Try this Three Leaf Chicken Salad idea. It is healthy and delicious and goes beautifully with a glass of Leopard’s Leap Chardonnay! You can even use a rotisserie chicken if you don't have time to do the roasting...

Ingredients

olive oil

1 x 1,2 kg whole free-range chicken

½ a bunch of fresh lemon thyme

1 lemon

100 g rocket leaves

75 g basil leaves

200 g cos lettuce

200 g broccolini

6 salad spring onions, finely sliced

100 g goat’s cheese

Pesto dressing

¼ cup basil pesto

2 tablespoons lemon juice

Method

Preheat the oven to 200 °C.

Drizzle olive oil over the chicken and sprinkle with sea-salt and black pepper.

Strip over the lemon thyme leaves (keeping the stalks). Rub the flavours into the skin, halve the lemon and put it inside the cavity along with the thyme stalks.

Place the chicken into a large roasting tray and put into the preheated oven for 90 minutes, or until the chicken is golden and the juices from the thigh run clear when pricked with a knife.

Put the roast chicken onto a plate, cover with tin foil and leave to cool.

To make the pesto dressing, put the pesto and lemon-juice into a bowl and stir to combine.

Remove all the chicken skin and set aside, then use two forks to strip the meat off the bone. Pile the meat into a large bowl and drizzle over any resting juices from the plate.

Trim, then cook the broccolini in boiling salted water for 5 to 6 minutes.

Place the cos lettuce, baby spinach, broccolini, rocket, salad spring onions and half the basil into a large bowl and toss to combine.

Divide the salad and chicken between bowls. Top with the dressing, cheese and remaining basil to serve.  Serves 6.