Recipe: Coating of Parmesan cheese maximizes chicken’s crispy bits

The meat of a roast chicken is all well and good, but it’s the skin that I really adore. Getting it as crisp and burnished as possible is my goal for every bird; if I can hear it crackle like a potato chip, I know I’ve gotten close.

Strategies for achieving this abound. You can leave the bird uncovered in the fridge overnight, or blast it with a hair dryer. You can rub it down with salt or baking powder or both. Some cooks recommend separating the skin from the flesh, poking holes as you go to release the fat. All of these methods work, to varying degrees.

But the fastest, simplest and perhaps most delicious way to get chicken skin as crunchy as a strip of fried bacon is to turn it into a giant frico, an Italian cheese crisp — that is, to coat the bird with enough grated Parmesan so that, as it roasts, the skin turns into one big, salty, schmaltz-infused cheese wafer.

It’s an idea that follows in the footsteps of my recipe for Parmesan fried eggs and J. Kenji López-Alt’s for frico roast potatoes. In theory, it made perfect sense.

However, it did take a few tries to get it right. Its ultimate success depends on when you apply the cheese. Add it too early, and it burns a little, imbuing the meat with a scorched flavor. Sprinkle it on too late, and the skin gets more leathery than crisp. I found that adding the cheese halfway through roasting was perfect, with the Parmesan melting and bubbling into a crackerlike coating that wraps the bird in a crisp, umami embrace. There’s nothing quite like it.

With skin this good, I took the less-is-more approach with the other flavors. I mixed up a salt rub with some fresh rosemary because it seemed like a natural fit for the chicken and Parmesan, and used some lemon zest for its citrus perfume. Then I added plenty of freshly ground black pepper, and a big pinch of red-pepper flakes, to lend the heat and astringency necessary to cut some of the richness.

Finally, instead of making a sauce, I squeezed juice from the zested lemon into the pan drippings, and called it a day. It was as fine a dinner as I’d ever cooked, and for an easy roast chicken recipe made from simple ingredients, that’s saying a lot.

BE SURE to serve this chicken dish with the lemony pan drippings, which make a bright, rich sauce for the tender meat. Heat lovers should feel free to add plenty of red-pepper flakes to the drippings — or serve red pepper on the side for individual spicing.

CRISPY PARMESAN ROAST CHICKEN WITH LEMON

By Melissa Clark

• 1 small lemon
• 2 teaspoons kosher salt, plus more to taste
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 teaspoon chopped rosemary, plus 4 sprigs
• Large pinch red-pepper flakes, plus more for serving (optional)
• 1 (3-1/2- to 4-pound) whole chicken, patted dry
• Extra-virgin olive oil, for drizzling
• 1/3 cup finely grated Parmesan

Finely grate 1 teaspoon zest from lemon and place in a small bowl. (Save the lemon for the drippings.) Stir in salt, pepper, chopped rosemary and red-pepper flakes, if using.

Season chicken inside and out with salt mixture. Let sit at room temperature 20 minutes or refrigerate uncovered for up to overnight.

Heat oven to 425 degrees. Place chicken, breast-side up, in a large skillet, sheet pan or roasting pan. Stuff cavity of chicken with rosemary sprigs. Drizzle breast with a little olive oil. Roast chicken 30 minutes.

Sprinkle chicken all over with Parmesan, then continue roasting until skin is golden and bird’s juices run clear when skin is pierced with a knife, 25 to 30 minutes longer.

Let rest 10 minutes. Squeeze juice from zested lemon, to taste, into pan drippings and season with more salt and red-pepper flakes, if you like. Carve and serve with drippings spooned over meat. Serves 4 to 6.

Nutritional information unavailable.