True roasting involves cooking meat (including poultry and game) on a roasting spit near a hot fire. Although spit roasting is popular, general-purpose or forced-air convection ovens are commonly used for roasting. Electric rotisseries are sometimes used for roasting chickens in large quantities.

Principles

1.
Only prime-quality cuts of meat and poultry should be selected for roasting.

2.
To aid even cooking, joints to be roasted should be of even size and not too large.

3.
Joints should be trimmed of excess fat and tied up or trussed to hold their shape if necessary.

4.
Boned meats (such as a leg or shoulder of lamb) need a longer cooking time because the bone acts as a conductor of heat.

5.
Lean meat may be larded and surfaces rubbed with dripping or oil.

6.
The meat should be placed in a roasting dish on bones or a bed of roots (consisting of carrots, onions and celery, cut as for a mirepoix) to keep it out of the fat. That part of the roast allowed to rest in the fat or pan juices will boil and become a dull grey colour.

7.
Roasting temperature should be constant at 150C. High starting temperatures don’t improve the finished roast but tend to increase cooking loss through shrinkage.

8.
A meat thermometer should be inserted into the centre of the smallest roast. This registers the internal temperature of the meat, giving an accurate indication of how well cooked it is.

9.
If meat thermometers aren’t available, estimate how well cooked the meat is by counting cooking time in relation to the weight of the joint. For poultry and pork, prick the meat to see if the juices run clear.

10.
The meat should be basted with fat from the pan during roasting to moisturize and add flavour.

Gravy to accompany a roast should be made from the pan juices.