Sunday Roast

I thought we should really give our new oven a test run on a roast dinner before Christmas Day. So I bought a small, local organic chicken to try out in the conventional oven. Brian smothered it in butter and rosemary and doused it in a good slosh of wine. We covered it up with tin-foil and let it cook gently at 180° for about an hour. I then added the potatoes, parsnips and carrots to roast in the juices. After about half an hour, we drained the wine and chicken juices off to make the ‘jus’ – by reducing it by half – and returned the chicken to the oven to crisp up the skin before resting it. At that point I turned up the heat to finish off the roasties, before serving up along with some choux (sprouts).

For dessert I had cut some of my ‘acquired’ apples up, which Brian mixed with some lemon juice and apricot jam to make a quick apple tart.

The whole dinner was delicious. Carrots tasted like carrots, apples like apples, chicken like chicken – great produce all cooked so simply, yummy.