Lemon Crock Pot Chicken

 

Somedays, I made breakfast, lunch and dinner all at the same time.  It's not an ideal situation but their are days when our schedule just demands it.  We had one of these days recently.   

I made eggs and toast for breakfast, packed a picnic lunch to eat at a wrestling match and put a chicken in the crock pot for dinner - all before 9:00 AM.  In some ways it's kind of nice to have all the cooking out of the way before we got busy with our activities for the day.  

I created this super simple recipe based on the ingredients that I had in my pantry, my refrigerator and herbs that were growing in my herb pots at the time.  Feel free to substitute your favorite herbs and flavors to make your own delicious chicken. 

Lemon Crock Pot Chicken
1/2 pound small white potatoes, cubed
1 sweet potato, cubed
baby carrots or 1 large carrot, peeled and sliced into 1" pieces
1 head of garlic, sliced in half
1 lemon
1 Tablespoon fresh parsley
1 Tablespoon fresh rosemary
1 Tablespoon fresh thyme
1 roasting chicken

Put vegetables and garlic in the bottom of the crock pot.  

Combine thyme, rosemary, parsley and zest from 1 lemon.

Rub herb mixture under the skin of the chicken.  Place chicken on top of vegetables.

I get my dinner ready to this point, put the lid on the crock pot and put it in the refrigerator until it's cooking time.  I cooked the chicken on low for 5 hours and it wasn't quite ready to eat when we arrived home.  I checked the temperature and it was only about 146 degrees so I transferred the chicken to a 9x13 dish and popped it in the oven to finish cooking. 

The vegetables were a little crispy as well so I spooned them into a glass dish, covered them with plastic wrap and microwaved them for 2 minutes. 

After an additional 45 minutes of cooking time in the oven, the chicken was perfectly browned and thoroughly cooked. 

I think that I like this crock pot to oven method.  The chicken came out juicy and delicious and the skin was nice and crispy.





As for the day's activities - they turned out pretty well too.  These are pictures from one of the wrestling tournaments that we were at last weekend.

Ciao!