Soy Ginger Chicken in the Slow Cooker

I've been studying like crazy for my CMP, in fact I had my nose in my textbook from 8 AM to 8 PM all day yesterday and took one short break to throw this meal in the crock pot.

I spent about five minutes on the internet searching for a slow cooker chicken recipe with ingredients that I already had on hand since I couldn't afford to leave the house. I was really on a roll with my studying so I didn't want to take too long of breaks. I found this recipe on Martha Stewart's Every Day Food. Her prep time said 30 minutes, and she was right. I was in and out of the kitchen in a snap AND that included the time it took me to pull ingredients and photograph each step.

Let me show you how easy this was.

I started by throwing three frozen chicken breast in the crock pot. Also, underneath the chicken you can't really see I dumped in the last of the Guinness and Onion Soup in the bottom, maybe 1/2 cup worth. I didn't have any onions (white, yellow or green) so I used this as my onion addition. I figured the extra liquid would help here too since we aren't adding that much liquid to the slow cooker, and in a sense braising the chicken.

Here are the other ingredients I threw in. Balsamic vinegar, black pepper, minced garlic, corn starch, coriander, ginger, soy sauce and brown sugar. Not shown, but added later: 1 celery stalk, 1 zucchini, store-bought Orange/Chili/Garlic sauce.

To the chicken I throw in 2 T brown sugar.

1/3 cup soy sauce.

5 garlic cloves, minced.

1 piece of fresh ginger (I keep some in the freezer), peeled and cut into thin strips (or chunks, whatever you feel like.)

1 T balsamic vinegar.

1 t ground coriander.

Ground, and added to the crock pot.

1/2 t ground pepper. The powder stuff is just fine.

The original recipe calls for cilantro, scallions and carrots...all of which I didn't have. On a whim I saw this in the fridge and decided to pour a little in over the chicken. d'Oni makes some kick butt sauces and glaze. I've tried several of them and love them all.

So here is where I am at 30 minutes after I started. I believe this could have been thrown together even faster had I not been photographing...but I'm not sure I could cook something up in the kitchen without my point and shoot Casio Exilim.

The original recipe calls for low cooking for six hours. Instead I turned my crock pot on high. The house smelled so good! After an hour, this is what my Soy Ginger Chicken looked like.

Here it is after 2 hours.

Wishing I had a carrot or two, but instead reached for the veggie drawer I found celery, zucchini and blueberries.

I left the blueberries to chill, but sliced and diced one celery stalk and one zucchini. The zucchini I knew would really fall apart after being added to the slow cooker, so I left it in large matchstick style slices.

Here are my additional veggies added to the crock pot.

Stir it up, put the top back on for a little while longer.

When the chicken is fully cooked, the meal is ready!

To thicken up the sauce, I removed two cups of the cooking liquid and put in a small pot on the stove. Turned the heat to medium-high and got it to a rolling boil, then added one tablespoon of corn starch.

Using a whisk I continually stir and whip until the sauce thickens to my liking.

When it was thick and "glaze-like" I poured the sauce back over the chicken in the crock pot.

I made simple stove top quick rice but used a can of chicken broth as my cooking liquid instead of water.

I served the Soy Ginger Chicken on top of a healthy scoop of rice.

This was definitely EASY! I loved how the sauce coated each vegetable and the chicken and seeped down into the rice. The chicken was perfectly moist since it cooked in a delicious liquid. I'm also really glad I added the zucchini at the end, it not only added color but a healthy bite and another vehicle for delivering the SAUCE to my MOUTH.

I need to use my slow cooker more often! Have a great slow cooker recipe? I'd love to give it a try, e-mail me at homewithmandy (at} gmail {dot] com.