It’s a bit boring and I don’t weigh anything but sure! All on a large slow cooker.
ingredients:
1 of the huge packs of whole chicken breasts from Tesco (I’ve found whole chicken breasts turn out so much nicer than diced chicken). It’s about £10 a pack - 1.6kg or something like that, I try to do 1 large chicken breast per person and a couple spare for the next day/the freezer.
1 rasher of smoked back bacon per portion
Maris piper potatoes (loads)
Fresh carrots (6 large or a loaf of small)
Tomato Puree
White pepper
Bisto beef gravy granules (ordinary not the best version)
1 x oxo Beef stock cube
Lots of Worcester Sauce
Onion Granules (if you like onions, put onions in instead - I switched to these as me and the kids hate the texture of onions but love the flavour, so were always picking bits of onion out)
Boiling water
For the dumplings;
130g Atora Suet
260g Self Raising Flour
Pinch of Salt
Water to mix
Method:
Peel and chop your potatoes into quite small chunks - the smaller you go, the better flavour they take on (but not so small they disintegrate). Fill the bottom of the slow cooker with enough for a portion for each chicken breast/person you are cooking for.
Peel the carrots and chop into small chunks rather than slicing, put these in on top of the potatoes.
If putting onion in, chop it however you prefer it and add it in.
Add the ground pepper, a shit ton of Worcester sauce, lots of tomato puree, a load of onion granules (unless you did an an actual onion) and the crumbled oxo cube. Next sprinkle a layer of gravy granules across everything.
Add in enough boiling water to start to dissolve the granules and cover your vegetables but don’t fill it.
Put your rashers of bacon individually into the slow cooker.
Place your chicken breasts into the pot on top of the veg and bacon but try not to stack them on each other, squeeze them in next to each other like they’re a lid for the veg.
If you have any space, add boiling water to fill it. Using a wooden spoon, push each chicken breast as far under the water as possible.
Turn it onto high and leave it. I only check it by opening it maybe once to stir it and add more water.
After it’s been on for around 12 hours (the longer it gets left, the better it tastes), I make the dumplings (weigh out your suet them twice as much self raising flour, add a good sprinkle of salt then add a small amount of water - give it a stir and keep adding water a small amount at a time until it is well mixed but not running and also not too dry. I use the mixing spoon to dish out small lumps (you can use your hands to make balls but I don’t bother) of mix and use a teaspoon to push it off into the casserole. I do 2 very small per person or a larger one each, plus spares for the freezer portions.
Leave the dumplings around 45 mins to cook as they do take longer in the slow cooker.
I always serve with warm crusty bread - home made if I had the time and inclination to make it early enough, but usually go for the par-baked baguettes you can buy in the supermarket. These take around 10-12 mins to bake, so I do them whilst the dumplings are cooking. Butter them up whilst warm.
Serve everything up in “pasta bowls” with the bread on the side.
If you are less fussy than me you can of course add more veg in. Swede and parsnip are good ones to add, some people like peas. My mum used to add a ton of marrow fat peas and Heinz baked beans to her casseroles as my dad loved them. The juices/sauce do help with the flavour!