Everyone loves roast chicken, succulent, sweet and easy to cook. Add some simple accompaniments and your chicken can give you a week’s worth of delicious meals.

Here are some of our suggestions plus our simple roast chicken recipe. Don’t worry about buying an expensive bird, just get the best you can afford.

Serves 6-8

Ingredients

• 1 Whole chicken
• 50g butter, softened
• Salt & Pepper
• 1 lemon (optional)

Heat your oven to 220°C

Directions

1.  Remove your chicken from it’s packaging and place on a chopping board. There is no need to wash your chicken – anything harmful will be cooked off in the oven. Either pat chicken dry with kitchen paper or allow to dry naturally.
2. If using a lemon, slice it in half at this point and insert in the chicken’s main cavity
3. Grab your softened butter and using your fingers, rub the fat all over your chicken’s skin. Try to cover as much of the bird as possible.
4. Now lift your chicken onto a roasting tin or baking tray and sprinkle with salt and pepper
5. Place in the oven and roast for for 20 minutes per lb (450 g) plus 10-20 minutes extra. For extra juiciness, baste the chicken every 20mins or so using the fats and juices from the pan.
6. One the time is up, check your chicken is cooked by piecing the meat with a skewer, fork or knife. The juices should be clear – no pink! If you need to, pop the chicken back in the oven for another 10mins or so and check the juices again.
7. When fully cooked, leave the chicken to cool before removing them lemon (if used) and carving or dividing in to portions – there are no rules just go with what you think works best.

Gravy (optional)

In your roasting tin you’ll now have the base for a delicious, already seasoned gravy! To make a gravy, add 200ml of either hot water, stock (vegetable or chicken), or white wine – whatever you’ve got at home. Pour the liquid into the pan and using a wooden spoon stir it into the existing fats and juices scraping in any tasty bits from the bottom of the pan. Carefully pour this into a jug and your gravy is ready to serve.

SERVING SUGGESTIONS

Chicken with white beans
Next time your at the shops, grab a tin of white beans: butter beans, cannellini, or haricot. To save even more cash, choose a tin of own brand baked beans and rinse off the sauce when you get home.

Add chicken pieces to an ovenproof dish along with a serving of white beans, add a splash of chicken gravy and warm in the oven for 30mins.

Chicken sandwich
No one really needs a recipe for a chicken sandwich but here’s how we like them at Quids in!: We grab either a loaf of bread, a roll (such as a baguette) or some wraps. Into this goes mayo followed by lettuce, tomato topped off by some tasty roast chicken. A bit of salt & pepper and maybe a smear of mustard and we’re good to go!

Chicken salad
Add pieces of chicken to some torn lettuce leaves, quartered tomato, slices of cucumber and sliced spring onion. Add some olives or pickles if you like. You can dress the salad very simply with some olive oil, salt and pepper or if you have some mustard and lemon juice you can make a simple vinaigrette with this recipe.

Chicken pasta bake
This is the ideal choice when a hearty meal is called for. You’ll need a tomato sauce which you can get ready-made (such as Dolmio) or you can make your own, our recipe is here.

Heat your oven to around 190°C. Cook smaller pasta shapes (such as penne, rigatoni or spirals) in boiling salted water – allow around 100g per person. Once cooked, drain and tip into an ovenproof dish. Add a few handfuls of roast chicken pieces and stir in your tomato sauce so that the pasta and chicken are fully coated. To finish, sprinkle the top of your pasta and chicken with grated cheese, cheddar works great.

Bake in the oven for 20-30 mins or until the pasta and chicken are piping hot and the cheese is golden and bubbling.