hooked.  It is “gloriously” easy, you just put everything in the roasting pan and leave it to cook in the oven, “pervading the house, at any time of the year, with the summer scent of lemon and thyme -and of course, mellow, almost honeyed garlic.”  And the chunks of lemon don’t just flavor the chicken, you can eat the almost caramelized pieces skin and all.

1 chicken (3 1/2 to 4 lbs.) cut into 10 pieces (see note)

1 head garlic, separated into unpeeled cloves

2 unwaxed lemons, cut into chunky eighths

small handful of fresh thyme

3 Tbs. olive oil

10 Tbs. white wine

black pepper

Preheat the oven to 300 degrees.  Put the chicken pieces into a roasting pan and add the garlic cloves, lemon chunks and the thyme; just roughly pulling the leaves off the stalks, leaving some intact for strewing over later.  Add the oil and using your hands mix everything together, then spread the mixture out, making sure all the pieces are skin side up.

Sprinkle over the white wine, and grind on some pepper, then cover tightly with foil and put in the oven to cook, at flavor-intensifying low heat, for 2 hours.

Remove the foil from the pan, and turn up the oven to 400 degrees F. Cook the uncovered chicken for another 30-45 minutes, by which time the skin on the meat will have turned golden brown and the lemons will have begun to scorch and caramelize at the edges.

I like to serve this as it is, straight from the roasting pan: so just strew with your remaining thyme and dole out. Serves 4-6.  (I think 4)

Note: Sometimes I’ve found the breast pieces to be on the dry side with this long cooking time.  But the legs and thighs are juicy and crispy and wonderful with the mellow garlic and lemon.  When you take off the foil and turn up the heat,  it’s a perfect time to add a sheet of peeled and salted carrots tossed in olive oil to the oven, since 400 is the right temperature to roast both dishes.