Spicy Rubbed Roasted Chicken

Something as basic a Roasted Chicken was not always so basic to me. I did not make my first fully Roasted Chicken until just a few years ago. Since most of my family will only eat the white meat it seemed wasteful. This is the recipe that changed all that around here.

I decided to give it a try when I sawthat the name of the recipe was “Spicy Rapid Roast Chicken”. I was lured in with the words “Spicy” and “Rapid”. “Spicy” it is…and “Rapid” it is not. I like to buy the big Roaster Chickens for this…you know the ones with the pop up timer. It’s kind of like roasting a mini turkey really. I usually buy a 7 to 8 pound Chicken and if you want to try this one…and I highly encourage you to do so, plan on it roasting for between 2 to 3 hours. It is truly worth every minute of wait time. (your house smell so good too.)

Here is the recipe and I renamed it because the word “Rapid” was an outright lie!!

Spicy Rubbed Roast Chicken

1 7–8 pound whole “Roaster” Chicken

Olive Oil

1 tsp. kosher salt

1 tsp. black pepper

1 tsp dried oregano

1 tsp dried basil

1 tsp. paprika

1/8 tsp. cayenne pepper

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Rinse chicken thoroughly inside and out under cold running water. Pat dry with paper towel. Place chicken in a shallow roasting pan. Rub the entire chicken with olive oil. In a small dish, mix the kosher salt, black pepper, oregano, basil, paprika, and cayenne pepper together. Sprinkle all of the rub mixture over both sides of the chicken.

Make a “tent” out of Aluminum Foil and loosely cover the top of the chicken to prevent over browning. Put the chicken in the oven and roast for 30 minutes. Lower the temperature to 400 degrees and continue to roast till done. Check every now and then and towards the end of roasting remove the foil to enhance the browning. When your pop up timer is up…in approximately 2 1/2 hours, remove from the oven and let sit for about 10 minutes before you start to carve.

I like to move the Chicken to a cutting board after it has rested and then pour all of the juices from the pan into a fat separating cup. You want to keep all of the deep brown sauce and browned bits and pour off the fat. This sauce is what makes this chicken so wonderful. Something about all of those rub spices mixed in there with all the browned bits and it is delicious. Carve your chicken and then pour the brown sauce over the platter of meat.

Serve with mashed potatoes or hot buttered noodles and a vegetable.

(You can use the leftover carcass for making chicken stock. Place in a stock pot and cover with water, throw in some carrots, and a chunked up onion and simmer for at least an hour or more. Strain and save the broth for making Chicken Noodle Soup the next day with any leftover meat you might have left or freeze for future use. Makes a very flavorful soup stock.)

Now it was a rainy and raw day here today…the men were starving…and I forgot to take a photo of my bird when it came out of the oven so the top photo is an image from google but very closely resembles what mine looked like. I even served green beans with it like in the photo. But I served mashed potatoes instead of the roasted ones above. Oh, and there was no Iced Tea either. I’ll get the hang of this blogging thing one of these days. :)

I am adding this post to FOOD FRIDAY over at DESIGNS BY GOLLUM. Stop by there for some wonderful recipes!