I firmly believe a part of healthy living is good eating. Not just the food, but the experience of cooking with and for others and then eating food made with love together around the kitchen table.

It's good for the soul.

I love to cook. LOVE to. We would have amazing, from scratch dinners every single night except for one problem.

Two adorable little distractions that constantly need diapers changed, stories read, bo-bos kissed and drinks poured.

I'll get halfway through making what's destined to be a fantastic meal and then tragedy strikes. Or what a two year old deems is a tragedy, like a drop of water on her shirt or a bug outside on the other side of the window.

And then we eat scrambled eggs and toast for dinner.

But sometimes, SOMETIMES, I want to eat something that I would fix for company but that I don't have to babysit at the stove.

That's where a meal like this comes in. I smushed together a couple of recipes that are easy to make and turned it into this one: perfect roast chicken recipe.

Did you know you can make a roast chicken in the crockpot?

Alleluia.

Crockpot Roast Chicken and Easy Gravy

Ingredients

• 2 medium onions, chopped
• 6 cloves garlic, chopped
• scallions, chopped (optional)
• olive oil
• 1 tsp tomato paste
• 1 whole chicken (3-5 lbs)
• chicken stock, water or white wine
• 1 1/2 teaspoon paprika
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• 1 teaspoon poultry seasoning
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder (or less, but I really love garlic!)
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/2 lemon, 1 small onion, a bunch of herbs or a combo to stuff in chicken cavity

Directions

Chop onions, garlic and scallions and sauté in olive oil until translucent. Stir in tomato paste. Deglaze pan with 1/4 cup of chicken stock, water or white wine. Pour contents of pan into the bottom of slow cooker.

In a small bowl, mix together salt, paprika, poultry seasoning, onion powder, garlic powder and pepper. Rub spice mixture all over whole chicken. Stuff cavity of chicken with half lemon, onion or herbs. Place chicken in crock pot.

Cook on low for 4-5 hours. None of that basting nonsense you have to do in the oven.

To make gravy, remove chicken and use an immersion blender to blend the onion mixture at the bottomof the crocpot into a gravy. (I used a hand mixer, but in an ideal world, it would have been an immersion blender). 

I like to serve this with rice and collard greens or roasted vegetables.

Pour gravy on everything you can.

Eat.

Then I would top the whole thing off with this amazing Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe. I usually modify it a bit and replace all of the flour with 1 1/6 cups whole grain spelt flour. They're eye-rolling-back-in-your-head yummy.

Then I'd give one cookie to my daughter and then eat the rest after the kids go to bed while watching Celebrity Apprentice with my husband.

And while I'm wishfully thinking, my kitchen would magically clean itself after and then every little person in my house would sleep through the night.

Bon Appétit!