Roast Chicken

Ingredients

• 4 lb whole chicken
• 2.5 ounces honey
• 4 ounces kosher salt
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• thyme leaves
• 1 lemon
• olive oil
• ground black pepper

Directions

Mix honey, salt, bay leaves, a thyme branch, juice from a lemon and a small amount of warm water in a pot.

Pull skin away from chicken just enough to place thyme leaves and garlic under skin. (When cleaning chicken, don't cut off flap - use it to truss chicken later.) Place chicken in liquid, breast side down, and add enough water to almost cover the chicken. Cover and leave in refrigerator for 3+ hours. (After brining over night, it was too salty.)

Remove chicken 1/2 hour before starting to cook.

Preheat oven to 375 F. Make sure rack is in middle setting.

Rinse off brine and place on rack in deep pan, breast side up. Grind pepper in cavity. Truss: Tie legs together with twine + tuck wings under. Rub chicken with olive oil and ground pepper.

Roast chicken breast side DOWN on a v-rack in a roasting pan, uncovered. After 20 minutes, flip and baste chicken. (Uneven basting may cause skin to brown unevenly.) Roast another 20 minutes and check temperature. Raise oven temperature to 425 F to brown the skin. Roast another 20 minutes or so.

(The roasting temp and time seem off. Next time, try roasting at 400 F for 20 minutes, flip and baste chicken, then raise temp to 425 F and roast another 30 minutes, check temperature, then probably roast another 10 - 20 minutes, depending on the temperature. Also consider roasting for a period at 450 F.)

To check temperature: thigh should register 175 - 180 F. Breast meat should register 150 - 155 F.

Let chicken stand 5 - 10 minutes (to finish cooking).