BBQ Roast Chicken in A Roasted Vegetable Sauce with Baked potatoes and Sour Cream

I have a love affair with roast chicken dishes. I love it that I can just put them in the oven, do stuff completely unrelated to them for the next 45-60 minutes, and then 'Ding!' lunch is ready. My kids love them, I love them and oh have I mentioned my cats love them too? They usually prowl around our feet while we eat chicken, like the predators they are, hoping (and getting) many many tasty morsels.

I'm so hungry mommy! Can I have some chicken prueeesee?

I love this dish for its simplicity. And since I have the habit of marinating the chicken or meat that I've  bought before freezing them, all I have to do on the day that I want to cook this dish is thaw the chicken and cut the vegetables. After arranging everything on a tray, I put it in the oven and then spend the next 45 minutes doing yoga (if the little one lets me. If not, then I will be playing with her AND doing yoga. Quite fun really :-)

Anyway before someone gets confused, there is no cat recipe here!!!!!!

It's strictly chicken and vegetables in a tray y'all, and it's mighty delicious. Here is the recipe.

For the Chicken

• 3 or 4 chicken legs (I use organic free-range and they do taste better!)
• 8 tablespoons of BBQ sauce (of your fave brand)
• Shakes of garlic powder, salt and pepper
• A few pinches of dried rosemary (or a few sprigs of fresh ones)

For the vegetables

• 2 capsicums or bell peppers quartered
• 1 leek, cut into similar sizes
• 2 onions quartered as well
• 1 zucchini/courgette, well, you know the drill
• 6-8 cloves of whole garlic, skin and all (optional)
• 4 large potatoes cubed, or similar amount of baby potatoes 
• Olive or Canola oil. 
• Sprinklings of dried herbs like rosemary and thyme and paprika 

Feel free to substitute vegetables according to what you have in the fridge. Sometimes I throw in black pitted olives too, since that adds a nice saltiness to the sauce in the vegetables.

 To serve:

• Sour Cream and chopped chives, seasoned with salt and pepper
• Or Creme Fraiche and Herbs 
• Tobasco sauce, chilli sauce or chopped fresh chilli as befitting your tastebuds.

Ready? Set. Go!

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees. Take out a tray and place the cut vegetables on it. Season with pepper and herbs but NO SALT as it will draw out too much liquid from the vegetables (read that somewhere and have not done that to my roasted vegetables ever since).

Place the chicken legs on top, pour some olive oil over everything and slide the tray into the oven.

As for the potatoes, you can either put them on a separate tray or put them together with the vegetables (but you will need a big tray for all of that!).

Let them cook together at 200 degrees for the next 45 minutes, turning once at the 20 minute mark, and another time at the 40 minute mark. The chicken will have shrinked away from the bones, the skin all crispy and dark and there will be charred bits on your vegetables. It all adds to the caramelly, BBQ flavour, but if that is not what you want, then make sure that the chicken covers the vegetables completely and turn the chicken more frequently.

The roasted leek and capsicum somehow forms a delicious caramelly sauce that goes well with all the garlic, if you are a garlic person. When which, you will be squeezing the roasted garlic out of their crispy shells and mashing them into the sauce. If not, then just omit the garlic and just have caramelly sauce to pour over your BBQ roast chicken legs. I have also been known to liberally sprinkle tobasco sauce or chilli sauce, or occasionally chopped fresh chilli over my entire plate while my children watches and wonders why is mommy occasionally wiping tears away from her face?

Yummy for the tummy, that's all I have to say.