Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Crock-Pot Chicken Cacciatore

I am blessed with a husband who enjoys cooking and likes to make our dinners as an expression of his love and care for us.  Some would even say I am spoiled!  But once upon a time when I was a single girl I was a not too bad cook.  Now as a mom to 4 kids and homeschooling the two oldest I find it difficult to get  my act together and have dinner waiting, or at least thought of, when dh comes home.  Adding to that challenge is that, since he starts work at 5:30am, he is home by 3pm!  I'm trying to find some good crock-pot recipes and today I decided to make this one posted at Organizational Hysteria.
 
 
 










It probably took me close to 2 hours to manage to get these simple ingredients into the crock pot!  It was cobbled together between getting the kids started on the schoolwork, going down to the basement to check the pantry closet for tomato paste (which we didn't have so I substituted crushed tomatoes - which involved figuring out that two 6 oz cans of tomato paste might equal just under half the 28 oz can of crushed tomatoes, except of course there is more liquid in the crushed tomatoes so we'll see how that turns out), taking frozen chicken breasts out of the basement freezer (blessedly boneless skinless that the in-laws left behind after their recent visit!), checking a math worksheet, rocking the crying baby's chair, chopping up an onion and crying myself, redirecting the toddler who was shoving the 4yo's shoes (which had not been put away in the closet!) in baby's face, thawing the frozen chicken breasts, wondering how much garlic powder might be an adequate substitute for the 2 garlic cloves I was not about to mince, serving a snack to the now hungry and crying toddler, helping the 4yo cut something up, noticing the toddler had put the glue stick in a water bottle, rocking the crying baby's chair again, putting everything in the crock pot, and pouring myself a glass of wine (I've heard you should only cook with wine you would drink and I hadn't tested this one yet...) - to be consumed with lunch, which was now due to be prepared.  I didn't have the dry white wine the recipe called for so just used red.  I also didn't have mushrooms so omitted them.

 










So... it's all in the crock pot and the house smells of onions (and I'm not a big fan of that)... I know dh will appreciate the effort and I also know the 6yo will not eat it since it has tomato sauce... sigh...

[EDITED to add photo of the final product]

3 comments:

  1. I completely relate to how long it can take getting this into the crock pot (and also that some of the kids won't touch the food).

    But it sounds very yummy!

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  2. Thanks! From the way others talk I always assume they just toss it all together and that it takes me far longer than it should. At least I already knew how it would be received by the kids so wasn't disappointed by that. I though it turned out well - I would add more liquid next time to make it more of a sauce, and it definitely needs the mushrooms.

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  3. Good job.
    Since I have to make dinner for the lunch hour I put all the ingredients in the pot at night after the kids go to bed. Then in the morning while I do the breakfast thing I just put the pot in the base and plug it in !
    It takes a fraction of the time when there are no kids involved :)

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