Slow Cooking Chicken

DancingLady

DancingLady

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I usually cook my chicken in a crock pot for a very, very long time. One reason I do this is that if you cook it for a long time, the bones break down and you can get more nutrients. It takes about 24hrs for the bones to really be crumbly to where you can eat the spine easily and even bite off the ends of the leg bones.

What I like to do to maximize the nutrition of my chicken stews is start the chicken in the evening and cook just the chicken overnight, then add the rest of the stew ingredients in the morning. This way I don't overdo it on the veggies and make them all mushy, but I still get the benefits of the bone marrow and hopefully lots of calcium from the bones.
 
I've heard this is one of the big benefits of making your own stock at home, since you get much more of the calcium from the bones, as well as the gelatin and collagen which are also very good for you. Often the boxed/canned stocks you get in the store are missing much of this. A good home made stock should thicken up when put in the fridge, almost like a slightly runny Jello. Some people mistake that as fat, but it's not, the fat will all rise to the top.

Personally I have no interest in eating the bones though. I would be horrified if a splintered piece of bone got stuck in my throat. I even have a hard time cleaning off Buffalo Wings, and leave all the tough chewy stuff on the bone. My dad on the other hand will eat every last morsel of meat and cartilage off the bone until it's completely clean.

Dark meat will hold up better for long cooking like this, because there is so much fat in it that needs to be rendered out. But I wouldn't personally do something like this with white meat, as it will dry it out too much. And though this might sound contradictory because slow cooked chicken white meat would be swimming in juices, it takes on more or less the texture of wet sawdust - it's technically wet, but the strands of meat themselves are still dry.
 
DancingLady said:
I usually cook my chicken in a crock pot for a very, very long time. One reason I do this is that if you cook it for a long time, the bones break down and you can get more nutrients. It takes about 24hrs for the bones to really be crumbly to where you can eat the spine easily and even bite off the ends of the leg bones.

What I like to do to maximize the nutrition of my chicken stews is start the chicken in the evening and cook just the chicken overnight, then add the rest of the stew ingredients in the morning. This way I don't overdo it on the veggies and make them all mushy, but I still get the benefits of the bone marrow and hopefully lots of calcium from the bones.
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How exactly do you cook it?
Is a crockpot the same as a slow cooker?
Is it cooked in water?
Skinned and chopped up?
 
Although clearly you need calcium, your body will not use it unless you need it. There is an exact link between the size of your muscles and the density of your bones. If you have weak muscles you will have weak bones. This is why you often see old people in homes doing exercises with light weights.
 
I cooked one whole chicken in the slow cooker & never did it again. I cooked it only with onions & a smidge of broth at the bottom & for some reason it almost instantaneously went bad. The slow cooker didn't click over to warm & it was still hot when I opened it & was bombarded with the smell of rotten chicken flesh. I don't blame the chicken, I blame myself. Well, I blame the chicken a tad.
 
I bake the chicken, which we eat until we are down to the bone, then I put what is left in the slow cooker and let it cook until the meat fall off the bones for soup or salad.
 
not over keen on over cooked chicken ,my wife puts bird in a covered tin in the bottom oven for hours its a easy meal,but would make a better soup:thumbsup:
 
Always chopped, diced, or in another meal. For slow cooking chicken itself, I find 1/4 broth, and SHREDDED (yes shredded) chicken breasts saute nicely in a slow cooker. Just spice it right and you got some chicken that just falls right off the bone.

However to cooking a whole chicken... I just have to say no thanks. I'm not a fan of waiting over 24 hours for a meal. Even if it tastes godlike. not even the fact of the chicken being whole or the bones - that don't bother me. But if I'm cooking it's because I want to eat sometime in the near future, unless I'm entertaining guests that may be coming over.
 
sidevalve said:
Buffalos have wings ?!!!:eek:
TBH we had a friend who used to cook chicken in this way and it was ok but so dull. Much prefer roasting.
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On topic, I had a friend that did that as well but then used their own spices to and I think my stomach may have exploded, but man it tasted good.

I tried some long slow cooked chicken. It had a funky type of taste. But it wasn't a bad type of funky, just not cooked for normal hours chicken, nor baked/fried/roasted, whatever. It is it's own unique area.
 

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I really don't fancy the idea of crumbs of bone getting in my chicken at all. I'll be giving slow cooked chicken a miss!

I usually just roast it in oneof those roasting bags. A small chicken is practically falling apart after 2 hours on medium in one of these bags and that suits me fine.
 
Buffalo wings are chicken wings that are deep fried and served with a hot/spicy buffalo wing sauce. I think they originated at the Anchor Bar in Buffalo NY, hence the name Buffalo wings. They are served with blue cheese dip. Delicious.
 
My mother would always say to us that when we cook chicken or fish, it should always be on low fire. Even in frying chicken drumsticks, it is not good to rush things by having a hot flame because the drawback would be the raw interior part of the chicken. Often there would still be reddish part or worse blood is evident. Raw inside but burned outside? That's the result if you did not cook chicken in low fire. But on the contrary, we do not use the chicken bone nor let it break in overcooking. Just the meat for us.
 
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