Ina Garten’s Engagement Chicken Is the Best Recipe I’ve Ever Had

An internet search for “roasted chicken recipes” will produce thousands of results. With so many recipes, you’d think there were hundreds of ways to roast a bird. If you review a handful, you’ll notice similarities in everything from how the bird is prepped to the roasting temperature. That’s because roasting a chicken is a pretty basic cooking technique.

Yes, you can adjust for various factors to achieve the results you’re after, but the rules are basically the same. Find a good bird, pat it dry, and roast it until the skin is golden-brown and the juices run clear. But somehow. Ina Garten’s engagement chicken is much better than any other roast chicken recipe. Try it once, and you’ll understand why.

How To Make Ina’s Engagement Chicken

The first step is to preheat the oven to 425°F. Prep a whole chicken by patting it dry and seasoning the inside and outside with salt and pepper. Fill the cavity with a couple of lemon quarters and a halved, whole head of garlic. Tie the legs of the bird together and tuck the wings under, then place it in a roasting pan and brush the skin with oil.

Toss some sliced onions and lemon quarters with oil, salt, and black pepper, and add them around the chicken.

Roast the chicken until the skin is golden and the breast meat registers 162°F to 165°F on a digital thermometer. Remove the chicken from the oven, transfer it to a cutting board, cover it with foil, and let it rest for at least 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, prepare a sauce by transferring the roasting pan to the stovetop, which will still have the onions and lemons in it. Add white wine and simmer, scraping up any browned bits stuck to the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon, then add some chicken stock and a bit of flour.

Cook and stir until the sauce is thickened. Carve the chicken and serve it with the warm sauce, as and the roasted onions and lemons. The lemons will be so tender that you can cut and eat them right alongside the chicken and rich gravy.

The result is a deliciously tender roasted chicken. I love to serve it with roasted or mashed potatoes and a big green salad, preferably Caesar. Leftovers don’t go to waste either! I’ll use the bits and pieces for soup, toss them into grain bowls, or even add them to quesadillas. 

Tips For Making Ina’s Engagement Chicken

I’ve made Ina’s recipe as written and love it, but I’ve been known to tinker with recipes and this one is no exception. Here are a couple of my recommendations for recreating her dish with the most success.

• Use a cast iron pan. I don’t have a small roasting pan, but I know that my large cast iron skillet can hold a four to five-pound roaster chicken and can easily be moved from the oven to the stove.
• You don’t have to truss. Are you out of or don’t have kitchen twine? Are you not interested in messing with a raw chicken any more than you have to? No problem! You can skip trussing the legs, but this may shorten cooking time since the bird won’t be tucked up in a tight ball, so adjust time accordingly.
• It’s a great meal prep dish. If I don’t have a use for the entire roasted chicken for one meal, I’ll remove what I can from the carcass and freeze it in a resealable freezer bag for another time. I freeze the sauce, too, but I just remove the lemons first because they don’t hold up well in the freezer. That way, I have Ina’s delicious chicken whenever I need it!