Lemon and 40 clove Garlic Roast Chicken...stuff them up its butt!

Continuing with all things lemon here is a twist on roast chicken. I used a lot of whole peeled garlic and included lemons in the pan itself to get a nice citrus tang to the pan juices. Definitely is tart but still very tasty.

Lemon and 40 Clove Garlic Roast Chicken

• 2 roasting chickens, about 5-6 lbs each
• 8 lemons
• 4 cloves garlic
• 2 T thyme
• 2 c cubed carrots
• 4-5 medium white potatoes quartered
• salt, pepper
• olive oil
• 1/2 - 1 c water, white wine or broth

Preheat oven to 425. Wash and clean the chickens. Dry them. With cut one lemon into 4 slices. Remaining lemons cut in half.

For each chicken: Salt and pepper the inside of the chicken. Sprinkle in approx 1 t thyme. Add 3-4 lemon halves and 6 cloves of garlic. Slip fingers between skin and breast meat. Insert 2 lemons and 2 cloves garlic on each breast of the chicken. Fold wings under, truss and tie legs together. Lightly oil the chicken with the olive oil. Salt and Pepper the top and bottom of chicken. Sprinkle remaining thyme over the two chickens.

Place the celery stalks in the center of large roasting pan. Place chickens on top of the celery. Add remaining lemons, cut side down around the chickens. Put in the oven and roast for 15 minutes.

Toss remaining cloves of garlic, carrots and potatoes with 1T olive oil. Add 1 t sea salt and fresh cracked pepper to taste. At the end of the 15 minutes remove the roasting pan. Add the vegie mix around the chickens. Insert thermometer or oven probe to the thickest leg of the largest chicken.

Lower oven to 325. Roast until thermometer reaches 170. Baste as needed if your pan starts to dry out. (The potatoes soak up a lot of pan juices so you do need to monitor).

At the end of the cooking time remove the chickens and put on platter, tenting to let stand 10-15 minutes. Spoon out the vegies and put in serving bowl. Add additional broth to pan juices and a thickener to make a gravy.