Roasted Chicken Recipe

Happy Fourth of July!!!!  I honestly love this time of year and love this holiday!  Even though we are super hot here in Arizona, I still love that sun, but we might even get a little rain today!

I love to celebrate holidays and birthdays, any chance to celebrate is worth it.  It was our really good friend, Rick's, birthday yesterday and we had him over for dinner.  All 3 of us our counting our calories and eating healthy so I needed a birthday worthy healthy dinner.  I decided on roasted chickens, blanched asparagus, and rosemary and olive oil couscous.  YUMMM!

The decision to make roasted chicken might have been because I bought my very first real life Chef's Knife at Sur La Table the night before and wanted to try something that would really put it to use!

I might have been a bit excited I finally got my knife!  I have been looking at this one for months!

Roasting the chickens were much easier than I thought, carving it was a whole different story, much harder!  Glad I still have all 10 fingers....

Roasted Chicken 
-1 roasted chicken (I used two and just did the same to both)
(I got my chickens at Trader Joe's they were only about $5 a piece.  So affordable! The 3 of us didn't even end up eating one.  We will have plenty of chicken in our house this week...and I sent some home with Rick, this might become a month ritual for us, such great chicken and cheaper than buying chicken breasts)
-1 Fresh Whole Lemon
-Fresh Thyme
-1 whole fresh garlic
-Salt
-Pepper
-Butchers Twine
-Roasting pan
( I did not use a roasting pan, with my whole minimalist house plan it would be against my minimalist morals to have a pan that I only use occasionally.  Instead I used a deeper cookie sheet and the cookie cooling rack.  It worked perfectly!!)

1.  Clean chicken.  I put my chickens in the sink and took out the innards and rinsed them off.  I then dabbed them dry with a paper towel and placed them on a cutting board to prepare and season them.

2.  Slice the lemon in half or fourths depending what will fit inside the chicken.  Peel the outer skin of garlic and tear pieces apart.  Wash the thyme.  Place the garlic pieces in the cavity of the chicken they should cover the floor of the cavity, next place half the lemon pieces into the chicken.  I then put a good amount of thyme, maybe a nickel size around, and sealed all of that off with the last pieces of the lemon.  Depending on how large your chicken is you can do more or less, my goal was to just make sure it was full.

3.  Take about a foot of butchers twine and tie the legs together criss crossed, sealing that cavity in order for all the flavors to soak into the chicken.  I tied a bow and cut the longer pieces off.

4.  Salt and Pepper the heck out of each side of the chicken.  I really went to town and rubbed it in after I put the salt and pepper on.

5.  Bake in an oven preheated to 375 F (lowered to the second lowest rack setting) at 20 minutes per pound.  I used a meat thermometer and made sure my chickens reached 180 degrees.

This was honestly one of my new favorite recipes.  Moist and delicious!    

So simple.  So healthy.  So good.  

ENJOY!