Garlic Butter Rubbed Roast Chicken

I cut into ours too fast and didn't take a picture...I was HUNGRY..so I just took a picture of Martha's. Mine looked pretty much just like it. :)

I have wanted to roast a chicken for a while. I finally bought one last week when I was at Kroger and was planning to cook it Sunday, but had put it in the freezer and there's just no quick way to thaw a whole chicken. However, I vowed to cook it this week and today was the day. I thawed it yesterday and picked out the perfect recipe from a group of them in Martha Stewart Living's January issue. I chose the Garlic Butter Rubbed Chicken. The name just made my mouth water. The weird thing was that you roasted oranges and red onions with it. Now, I know that's not "WEIRD" really, but I don't want to eat roasted oranges and onions. That doesn't sound like a good accompaniment. But I did it....I didn't put as many as the recipe called for because that just seemed wasteful.

Here's how I made mine:

1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp course salt
4 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened
2 Navel oranges (1 zested), both cut into 2 in wedges
2 teaspoons finely chopped fresh thyme, plus some sprigs (I didn't have fresh...I used *gasp* dried and just put some in...probably 1/4 tsp)
1 whole chicken (4- 4 1/2 lbs)
2 Red onions, peeled, cut into 1 1/2 in wedges (I only used one)

Preheat oven to 450.

Mash garlic and salt to make a paste

Combine garlic paste, butter, zest, and thyme (not sprigs).

Gently seperate skin from breast of chicken and put HALF (not all) of butter mixture under the skin of the chicken. I put ALL of mine and then had to whip up some more for later.

You can season with more salt here if you wish, but I thought the butter mixture was pretty salty so I didn't salt any more....of course mine was probably salty enough bc I used 50% more butter mixture on mine. So, now that I think of it, it makes sense that mine was salty enough. Carry on with your salting, people!

Fill cavity with 2 orange slices, 1 onion slice, and thyme sprigs if you've got them. Place chicken breast side up on a rimmed baking sheet. Tie legs together with cooking twine (or heavy duty thread if you are like me and didn't have no stinking twine).

Scatter oranges and onions around the chicken. Pop that baby in the oven and roast for 30 minutes. Then brush it with the rest of the butter. Pop it back in for 15 minutes. Remove the onions and oranges. Put it back in until a thermometer placed in the thickest part of the thigh reads 165 (10-20 minutes). Let rest 10 minutes before carving.

Now, I wouldn't call this an "easy" recipe, but it wasn't too labor intensive. All I know is that it was SOOOOO worth it. Michael and I both gave it HUGE thumbs up. Joseph was just "ehhh" but he's not a huge fan of chicken. He ate a roll and some asparagus.

I happen to know that the Krogers in our area are having whole chickens for 79 cents a lb starting tomorrow. Go get you a chicken and try this...you will like it!