Tired of boring old apricot chicken? You’ve probably grown up eating apricot chicken made with apricot nectar and a packet of dry soup.
If you prefer to make things from scratch rather than adding packet mixes to your cooking, rest assured, yes, you can make apricot chicken without french onion soup. This recipe is just as easy to prepare but with a bit of moroccan flavour added to give it a bit of a middle-eastern feel, and no french onion soup required.
You don’t technically need to slow cook this dish – you can just leave it to finish cooking in the pan on the stovetop, but our family definitely prefers this apricot chicken when I cook it in the slow cooker. It just makes the chicken fall apart so easily and it helps to bring out the flavours. It’s a very easy meal to prepare and, when you let the slow cooker do most of the cooking, you really can’t go wrong with this recipe.
Most of the ingredients are pretty straightforward – chicken, onion, garlic, dried apricots. The only ones you may not be as familiar with, depending on where you live in the world, are apricot nectar and moroccan seasoning. To make it as easy as possible for you, this is what the ones I use look like:
The apricot nectar is usually found in the fruit juice section of the supermarket while the moroccan seasoning is kept with all the herbs and spices.
To begin with you need to coat your chicken pieces in some flour with salt and pepper. You can use whatever chicken pieces your family prefers, this dish is delicious with thighs, legs and drumsticks. Chicken pieces with bones really help the flavour develop fully and the meat just falls away from the bone when you cut it.
`That being said, my family don’t like chicken with bones in it – they find it too much work to eat! So, I always use chicken breasts to make this recipe. Depending on the size of the breast I would normally cut them into 4 or 5 smaller pieces. As long as your chicken pieces are a similar size, you’re good to go.
The easiest way to coat the chicken pieces is to add the flour and the salt and pepper to a snap lock bag. I like to stand the bag up inside a bowl or jug to help keep it upright while I’m adding my ingredients.
Then seal the bag and give it a good shake to make sure all of the chicken pieces are coated in flour.
Next melt your butter with the oil in a large pan.
And add your coated chicken pieces to the pan.
Remember, we’re going to use the slow cooker to do the actual cooking so we don’t want to cook the chicken pieces, just get them nice and brown on the edges.
Once your chicken is browned, transfer the pieces to your slow cooker/crockpot.
Then, in the same pan used to brown the chicken, add your moroccan seasoning. If there is no fat left from the chicken, add a bit more oil to the pan first.
Stir the seasoning over heat for a few seconds until it gets lovely and fragrant. Then add your sliced onion to the pan.
Cook and stir over heat until combined, then add your finely chopped or minced garlic.
Once the garlic has been stirred through and combined with the onion and seasoning it’s time to add the can of apricot nectar.
Give it all a stir and let the liquid come to a boil.
Then you simply need to pour the sauce into the slow cooker on top of the chicken pieces and stir it through to combine.
Put the lid on the slow cooker and then walk away and relax for a few hours! It will take 4-6 hours on high or 6-8 hours on low.
One hour before serving time add a handful of dried apricots to the slow cooker and stir through.
Serve with mashed potato or rice and your choice of vegetables.
Slow Cooker Moroccan Apricot Chicken Recipe
Slow Cooker Moroccan Apricot Chicken
Ingredients
- 500-800 g chicken pieces any pieces you like, my family prefer chicken breast so I usually use 2-3 large chicken breasts and cut them up into smaller pieces.
- ⅓ cup plain / all-purpose flour
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon pepper
- 1-2 Tablespoons olive oil
- 1 Tablespoon butter
- 2 Tablespoons Moroccan seasoning
- 1 brown onion sliced
- 2 cloves garlic finely chopped or minced
- 1 405 ml can apricot nectar
- 8-10 dried apricots
Instructions
- Coat the chicken pieces in the flour combined with the salt and pepper.
- Heat oil and butter in a large frying or saute pan.
- Brown chicken pieces on all sides.
- Once browned, transfer chicken to the slow cooker.
- In the same pan over medium heat, add the Moroccan seasoning and stir for a few seconds until aromatic.
- Then add onion and garlic and stir over heat to combine.
- Once the onion has softened add the apricot nectar and bring it to the boil.
- Carefully pour the sauce into the slow cooker over the chicken pieces.
- Stir to combine.
- Slow cook for 4-6 hours on high or 6-8 hours on low.
- 1 hour before serving add the dried apricots and stir to combine.
- Serve with mashed potatoes or rice and your choice of vegetables.
For truly amazing apricot chicken, look no further than this recipe for Slow Cooker Moroccan Apricot Chicken – it really is easy and delicious and sure to become a favourite family meal.