Slow Cooker Roast Chicken is the juiciest, most forgiving and easiest whole chicken recipe I know. It’s such a great way to cook a whole chicken in the slow cooker that’s incredibly quick to prepare with beautiful flavours reminiscent of Greek food!
This roast chicken recipe can be slow cooked OR pressure cooked. You can serve up a Sunday Roast Chicken dinner any day of the week!
Slow Cooker Roast Chicken – A Gold Nugget Recipe
If you’re new to making a whole chicken in a slow cooker, this is going to be life changing.
No false promises! This crock pot whole chicken recipe is truly one of my gold nugget recipes. That elusive combination of quick and easy, incredibly forgiving, but in no way a compromise of a great classic Roast Chicken. Here’s why:
✅ The flesh of this chicken (even the breast) is so juicy, you’d swear it’s been brined;
✅ Ultra forgiving – Even if you go 2 hours over the cook time, it’s still juicy. The magic of slow cookers!
✅ It looks and tastes like a traditional oven roasted chicken – albeit (I kid you not) the breast meat is more tender and juicier;
✅ Various cooking options with exactly the same outcome. Slow cook on low (5 hours), high (3 hours), or pressure cook for 24 minutes.
✅ It takes less than 10 minutes to prepare to get it in the slow cooker, and you can prep ahead. Plus, the Lemon Sauce is effortless – just add cornflour/cornstarch into the slow cooker juices.
Crock pot whole chicken recipe ingredients
This is all you need for this recipe:
How to Cook a Whole Chicken in a Slow Cooker
This Lemon Garlic slow cooker whole chicken starts with an olive oil paste that’s made with lemon, garlic, salt, pepper and dried herbs of choice (I use thyme, oregano and parsley).
For maximum flavour, I put most of the paste under the skin of the chicken. This is not hard to do – and doesn’t need to be “perfect”!!! Watch the video. 🙂 Just loosen the skin using a dessert spoon (hugs the curves, avoids piercing skin).
Then spoon the paste under the skin.
Roughly spread the paste using your hands or the spoon on the surface of the skin. Doesn’t need to be perfect, the paste will slide and naturally spread as it cooks.
Pop the used lemon inside the chicken.
Place the chicken on a rack in the slow cooker (or use balls or a ring of scrunched up foil). This keeps the underside of the chicken from being submerged in liquid which makes it cook faster.
Slow cook for 5 hours on low or 3 hours on high.
Brown the skin – When the chicken comes out of the slow cooker, it will smell gorgeous but will look thoroughly unappetising – pale and colourless. Just a quick 5 to 10 minute broil/grill fixes that – you will be amazed how quickly the skin goes from bland to crispy golden brown!!!
How long does a whole chicken take in the slow cooker?
A 2kg/4lb whole chicken will take 5 hours on low, or 3 hours on high. This will be a juicy and carvable, chicken like a traditional oven Roast Chicken.
If you want one where the meat is more tender and can basically be pulled off the bone with little effort, slow cook for 7 to 8 hours on low.
Pressure Cooker / Instant Pot Option!
This Lemon Garlic Roast Chicken can also be made in a pressure cooker. It comes out exactly the same – just a heck of a lot faster! 😂 Just add 1/2 cup of water and pressure cook for 24 minutes on high. Let it depressurise naturally for 10 minutes then release the valve.
Lemon Sauce
I used to call this a gravy, but it somehow seemed odd to have a lemon flavoured gravy. So I reverted to just Lemon Sauce!
You’ll love how straight forward this is compared to usual gravies. No messing around with oily pans and cooking flour and straining. Just add cornstarch / cornflour then simmer until thickened. That’s it!
Oh the possibilities!!!
The beauty of recipes like this is that it’s easy to adapt this cooking method to make it your own. I’ve kept it straightforward because it’s an everyday roast chicken recipe.
Here are some ideas for variations:
Other dried herbs – or use fresh instead;
Add spices – or skip the herbs and use a rub instead;
Add a quartered onion and halved head of garlic (or smashed garlic cloves) under the chicken (it will make the gravy even tastier! Strain out of sauce)
Add fresh herbs and a halved head of garlic inside the chicken (you need lots of garlic to be able to taste it)
Use butter instead of oil (use more!)
OK, so that’s it from me! Longer than usual post, but I have a lot to say when it comes to this Slow Cooker Roast Chicken. 🙂 Hope you enjoy. And I’d really love to hear what you think if you try it – or how you make it your own! – Nagi x
Lemon Garlic Slow Cooker Roast Chicken
WATCH HOW TO MAKE IT
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Lemon Garlic Slow Cooker Roast Chicken
Ingredients
- 2 kg / 4 lb whole chicken , patted dry (Note 1)
Rub (Note 2):
- 1 tsp dried thyme
- 1/2 tsp dried parsley
- 1/2 tsp dried oregano
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 2.5 tbsp olive oil (or melted butter), plus extra for drizzling
- 3 garlic cloves , minced
- 1 large lemon , all zest + all juice
Lemon Sauce:
- 1 tbsp cornflour/cornstarch mixed with 1 tbsp water
- 1 extra lemon , just in case
Instructions
- Rub – Mix Rub ingredients. should be fairly thick and sludgy. Adjust with extra oil if too thick.
- Loosen Skin: Use upside spoon to loosen skin of chicken (see video). Spoon most of the Rub under the skin, leaving about 1 tbsp mostly oil for the skin. Use hands or spoon on skin to spread the paste – doesn’t need to be perfect.
- Stuff used lemon inside the chicken.
- Put rack inside slow cooker (Note 3), place chicken on top. Spread with remaining sludge, sprinkle with a pinch of salt and pepper.
