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Butterflied Roast Chickens

by Dawn T in Rouxbe Recipes

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Step 1: Brining the Chickens (optional)

Brining the Chickens (optional)

To start this dish, it is optional to brine the chickens, but it does make the meat incredibly moist and flavorful.

Choose a suitable-sized container and prepare enough All-Purpose Brine to fully cover the chickens.

Remove the neck and the insides from each chicken and place them into the container. Pour the cold brine over top and place into the refrigerator for at least 3 hours or overnight.

When ready to roast the chickens, remove them from the brine and let drain. Pat dry with paper towels.

  • 2 whole chickens
  • All-Purpose Brine (Rouxbe Recipe)

Step 2: Roasting and Serving the Chickens

Roasting and Serving the Chickens

To cook the chicken, first preheat your oven to 400º degrees Fahrenheit (200°C).

Next, butterfly each chicken. Press down on each chicken to ensure it lies flat. Using your fingers, loosen the membrane and skin under the breasts, thighs and drumsticks. Be careful not to tear the skin. Place a slice of compound or regular butter under each breast, thigh and drumstick. Spread the butter underneath the skin as you go.

Set the chickens onto a baking tray. Drizzle with a bit of olive oil and rub all over the skin. Season with salt and pepper. If you haven’t brined the chicken, you may want to season a bit more liberally.

Place into the oven for about 20 minutes. Then turn the heat down to 350º degrees Fahrenheit and let cook for another 30 minutes or so. Baste both chickens part way through with the drippings from the bottom of the pan.

To check for doneness, flip over and cut off a thigh. Make an incision in the thickest part of the thigh to peek inside. Transfer to another tray in the event that one chicken needs to go back into the oven. Be sure to check both chickens for doneness as they may be different sizes and cook at different rates.

Once done, carve and transfer to a platter. If desired, drizzle with a reduced dark chicken stock and serve.

  • 6 to 8 tbsp Compound Butter (Rouxbe recipe)
  • 2 tbsp olive oil
  • kosher salt (to taste)
  • freshly ground black pepper (to taste)

Notes

Recipe for: Tarragon and Shallot Compound Butter

For crispier skin, the chickens can be air-dried in the refrigerator for 4 to 6 hours before roasting. Set a cooling rack over a baking tray. Pat the chicken(s) dry after brining and set on the rack to air dry in the refrigerator. It is best to let the chicken come to room temperature for about 30 mins before cooking.

You don't have to cook two chickens. We cook two so we have leftovers that we can use in other dishes such as:

Chicken Enchiladas
Chicken Pot Pie
Chicken and Dumplings

Related Tips & Techniques

Dd_butterfly_whole_chicken_thumbnail

How to Butterfly a Chicken

 Dd_compund_butter_thumbnail

How to Make Compound Butter

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Buying, Storing & Thawing Poultry

 Cs_brining_t2_thumbnail

How Brining Works

 Cs_roasting_l1_t2_thumbnail

Preparing to Roast Chicken

Related Cooking School Lessons

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Poultry Fundamentals

 Cs_brining_onecolumn

How to Brine

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How to Roast Chicken

Bill S

Great Recipe

This was easily the juiciest chicken I've ever eaten. Brining will now be something I do as a matter of course. We made a compound butter with tarragon, basil, and oregano.

The only downside was on doneness. After 50 minutes, testing a thigh showed it needed more time. After 10 more minutes, the other thigh looked good. Unfortunately, while carving, we found other parts of the bird that were still pink, so I've still got some learning to do on when a chicken is fully cooked.

Joe G
Rouxbe Staff

Cooking Time

Hi Bill. Glad you enjoyed this delicious chicken. Equally glad you tried brining and now understand what a big difference this easy step can make to your final meal. Nice work.

As for cooking time, I'd strongly suggest from this point forward, that you always disregard cooking times published on ANY recipe. Everyone has a different ovens and everyone's oven is out be a few degrees (or more), making it impossible to judge doneness by published cooking times. In cooking school you are never allowed to ask the question, "how long". And if you do, you will always get the same answer - cook until it is done.

With this chicken, don't hesitate to turn it over, and cut into the meat in a couple of places (always the thickest part). And always make sure to rest it before eating. For a whole roast chicken, you can watch this Drill-down for how to test chicken:

http://174.129.228.44/drilldowns/83

Cheers, Joe

Liz S

Juicy Juicy Chicken

This was a great way to roast chicken. We brined a small free range organic chicken and just "eye-balled" a mix of tarragon, green onion and butter together to put under the skin. It was so moist and tender and made the best gravy. I had done a separate chicken stock reduction but just added that to the gravy. Yummy. I made the mistake of cutting out the bone before brining but that didn't seem to hurt it any. This will become a favourite way of roasting from now on.

Stephen W

Brine & Butterfly

This recipe calls for butterflying the chickens after the brine process. Will it make a difference if I butterfly the chickens before the brine process? Thank you.

Dawn T
Rouxbe Staff

Re: Brine & Butterfly

No difference if you butterfly before you brine...go for it!

Kelly M

Cooking Time

I realize the cooking time question is old, but this is very important, so I thought I would bump it for others who also might be wondering.

While the drill-down Joe posted is indeed useful to tell if the bird is under-done, it won't keep you from first cooking it to the point where it is overdone, which, in my experience, is more often the problem.

As Joe said, each oven is different. And, what is more, the temperature you set is an average temperature. Some ovens will stray much farther from that average temperature than others, meaning they will get much hotter or colder before their thermostats kick in to make a change. So, even if their average temperature is set at the target, they still might cook faster or slower than other ovens.

In short, time is a pretty useless thing to judge by; what takes an hour in the person who made the recipe's oven might take 45 minutes in yours, or an hour-and-a-half.

The only 100% reliable way to tell is to cook to temperature. The best way I have found to do this is with a probe thermometer, with which the probe goes in the meat, and the "brain" stays outside the oven, and sounds an alarm when the meat gets up to a preset temperature, which in the case of poultry is 165 degrees. The alarm goes off, you take the bird out, rest it for a few minutes, and voila, perfectly roasted bird.

The same, of course applies to beef roasts, pork roasts, and so on, although temperatures vary. Cook to temperature, though, and whatever you roast will always come out perfect.

Dawn T
Rouxbe Staff

Re: Cooking Times

There are also a cooking school lesson on How to Roast Chicken. Here you will find even more information about cooking and testing a chicken for doneness.

Ruth A

Great Recipe

I didn't realise how much difference brining could make. As I am by my self and only like dark meat I though I would try using four thighs. I put them in the brine for an hour. As I am watching my weight I only rubbed the out side with olive oil.The results was unbeliable. I sonn will be 82 abd have been cooking as long as I can rember. So the saying that you never get to old to learn something new is so true

By Ruth .

Allan O

Great for Cornish Hens

For my first time brining, I experimented with two cornish hens. These were easy to butterfly with kitchen shears, and I used a compound butter I made with fresh shallots and dried thyme. Everything about this dish was delicious! The hens were so full of flavor! I can't wait to do this again, but with a larger, roasting chicken.

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