08 August 2009


This is a recipe I found on a slow cooker recipe website a few years ago. I saved it, but never tried it. I stumbled upon it in my recipe files when I was doing my meal planning for August and decided to finally try it.

Slow Cooker Peanut Chicken

Ingredients:
¼ cup peanut butter
2 tbsp peanuts, chopped
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp onions, minced
1 tbsp cilantro, minced
1 clove garlic, crushed
⅛ tsp fresh ginger, grated or minced
4 chicken breasts
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp honey
1 tbsp butter, melted
12 oz. chicken broth
1 tbsp cornstarch
4 servings white rice, cooked

Directions:
Mix peanut butter, peanuts, 2 tbsp soy sauce, onion, cilantro, garlic, and ginger. Spread on inside of each chicken breast. Roll up; close with toothpicks. Place in slow cooker.

Mix remaining 2 tbsp soy sauce with honey, butter, and broth; pour over chicken. Cover and cook on low for 4 to 5 hours. Remove chicken from pot. Turn power to high. Dissolve cornstarch in small amount of cold water; stir into sauce. Cook on high for about 15 minutes. Spoon sauce on chicken and serve over white rice.

Makes 4 servings.

This was really good! I don't know why I never tried it before. We love Thai-style dishes and dishes with peanut sauce on chicken or salmon. And I love my slow cooker, so this was right up our alley!

I changed just a few things. The original recipe called for parsley instead of cilantro. I don't really care for parsley very much and cilantro is more common in Thai-style dishes. It also called for red pepper sauce. We don't like red pepper, so I omitted that. I think next time I make it I will throw in some other kind of pepper or something to add a bit of heat to the dish. But it was okay without it.

I noticed that the chicken got a little bit dried out on top where they stick out of the cooking liquid. I'm not sure how to fix this. When I noticed it, I basted them a couple of times with the liquid and that seemed to help. The only other option is to increase the liquid so that it covers the top of the chicken. That might be a problem when you go to make the sauce, though.

I will say this: it was not a cinch to put together. It took a while to collect all of the ingredients and prep the chicken to go into the slow cooker. I honestly think it took me the greater part of an hour. But I am kind of slow and it was worth it anyway. Just keep that in mind if you are planning on throwing it together before you leave for work in the morning. To speed things up, you could put together the peanut paste and the cooking liquid the night before and store them in the fridge. Then in the morning, you would just have to spread the paste on the chicken, roll them up, and put in the slow cooker with the cooking liquid.

Here are some pics of the process:


Spreading the peanut paste on the chicken breasts. I use chicken breasts that have been split in two because the ones I buy are so incredibly thick. I wouldn't have been able to roll up a full one.


I used a lot of toothpicks to secure the rolls. Make sure you roll from the smaller end up toward the larger end.


Into the slow cooker with the cooking liquid. Notice I use Reynolds Slow Cooker Liners. They are so great. They make clean-up as easy as pulling out the bag and throwing it away. Highly recommended.


I served the peanut chicken with Alton Brown's recipe for Vegetable Curry. What a great meal!


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