As my kids get older, the amount of time I have to cook dinner seems to be less and less. Ok, who am I kidding. It doesn’t seem to be less. It actually is less. A whole lot less. Between Spanish classes, Y-Guides and Faith formation, our afternoons are filled with the kids and me shuttling around in the car, racing to make the next destination on time. Dinner is a far thought in the back of my mind.
I remember the days when I had all afternoon to think about and prepare a tasty meal. I would plan and orchestrate without interruption and the result was usually a masterpiece fit for a king (or at least a family of five). Today I’m lucky if I walk in the door at 5pm and have even had the foresight to pull out a package of meat for that night’s meal. Enter in my trusty slow cooker.
If you are a busy family with not a lot of time to put a healthy meal on the table, than the slow cooker is an absolute must have. I’m not sure what I would do without mine. On busy days when you know you don’t have hours on end to cook, you simply dump your dinner in the pot, turn it on, and come home to something that feels (and looks! and tastes! and smells!) as though you’ve been orchestrating all afternoon without interruption.
This is one of those dishes that is on my “go to” list for a quick, easy to put together weeknight slow cooker meal. You literally throw all your ingredients in the pot and let ‘er cook until done. It’s a true thing of beauty. This chicken dish was inspired by my birthday dinner last weekend at our local Greek restaurant. Ever since I dined there, I feel like I can’t get enough of those Eastern European flavors. The dill, the lemon, the feta. Mmmmm. Send me on a one way ticket to Santorini and I’ll wave and never look back. Unless of course, one of my friends would decide to cook up a batch of this chicken and subsequently invite me over for dinner. In that case I could probably be convinced to hang around for at least one more meal.
To cook up a batch for yourself all you’ll need is a slow cooker and a few choice ingredients.
Look at that delicious marinade. Think rosemary, lemon, balsamic and dill. Now think smiling faces, full tummies and empty plates.
Of course a marinade as gorgeous as this one is nothing without it’s meaty mate. Pop in your chicken, get it good and coated and close up shop for the next four to six hours.
Now picture it, you’ve just walked in from a busy afternoon of running you and your children ragged, you’re tired and hungry, the kids are asking what’s for dinner and the last thing you want to do is get behind the stove and cook. You open the door to your house and instantly your mood lifts. There is a smell so amazing emanating from your kitchen that you couldn’t be in a bad mood if you tried. You head straight over to your now ready to be eaten, “see I told you this day wasn’t so bad” meal and open up the top.
A quick batch of noodles, a hunk of greek chicken, and a bit of feta and sliced olives and you’re sitting down to a delicious and healthy homecooked meal, wondering why you ever bothered to be stressed out about such a simple concept as dinner.
Greek Inspired Slow Cooker Chicken
Yield: Four Adult Sized Servings
Total Time: 5 Hours
Ingredients:
1 Lemon, Juiced
4 Garlic Cloves, Minced
1/4 Cup Olive Oil
1/2 Cup White Wine
1/4 Cup Chicken Broth
1 tsp Dill
1 tsp Rosemary
1 Tbsp Balsamic Vinegar
1/4 tsp Pepper
1/2 tsp Salt
1 Whole Chicken, Broken into it's Respective Pieces
Directions:
Add all the ingredients with the exception of the chicken to the marinade.
Mix up well.
Add in the chicken and coat all the pieces completely.
Cook on low for 6 to 8 hours or on high for 4 to 6 hours.
Serve over noodles with sauce from the slow cooker spooned over the noodles and a little feta and olives for good measure.
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I love the addition of dill. Mmmmm… dill!! Also, I’m a tad disappointed that your post wasn’t about the bananas foster french toast! Will we get to see that anytime soon, I hope?!
Julie replied: — March 7th, 2011 @ 11:33 am
That can easily be arranged. I’ve added to my list of to cooks; maybe we’ll whip it up this weekend? 🙂
Slow cookers are the best, aren’t they! Even though I work form home, I still love the feeling that dinner is working itself out in the kitchen with no intervention on my part 🙂 Love the flavors of lemon, rosemary and dill in this!
Looks great!
P.S. I’m an email subscriber and it would be great if your whole feed appeared in your email. I don’t always have the time to click over and have a system of archiving to add “to try” recipes for copying later.
Julie replied: — March 7th, 2011 @ 11:21 am
Sent you a reply. 🙂
I’m a big fan of the crock-pot. I will be remembering this recipe for sure!
By the way, I tried to be like you this weekend. I took a few pictures while I cooked. 🙂
I love the flavors but then again I am Greek how couldn’t I? It looks delicious and so is Santorini. One of my top favorite islands in the world!
Love my crock pot, in fact it is busy at home making up pulled pork while I am slaving away here at work 🙂 anne
Oh, this looks so lovely and flavorful! I don’t break out my slow cooker that often, but I’ll have to for this one. At this phase in our lives, we’re not that busy in the evenings (I know a future with kids will change that!), but on a lazy Sunday this would be great since it could cook while we’re at church. Mmmm.
Dill,Rosemary, yum yum. This looks delicious Julie 🙂
I love feta with chicken. That is a plate that I would definitely clean…maybe even lick clean 🙂
This looks so good! I love Greek everything! Thanks for sharing!
Always looking for new chicken recipes.Looks totally yum.I love the dish because it cooks all by itself and has dill & rosemary.
