Dinner just got a whole lot easier! Meet your new favorite weeknight slow cooker meal: my Light Slow Cooker Florentine Chicken. This recipe features chicken breast slow cooked with shallots and red pepper strips for three hours. Half & half and parmesan cheese combine to create a decadent sauce you can’t get enough of. Fresh spinach ties it all together, leaving you with a home cooked meal that feels like it’s straight out of your favorite restaurant! Serve over pasta or with mashed potatoes for the perfect dish your whole family will love.
All about my Light Slow Cooker Florentine Chicken
Slow cooker meals are some of my most-loved and most-requested recipes. I get why you all love them–I do too! They’re easy to put together, make for less dishes to clean, and you can set them to cook while you take care of the other responsibilities in your busy lives.
However, as I’ve said before, I have a love/hate relationship with the slow cooker. There’s a fine line between a delicious well-cooked meal and mushy, sloppy mess. You can trust that my slow cooker recipes will do well texturally. I’m picky about flavor and texture myself, so I would never share a recipe before I thought the texture was perfect. In most of my other slow cooker recipes like my Slow Cooker Teriyaki Chicken and Slow Cooker Pulled BBQ Chicken I opted to shred the chicken. This Light Slow Cooker Florentine Chicken is great as is. You’re sure to have a meal that is tender, flavorful, and complimented well by the sauce, spinach, and roasted red pepper strips.
What you’ll need to make Light Slow Cooker Florentine Chicken
Here is everything you need to make this slow cooker recipe:
- Chicken breast
- You should aim to have 4 full chicken breasts, so that each serving gets one piece.
- Paprika
- Garlic powder
- Onion powder
- Kosher salt
- Dried oregano
- Dried basil
- Fresh cracked pepper
- Shallot
- Roasted red pepper strips (packed in water)
- Like the ones I’ve linked here
- You can also use roasted red peppers packed in water, and chop them yourself.
- Chicken broth
- I do not use reduced sodium for this recipe. If you do use reduced sodium, you might have to add more salt to taste later on.
- Fresh spinach leaves
- Half & half
- Parmesan cheese (grated)
- Corn starch
- Fresh parsley (chopped)
- Fresh basil (chopped)
How to make this recipe
Start by combining your spices together. Once you’ve created this spice blend, season the chicken on all sides. Place the chicken breasts on the bottom of the slow cooker. Slice the shallot and add it on top of the chicken with the red pepper strips. Pour the chicken broth over the ingredients in the slow cooker.
Cook on HIGH for 3 hours.
After 3 hours, remove the chicken from the slow cooker. Once the chicken is removed, stir in the half & half and parmesan cheese. Combine the corn starch with the water to form a slurry and pour that in. Stir to combine.
Place the chicken back in the slow cooker. Now, you can add in the spinach.
Cook for another 30 minutes on HIGH. Finish with fresh chopped parsley and basil. Taste for seasoning.
Light Slow Cooker Florentine Chicken
Equipment
- slow cooker or crock pot
Ingredients
- 2 lbs chicken breast, 4 chicken breasts
- 1 tsp paprika
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1 tsp kosher salt
- 1 tsp dried oregano
- 1 tsp dried basil
- fresh cracker pepper, to taste
- 1 shallot, sliced
- 1 cup roasted red pepper strips, packed in water
- 1/2 cup chicken broth
- 6 oz fresh spinach leaves
- 1 cup half and half
- 1/3 cup parmesan cheese, grated
- 2 tbsp corn starch
- 2 tbsp water
- 2 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped
- 2 tbsp fresh basil, chopped
Instructions
- Combine the spices together, and then season the chicken on all sides with the spice blend.
- Place the chicken breasts at the bottom of the slow cooker.
- Slice the shallot and add it on top of the chicken with the red pepper strips, and pour the chicken broth over.
- Cook on HIGH for 3 hours
- After 3 hours, remove the chicken from the crockpot.
- Stir in the half and half and parmesan cheese.
- Combine the corn starch with the water to form a slurry and pour that in.
- Stir to combine, and then add the chicken back in and the fresh spinach.
- Cook for another half hour on HIGH.
- Finish with the fresh chopped parsley and basil.
- Optional: serve over pasta or with mashed potatoes and a vegetable.
Weight Watchers
Notes
- 5 WW points
Nutrition
Love a slow cooker meal? Me too! Try one of my other easy slow cooker recipes that make dinner time a breeze:
- Slow Cooker Buffalo Chicken Sliders with Pickle Slaw
- Healthy Slow Cooker General Tso’s Chicken
- Slow Cooker French Dip Sandwiches
- Slow Cooker Shredded Beef
And if you are looking for something a little sweet and perfect for Fall, meal prep my Apple Pie Filling for the perfect addition to any oatmeal or yogurt bowl! Also made in the slow cooker, this recipe is beyond easy to prepare, cooks itself, and makes your entire home smell like fall.
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Can you cook on low for longer?
This was easy and delicious!
Yes! I cooked it on low all day while I was at work!
I made it tonight for dinner. I cooked it on low for 6 hours. It was delicious! I’ll be adding this to the dinner rotation.
This is such a tasty and easy recipe! I served it over mashed potatoes with green beans on the side. Will make again!
Another fabulous recipe! Loved it. Thanks Steph.
I think my chicken pieces were too thick so I ended up shredding some of the thicker ones however, we enjoyed this meal overall. I served over rice along with some extra spinach. I would make this again. Thank you always for new ideas!
This was absolutely amazing, so flavorful
This was SO good. It took almost no prep time and made for the perfect weeknight meal on a busy day. The sauce is unbelievably good. So flavorful and complex for such little cook time. Highly recommend!
Hi, I plan on making this tonight and I was wondering if you can freeze the left overs and if so how would you heat it up?
I made this in my instant pot and had to add an extra 1/2 cup of broth in order for it to work this way. (I cooked 15mins at high pressure and did a natural release, then I cooked 30min on slow cook for the final steps) It tasted great but was admittedly very soupy with our mashed potatoes. Leftover portions are becoming just that — a soup! I shredded the chicken and will add a small amount of cooked noodles to the “broth”. Thanks for the recipe!
Creamy, filling and healthy! That’s a winner!!!!
So YUMMY!!!!!!
The flavor in this chicken recipe is incredible! Made this for the first time and my husband raved about it! So good and so easy to make! Thanks for another great recipe.
The sauce for this is really good!! It’s really
Simple to make and restaurant quality.
This was delicious and easy!! I was able to put this up after work and had a great meal for dinner!! Served this over pasta for my husband and I had it with some roasted potatoes.
Bland…wanted to love it, but didn’t.
If you’re strapped for time can this be done in an instant pot? Or you think it best to be done in the slow cooker?? Love your stuff! 😁
The texture of the chicken was great, and I thought it was fairly easy to make. I do think, however, that it needs more flavor! Maybe a couple of tablespoons of butter and/or a little more garlic would be nice.
Rave reviews from my whole family on flavor! My sauce didn’t thicken up though, any tips on that?
This is sooo good! I shredded the chicken and added mushrooms and artichokes too