Butcher

Halal Medium Whole Chicken

A medium whole chicken for roasting whole or jointing at home. Buying the whole bird gives you breast, legs, wings and a carcass for stock, so one chicken can cover a roast dinner, a second meal of leftovers and a pot of broth. Roasting on the bone keeps the meat juicy, and the skin crisps over the top. Roast it whole with lemon, garlic and sumac, spatchcock it for the barbecue, or joint it into eight for chicken karahi, maqluba or Moroccan chicken with preserved lemon and olives. Palestinian families roast it for musakhan, piled onto taboon bread with sumac and slow-cooked onions, and Afghan cooks use a whole bird for qorma or a pot of shorwa. Keep the carcass and simmer it with onion and bay for an hour to make stock for rice.