Butter and Sage Chicken

My fresh herbs are growing like crazy, so it is time to start using them! This easy crock pot meal is delicious and creates a chicken that is tender and flavorful.  I'm a proponent of using likes of herbs and spices in crock pot dishes ... otherwise they all taste the same!

The end result of this recipe also provides some wonderful sweet onions ... and a couple cups of savory broth to freeze for another delicious recipe later on!  I added roasted green beans with burst cherry tomatoes ... topped with bleu cheese.  Of course, that slice of sun dried tomato bread made the meal even better!  That's a recipe you'll see another day.

Begin preparation with 3 Tablespoons of soft butter. Add the equivalent of 2 Tablespoons of chopped fresh sage leaves. I enjoy using my Pampered Chef herb shredder!  Add a teaspoon of paprika, a teaspoon of mustard seed and a teaspoon of celery seed.  Blend it all together.

To keep the chicken from swimming in broth in the bottom of the crock pot, cut 2 sweet onions - Vidalia are my favorite - in half and place them in the bottom of the pot.  I usually leave the skins on, because skins naturally color the broth and I like that!  Add 2 cups of chicken broth to the bottom of the pot.

Place the chicken on top of the onions and rub the butter combination all over the breast.  It is important for the chicken skin to be dry.  Use a paper towel to blot up any moisture.

Cook on high for 3 hours.  After the butter begins to melt, use a brush to spread the herbs over the chicken.

 

The chicken is fork tender... depending upon the weight of the chicken, it might fall off the bone after 3 hours!  Notice that nice piece of onion in the middle of this plate.  We love onions, so that is a treat!

Serve this with your favorite vegetables or add a little pasta or potato!  It is delicious.

I'll be sharing this post with a few of the parties listed in my sidebar!  Make sure you click through to see the other posts.

Royal Wedding Supper Tea Party!

I'm reposting something from the last royal wedding!  Enjoyed Harry's wedding today!

Last week's Royal Wedding was cause for celebration at my house!  I was a big follower of Princess Diana because I thought she brought a little reality to the British Monarch ... so you know I had to follow the lives of her sons.  I hosted a little supper tea party, complete with a 5-course meal that I adapted from past royal wedding meals. 

A table for six, set in the dining room.

The first thing guests saw was the engagement picture of

Prince William and Catherine.

 The centerpiece was a silk floral arrangement that picked up the colors of  the tablecloth ... all sitting on a vintage hand-crocheted table cloth bunched up in the center of the table.  Surrounding the flowers were framed pictures of past Royal weddings ... Prince William's ancestors back to Queen Victoria!  I also included a portrait of  Henry VIII and Anne Boelyn ... just for fun!

The menu featured items from past Royal Wedding reception breakfast menus.  Normally, the weddings were held in later morning, with a meal ... called breakfast ... in early afternoon.   Cumberland Sauce dates to Queen Victoria's wedding reception ... the late Queen Mother had grilled scallions at her reception ... The Queen Mother and Diana had strawberries and cream for dessert.

I used my Johnson Brothers Old Britain Castles ... and yes, that's one of the Christmas Tree plates.  Don't forget that Queen Victoria's husband, Prince Albert, introduced England to the (German) Christmas Tree!  I added some pink Depression Glass, including my cream soup bowls ... and my Fostoria Mignon stemmed glasses.   The flatware is Oneida Evening Star silverplate.  I have actual 'afternoon spoons' in that pattern ... that are intended for afternoon, tea ... so I chose it for this meal.

The favors were coasters imprinted with the wedding date, the picture and names of the bride and groom ... and the Windsor coat of arms.  Each guest also received a tiny can of English tea!  If you missed my other Royal Wedding post with all the vintage photographs, visit my home page.  I'm linking with Tablescape Thursday and Pink Saturday so make sure you click t

hrough to visit the other posts!

Royal Wedding Time!

Here's a post from the last royal wedding!  Enjoyed the one today!

Here's a little teaser!  A little pink for Pink Saturday!  Next week I'll be posting all the pictures from my Royal Wedding Supper Tea party, but this week ... just a little tease!  Make sure you click through to see all the other pink posts ... but first, take a look at my Royal Wedding post, updated with a couple wedding pictures from today.  Enjoy ... and make sure you come back next week for a full display of my royal tablescape!

