Slow-Cooked Chicken Pot Roast with Sweet Paprika and Cayenne

This flavorful chicken falls right off the bone, thanks to a long roast in a slow cooker. Weeknight dinner doesn’t get easier! This recipe is from the new cookbook, Good + Simple.

If you follow along on instagram or snapchat, you might have noticed that I just finished up a month of Whole 30. Eliminating grains and legumes really threw me for a loop in terms of meal planning, so I spent a lot of time scouring through cookbooks and magazines looking for inspiration.

About halfway though my 30 days, I received a review copy of Good + Simple by British blogging duo Hemsley + Hemsley and was excited to see how many of the creative recipes were Whole 30 compliant – and every single one of them looked fantastic.

The book focuses on eliminating gluten, grains, and refined sugars while maximizing nutrition and is filled with fresh recipes that I found to be really inspiring. It’s packed with gorgeous photos and tons of information about nutrition and food prep. A few recipes that caught my eye include butternut and almond butter porridge, spicy coconut kale chips, slow cooker smokey apple pulled pork, and green goddess noodle salad. There are also some clever desserts, like tahini date fridge fudge (which is delicious and reminds me of a less-sweet version of halva), cannellini vanilla sponge cake with chocolate avo frosting, and lavender an carob “hot chocolate.”

One of the first recipes from the book that I tried was this Slow-Cooked Chicken Pot Roast with Sweet Paprika and Cayenne. Thanks to tons of root vegetables, it’s a simple slow cooker meal that was easy to prep the night before and let cook all day while I was at work. i was a little skeptical of the amount of spices the recipe called for (a teaspoon and a half of cayenne?!), but it totally worked. The result was spicy, but the flavor of the lemon also came through really strongly and the cooking liquid made a delicious sauce.

The book suggested a few side dishes to accompany the meal, but I didn’t think it needed any extras. If you want more, a simple green salad would be nice alongside the chicken.

Slow-Cooked Chicken Pot Roast with Sweet Paprika and Cayenne

Yield: 4

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Ingredients

• 4 large carrots, roughly chopped
• 2 large onions, roughly chopped
• 3 large celery stalks, roughly chopped
• 1 celeriac or 2 small turnips or rutabagas, roughly chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, halved
• 1/2 cup water
• 1 handful fresh rosemary, parsley, basil, basil or thyme, or 1 tablespoon dried
• 1 x 4 pound chicken

For the stuffing:

• 1 lemon, halved
• 4 garlic cloves
• 1 medium onion, roughly chopped

For the spice rub

• 4 teaspoons sea salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons black pepper
• 1 1/2 teaspoons cayenne pepper
• 1 1/2 teaspoons sweet smoked paprika
• 1 1/2 teaspoons dried thyme

Instructions

1. Place the chopped vegetables in a slow cooker with the garlic, water and herbs.
2. Stuff the chicken with the lemon halves, garlic and onion and place on top of the chopped vegetables.
3. Rub the top of the chicken with the salt, spices and thyme. Put the lid on the slow cooker and set to low for 8 hours. Alternatively, place in an ovenproof casserole with a tight-fitting lid and cook in the oven (preheated to 325ºF) for 4 hours.

Notes

Reprinted with permission from Good + Simple, by Jasmine Hemsley and Melissa Hemsley.

I received a free review copy of Good + Simple, but all opinions are my own. This post contains affiliate links.