Roasted Chicken

Instructions

• 1
  Two hours before roasting, take the chicken out of the fridge and thoroughly salt it on all sides with 1 tablespoon of salt. Mix the remaining salt with paprika.
• 2
  Preheat the oven to 170 °C.
• 3
  Pat the chicken dry, cut the butter into 2 pieces, and insert them under the skin on the chicken's breasts. Sprinkle the chicken on all sides with the salt and paprika mixture.
• 4
  Pour water into the roasting pan to a depth of 1 cm. Place the prepared chicken on a rack in the preheated oven and place the roasting pan with water underneath it.
• 5
  Roast for 90 minutes. During roasting, baste the chicken several times with the pan juices.
• 6
  The chicken is done when the thigh bone can be easily twisted without resistance.
• 7
  You can insert sprigs of thyme or rosemary and a bay leaf into the chicken's abdominal cavity. To the roasting pan, you can add thyme, rosemary, peeled onion, peeled garlic, or a few slices of bacon, according to your taste. To the salt and paprika mixture, you can add a teaspoon of dried garlic or a tablespoon of powdered milk, which will make the skin even crispier after baking. You can substitute paprika with curry powder. Do not open the oven too often during roasting, as this would prolong the total cooking time. It is sufficient to baste the chicken with the pan juices three times in the second half of roasting.