Roast Chicken Christmas Dinner Recipe

For the people that celebrate Christmas, I hope you had a lovely day ,  as well as the weather being nice (hopefully it was!!) 

If you do not celebrate this, I hope you had a good Holiday, full of fun and enjoyment and happiness.

I really wanted to continue the festive spirits, and decided to make another roast dinner, with a twist. I thought about this as soon as I woke up that morning, went to the local supermarket to buy all the ingredients that I needed. I purchased the following: 

• Peri Peri marinated whole chicken
• Harissa paste  (X2) 
• 1 aubergine
• bunch of broccoli 
• 1 courgette
• 2 extra large sweet potatoes.

It is arguable that these ingredients are missing loads of important ingredients, as part of the roast dinner. For example brussel sprouts, parsnips, carrots, and finally gravy. These are the reasons I did not use the above examples in my recipe: 

Brussel Sprouts- I like them but not enough to make a purchase. Myself personally I would rather go for carrots instead. It is a big big shame, as sprouts contains a source of vitamin C, Vitamin K, Folate as well as Fibre. Vitamin C is great for improving our immune system. Our immune system is definitely something to think about as we approach the winter period ( that is if you are living in the UK) 

Vitamin K is great for assisting with bone health and blood clotting, Folate assists with the reproduction of cells in the body, and works in partnership with others to form DNA. Folate is part of the Vitamin B9 family, please do not confuse folate with folic acid. Folic acid is also part of the Vitamin B9 family as well and helps to produce new cells, as well as DNA and RNA. This is particularly important for expectant mothers, to increase their folic acid intake. It is advised for them to take a supplement during the 9 months of pregnancy.  

Parsnips- I love Parsnips, but personally I think they taste similar to potatoes so just decided to leave this out for the first time, whilst I carry out this experiment. 

Carrots- This was a difficult decision as again I love Carrots, however at the supermarket this was sold at a reasonable price, but the amount of carrots was far too much for me to buy this. I know that I will not be eating carrots again within the next few days, and felt that this could potentially end up in the bin. To avoid unnecessary  food waste, I did not buy the carrots.  

Gravy- I purchased a whole chicken that was already marinated, I felt that there was no need to purchase the gravy. Also when I saw the chicken, I felt that there was not enough marinade on this, so I decided to add the Harissa paste to make sure the whole chicken was completely covered in Harissa and marinade.   

Potatoes- I decided to go for sweet potatoes instead of Maris Piper or King Edward Potatoes for the added benefit of the extra fibre in the sweet potatoes. Fibre is important for the prevention of constipation, and to keep our bowels regular. 

I decided first to cook the chicken, as that would take the longest out of the rest of the ingredients. I added the Harissa paste in first, rubbed the paste into the chicken, making sure that every part of the chicken was covered, and no part was left out. I covered this in foil, and then put this in the oven for 1 hour and 30 minutes. 

During the process I then cooked the vegetables, starting off with the sweet potatoes. I boiled this for 15 minutes, put this into a roasting tray, added rosemary, thyme, coconut oil, salt and black pepper, then I put the potatoes in the oven for 45 minutes. 

Following that I made the aubergine and the courgettes at the same time. I cut them both lengthways, added salt, black pepper, coconut oil, this was then put in the the oven for 12 minutes. 

Finally for the broccoli I cut the bunch in half lengthways, added this in boiling water for 3 minutes, removed from the heat after 3 minutes, added in butter, salt and  black pepper, mixed this with the broccoli. 

Everything came out great however the only disappointment was that the aubergine was still hard. Next time I will definitely leave this in a little longer, as 12 minutes was clearly not enough. 

Overall I am proud of my roast dinner, the flavour from the roast chicken harissa was fantastic, with the combination of the roast sweet potatoes, and vegetables this is something I am proud of.