Chicken Cacciatore: A Healthy, One-Pot Meal
Spend less time washing dishes with this heart-healthy stew.

Every family has their easy chicken recipes for a quick weeknight dinner, but it’s easy to get stuck recycling the same go-to meals. Instead of roasting an herbed chicken breast for the third time this month, consider trying this saucy, flavorful chicken cacciatore.
In this episode of To Eat With Love, our Mediterranean diet cooking show, nutritionist Fiorella DiCarlo, RD, CDN, cooks an Italian chicken cacciatore, which is a traditional peasant dish with a sauce made of onion, garlic, tomato, and herbs. There are other forms of cacciatore, such as rabbit, but chicken is the most popular version, especially in the United States.
For this chicken cacciatore recipe, use a whole chicken. Although white meat is known for being lower in fat than the dark meat, the thigh and leg contains higher levels of healthy minerals such as iron and zinc. To lower the fat, consider removing the chicken skin before cooking.
You’ll then dredge the chicken pieces in flour and black pepper. You can use your preferred flour, so consider a whole wheat flour to increase the fiber content, or almond or brown rice flour if you need your recipe to be gluten free. One trick to dredge with ease is by combining the ingredients in a large plastic bag. With a few shakes, you’ll dredge every piece at once!
Next, sear the chicken in a hot pan of olive oil, which is a staple of the heart-healthy Mediterranean diet. Avoid moving, flipping, or turning the meat repeatedly; instead, let each side sit undisturbed in the pan until it has formed a true golden sear before flipping to the other side. After each side has seared, let it rest on a paper towel to remove any excess grease.
The sauce is cooked in the same pan. This not only makes one fewer dish to wash, but the sauce will now by infused by the flavor left behind from the chicken! Onion, green bell peppers, and garlic form an aromatic base for the sauce.
Then, the chicken is added back to the pan so it can continue cooking with those flavorful veggies. For the tomatoes, you can use a diced, crushed, or pureed version, but if you use canned tomatoes, look for low sodium brands. To give this chicken cacciatore sauce its signature Italian flavor, finish with a sprinkle of oregano and a bit of white wine.
The last ingredient is meaty, fiber-packed mushrooms. White button mushrooms are typically the cheapest and easiest to find, but cremini (also called baby bella) mushrooms are another popular choice. If you’re serving picky eaters, try chopping the mushrooms a little smaller—it makes them less intimidating.
After a little more simmering, this Italian chicken cacciatore is ready to serve! This stew can be served as is, or you can try it on a bed of whole-wheat pasta or zucchini noodles.
Ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour for coating
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 (4 pound) chicken breast and thighs, cut into pieces
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 1 onion, chopped
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 green bell pepper, chopped
- 1 (14.5 ounce) can diced tomatoes
- 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1/2 cup white wine
- 2 cups fresh mushrooms, quartered
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
1. Combine the flour, salt and pepper in a plastic bag. Shake the chicken pieces in flour until coated. 2. Heat the oil in a large skillet (one that has a cover/lid). Fry the chicken pieces until they are browned on both sides. Remove from skillet. 3. Add the onion, garlic and bell pepper to the skillet and saute until the onion is slightly browned. Return the chicken to the skillet and add the tomatoes, oregano and wine. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes over medium low heat. 4. Add the mushrooms and salt and pepper to taste. Simmer for 10 more minutes.Nutrition Information
Nutrition Information Based on a Single Serving
*Percent Daily Value are based on a 2000 calorie diet. Your daily value may be higher or lower depending on your calorie needs.
Dietary Needs



Fiorella DiCarlo is a registered dietitian in New York City.
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Today, we're cooking Mediterranean
peasant food at its best,
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chicken cacciatore huntsmen style.
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[MUSIC]
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And so what I have here is
a whole cut up chicken.
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And why this is amazing is because you
don't want to limit yourself only to
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the breast of the chicken because the
bottom part of the chicken, the legs and
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the thighs are filled with iron and
zinc, not as much in the breast.
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Because that's the most oxygenated
part of the bird, right?
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So these are very, very good for you.
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So, in this recipe I'm leaving the skin
on just to keep it crispy, but
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to lower the fat content of this meal
overall, you can take off the skin.
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What we're going to do is we're
gonna do a little shake and bake and
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we're gonna put our flour.
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And this is regular flour here.
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But you can also put almond flour or
buckwheat flour or
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whole grain flour as well to
reduce blood sugar level spikes.
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And some pepper, as well.
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All right, so we're gonna shake this
baby up just to get it all together.
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And we're gonna go ahead and
start dredging this chicken.
