Meyer Lemon & Rosemary Roasted Chicken
This meyer lemon roast chicken recipe is super flavorful and juicy. When meyer lemons are in season they’re perfect for cooking, especially for this oven baked chicken.
Meyer Lemon Rosemary Roast Chicken
When meyer lemon season begins to peak, a favorite lemon chicken dinner is to oven roast a whole chicken that’s lathered with meyer lemon and herbs. Fragrant rosemary, fresh meyer lemon juice and tons of meyer lemon zest all infuse into this whole baked chicken to make a fabulous and quick and easy dinner. Unlike the common Eureka lemons, these meyer lemons bring a beautiful floral aroma to the oven roasted chicken. Combine the earthy flavors of the fresh rosemary, what you have is a perfectly juicy, moist and fresh lemon and herb baked chicken.
Use Any lemon for Roast Chicken
If you don’t have meyer lemons, you can use regular lemons and other herbs. Almost any combination of herbs, including dry herbs, make a marinade. Probably our favorite classic baked or roasted chicken recipe has this duo combination and you really can’t go wrong. It’s hard to resist the citrus flair and fragrant balance of herbs on the crispy lemon chicken skin. This recipe is so good, be prepared to have it as your go-to lemon and herb whole baked chicken recipe!
What do make with leftover chicken?
We love having leftover chicken.The possibilities are endless! And save the bones because those are great for making a chicken stock for future soup recipes.
- You can make easy curry chicken salad
- Avocado chicken salad with bacon
- Leftover chicken is perfect in this healthy chicken and kale soup.
- Serve with or rosemary potatoes with garlic and parmesan
- Use this creamy lemon sauce as a side sauce
- This roasted broccoli is fantastic as a side dish
Video on How to Truss a Chicken
Meyer Lemon & Rosemary Roast Chicken
Ingredients
- 1 whole Chicken (about 5 lbs.)
- 2 Tablespoons (30 ml) Olive Oil
- 2 Tablespoons (30 ml) fresh chopped Rosemary
- zest from two Meyer Lemons
- Kosher Salt
- fresh cracked Black Pepper
- 2 medium Meyer Lemons , cut into quarters
Equipment
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425°F (if using quick preparation – othewise wait until after step 2). Pat dry the chicken. For the crispiest skin- see step 2. For quickest preparation- proceed to step 3.
- Sprinkle salt over all surfaces of chicken. Set on a plate, place in fridge and allow to air dry for at least 2 hours and up to overnight. Remove from fridge and pat dry water that had come to skin surface.
- Combine olive oil, rosemary, and meyer lemon zest.
- Truss the chicken if desired (see video in post for trussing instructions). Place in a baking dish. Spread rosemary mixture evenly over the chicken. Squeeze one whole meyer lemon worth of quarters over and inside the chicken and place the squeezed pieces in the roasting pan with the chicken. Season chicken generously with salt and pepper.
- Roast for about 1 hour 20 minutes to 1 hour 35 minutes or until juices run clear when you cut between the leg and the thigh or the temperature in the thickest part of the thigh reads 165°F when probed with an instant read thermometer.
- Remove from oven and allow to rest for about 10 minutes. Carve and serve with the remaining meyer lemon quarters to squeeze as desired.
Video
Nutrition Information per Serving
Yummy Chicken Recipes and More
- Lemon and Herb Roast Chicken
- Easy Oven Roast (Baked) Chicken {Video Recipe}
- Lemon Pepper Chicken with Creamy Garlic Lemon Sauce
- Slow Cooker Whole Chicken Recipe
- Skillet lemon pepper white fish
- Shrimp curry
- this meyer lemon roast chicken recipe was originally published in 2013 and updated with new photos.
8 Comments on “Meyer Lemon & Rosemary Roasted Chicken”
This combination of lemon with herbs is my favorite I’ve encountered in a roast chicken recipe so far. It’s perfect.
This was a really great roast chicken recipe. I’m in love with the combination of lemon and rosemary. I also really love house juicy it came out. Thanks for the recipe.
This is the absolute best lemon and herb over roast chicken recipe I’ve ever had the pleasure to eat! I’m definitely making this for next family dinner.
I don’t have the best of luck with roast chicken. I was vegetarian for awhile and before that, chicken was never my favorite. I hate chicken skin. The one time I made a delicious, memorable roast chicken (not this recipe) is was a Meyer Lemon-Rosemary chicken and it will forever be my favorite flavor combination. Not only delicious but the house smelled AMAZING – I actually started looking for Meyer Lemon-Rosemary candles! The kickers was a rice-mushroom stuffing w/ brown basmati, wild rice, mixed mushrooms, garlic, onion etc.
This looks great. I’ve never had a Meyer lemon., but have lots of regular lemons.
Happy Saturday! Just letting you know I featured this recipe in my monthly round-up of 25 Deliciously Healthy Low-Carb Recipes from October 2015. Hope a lot of my readers will come over here and try it!
Thank you so much Kalyn for including our recipe on your round up!
I always have to browse a lot to find a good recipe for roasting whole chicken. This recipe is really useful! Thanks.