Slow Cooker Cranberry Chicken with Homemade Catalina Dressing

I needed an easy dish for Easter Sunday yesterday other than ham. For one thing, my daughter and her family were going to another Easter dinner later that day which surely would feature ham as the main entree.  I resorted to using chicken and my trusty slow cooker so I could just dump the ingredients and forget it. I still had shrimp scampi over linguini and ham broccoli quiche to prepare so this approach was a lifesaver.

This dish turned out to be not only convenient to prepare but a crowd pleaser. It uses only four ingredients and if you do not have the Catalina dressing, I am providing a homemade version using stuff you have in your pantry. I got the recipe in the web and tweaked it by skipping the oil listed but you can add it if you want.

Cranberry Chicken with Homemade Catalina Dressing

Adapted from this source

• 3 lb chicken  thighs or breasts
• 1-16 oz can whole cranberry sauce
• 1 cup Catalina dressing (store bought Kraft brand or homemade see recipe below)
• 1 envelope dry onion soup mix

Place all the ingredients in the crock pot and cook for 3 hours on high setting or 6 hours on low. I cooked mine in an Aroma brand rice cooker/slow cooker for 2 hours at slow cooker setting.

Homemade Catalina Dressing

Adapted from this recipe

• 1/4 cup catsup
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup red wine vinegar
• 1/4 cup onion, chopped finely
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 1/4 tsp Worcestershire sauce
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1/2 cup oil (optional)

Place all the ingredients in a small bowl and whisk till blended or you can use your blender.