Cooking Time Calculator

Working out roast timings backwards from when you want to serve dinner is the actual cook's problem. This calculator takes the meat type, weight and your target serve time, then tells you exactly when to put it in the oven, when to take it out, and how long to rest it. A 1.5kg whole chicken at 200°C needs around 70 minutes (20 minutes per kilo plus 20 minutes), then 14 minutes resting. To serve at 7pm, it goes in at 5:36pm. The maths is done; the timeline is laid out.

The tool covers chicken, turkey, beef, lamb (leg and shoulder), pork (roast and belly), gammon and duck, with doneness settings (rare, medium-rare, medium, well-done) for the cuts that take it. Each meat has its own per-kilo formula, so 1kg of beef does not get the same cooking time as 1kg of lamb. Resting time defaults to 20% of the cooking time, with a 10 minute minimum, which is what professional kitchens use to let juices redistribute through the meat.

Cut into a roast straight out of the oven and the juices spill onto the board. Wait 15 to 20 minutes covered loosely with foil and the same juices stay in the meat. The protein fibres relax, the temperature evens out from edge to centre, and the slices come out moist instead of leaking. Skipping the rest is the most common mistake home cooks make with a roast. The calculator builds it into the timeline so you do not forget.

Internal temperature is the only reliable test for doneness. A meat thermometer (£8 to £15) gets pushed into the thickest part away from bone. Chicken and turkey hit 75°C minimum (food safety, non-negotiable). Beef ranges from 50°C rare to 70°C well done. Lamb sits between 55°C pink and 72°C well done. Pork roasts to 65°C, gammon to 70°C. Cooking times in this calculator are estimates; the thermometer is the truth. For the rare and medium-rare scenarios where temperature precision matters most, the [meat cooking calculator](/meat-cooking-calculator) gives a fuller breakdown with cut-by-cut detail.