Monday, December 12, 2011

Crockin' through the bitter end of Fall 2011...

Well, here we are at long last; finals week is upon us. And is often the case in the fall, most of my finals are backloaded at the end of the week, and I actually had the day off today. I know I'm going to be sorry come Thursday, but it was nice to have a three-day weekend, and a little time to take a breath before the deluge.

Though I was at home all day, I had a Christmas project underway (more about that later), so I broke out my second, back-up crock pot and made a recipe that I saw a long time ago on the Crockin' Girls Facebook page called Garlic Brown Sugar Chicken for dinner. I tweaked the recipe a little (changes noted below), and it turned out great! The main change I made was to pop the chicken pieces under the broiler for a few minutes after they were done cooking in the crock pot, just to crisp up and color the skin. Then I served the chicken with steamed rice and herbed French-style green beans. YUM!


Garlic Brown Sugar Chicken 

1 large chicken, cut into serving pieces (I used a package of 8 or 9 thighs)
1 cup packed brown sugar (I cut this to 1/2 cup, and it was still quite sweet!)
2/3 cup vinegar (I used rice wine vinegar)
1/4 cup Sprite or 7-Up soda (I used Sierra Mist Natural)
2-3 tablespoons minced garlic
2 tablespoons soy sauce (I upped this to 1/4 cup)
1 teaspoon pepper
*I added one thinly-sliced onion, a teaspoon of fresh grated ginger, and a squirt of sriracha hot sauce.

1. Place chicken in crock pot.
2. Mix all remaining ingredients and pour over chicken.
3. Cook on low for 6-8 hours.(When the chicken was cooked through and tender, I broiled the pieces for about five minutes to crisp up the skin.)
4. Serve over rice or noodles.
5. You can thicken the juices after cooking with a little cornstarch. (I used 1/4 cup of flour whisked into a slurry with some of the cooking liquid, then added back to the pot and cooked on high for another half hour or so.)

Here are the chicken pieces right out of the crock pot.

And here they are after a few minutes under the broiler.

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