Slow-roasted Garlic and Lemon Chicken
Serves 5·Added 5 May 2026 by Tom Melhuish
MainSummer
Ingredients
| 1 | chicken (approx. 2-2.25kg), cut into 10 pieces | |
| 1 | head | garlic, separated into unpeeled cloves |
| 2 | unwaxed lemons, cut into chunky eighths | |
| 1 | small handful | fresh thyme |
| 3 | tablespoons | olive oil |
| 150 | ml | white wine |
| black pepper |
Method
1.Pre-heat the oven to 160°C/gas mark 3.
2.Put the chicken pieces into a roasting tin and add the garlic cloves, lemon chunks and the thyme; just roughly pull the leaves off the stalks, leaving some intact for strewing over later.
3.Add the oil and using your hands mix everything together, then spread the mixture out, making sure all the chicken pieces are skin side up.
4.Sprinkle over the white wine and grind on some pepper, then cover tightly with foil and put in the oven to cook, at flavour-intensifyingly low heat, for 2 hours.
5.Remove the foil from the roasting tin, and turn up the oven to 200°C/gas mark 6.
6.Cook the uncovered chicken for another 30–45 minutes, by which time the skin on the meat will have turned golden brown and the lemons will have begun to scorch and caramelise at the edges.
Recipe Notes
AI · may be inaccurate
Origin
I got the idea of it from those long-cooked French chicken casseroles with whole garlic cloves and just wanted to spritz it up with lemon for summer.
Tips
I like to serve this as it is, straight from the roasting tin: so just strew with your remaining thyme and dole out.
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