Slow Cooker African Peanut Stew
African Peanut stew is a delicious and flavorful chicken recipe the whole family will love. Chicken thighs are cooked in the slow cooker with a tomato and peanut butter based sauce and plenty of warm spices until they are fragrant and fall apart tender. Serve with rice.
African peanut stew is a recipe that comes from West Africa. Traditionally it is quite spicy (but oh so delicious), but I reduced the heat factor in this recipe to make it more enjoyable for my kids to eat.
This is such a fantastic meal! If you like this, be sure to check out our other kid friendly African recipes, including my absolute favorite meal ever, Bobotie! My kids also really like Beef Pilau, which is such a comforting meal all year long.
This recipe is perfect for when you need an easy slow cooker meal. Chop an onion, add the chicken, make a sauce,and cook! Add in some rice and you have an easy meal with lovely flavors that is ready with almost no work at all!
How to make African peanut stew in the slow cooker
This recipe is simple to make! For the full set of directions, please scroll down to the recipe card below. This is just a general overview on how to make it to help you plan.
- In the bottom of the slow cooker, add the oil and chopped onion.
- Place the boneless skinless chicken thighs on top of the onions.
- In a medium sized mixing bowl, mix together the crushed tomatoes, peanut butter, garlic, ginger, paprika and pepper.
- Pour the sauce over the chicken.
- Place the lid on the slow cooker and turn it on to low heat.
- Cook for 7 hours on low or 4 hours on high.
- When done, shred the chicken with a fork.
- Serve with cooked rice, and garnish with roasted peanuts and chopped parsley.
Timing of this recipe
This recipe does not take a lot of prep work at all. It will take you about:
- 10-15 minutes to put everything into the slow cooker in the morning
- 7 hours on low to cook (or 4 hours on high)
- Just a few minutes to shred the chicken
Note: I did not add rice to this timing because you can cook it while the chicken finishes cooking, or you can use microwave ready rice that is ready in 90 seconds.
Prepping ahead of time
This recipe is fairly quick to throw together, but if you need it to be faster, here are some ways you can make this meal even quicker:
- Use pre-chopped fresh or frozen onion.
- Mix the sauce the night before and store it in the fridge until ready to use.
- Use microwave ready rice.
How to serve this to your family
Serve this chicken stew with rice. We added dry roasted peanuts and chopped parsley to ours, and these are fun additions that kids can sprinkle onto their own plates as they see fit.
How to make this kid friendly
This meal has tender chicken with a mild flavored sauce and fun toppings, which makes it a great meal to serve to kids. If your kids need some extra encouragement to taste it, try adding in some of the following dinner conversations and inviting the kids into the kitchen to help you cook.
Dinner conversations with kids
How we talk about food plays an important role in how willing our kids are to try something new. Try these conversation starters to encourage your children to be more open minded about this meal.
- This chicken stew has peanut butter in it! Can you taste it? What other meals have we had that include peanut butter?
- What else could we serve this meal with besides plain rice? What do you think we could pair it with that would be good?
- This recipe is from West Africa – can you think of any other recipes we have tried from Africa?
Read more about how to explore the sense of taste with your kids.
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Slow Cooker African Peanut Stew
Ingredients
- 1 Tablespoon olive oil
- 1 yellow onion chopped
- 2 lb boneless skinless chicken thighs
- 15 ounce crushed tomatoes
- ½ cup peanut butter
- 4 garlic cloves minced
- 1 teaspoon ginger minced
- 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
- ½ teaspoon ground black pepper
- 3 Tablespoons fresh parsley chopped
Instructions
- In the bottom of the slow cooker, add the oil and chopped onion.
- Place the boneless skinless chicken thighs on top of the onions.
- In a medium sized mixing bowl, mix together the crushed tomatoes, peanut butter, garlic, ginger, paprika and pepper.
- Pour the sauce over the chicken.
- Place the lid on the slow cooker and turn it on to low heat.
- Cook for 7 hours on low or 4 hours on high.
- When done, shred the chicken with a fork.
- Serve with cooked rice, and garnish with roasted peanuts and chopped parsley.
