This orange roasted chicken is tasty, juicy and very easy to make. If you’re having a small celebration it’s an excellent option. It also takes a lot less time to cook than turkey and looks equally impressive at the table.
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Orange Roasted Chicken
This orange roasted chicken recipe is based on my honey-roasted turkey but I simplified it quite a bit. The idea behind this is to give you a quicker recipe to make. This focuses on those of us who don’t have much time to spare at the end of the year. Also, it’s a great alternative if your celebration involves only a handful of people. Usually, a whole chicken would be ideal for 4 people, but with several side dishes, this chicken can feed up to 8 people.
Increasing the flavour of this chicken
If you have a bit more time and you’re organized, here’s a recommendation. I recommend that after rubbing the chicken with the butter on and under the skin, leave it to marinate overnight. In this way, the meat in the orange- roasted chicken will have more time to absorb all the flavours in the butter. Butter and fat in general are a good vehicles for flavour. That’s why creamy desserts start tasting like “fridge” after a couple of days.
Chicken cooking point
We’re all scared (and if you’re not, you should be) to under or over-cook chicken and have it be really dry. To avoid it, your best friend will always be a meat thermometer. The chicken is ready when all its parts have reached 73C/163F. Then you know that there are no live bacteria left and the chicken will still be extremely juicy. That’s how you get a perfect orange roasted chicken.
Ingredients
For the chicken
- 1.6 kg whole chicken
- 100 g unsalted butter at room temperature
- 1 tsp onion powder
- ½ tsp paprika
- 1 tbsp salt
- Pepper
- 1 tsp fresh rosemary chopped
- 1 tsp fresh thyme chopped
- 2 tbsp honey
- 2 oranges zest only
- 1 garlic clove purée, grated or finely minced
For the sauce
- 150 ml freshly squeezed orange juice
- 1 tbsp cornstarch
- Salt to taste
Instructions
For the chicken
- Make sure that inside the cavity of the chicken there are no interiors in a bag. Also, cut off the neck and tail if they're still attached.
- In a bowl, mix the butter with the rest of the ingredients.
- Pat the chicken dry with kitchen paper all around.
- Carefully, separate the skin from the flesh of the chicken using your hands. You want to separate it on the breast and also as far as your hand can go into the legs.
- Rub the chicken with the butter inside the skin, on top of the skin and also on the inside of the cavity.
- If you have time, you can marinade it overnight. Otherwise, it goes straight into the oven.
- Roast the chicken in a baking dish or tray that's somewhat deep in a preheated oven at 180°C/350°F for approximately 1 hour or until the temperature at the centre of all pieces of the chicken has reached 73°C/164°F. Baste it every 15 minutes with its juices. If at any point a section of the chicken becomes golden enough, cover it with aluminium foil.
- Remove it from the dish it was baked in and let it rest for at least 15 minutes before carving.
For the sauce
- Pour the juices and butter that was left behind in the tray into a saucepan through a colander.
- Dissolve the cornstarch in a bit of the orange juice and reserve.
- Add the orange juice to the saucepan and mix. Add the dissolved cornstarch too, stirring constantly to prevent lumps from forming.
- Let it boil at medium heat. From the moment it boils, let it boil for an extra minute, always stirring constantly.
- Taste the sauce and adjust the level of salt if needed.
