Roast Chicken

For my roast chicken I combine two of Jamie Oliver's recipe PERFECT ROAST CHICKEN & ROAST CHICKEN WITH LEMON AND ROSEMARY AND ROAST POTATOES

1 chicken -1.6kg
2 medium onions
2 carrots
2 sticks of celery
1 bulb garlic [break the garlic into cloves -unpeeled]
olive oil
sea salt
freshly ground black pepper
1 lemon
butter
a small bunch of fresh thymes/rosemary/bay/sage/m

ixture [I use McCormick dried mixed herbs-a handful]
potatoes [ I use only 2 potatoes- my kids not a big fan of potatoes]
optional you can add broccoli-cook separately, later assemble with the roast chicken.

Rub the chicken inside & outside with a generous amount of salt and freshly ground black pepper. Do this in the morning if possible then cover and leave it in the fridge until you're ready to start cooking for lunch or dinner.

Take out the chicken 30 mins before it goes into the oven. Pat the chicken with the kitchen towel.Carefully with the chicken cavity facing you peel the skin of the chicken away from the flesh without tearing it then put some butter in it try to reach to the drumsticks. This will make the chicken skin crispy when roasted. Rub all over the chicken with olive oil. Preheat your oven to 240 C .

Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil cut your potatoes into golf ball sized pieces, put them into the water together with the lemon and garlic cloves for 12 minutes. drain and allow for steam dry for 1 minute remove the lemon and the garlic. Toss the potatoes in the pan while still hot this will make them lovely and crispy when they roast.

While the Lemon still hot carefully stab the lemon about 10 times and put it in the chicken cavity together with herbs and garlic [1/2 from the bulb].

Vegetable roughly chop. Pile the vegetables-carrot, onions, celery and the other 1/2 of the garlic into the middle of tray drizzle with olive oil, season with salt and pepper.

Place the chicken on top of the vegetables and put it in the oven. Turn the heat to 200 C and cook the chicken for 1 hour 20 minutes. You can tell the chicken is cooked when thigh meat pulls easily from the bone and the juices run clear.