Slow Cooking With Shannon

Yesterday I said that the ultimate compliment on my cooking would be for somebody to say that I should have my own Food Network show. So I thought it might be fun to do a post in the style of a cooking show, based on what I made for dinner yesterday. The recipe is at the bottom.

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Hi everyone, and welcome to Slow Cooking With Shannon. Today we'll be preparing one of my mom's Crock Pot recipes, Slow Cooker Chicken Barbecue!

As I enter my television studio, I discover that it's a giant mess! I swear the housekeeping staff had it spotless last night, but unfortunately I share the studio with a couple of other people who aren't all that neat.


[Cut to really long commercial break.]

Okay, we're back! I got the kitchen cleaned!


Unfortunately it took 25 minutes, and since this is a 30-minute show, I only have 5 minutes left to make my recipe. I can do it! Let's go!

You start with boneless, skinless chicken breasts. I like to use breasts that have a "sell by" date of yesterday. You know, just to add a little more adventure!


Next you spend forever looking for Worcestershire sauce. And are you guys wondering how I got my own cooking show when I can't actually pronounce the word "Worcestershire"?

Oh, and I'm being interrupted by my small co-host, who is begging incessantly for water! Focus groups have had mixed feelings about him.

Also, where is the cumin? I once had my spices organized alphabetically, but now my spice cupboard looks like this:


You also add water and vinegar. So, to recap: that's chicken breasts, water, Worcestershire sauce, vinegar, and cumin.

You put it all in the Crock Pot for 6 hours on LOW, or 3-4 hours on HIGH. Not Your Mother's Slow Cooker Cookbook says the formula is 1 hour on HIGH equals 2-2.5 hours on LOW. When figuring out how much time you need, bear in mind that there is another hour of cooking required beyond this initial time.

So, I set my slow cooker to HIGH for 4 hours.


Also, how low-budget is my cooking show? Was the best we could do a stained Crock Pot with the knob broken off the lid?

So, you have four hours. During those four hours, you could clean the rest of your house, wash cat vomit off your comforter, swim 2,000 yards, and go to Target intending to buy a few things but walking out with $150 worth of stuff.

However, since this is only a half-hour show, we're going to pull out another batch that we already cooked for four hours. This is known in the business as a "swap-out."

We also drained the juices out of the pot, shredded the chicken breasts using two forks, and stirred in barbecue sauce.


Now you need to cook it for an additional hour on LOW. During this time, you can prepare fancy gourmet side dishes, like this:



Or this:


And look! Our chicken is ready! Serve it on toasted hamburger buns.

Mmm, delicious! Thanks for watching, and join us again next time for another episode of Slow Cooking With Shannon!


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Slow Cooker Chicken Barbecue

Note: For the preparation above, I cut this recipe in half. The original recipe below makes a lot of chicken.

4 pounds boneless, skinless chicken breasts
3/4 cup water
3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
3 tablespoons vinegar (any kind)
1 teaspoon cumin
28 ounces barbecue sauce

Put everything except the barbecue sauce in the slow cooker for 6 hours on LOW or 3-4 hours on HIGH. Drain juices and shred chicken using two forks. Pour in barbecue sauce, stir, and cook on LOW for 1 hour. Serve on buns.