Roasted Chicken with Rosemary & Potatoes

A really simple, classic recipe; chicken and potatoes, what else do you need?

Well, rosemary would be nice. Some salt and pepper as well. And why not get some cherry tomatoes for some lovely colour and texture contrast?

Use whatever chicken you like, in this example I am using breasts, but feel free to use thighs or legs.

You can preheat your oven to roughly 180 degrees celsius (355 fahrenheit). My oven generally underwhelms me, so I tend to turn it up a bit hotter than needed, if you know your oven's idiosyncrasies, then feel free to adjust to match.

Let's start with the potatoes, I use one potato per person if they are medium to large potatoes, by which I mean one potato is larger than my fist. Chop the potato into smallish bits, aim for the size of a standard board-game dice, its okay if some bits end up a bit larger too.

Before you start chopping; we are going to be boiling these potatoes just to cook them a little bit (this is called "Parboiling"), so set up a saucepan of water and let it come to a boil while you chop your potatoes.

Drop the potato pieces into the boiling water, and a pinch or two of salt and we will let them boil for just 5 or so minutes.

Meanwhile, if you have dried rosemary that comes in one of those spice-bottles, then you can skip this next bit. If you went and got some real rosemary, then break the leaves off two of the stalks and finely chop them up. 

We can start now with seasoning the chicken, if you like. I just rub a bit of salt and pepper on the chicken, but feel free to experiment with other dry seasonings as well.

Its probably time to get those potatoes out now, strain them and let them sit for a while so they get to really dry out.

Next, heat up a pan or a skillet to a medium-high heat, add just a bit of oil, and sear the chicken pieces. What I mean is that we are not going to let the chicken cook completely, we just want to sear the outside.  It shouldn't take more than one minute on each side if the pan is nice and hot, the outside will be slightly browned, and that is good enough.

Now, we just get everything together in a baking pan ... simply place the chicken on the sheet, surround it with the potatoes, and generously sprinkle all that rosemary you chopped up. Why not add two full stalks of rosemary for some fun?

Now put the pan in the oven at roughly 180 degrees celsius (355 fahrenheit) for about 20 minutes. In case you haven't noticed, I have not done anything with the tomatoes. Let the chicken and potatoes roast for a bit, say roughly 10 minutes, then carefully take the baking tray out just a bit and add the cherry tomatoes, please be careful not to burn yourself. If you feel more comfortable taking the entire pan out and placing on the counter while you add the tomatoes, thats fine. You won't hurt the chicken's feelings.

Finally, put the pan back in for another ten minutes or so. Generally, you will start noticing a nice aroma in your kitchen when the dish is ready. Carefully take it out and just make sure the chicken is cooked.

Hopefully, your potatoes are a little more roasted than mine, so if they are more brown at this point, thats great! Now just plate and serve.

As you can see, this is an incredibly easy recipe. The chicken should be nice and juicy inside and slightly crisp outside, as should the potatoes. The tomatoes will be completely melt-in-your-mouth gooey in contrast, and the dish on the whole will have the aroma of rosemary yet without being overpowering on the spice.

Oh, and the stalk is just decoration, don't eat it.

Well, eat it if you want, I suppose, just don't tell anyone that I told you to eat it.

This dish pairs well with a chardonnay, a red table cloth, and another person.

As with all the other recipes we put on this site, this is meant to be easy to follow. We are hobby chefs who love to cook, and we are always up for learning new techniques. If you know of anything in this recipe which can be done a different way, whether for increased ease of preparation or better taste, please add a comment below!

Whipped up by Shyamal Addanki