Roast chicken salad with liver stuffing

Serves 4

Chickens tend to get roasted for a substantial lunch or dinner meal, and the thought of turning some of the normal ingredients that go into a roast chicken dinner into a main course salad may not seem obvious. But I've even made this salad in the past with bread sauce that has set in the fridge, fried into little nuggets.

I've also added some ceps to the salad as Tony Booth in Borough Market had an unusually early arrival of British ones. They don't generally appear until late August or September but with this mad weather we've been having, it was a pleasant surprise when they arrived this year in early June.

1 good quality chicken weighing about 1-1.2kg
4 rashers of streaky bacon
120g chicken livers
60g softened butter

For the stuffing

2 onions, peeled and finely chopped
1tbsp sage, chopped
60g butter
100g fresh white breadcrumbs
2-3tbsp chopped parsley
The livers from the goose, or the equivalent of chicken livers

To make the stuffing, gently cook the onions and sage in the butter for 2-3 minutes without colouring, then remove from the heat and stir in the breadcrumbs. Meanwhile, season and fry the goose livers in a hot frying pan for a couple of minutes on each side, remove from the heat and leave to cool a little. Chop the livers into rough smallish pieces and mix into the breadcrumbs with the parsley and season to taste. Spoon the stuffing into an ovenproof dish, spreading it about 1-1cm deep. Pre-heat the oven to gas mark 7, season the chicken inside and out then rub the breasts with half of the softened butter and place in a roasting tray. Roast the chicken for 50 minutes to an hour with the stuffing, basting occasionally.

In the meantime, cut the bacon rashers in half and cook in a dry frying pan for 2-3 minutes on each side until crisp. Remove and keep warm. Add a little butter to the pan, season the livers and cook on a high heat for a couple of minutes on each side, keeping them pink. Whisk the ingredients together for the dressing. Remove the chicken from the tray, add half a cup of water to the tray and simmer on the stove top on a medium heat, scraping any residue from the bottom of the tray with a wooden spoon as it's simmering. Let the liquid reduce by about two thirds then whisk into the dressing.

Remove the breast and leg meat from the bird with a sharp knife and carve into slices and chunks. You can scrape any crisp skin and meat from the bone and shred it into the salad.

Arrange the leaves on plates with the chicken, livers and bacon in among them. Spoon nuggets of stuffing on to the salad and spoon the dressing over. If you're using mushrooms as I did, then sauté them at the same time as the livers and scatter over the salad.