When you want a change of pace from serving brisket for Passover seder, make roast chicken. These 8 recipes for this crowd-friendly dish are kosher for Passover and will look so good at the center of your table, surrounded by good wine, roasted vegetables, matzo-ball soup, maybe a spring-forward soup, and of course, flourless chocolate cake. And once you're done cooking and serving a whole chicken, use the remaining carcass and bones to make the stock for a matzo ball soup.
1. Roast Chicken with Lemon Curd, Garlic, and Chiles
"Lemon curd is typically used for sweet recipes — but why not think outside the box and take it someplace savory? This dinner makes the most of lemon curd, adding tart richness to sheet-pan chicken thighs. Fresh rosemary is a natural pairing, and chile offsets it from being overly sweet," writes Food52 Resident Melina Hammer. Swap out the bread for serving with cooked quinoa or matzo.
2. Barbara Kafka's Simplest Roast Chicken
When you want a really simple, super-classic roast chicken to serve for Passover, this is it. Recipe developer Barbara Kafka swears by roasting the chicken at a high temperature for just one hour, which will ensure that the skin stays nice and crispy, while the meat remains moist.
3. Slow-Roasted Chicken with Extra-Crisp Skin
There's nothing worse than eating soggy chicken skin but on the other hand, there's nothing better than eating crispy chicken skin. Whereas Barbara Kafka prefers to roast a whole chicken in one hour (or less!), recipe developer Lindsay Maitland Hunt goes for a lower, slower method, then removes the skin and crisps it separately.
Entertaining for the holidays is stressful enough, but this "set it and forget it" recipe for slow-cooked chicken will help make one thing on your list so much more manageable.
5. Lemon and Onion Roasted Chicken
This aromatic preparation of roast chicken is obviously totally doable year-round, but recipe developer Bevi especially loves serving it for Passover—she recommends doubling the recipe to feed a crowd.
6. Braised Moroccan Chicken and Olives
"This flavorful dish was inspired by two of my favorite Moroccan ingredients, olives and preserved lemons. They work beautifully together in this dish to add a ton of flavor to the sauce. In addition, braising the chicken makes the meat wonderfully tender and juicy." writes recipe developer Sonali (aka The Foodie Physician). Sonali recommends serving this with couscous, but for Passover you could easily swap in cooked quinoa for a kosher side dish.
7. Shaheen Peerbhai and Jennie Levitt's Cold-Oven Roast Chicken
If you're not interested in having to cook and carve a whole roast chicken for Passover, stick to individual chicken thighs. They'll cook faster, be simple to serve, and will likely be more flavorful and more forgiving than a whole chicken (but shh, don't tell the full-size bird).
8. Slow-Cooker Rotisserie Chicken
This low-fuss, high-reward chicken tastes like your favorite grocery store rotisserie chicken . . . dare we say it's better?