- Slow cook 5 hours on low or 3 hours on high, or until juices run clear or internal temperature is 75C / 165F using a meat thermometer. (Note 4 for other cook methods)
- Brown skin: Remove chicken from slow cooker, drizzle with a bit of extra oil. Grill/broil on medium high for 5 to 10 minutes to brown the skin (~25cm /10″ from heat source). Or oven 240C/450F for 10 min.
- Spoon over pan juices, then serve with Lemon Sauce! (No need to rest chicken)
Lemon Sauce:
- Pour all slow cooker liquid into a saucepan, add cornflour / water mixture. Mix.
- Bring to simmer over medium high and cook until liquid thickens to thin syrup (depends how much liquid you have, usually 3 min or so). Adjust salt and pepper to taste, add more lemon if desired (the extra lemon). Pour into jug.
Recipe Notes:
Pressure cook – Add ½ cup water and pressure cook for 24 minutes on high (depressure naturally 10 min before releasing valve).
Oven – Follow directions in this juicy Roast Chicken recipe. 5. Slow Cooker Cook Times:
1-1.5kg / 2-3 lb – 4.5 hrs on low
1.75-2.25kg / 3.5-4.5 lb – 5 hrs on low
2.5kg / 5lb – 6 hrs on low
For almost “all apart” meat, add 1 to 2 hours onto the cook times. Flesh is still juicy! Pressure Cooker: 6 minutes per 500g/1lb of chicken. 5. Prep Ahead / Storage: Prepare chicken with rub under and on skin. Refrigerate up to 48 hours then slow cook per recipe. Cooked chicken keeps for 3 to 4 days in the fridge. 6. Nutrition per serving assumes all sauce is consumed.
Nutrition Information:
Originally published August 2014. Updated January 2019 – recipe improved, everything completely rewritten, new photos, new video. Most importantly, Life of Dozer section added! 😂 Just in case anyone is after the original recipe, here it is.
More whole chicken recipes
Life of Dozer
He was captivated by the video for this slow cooker chicken…. 😂😂😂
Oh my goodness Nagi, you have done it again, set my tastebuds drooling… absolutely delicious, the lemon adds a light and lovely flavour
I have made this a few times, in the past I’ve always cooked chicken at least 9 hours on low but this is much better. Today I have brined it to see what will happen!
Oh my! Scrumptious. The lemony saucy gravy is such a delicious finishing touch. This will be how I make roast chicken from now on.
Huge hit with everyone! My daughter and I aren’t chicken lovers so I wasn’t really expecting to love it like We did! We ALL did! And sooooo simple! And the drippings from the chicken…just amazing!
Thanks again for this unbelievably simple and super yummy dinner!!
Hi Nagi.
I made this recepie for our Sunday roast about two weeks ago and the family loved it so much I’m making it again for tonight’s meal.
Thanks.
I love a recipe on repeat! N x
Hi Nagi,
Is it ok to leave out all the lemon in this recipe? My kids are very fussy! Thank you so much for your delicious recipes! You are an excellent cook.
Sylvia
You can leave the lemon out Sylvia but I think you still need some acidity in the dish – maybe sub in 1 or 2 Tbsp of apple cider vinegar! N x
I want to serve this with your (amazing) creamy mushroom sauce, and I feel like the parsley/lemony flavour won’t go with the rich mushroom sauce so I may sub the herbs for more like a rotisserie-flavour mix… do you think it will still need the acidity or can I just do extra oil? Or I wondered whether red wine vinegar may give it a slightly more “earthy”/rich flavour compared to anything citrus ??? Glad of any advice…
Absolutely delicious chicken dinner. So juicy and tender and the gravy tasted amazing. First time roasting a whole chicken in the slow cooker which will now become my go-to recipe.
Really really yum Nagi! Great recipe.
Easy to make. The skin on the top pulled away from the breast which turned out a little dry. Good flavor! The gravy was a little bitter from the lemon on the cavity. I will leave it out next time.
What’s the temperature for slow cooking?
Is it the same as 12 hours at 100 oC ?
Yes you can slow cook in the oven at 90-100 degrees Celsius in a tightly sealed pan! N x
Hi Nagi, I’m planning this for Xmas day, I did a practice run yesterday (2kg chicken for 6 hours, 10 mins in the oven at 200 to crisp up the skin) but the breast was a little dry, tasted delicious though!
Will slow cooking for longer make it less dry? Should I put some stock in the slow cooker go help?
Kym the chicken is dry because you cooked it to long!
1.75kg -2.25kg Chicken is 5 hours per recipe instructions
Say that times for cooking anything are always estimates chicken is cooked when the cooking juices are clear.
Thank you Nagi. I never made roast chicken because I hated dealing with raw chicken and the checking of the oven. I was slightly doubtful when I saw the white chicken in the slow cooker at first, but this was so easy and tasty. What a fabulous idea! Thank you!
Thank you Nagi, could I do a boned out chicken this way or do you have any suggestions. I would like to carve with no bones. Thanks Fi
Wow. This chicken dish is super easy and full of taste… a big hit in our household tonight!
Made it in my new slow cookes & loved it even though just a little too oily. I’ll cut down on the oil next time.
This was easy to do and turned out exactly like described!
I would like to make the Slow Cooker Roast Chicken using pieces – mix of leg and breast (6). How long would I cook for?
Thank you in advance
I haven’t made this yet. Can this recipe be adapted to a 7.5 quart dutch oven? If so, what timing, temperature, etc.? I just discovered your website and I feel like Ali Baba saying “Open Sesame!” and walking in to a cave of wonders.
Love this wonderfully moist recipe.
3 hrs on high and 2 hrs low plus a good 15-20 minutes at 200C to brown – perfect Very forgiving Added mushrooms onions tomatoes carrots and gralic /chilli