oven roasted spatchcock chicken stew

… oh my what a week.  My good intentions went south very quickly at 5pm on Monday with a glass of pink Chandon at the desk and then it was pretty much downhill from then on in… I had the new Fashion Show exhibition at Madame Tussauds to style, two pitches for new business and an event contract which was hinging on being thrown in the bin to sort and this was all before dinner with the family on Wednesday night.  Oh and did I mention 2 nights out with clients that ended at 3am in the morning.  I’ve probably drunk my way through half a cask of vodka, a couple of barrels of Sauvignon Blanc and some very dodgy Moscow Mules at a ‘new London club’ that was, quite frankly like sitting in a hotel lobby surrounded by prostitutes… I could go on but I might get offensive and I need a lie-down…

oven roasted spatchcock chicken stew
because of the above, Saturday was a day of rest.  Quite literally I spent it mostly in bed flicking through the TV between snoozing and a very very long bath and at some stage, after nodding off in front of some dreadful home-improvement show where the buyers were quite clearly as annoyed with the over-enthusiastic presenter as I was, there must have been one of those sappy ‘made for TV’ movies come on the screen… I have no idea what it was about but there was a lot of crying and driving in upstate New York and some driving whilst crying in the snow… anyway, at some point there was a montage of one of the characters learning to cook and he pulled out of the oven a glorious pot of spatchcock chicken stew.  I was immediately smitten with the thought of golden chicken bathing in wonderful juices that I knew I had to make this for Sunday lunch.  With no recipe and just a fragment of memory to go on I’m making this up as I go but how hard can it be… bung whatever veg you have in the fridge and a chicken in a pot and roast the bugger… it was very good and served perfectly with creamy mash… I was a very happy boy and proves that falling asleep in front of the television can be a blessed thing…

1 medium free-range chicken
2 carrots – chopped
1 onion – roughly chopped
2 inches of celery – chopped
3 cloves of garlic – un-peeled
half a butternut squash
2 glasses of white wine
a little plain flour
1 teaspoon good quality vegetable stock powder
rosemary and lemon thyme
salt and pepper

pre-heat the oven to 160C

i’m using my procook 28cm shallow round casserole dish with a lid which just about coped with the chicken after a lot of squishing

spatchcock your chicken –  don’t be scared, it takes seconds…

spread out all the chopped veg and herbs at the bottom of the dish then lay the chicken, breast up on top

season well, pour over a glass of wine and drizzle with a little olive oil then place the lid on and roast for 1 hour at 160C then take the dish out of the oven, carefully turn over the chicken and add a little more wine and some water – the chicken should be resting in a few centimetres of liquid at all times – place the lid back on and into the oven for another 30 mins

place a teaspoon if plain flour and a teaspoon of stock powder into a cup or bowl

repeat the above with the chicken but this time, as you turn the chicken back to breast up, spoon a few tablespoons of liquid into the cup with the flour and stock, stir it into a loose paste and then pour it into the liquid under the chicken

place the lid back on and into the oven for another 30 mins… after which, take the lid off, turn the oven up to 180C and let the chicken become golden on top – roughly 30 mins

take the chicken out of the oven, put the lid back on and let it rest whilst you prepare whichever veg you’re making

serve the chicken in the pot at the table and let your guests spoon out the vegetables and glorious liquid

eat and of course, enjoy!