This chicken sure looks yummie cooked in all the spices…too bad we did not have a chance to try this dish when in Greece 😉 Hope you have a wonderful week ahead Julie 🙂
I need to get my slow cooker back in action. My meal planning has been abysmal of late. That looks delicious. You need to invent the technology so I can just print it for my dinner!
oh ok I am sold I need to get me one!
The chicken sounds amazing with Greek flavors, an excellent family meal!
Oops! I think I just deleted your reply on accident!
I don’t think been for too long. 🙂
I mean, I don’t think it’s been that way for too long.
Oh my goodness, this looks SO good!!! Another must-try!
And I love your new banner/header look 😉 I like the purple color and the mc logo!
Looks and sounds delicious. I can almost smell it when I close my eyes.
Hey, hon, though, it’s really hard to read your blog with the background color and the text color you’ve got here. I had to highlight everything in order to read it. Help a girl out, can you?
it’s pretty amazing how much flavor a terrific marinade can impart. i like what you’ve done with those bird parts, julie. 🙂
Nice – I love to try new slow cooker recipes!
Oh wow! That is really pretty!
Yum!
Another reason as to why I need a slow cooker. This recipe sounds incredible.
Yum…., the dill would give it a lovely flavour too. I can’t imagine how busy a mom is Julie, its a huge job & lots to think about looking after everyone. Your chicken dish is awesome kid…. love it 🙂
This is my first visit to your blog! Thanks for a great slow cooker recipe – I was looking for one with chicken that didn’t involve tomatoes. This sounds delicious! Thanks for sharing – looking forward to coming back often for more recipe ideas.
this is perfect– doable and delish!
Tried this tonight! It was DELISH!!!!
I really could stand to dig out my slow cooker more often. Fabulous.
Looks so delicious!
I love slow cookers and don’t use mine enough .Yes, it’s great to come home to a meal that’s practically serving itself!
wow…looks tasty …n thx for this dish
Just found your site and love,love, love it!! I can’t wait to try this recipe! Yum!
This sounds so yummy and I haven’t hit the grocery store yet this week!
I only purchase, prepare or eat chicken breasts. Will this recipe work OK with just chicken breasts?
Sounds wonderful, and I really like that there isn’t a can of cream of soup in there. Thanks!
love your blog! this year we made a resolution (if you will) to eat out less and eat in more!
love your blog
Looks great! Exactly what I’m looking for- doing a Greek night tomorrow when a friend comes over and have to go into the office! Love crockpots.
Any suggestions on a substitute for the white wine? Is it necessary? Chicken broth, white wine vinegar, anything like that?
Can you make this with chicken breasts?
Can you make the marinade the night before??
This had a nice taste and was pretty simple to throw together. Next time I will cut down on the olive oil and probably omit the chicken broth and instead sprinkle some bullion powder in. Slow cookers tend to render out much more liquid than baking which can dilute your spices. I may try oregano in place of the rosemary next time also. Served it with rice and the kids and hubby both really like it.
I’m fairly new to this slow cooker thing. I tried the recipe and it was done in 3 hours. (It tastes great, just a tad overcooked I think). Just wondering what size crock pot you made yours in? And, if you have any suggestions for things to add into the crock pot to help even out the cooking? Thanks!
To the chicken breast only crowd- Yes, you can absolutely sub chicken breasts! Cook on high about 2 hours and test. It will likely be done if you used boneless.
I linked over from a OAMC website. I’m guessing to freeze you just prepare the marinade, toss in the chicken, freeze, thaw the day before, and cook as usual. Anybody verify this?
I meant it will likely be done in less if you used boneless.
I prepared the marinade, added the chicken, and froze it. The day I defrosted it, I forgot to put it in the crockpot. I came home from work and cooked it in the oven for about 45min. Then, I BBQ it until it was crispy. It was fantastic! Thanks for the recipe.
This dish looks lovely! I’m rarely inspired to take my slowcooker out because it always feels like more work than baking, but I do want to try this. One question, in the picture your picture has a lovely golden brown almost carmelized top – how do you get this effect in the crock pot?
Looks great; some of our favorite flavors! Fyi: I believe you meant “emanating” from the kitchen, not “ruminating”, which means to “meditate” as in chewing the cud like a cow does.
Thanks so much for this recipe! After making it once, I knew I needed to make it again, so I made a few tweaks to it and posted my version on my blog:
http://eatingnatural.wordpress.com/2012/10/14/revolutionary-greek-slow-cooker-chicken-and-pasta/
After cooking the chicken, all of that delicious marinade is left over, so I cooked some pasta directly in the marinade instead of in water. It brings a whole new dimension to the pasta!
I was wondering how many this serves and or what quantity of chicken you used? It would be really helpful to know. Looking forward to making this!
Made this today, no substitutions. There was a LOT of liquid in the crockpot so I boiled it down with a flour slurry to thicken it – next time I will degrease the broth as well. I put the chicken pieces in the broiler for 5 minutes to dry them out and brown them up a little. Added olives and feta as suggested and served with noodles. Very tasty and easy.
I was looking for a new idea for crock pot chicken…I love this idea! And balsamic vinegar in the recipe? Fuggedaboutit! It’s going on my list to try on our “run around night” next week!