It's Royal Wedding Time!  I have always enjoyed studying the British Royals and my two favorites are Queen Victoria ... because she had spunk ... and Princess Diana ... because she had spunk!   I doubt that those two women would ever have agreed on anything ... but they were both driven by what they thought was right ... "right" was probably not defined in the same ways!

The marriage of Prince William and Catherine will be an exciting time and I'm having a supper tea party to commemorate the occasion.  You'll have to check my site next weekend to see pictures of my tablescape!  Did you know that Queen Elizabeth is hosting the wedding reception and is only serving appetizers and sparkling lemonade, wine and champagne?  Typically, royal wedding receptions have included elaborate multi-course meals ... but not this time.  Why?  Maybe the menu is a reflection of the economic times all over the world.  Maybe the Queen is sensitive to the notion that being extravagant might not be appropriate.  We shouldn't  be surprised by that.  Then Princess Elizabeth was married in 1947, just two years after the end of World War II.  Great Britain was still using clothing rations and Princess Elizabeth was given 200 extra clothing coupons to use to buy her trousseau.  The coupons had been donated by young women all over Great Britain.  Queen Elizabeth understands austerity.

Did you know that Queen Victoria started the tradition of wearing white as a wedding gown?  Until that time, the color blue symbolized chastity and purity ... but she wore what she wanted to wear and dressed her attendants in white gowns that she had designed herself!  Her bouquet included orange blossoms and myrtle, which she had grown in her garden.  She married Prince (Consort) Albert in 1840.  No expense was spared for their wedding (reception) breakfast was served in early afternoon and
the menu was ten courses including Ballotine of Duck with Cumberland Sauce.

Here's the wedding portrait of Victoria and Albert's son, the future King Edward VII and the Princess Alexandra of Denmark.  The Edwardian era was a time of abundance and high fashion ... a time when the upper class splurged on everything!   Edward and Alexandra's marriage was the first Royal wedding to be photographed!

Their son, the future King George V, married Princess Victoria Mary of Teck in 1893.  The Princess was supposed to have married George's older brother who died six weeks after the original engagement was announced.  Growing closer through their grieving, George and Mary fell in love.

The 1923 wedding of next in line to the Crown was the first to be recorded on film The future King George VI (Queen Elizabeth's father) married Lady Elizabeth Bowes Lyon ... never expecting to be King.  Their traditional afternoon wedding breakfast included an elaborate menu of items named after Royals ... like fancy lamb chops named after Prince Albert!  This is a common practice!  Here they are in the official family wedding portrait ... with the King and Queen on the right.

Here's then Princess Elizabeth on her 1947 wedding day ... doing the official balcony wave!  We've grown so accustomed to seeing these sites on the balcony!  Elizabeth's trousseau might have been 'subsidized'  because of the times, but her wedding seemed to lack nothing!  Her 500 pound wedding cake was 9 feet tall!  Her bouquet included a sprig of myrtle from the bush grown for Queen Victoria's wedding bouquet over a hundred years earlier.

Finally ... here's Princess Diana.  I think Lady Di shared a sense of normalcy with the British Monarchy, but I'm not sure they wanted it!  She was a beautiful bride ... and a true humanitarian.  I think she was a great mom ... and had a magnificent influence on the two young Princes.   I suspect the future of Great Britain will tell the story we don't yet know.   Prince William seems to have a level head ... accepting his duties ... and respecting all people. 

So here he is!   The great-great-great-great grandson of Queen Victoria ... the ruler who did things her way!  It is hard not to remember those early pictures right after he was born!  What a cutie ... Now he's about to enter that next chapter of life.    I expect to see the streets lined with thousands of onlookers ... flags waiving.  I cannot wait to see Catherine walk down the aisle.  I'm
not admitting that I am a Royal-watcher ... but I certainly enjoyed watching this young man's mother.  She was true to herself ... and I want him to be just like her ... and just like Queen Victoria!  'Spunk' is the word ... do it your way!

 And here they are ... the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge ... the future King and Queen of England!