Recipe: Roast Chicken with Herb Butter and Croutons

This roast chicken with herb butter and sourdough croutons by Julia Busuttil Nishimura, known on Instagram as Julia Ostro, is a comforting, generous recipe made for slow weekends, family dinners and sharing around the table.

A whole chicken is filled with lemon and rubbed with a fragrant herb butter made from thyme, tarragon, sage and lemon zest, then roasted over leeks, white wine and torn sourdough bread. As the chicken cooks, the bread becomes golden and crunchy on the outside while staying soft and full of flavour underneath. It’s a beautiful way to use sourdough in a roast dinner, turning simple bread into rich, savoury croutons.

Roast Chicken with Herb Butter and Croutons

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

- 1.2 kg whole chicken, left uncovered in the fridge overnight

- 80 ml (⅓ cup) extra-virgin olive oil

- Sea salt and black pepper

- 1 lemon, halved

- 4 leeks, white and pale green parts, halved lengthways

- 2 thick slices of sourdough bread, roughly torn

- 150 ml dry white wine

Herb Butter

- 100 g unsalted butter, softened

- 2 tablespoons each of thyme, tarragon and sage leaves, finely chopped

- Zest of 1 lemon

- Sea salt

Method

Preheat the oven to 180°C.

Pat any excess moisture from the chicken with paper towel. With your hands, make a space between the skin and the flesh on the breast side of the chicken, being careful not to tear the skin.

Make the herb butter by combining the butter, herbs and lemon zest in a small bowl. Season with some salt, then place the butter in between the skin and flesh of the chicken, pressing and smoothing it down to make it relatively flat. Rub 2 tablespoons of the olive oil onto the skin of the chicken and season it all over and inside with salt. Place the lemon halves inside the cavity of the chicken.

Lay the leek and torn sourdough in a roasting tin and drizzle with the remaining 2 tablespoons of oil. Season with salt and pepper. Pour the wine in and around the leek and bread and place the whole chicken, breast-side up, onto the little bed you have made.

Roast the chicken for about 1 ¼ hours or until it is golden and the juices run clear when the thickest part of the thigh is tested with a skewer. The leek should be nicely caramelised and the bread crunchy on the outside and still a little soft inside.

To find your local Irrewarra Sourdough stockist, click here.

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