Crockpot Beer Chicken

It all started several weeks ago when my boyfriend Nolan & I went grocery shopping and noticed packages of sweet rub chicken drums & thighs for $.99 a pound. Since that's a pretty good price for chicken, we bought three pounds. I wasn't exactly sure what to do with it, but eventually decided to toss it in my crockpot with a random can of American Light beer I had in my fridge.

That's the recipe. Put some chicken in a crockpot with beer & cook it on low for 10-12 hours. It's delicious. Straight out of the crockpot, it's like butter. It falls off the bone, it's all drippy & tender, yeah...

And when chicken is on sale, you can't beat cooking $3 worth of chicken with a 50 cent can of beer for multiple chicken servings. Yep, when chicken is cheap, you can't beat the price.

Speaking cheap chicken, over the next week, Nolan decided this was an excellent price for chicken and bought nine more 3 lbs packs. 10 packs X 3 lbs each = 30 lbs of chicken. We've had a lot of crockpot beer chicken lately. This is okay, because it's seriously good and very versatile. We've had wraps, enchiladas, tortilla soup, and chicken & bean soup just to name a few.

It lends well to theme and variations.

Theme- a tortilla, chicken, some lettuce/spinach/sprouts/green stuff

Variation #1- mix together some ranch dressing & hot sauce like Frank's, add to the wrap, and BOOM you have a buffalo chicken wrap

Variation #2- add Asian peanut sauce and BOOM you have an Asian chicken wrap

Variation #3- add bacon & ranch and BOOM you have a bacon-ranch chicken wrap

Variation #4- put some salsa on it and BOOM you have a Mexi-chicken wrap

Variation #5- add saurkraut & swiss cheese and BOOM you have something that might resemble a Reuben wrap (I had this for dinner tonight & it was great)

Variation #6- add hummus and BOOM you have a Mediterranean wrap. If you're super fancy, add some kalamata olives.

Variation #7- soak with ketchup and BOOM you have a Mrs. Pig's Bulk Buy wrap

Variation #8- substitute bread for the tortilla, bacon for the chicken, and use lettuce & tomato and BOOM you have a BLT. Except that's not crockpot beer chicken.

Variation #9- add mozzarella cheese & marinara sauce, make it all melty in the microwave and BOOM you have an Italian chicken wrap

Variation #10- put some other kind of amazing salad dressing on it and BOOM you have something more interesting than chicken in a tortilla

Other random tip- I've been using crockpot liners lately for easy cleanup. Once the chicken is cooked, I separate the chicken from the bones, strain the liquid left in the liner, put the bones/skin back in the bag & pitch the whole thing. Very easy.

Any other variation ideas?