Lemon Chicken

Lemon Chicken. Such a simple name for such a Wow! dish. My sister-in-law posted the recipe on her Italian food blog last week and when I read it I knew it was just the recipe to offer to my dear family who had offered to cook my birthday dinner.

"Chicken?" queried Tayta. "But that means I'll have to touch raw chicken." And so she did, facing down one her culinary fear factors. The lemon chicken was fantastic and Tayta proclaimed it our new favorite chicken recipe.

Lemon Chicken via my sister in law, Shandra, via Matha Stewart

~Allow time for marinating: 1 hour to over night

Combine in a bowl:

1/3 cup coarse (grosso) sea salt
3 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice

Loosen the skin of the chicken from the flesh and rub/pour the lemon/salt mixture under the skin and in the cavity of the chicken. For the best flavor and texture, marinate the chicken for a few hours or even the day before you roast it, but if you've only a half an hour it is still worth the effort. When done marinating, rinse the salt off the chicken and prepare the gremolata.

Gremolata
1 bunch parsley
2-5 cloves garlic
zest of 1 or 2 lemons

To make the gremolata, c the parsley, garlic and lemon zest togethe . Mix the gremolata with six tablespoons soft butter and spread under the skin of the chicken and in the cavity. Add a few quarters of lemons and bay leaves to the cavity of the chicken and roast at 180 celsius (350 f) for 45-60 minutes , just until the juices run clear.

Serve with roasted potatoes and the lemons scattered around.

We used chicken breasts on the bone w/skin (nine of them to be exact) so didn't have a cavity to fill. Tayta tucked the gremolata under the skin and for a couple of large breasts I made a large slit/slice in the chicken and she put in more gremolata. My family served this with garlic roasted broccoli...(to be continued)