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Now, you can also do it
without the flour altogether.
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And you can just sear it in a pan.
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You can sear it in a pan with oil
just to get it brown that way,
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then start your recipe from there.
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I want to get this guy here, all right.
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There you go, it's nice and dredgy.
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There you go, all right.
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So, now we're going to go ahead we have
a little bit of heated pan going on here.
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And we're going to put our extra
virgin olive oil in to coat the pan.
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And Mediterranean diet is filled
with extra virgin olive oil.
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It is the main fat that they use,
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which is great because it's
monounsaturated fat, has lots of omega-3s,
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and it's gonna be a great accompaniment
to this very, very healthy meal.
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So, once this is heated here, we're gonna
get our nice little beautiful sear.
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And this is the leg here.
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As I was saying,
this has most of the iron and zinc there,
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which is great because we need
iron to boost our immune system.
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We need it for energy.
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Good iron in your diet also allows for
good mental health and
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lots of power packed protein, of course,
in this chicken, which is great.
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There we are, perfect.
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This is a high protein meal, and it's
great for stabilizing blood sugar levels.
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Cacciatore means huntsman, and it is
a really big dish in peasant cuisine.
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And what we're doing is taking all
of the flavors from the woods,
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the seasonal flavors from the woods,
mostly the wintertime, and
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bringing them into this meal.
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Whether it's tomatoes and
wild mushrooms and red peppers,
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and really stewing it
together into this wild game.
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[NOISE] All right, now we're gonna.
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Time to flip our chicken.
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There we are.
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And that's what we're looking for,
this beautiful brown little crust here.
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Now this is also holding in the juices for
the chicken.
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All right, so we're gonna pick up
our little crispy chicken here.
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We're going to put it on a paper towel
just to soak up some excess fat.
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Here we are, we could just have
this sitting there for a bit.
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And so, now we're going to continue with
the rest of our ingredients in this pot
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and make a wonderful one pot meal.
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We're gonna start with extra virgin
olive oil on the bottom of the pan and
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add our onions.
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There we go,
we wanna have a little sizzle like that.
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And we're going to go ahead and
cook these until they're brown.
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These onions have a lot of
antimicrobial properties and
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lower inflammation in the body, so
they're super duper heart healthy.
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So, that's why you want a lot
of these onions into your diet.
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We're gonna allow them to brown a bit.
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And also add some green bell peppers here.
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This is gonna give it a burst of color.
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And these bell peppers also have a lot
of vitamin C, and vitamin A in it,
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which also reduces a lot of oxidative
stress in the body, which helps with
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the health of your arteries, and
the cholesterol, and blood pressure.
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But it's all very,
very woodsy ingredients, very rustic and
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very peasant style.
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Now I'm gonna add also the kick of the
garlic, which has a lot of allicin in it,
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which is an enzyme and
a very strong antioxidant.
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This is great for
lowering cholesterol levels.
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And also great for blood sugar levels for
people with diabetes.
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And once it browns for about a good ten
minutes, you'll see onions turning colors.
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Now, our chicken is going
to go right back in.
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And it is going to take up all of our
flavors of these ingredients that are in
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our pan.
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And now we're going to
add our tomato sauce.
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You can do this diced, peeled,
crushed, however you like.
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This is filled with lycopene and
vitamin C, which is also great for
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blood vessels and
lowering blood sugar levels in the body.
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Because it's a natural sugar
that is in this tomato.
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Next, we're gonna add a wonderful
spice called oregano,
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which is a very huge
spice in Italian cuisine.
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It adds a kick of antioxidants.
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The essential oils in the oregano
contain omega-3 fatty acids
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which add to the healthy
content of fat in this meal.
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Next, we're going to add our white wine.
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So, we're doing it Northern-style today.
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And again,
this is very much a peasant dish.
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So, the very last ingredient that we're
going to put in is our final woodsy
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ingredient, which is the mushrooms,
and you can put any mushroom you like,
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oyster mushrooms, cremini mushrooms,
whatever you prefer.
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We want to put the mushrooms in at the end
because they need a less of a cook.
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They're filled with fiber and they're
filled with vitamin D, which is great for
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your health, for your immune system.
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This is going to sit here and
simmer for about 30 minutes.
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And this going to fall off
the bone by the time we're done.
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All right, so
our huntsman's meal is now done and
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we're gonna take our slow
cooked chicken onto our plate.
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There we are.
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And we're gonna add some seasonal
parsley over it just to give it some
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beautiful color.
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Now this is a low carb, protein packed,
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iron rich, antioxidant filled meal.
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I'm Fiorella, and I'll see you next time.
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[MUSIC]