sallyg said: 
Hi!
But which situation?
I tried a whole chicken in the slow cooker yesterday, with moderate success. 8 hours low, probably could have shortened that but I wasn't home to check. It was very tender, a bit bland, certainly easy, now I have few cups of broth for soup and may get to make chicken salad.
You are essentially poaching the chicken when cooking in a slow cooker - and the secret there is to poach in an already flavourful liquid. Make a simple court bouillon, then cook the chicken in it. If you've not made court bouillon, it is simple - a couple of liters of water, 1/2 liter of white wine, a chopped carrot, a chopped onion, the juice of 1/2 lemon, about a dozen black peppercorns, a bouquet garni (basically a few healthy sprigs of thyme tied together with a couple of bay leaves), the green tops of a leek if you have them (I always freeze my leek tops when using leeks in other dishes and then have them available for such uses) and a few sprigs of parsley. Bung them all together, bring to a boil, cover, reduce heat and simmer for 20 - 30 minutes. Strain, add salt to to the level that you would if it were a soup (then you need not salt the meat or fish which you poach in the bouillon) use this bouillon to then slow cook your chicken. I would think four hours would be sufficient but would check the thigh with a meat thermometer at that time. Ideally you want to keep the chicken fully submerged in the bouillon throughout cooking - you can achieve this by 'stuffing' the cavity of the bird with a great handful of flatware which can then be removed and run through the dishwasher.
The Italians would then make a salsa verde (parsley, garlic, lemon rind, olive oil, salt and pepper, roughly pureed) to drizzle over or dip the poached chicken in at table.
It is a really delicious summer dish where lighter fare is on the menu.
