Roasted capon on garlic crouton

Serves 8-10 Starters and mains

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Method

Place the sugar and the salt in a clean large container. Add the hot tap water to dissolve the salt and sugar and whisk until completely dissolved. Add the very cold water. Stir the brine and submerge the capon in it. Place in the fridge and let the bird brine for a full 24 hours.

When ready, remove the capon from the brine. Set in a roasting pan and glug a little blended oil over the bird, rubbing it to coat until slick and slippery. Season all over with black pepper only.

Place the bird in a 180C/350F/ Gas 4 oven directly onto the oven shelf, breast-side down. Quickly fill the oily roasting pan halfway with water and set directly below on the over floor. Take care to place it well to collect the fat and juice that drips down throughout the roasting – you don’t want a grease fire in your oven. Roast for 2 hours, 10 minutes, until the juices run clear when pierced with a skewer.

While roasting, take the thick slices of 2-day-old peasant bread and lay them out on a cooling rack. Rub each one on both sides with raw cloves of garlic until you have worn the cloves down to nothing – use one whole clove per slab of bread.

For the last 40 minutes of roasting, set the croutons still on their rack into the oven, directly under the bird, and directly above the pan of water collecting juices. They will toast here and absorb fat and juice.

Check them occasionally to see they aren’t burning and, conversely, to see that they are in fact toasting. Some birds are so juicy that the croutons can become too soggy before they have a chance to toast.

Remove the capon from the oven, carefully. It is best to pull out the rack as far as you can without it tipping and then confidently grab the bird with a clean dish towel folded up in each hand. Place it directly into a waiting pan and let all the juice that has accumulated in the cavity pour out into the pan.

Remove the croutons and set aside. Remove the roasting pan of accumulated water, juice and fat from the oven floor and strain into a heatproof container. Add any juices from the capon cavities. Skim the fat off the top and keep warm.

Butcher the bird into two wings, two legs, two thighs and two breasts – cut in half. It’s tricky, but leave the skin intact to the best of your ability.

Place portions of meat on top of the croutons and spoon a generous amount of the collected, strained and defatted juices over each plate.