A simple meal with veggies and meat can be as easy to throw together as a frozen pizza. Learn how to make a perfect roasted chicken in this easy tutorial.
Nothing says mealtime simplicity like a crispy bird, alongside garden fresh veggies and a steaming bowl of mashed potatoes. The prep work is practically nil, and who could argue with the deliciousness?
Every member of my family, from the youngest to the oldest loves it when a steaming roasted chicken is on the table for dinner.
I often get a lot of people asking me how I have time to feed my family healthy whole food. My answer is always the same, “by keeping it simple”.
I talked a lot about this in my post: 5 Tips for Healthy Meals Every Night Without Meal Planning
How to Make a Perfect Roasted Chicken Video
It doesn’t have to be complicated
Cooking healthy doesn’t have to be complicated or elaborate. In this day of Pinterest and Instagram, I notice that a lot of families get overwhelmed with cooking. They think they need a white board with every recipe for the week neatly written out and a well organized grocery list, that includes the fish sauce for fish taco night.
Hey, I’m not knocking meal planning, if thats your thing, and I’m certainly not knocking fish tacos. BUT, if you find yourself so overwhelmed with ideas and options that you have resorted to take out every night and lose sleep over the thought of cooking from scratch, just know that it doesn’t have to be difficult and time consuming!
In my opinion, throwing a whole chicken in the oven with a couple of sweet potatoes is just as easy as baking a store-bought frozen pizza.
In both scenarios, you unwrap something, put it in the oven and then clean up the dirty dishes.
No need for expensive weekly meal boxes to get healthy meals on the table. All you need is some thawed meat, veggies and herbs and spices to get something nutritious. And despite popular belief, I do not spend all my time slaving away in the kitchen.
I have 5 kids to wrangle and blog posts to write, by golly!
Simple meal options include:
Scrambled eggs with a side of sourdough toast, avocados and fresh tomatoes.
Ground beef with sautéed onions and homemade sauerkraut.
Roasted chicken with mashed sweet potatoes and a frozen bag of brussel sprouts.
None of these take forethought and planning, and they can be thrown together in under an hour.
All this style of cooking takes is mastering a few easy skills.
I find myself getting the same things over and over at the grocery store. I don’t hardly even use lists, unless there is something I buy very rarely and know I won’t grab on impulse.
Our chicken process
You want to know something I haven’t purchased in probably five years? Boneless skinless chicken breasts. No wonder people think eating healthy is such a sacrifice. Those darn things are flavorless. They have no fat (which, by the way, is not a good thing) and they’re tough unless cooked properly.
Cooking a whole chicken is so simple. You don’t even have to know how to cut it up.
After we’ve enjoyed our roasted chicken the first time, I pick the bones clean and store it for another meal. The leftovers are great with peppers and onions over quinoa, in a big pot chicken soup, or whipped up in a chicken salad. I use the bones to make broth. Not a part goes wasted.
How to Make Homemade Bone Broth
How to Make a Perfect Roasted Chicken Ingredients
One medium whole chicken
2 tablespoons coconut oil
¼ teaspoon garlic powder
¼ teaspoon onion powder
¼ teaspoon sea salt
½ teaspoon Italian seasoning blend
Freshly ground black pepper
How to Make a Perfect Roasted Chicken Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
- Rinse the chicken in cool water and pat dry.
- Drizzle with two tablespoons melted coconut oil.
- Sprinkle on the garlic powder, onion powder, sea salt, Italian seasoning blend and freshly ground black pepper.
- Bake for one hour.
All the juices inside the chicken should be clear, not pink, whenever you cut into it. If it is not all the way done, just bake it a little longer.
The skin should be crispy and the inside juicy.
One whole chicken serves our family of 7 for two meals. It also provides us with a half gallon of homemade chicken broth.
Instant Pot is another option
Another way to cook a whole chicken is in the Instant Pot. This way does not produce that gorgeous crispy skin.
Although I definitely prefer to roast chicken, because it has better flavor, I do sometimes use the pressure cooker. I do this when I am running behind and need to get a chicken cooked in less time. Sometimes I also use the Instant Pot when I forget to have my chicken thawed out.
A perfect roasted chicken only works with a thawed chicken!
Also, if I plan to make soup with the chicken, I use the pressure cooker. You can see that process in this post: White Chicken Chili Recipe
I show how I cook a whole chicken in the Instant Pot in this video about Easy Healthy Meal Ideas for Family.
How to Make a Perfect Roasted Chicken Print the recipe
Perfect Roasted Chicken
Video
Ingredients
- 1 medium whole chicken
- 2 tablespoons coconut oil
- ¼ teaspoon garlic powder
- ¼ teaspoon onion powder
- ¼ teaspoon sea salt
- ½ teaspoon Italian seasoning blend
- Freshly ground black pepper
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
- Rinse the chicken in cool water and pat dry.
- Drizzle with two tablespoons melted coconut oil.
- Sprinkle on the garlic powder, onion powder, sea salt, Italian seasoning blend and freshly ground black pepper.
- Bake for one hour.
Notes
- All the juices inside the chicken should be clear, not pink, whenever you cut into it. If it is not all the way done, just bake it a little longer. The skin should be crispy and the inside juicy. One whole chicken serves our family of 7 for two meals. It also provides us with a half gallon of homemade chicken broth.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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