Balsamic Chicken (for the Crock Pot!)

Quick, look out your window!  Are pigs flying by?  They should be, because ladies and gentlemen, I have found a recipe containing cooked onions that I will eat.  What kitchen concoction could create this miracle?  Read on...

Recipe: (from Crock Pot Girls)
4-6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
2 14.5 oz cans diced tomatoes
1 onion, thinly sliced (not chopped)
4 garlic cloves
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon each: dried rosemary, basil, and oregano
1/2 teaspoon thyme
ground black pepper and salt to taste

Pour the olive oil on the bottom of the pan, place the chicken breasts on top of the oil, and salt and pepper each breast.  Place onion slices on top of chicken then put in garlic cloves and dried herbs.  Pour in balsamic vinegar and top with tomatoes.  Cook on high 4 hours.  Serve over angel hair pasta.

Nutrition Information: This recipe didn't come with specific nutrition information, but I put the ingredients into the Recipe Calculator here.  Great feature!  It comes out to approximately 355 calories per serving (before adding pasta or other sides).  It doesn't contain any clearly objectionable ingredients, and there are lots of health benefits to tomatoes, garlic, and olive oil.

I didn't have any angel hair pasta, so the first night I simply served it with a side of baked sweet potatoes.

Pop on a baking sheet for approximately 40 minutes, sprinkle with cinnamon, enjoy!  So good!

For leftovers the next night, I served over regular spaghetti noodles.

Verdict:
This is a must-make-again recipe!  The chicken was so tender we almost didn't need knives.  The flavors blended well together.  It wasn't an overly heavy meal.  And the onions, you may ask?  My problem with consuming cooked onions stems mainly from their texture.  They're slimy.  And chewy.  And I can't get past that.  I understand the theory of using them to flavor the rest of the dish and willingly cook with them, but I am steadfast about picking them out very thoroughly.  In this case, the onions were almost crispy.  With a flavor identical to the rest of the food that came out of the Crock Pot and a nice crunch instead of slime, they were very edible.  Even for a life-long onion hater like myself.  Side note: while this was delicious the first night, it was not quite as good the second night.  Still edible but not something I would intentionally make a huge batch of hoping for several portions of leftovers.