Citrus-Herbed Roasted Chicken with White Wine Sauce

Occassionally inspiration will hit me. This is a rare occurance, as I admit most of my ideas are stemmed from other's creative minds! Cooking seems to be the one exception. As I have once stated before, healthy eating is a necessity in our home. Not that we eat healthy all the time , (thanks a lot Gutherie's, you are my one weakness since college). Last night I created a recipe for a roasted chicken that was so good it needed no dipping sauce. Chicken can be so boring! One summer, before I went off to college, I stayed with my mom ( my parents are divorced and have been so since I was five years old). We had chicken every night, in every way you can prepare it. I say this with sarcasm, just the memory of those chicken meals makes me shutter. Needless to say, it was a VERY long time before I would eat chicken again. This is probably why I have such a love for Gutherie's , it was the first chicken I ate since I spent that summer with mom. Well, those days are behind me and now I enjoy chicken, every now and then. I served the roasted chicken along with some herbed potatoes, yum!

Don't forget to click on the printer friendly button if you would like a copy of this recipe. Bon Appetit!





Citrus-Herbed Roasted Chicken with White Wine Sauce

Ingredients:

1 Whole Chicken, neck, giblets and all the other yucky stuff removed
1 large lemon, sliced
1 lime sliced in half
4 fresh rosemary stems, 2 stripped and chopped
6 cloves garlic, 3 minced
1/2 cup white wine (your choice)
2 tbsp. melted butter
pepper
salt
8 dried bay leaves

*Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Time to get friendly with your bird! Remove all the giblets, neck and other repulsive stuff from inside your bird. Wash him thoroughly and pat dry. You will need to lift the skin from the body of the bird, but be careful not to tear through the skin, like I did in some places. Some places will not give, so do the best you can. If I can do this, ANYONE can! Now you are ready to season it. Notice I did not give measurements for the pepper and salt. If I had to guesstimate, I would say about 2 tablespoons of pepper and 1 tablespoon of salt.



Rub the salt and pepper all over the outside of the chicken. Top and bottom and into crevices.





Next, stuff the lemon slices, bay leaves, some pepper, minced garlic and the rosemary under the skin. Do this all over the bird, even under the skin of the legs. Take the halved lime, remaining garlic cloves and 2 rosemary sprigs and stuff them into the bird. You should feel like you have violated this bird by the time you are done! We want him seasoned to perfection!

After the bird has been seasoned, ( and you've washed your hands), mix the white wine and butter together in a bowl. Pour over the bird.



Cook the chicken at 400 degrees for 30 minutes. Drop the temperature to 350 degrees and cook for 45 minutes more. You want the outside nice and crispy and the inside tender and juicy.

If you want to add the potatoes, you will need red potatoes, chopped rosemary ( I used what was left from the chicken), salt and pepper and olive oil. Slice the potatoes into quarters. Place into rotisserie pan. Sprinkle with rosemary, salt, pepper and drizzle with olive oil. Bake with chicken the last half of baking.