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slow cooker chicken cacciatore

Name: slow cooker chicken cacciatore
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 6 h
Total time: 6 h 15 min
Cuisine: Italian
Ingredients: 1 15-ounce can diced tomatoes, preferably fire roasted; 3 tablespoons pure tomato paste; 1 tablespoon smoked paprika; 1 ½ teaspoon Italian Seasoning; pinch crushed red pepper; 2 teaspoons coarse kosher salt, divided; 6 bone-in chicken thighs, skin removed; ½ cup chopped olives, such as pitted black Italian olives; 1 medium onion, thinly sliced; 1 red bell pepper, finely chopped; 4 ounces crimini mushrooms, sliced; ½ teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary

Jump To Recipe January 14, 2019 by Katie // 83 Comments »

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This Slow Cooker Chicken Cacciatore is one of our all time fan favorite recipes here at Healthy Seasonal Recipes. It is made with chicken thighs slowly simmered with tomatoes, mushrooms, peppers, olives and spices. After cooking in the crockpot on low for six hours, the chicken becomes meltingly tender and the vegetables make a delicious savory sauce to spoon over it. It is naturally gluten-free, paleo and whole30 approved.

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This post contains affiliate links. This post was originally published on October 25th, 2016. I have updated it to share it with you again today.

What Is Chicken Cacciatore?

Chicken Cacciatore is an Italian inspired dish that roughly translates to hunter-style chicken. When I was researching how to take-on this classic chicken recipe (and make it healthier and easy enough for a week-night) I discovered that Chicken Cacciatore has so many variations, nobody really agrees what it is exactly.

Apparently it hails from Italy and the original dish was something hunters would have made out in the field (or woods) and therefore would be very simple. The chicken would be cut into parts and cooked with herbs and mushrooms.

But here in the states I know it to have wine, tomatoes and peppers as well. I also looked in the Joy of Cooking, like when I was working on the Chicken a la King, and their version does not have peppers.

To make things more confusing, some of the recipes I found online didn’t have tomatoes or peppers at all in them.

Eventually I just decided that it was totally fine to take some creative license. As long as the dish tastes delicious, is healthier, and can be made for a weeknight, I’m okay with breaking the rules.

Ingredients For Chicken Cacciatore

For full measurements see the recipe card below.

Canned diced tomatoes: I recommend looking for fire-roasted tomatoes. I like the ones that Muir Glen makes. If you love tomatoes, don’t miss this Ultimate Guide to Tomatoes!
Tomato paste: Look for one that is just tomatoes. Or tomatoes and salt. No need for sugar or corn syrup!
Smoked paprika: One of my favorite ingredients ever. Look for it in the spice section of good supermarkets. It adds a nice smoky taste to the cacciatore! I use it to make this Roasted Butternut Squash taste addictively good, and it’s the secret ingredient in my vegan shiitake bacon.
Italian Seasoning: If you’re a regular here, then you’ll know that I am a huge fan of dried Italian seasoning. Basically it is a blend of the most popular Mediterranean herbs in one mix, so it’s a great time saver! I love it for Italian recipes like this Cacciatore, Stuffed Shells or Beef Lasagna with Spinach.
Crushed Red Pepper: This is also called Red Pepper Flake. It adds a bit of heat to the chicken, but it is not too overpowering. Just a tiny kick. If you dislike spicy food, you can leave it out entirely.
Coarse kosher salt: I find it’s easier to sprinkle coarse salt by hand. If you want to sub regular table salt, read this post about the ratio for subbing regular salt for kosher salt.
Bone-in chicken thighs: I call for thighs because they become tender in the slow cooker and don’t dry out the way chicken breast does after long cooking times. The bones help hold them together. Note: You’ll have to remove the skin.
Olives: I like to use black Italian Olives, but if you can’t find them you can sub in Greek olives such as Kalamata olives. You can also use green olives like Spanish Olives without the pimentos in them.
Onion: This gives the Chicken Cacciatore flavor and adds healthy veggies for bulk. You can use yellow, white or red. You can read more about onions here. I use a french cut to slice the onions.
Red Bell Pepper: This adds more healthy veggies and bulk to the veggie sauce. They become meltingly tender!
Crimini Mushrooms: Criminis are also known as baby bellas because they are immature portabella mushrooms! You can sub in white mushrooms if you prefer.
Rosemary: Adding in fresh rosemary really makes the sauce pop! It’s added at the end so it has the most flavor!

How to Make Slow Cooker Chicken Cacciatore

Slow Cooker: First of all, most Italian hunters probably don’t have slow cookers out in the woods, so right there you know we’re off into new territory. I use a Large crockpot for this one.
Remove Skin: I removed the chicken skin to save on calories from fat.
Add Spices: Then I mixed a super flavorful combination of Italian spices, red chili pepper flake, coarse salt and smoked paprika and dusted the thighs with the spices. (All of which is virtually calorie free flavor.) Without the chicken skin these chicken thighs are still very rich and flavorful tasting. The smoked paprika made them so savory tasting.
Add Olives: Next I layered on chopped olives. The Joy of Cooking calls for olives so I tried that and loved the flavor it gave everything.
Add Vegetables For Health: Next, without stirring, I added on the vegetables. I used a whole onion, a whole pepper and mushrooms to really bulk the serving size up.
Don’t Stir: I didn’t stir the mixture because I wanted to make sure that the chicken stayed coated in the smoked paprika combination. I found that the vegetables released just enough juice, and it dripped down and mixed with the tomato, so that the chicken simmers and becomes completely tender.
Remove Chicken: At the end I pulled the chicken out, and mixed in some fresh rosemary and mixed the vegetables and tomato all together.
Thicken Sauce: If you like a thicker sauce, you can simmer the sauce in a saucepan on the stovetop for 5 minutes to reduce it. Then add the salt and rosemary.

: 1. Stir Canned tomatoes and tomato paste in the bottom of the slow cooker.

: 2. Stir together the seasonings.

: 3. Remove chicken skin and sprinkle with the seasoning blend.

: 4. Arrange the chicken on top of the tomato mixture inthe slow cooker.

: 5. Top the chicken with the olives and vegetables.

: 6. Cover and cook on low for 6 hours.

: 7. Remove the chicken with a slotted spatula.

: 8. Add salt and rosemary to the sauce.

What To Serve With Chicken Cacciatore

The sauce is full of veggies and so delicious! You’ll want to serve this with a starch of some sort. You can serve this with whole grain pasta, mashed potatoes or with soft polenta.
It is naturally gluten-free and paleo, so if you want to keep it low-carb you could serve it with spaghetti squash or zucchini noodles or cauliflower rice would be good too.
You could also make Minestrone for a first course, and then have this Cacciatore as your secondi!
The flavors of Caesar Dressing would be amazing with this Cacciatore! Add a loaf of Italian bread and dinner is served!!
For a sweet ending you could make Healthy Tiramisu with Greek Yogurt.

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Thanks so much for reading. If you make this recipe please, come back and let me know by leaving a star rating and review! It helps so much!

Happy Cooking!

~Katie