Karen's Herb-Roasted Chicken

Tonight, my sweetie gave me a night off from cooking by taking over the kitchen and making her herb-roasted chicken. Adapted from an NPR recipe, her chicken dish involves taking a whole roaster, stuffing a compound butter underneath the skin, and roasting it on a bed of potatoes. Earlier in the day, we picked up a Rocky Jr. chicken from the local Whole Foods Market (on sale for nearly half-off!). We were actually looking for a 3 lbs bird and were surprised that we couldn't find anything smaller than the 5 lbs one that we picked up.

After washing out the chicken and patting it dry, Karen loosened the skin and stuffed an herb butter made with fresh rosemary, sage, and thyme between the skin and the meat. She reserved some of the butter to rub over the skin of the chicken and stuffed a cut lemon into the cavity. We put the chicken breast-side down into a roasting pan on top of a bed of halved new potatoes and threw it into a 475º F oven. We roasted the chicken for an hour, dropping the temperature 25 degrees every 15-20 minutes and flipping the chicken over partway through the process. Our patience was rewarded:



To accompany the chicken and potatoes, we chopped up some red chard and sauteed the greens with garlic and red pepper flakes. The results - some good eats!