Colin Fassnidge's chicken drumsticks with vegetable tray bake

Hi, I’m Colin Fassnidge, no Lily and May today as they’re back at school. 

But today, we’re cooking a very inexpensive ingredient, chicken legs. So this is going to cost $5 a portion. 

We're going to bake the chicken legs on top of root vegetables and potatoes filled with herbs and cheese. And you know what, this is going to be one of the best family favourites you're going to cook. So what you can do is, a few hours before, your chicken legs, you marinade ‘em, you can even do this the night before. 

Our garlic, our paprika, our herbs, just mush them up, so you can smell ‘em. You can do this the night before, the day before just let them marinade, a little bit of olive oil. And that goes in the fridge. 

To make the tray bake, it's basically layered flavours and textures full of flavour, so let's go. 

We've got out potato, onion, garlic, carrots that's all roughly the same size. That goes into the bowl. Sweet potato. Into the bowl. Good pinch of salt, we add some pepper. You can use your dry mixed herbs or fresh, just rip ‘em, stalks and everything. All this is going to add flavour as it cooks nice and slow. 

Then we’re going to add a splash of olive oil, this helps marry it all together. The secret ingredient is an old piece of parmesan, everyone’s got an old piece of parmesan or cheese in the fridge, you can use cheddar. So this parmesan will melt into the vegetable bake, keep a little bit of parmesan for on top. 

So now you’re just going to mix this all with your hands, get in there and then it goes into your tray. So now what you are you going to do is, you’re going to add the chicken stock. So what the chicken stock does is it steams the vegetable as it cooks. I’m just going to add another little bit of parmesan, because this will caramelize on top and give you a beautiful crust. The secret to the dish is you put your chicken legs on top, the juice soaks into the actual bake and it’s one of the best bakes you're going to have. 

So that goes in the oven for 35 minutes 200 degrees, until the chicken is cooked. What you do then is you take the chicken off because the bake might take a little bit more cooking. Put the vegetables back in for another 10 to 15 minutes. Let it crisp and caramelize, serve the chicken. 

So finish it off with your leftover parmesan, look at that. That is my roast chicken leg and vegetable bake for under $5 a portion, feed the family, pack full of flavour.