super tasty spanish roast chicken

method

This is a cracker of a dish to cook at home. It will really get your taste buds going as it fills the house with the most fantastic smells.

First preheat your oven to 425°F, then place your potatoes with 2 of your lemons into a small pan of water and boil for 5 minutes. Drain, and then prick the lemons all over with a knife. (The reason for doing this is that you are going to put them inside the chicken and their wonderful juices will be released while cooking. They will burst with flavor and fragrance, and the heat from the lemons will help the chicken to cook quicker from the inside as well as making it taste and smell amazing.) Remove the parsley leaves from the stalks and put to one side. Stuff the chicken with your hot lemons and the parsley stalks. Then season the chicken and the potatoes with a little salt and freshly ground black pepper, and slice your chorizo at an angle, ą⁄₄ inch thick.

Get yourself an appropriately sized oiled baking pan. Lay the potatoes in the center, then place the chicken on top and sprinkle with the chorizo and a little of your parsley leaves. Drizzle with a little olive oil. Take a piece of wax paper and wet it under a tap so it becomes flexible, then shake it out and lay it over the top of the ingredients in the baking pan, tucking it in snugly so the juices don’t escape. Cook in the preheated oven for around 1 hour 20 minutes.

While the chicken and potatoes are cooking you can make what the Italians call gremolata, by finely chopping the zest of your 2 remaining lemons, the parsley leaves and the garlic. Season lightly and toss together to create a really fragrant seasoning-type garnish. Remove the pan from
the oven, take the chicken out and put to one side to rest. Give the potatoes a shake about and put them back in the oven for a few minutes to crisp up.

Carve the chicken and divide between 4 plates, with the potatoes. The potatoes will have taken on the smoky paprika flavor from the chorizo, so if there is any juice left over in the pan, pour every last drop over the plates. When you sprinkle over the gremolata it will hit the hot juice and smell fantastic. You’re going to love this one! An arugula salad goes really well with it.

serves: 4

ingredients

• 2lb potatoes, peeled and cut into 1 inch dice
• 4 lemons
• 4ą⁄₂lb free-range organic chicken
• a handful of fresh flat-leaf parsley
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 11oz good chorizo sausage
• olive oil
• 1 egg, beaten
• 2 cloves of garlic