Festive roast chicken

honey bacon crumbs, roasted squash, chestnut gravy & crispy sage

SERVES 6 PREP 10 MINUTES / COOK 2 HOURS • 2 slices of bread or panettone (100g total) • 4 rashers of smoked streaky bacon • 180g vac-packed chestnuts • olive oil • 2 butternut squash (1.2kg each) • 2 red onions • 2 bunches of sage (40g total) • red wine vinegar • 1 x 1.5kg whole chicken • runny honey

1 Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C fan/gas 4. Tear the bread into a large shallow casserole pan with the bacon, crumble in just a few chestnuts, add a little drizzle of olive oil, and place on a high heat. Toast for 10 minutes, or until golden and crisp, stirring regularly, then tip into a food processor and leave to cool.

2 Meanwhile, carefully halve each squash lengthways, discarding the seeds. Peel and quarter the onions. Pick most of the sage into a pestle and mortar with a good pinch of sea salt. Pound into a paste, muddle in 2 tablespoons each of olive oil and red wine vinegar, then rub all over the chicken, inside and out.

3 Scatter the onions and remaining chestnuts into the empty casserole pan and sit the chicken on top, tucking the chestnuts underneath it. Place in the oven with the squash halves, cut side up, on the shelf beneath. Roast for 1 hour 20 minutes, or until the chicken is golden and cooked through.

4 Remove the pan from the oven, move the chicken to a large board and leave to rest. Pick the remaining sage leaves, rub with a little oil and lay over the squash halves, leaving them in the oven for another 30 minutes.

5 Generously brush the chicken with honey. Blitz the bread mixture until fine, then evenly sprinkle over and pat onto the chicken. Boil the kettle.

6 Tip the rest of the contents of the casserole pan into the processor, add 300ml of boiling kettle water and blitz until smooth. Pour back into the pan and simmer the gravy to the consistency of your liking, then season to perfection. Move the squash to the board, add lashings of gravy and dig in.