Love super easy recipes that you can fix and forget? This Slow Cooker Chicken Cacciatore is just the one you need. Flavorful, filling and a family hit.
I have always loved slow cooker recipes. I love that I can just whip something together and forget abut it and have myself a dinner at the end of the day with little effort.
This Slow Cooker Chicken Cacciatore is one of my favorite easy and flavorful slow cooker meals that we make often in our house. Everyone loves it!
I’m surprised that the kids, being as picky as they are sometimes love this recipe as well. When they were younger and didn’t know ingredients and they asked I always told them it was seasoning.
The older that they got they realized what was actually in a dish and refused to eat it just because of what it was, but now that they are in their teens they have come to love those once they thought they hated.
Some of my other favorite slow cooker recipes that I have on my site include Slow Cooker Sunday Roast, Slow Cooker Bolognese Sauce and Slow Cooker Red Beans and Rice.
WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS:
- With flavor explosion this recipe does not lack in that department.
- You can double this recipe, just use a larger slow cooker.
- This can be cooked on low or high depending on how much time you have.
INGREDIENTS NEEDED (FULL RECIPE BELOW):
Chicken thighs
Olive oil
Carrot
Celery
Onion
Garlic
Dry red wine
Diced tomatoes
Mushrooms
Black olives
Rosemary
Parsley
WHAT IS CHICKEN CACCIATORE?
Cacciatore means “hunter” in Italian. In food, cacciatore refers to a meal prepared “hunter-style” with onions, herbs, usually tomatoes, vegetables, and sometimes wine.
HOW TO YOU MAKE SLOW COOKER CHICKEN CACCIATORE, STEP BY STEP:
- Pat the chicken legs dry, sprinkle from both sides with salt and place into the slow cooker, set aside.
- Heat the oil in a pan over medium high heat add the carrots, celery, onion and garlic.
- Cook for 4-5 minutes until onions are soft.
- Pour in the red wine.
- Cook for 1-2 minutes until the alcohol has dissolved.
- Remove from the heat.
- Add all ingredients except the parsley over the chicken thighs, stir carefully and cover.
- Cook on low for 6-7 hours and on high for 3-4 hours
- Serve over pasta and garnish with parsley
See how easy this Slow Cooker Chicken Cacciatore Recipe is? This is why we love it so much! I actually got this recipe from my friend Marsha a while back who’s husband is from Italy.
Once I tried it, I couldn’t stop making and eating it. They use boneless skinless chicken legs but those are harder to find here so we use chicken thighs in place of those.
If you can find boneless skinless chicken legs, by all means use them! That is how her husband would make this dish but I can’t compare on flavor for that unfortunately.
WHAT DO YOU SERVE WITH THIS?
While we like to serve this with various pastas, you can also serve over mashed potatoes or rice. Anything that is good that will soak up the flavors and sauciness.
We always also serve with some crusty bread, I mean anything like this has to have a loaf of crunchy bread in my opinion! But that is completely up to you.
Doesn’t that bowl of past just make you want to twirl your fork around and devour this dish? I know it does me. I can’t wait until we make it again.
We do like to use our slow cooker all year round, especially in the summer so we don’t have to heat up the kitchen to bake something or use the oven.
But this is also a comfort meal so I think that it is great all year long and that there is no set season that you would need to make this Slow Cooker Chicken Cacciatore.
DO I NEED TO USE RED WINE?
This specific recipe uses red wine as it goes great with the tomato sauce in it. Some recipes call for white wine, but with this one I would stick with the red.
It gives it a nice depth of flavor. I have also substituted red wine with balsamic vinegar as well in some recipes, so you could also try doing that too.
HOW TO STORE:
Place your remaining leftover Chicken Cacciatore in to an airtight container or ziptop bag and place in the refrigerator, this should keep up to 3-4 days. Reheat on stovetop or in microwave.
This can also be frozen, to do that place cooled recipe in an airtight container and press out as much air as possible. Place in freezer where it should keep for up to 3 months.
When you are ready to serve, let defrost in the refrigerator and then warm up on the stove or in the microwave.
TIPS AND TRICKS:
- We use boneless skinless chicken thighs for this recipe, traditionally from my friend they use legs, you could also use chicken breasts if needed.
- You can easily double this recipe, just use a larger 8 quart slow cooker.
- This can be frozen, see my tips above on how to do that.
- You can serve this with pasta, potatoes or rice.
- Red wine is needed in this recipe, but I have subbed balsamic vinegar before so you cold try that.
- You can cook this on other low or high, all depends on the time you have and when you want it finished.
If you are looking for a deliciously flavorful dinnertime recipe then you need to try this Slow Cooker Chicken Cacciatore! It is so so so good.
If you like this recipe you might also like:
Slow Cooker Chicken Cacciatore
Ingredients
- 8 boneless skinless chicken thighs skinless chicken thighs around 2 - 2.5 lbs
- 1 Tbs olive oil
- 1 medium carrot chopped
- 1 stalk celery diced
- 1/2 small onion diced
- 1 garlic clove minced
- 1/3 cup dry red wine
- 1 can 16 ounces diced tomatoes
- 5 oz whole mushrooms cut into quarters
- 1/4 cup sliced black olives drained
- 1/2 tsp dried rosemary
- Freshly chopped parsley to taste
Instructions
- Pat the chicken legs dry, sprinkle from both sides with salt and place into the slow
- cooker, set aside
- Heat the oil in a pan over medium high heat add the carrots, celery, onion and garlic.
- Cook for 4-5 minutes until onions are soft.
- Pour in the red wine.
- Cook for 1-2 minutes until the alcohol has dissolved.
- Remove from the heat.
- Add all ingredients except the parsley over the chicken thighs, stir carefully and cover.
- Cook on low for 6-7 hours and on high for 3-4 hours
- Serve over pasta and garnish with parsley.
Notes
- Nutritional value is for Chicken Cacciatore alone.
- We use boneless skinless chicken thighs for this recipe, traditionally from my friend they use legs, you could also use chicken breasts if needed.
- You can easily double this recipe, just use a larger 8 quart slow cooker.
- This can be frozen, see my tips above on how to do that.
- You can serve this with pasta, potatoes or rice.
- Red wine is needed in this recipe, but I have subbed balsamic vinegar before so you cold try that.
- You can cook this on other low or high, all depends on the time you have and when you want it finished.
Nutrition
Tornadough Alli is not a nutritionist or dietitian, and any nutritional information shared is an estimate. If calorie count and nutritional value is important to you, we recommend running the ingredients through whichever online nutritional calculator you prefer. Calories and values can vary depending on which brands were used.
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