Slow Cooker Chicken Wings simmered in a savory Japanese broth are amazingly fall-off-the-bone tender. Cooking low and slow gives you plenty of hands-off time with surprisingly moist and delicious results.
I’m finally joining the slow cooker bandwagon! Many friends in the US have a slow cooker in their kitchen and they’ve been telling me to get one. However slow cookers are not common in Japan and I did not grow up using them. Maybe it’s because most kitchens are quite small and there is no space for another small appliance.
I received my slow cooker a few months ago and I’ve been testing out Japanese recipes with it and it’s been fun, and amazingly easy! Today I’ll share this Slow Cooker Chicken Wings and Daikon (鶏手羽と大根の煮物).
Making Nimono With A Slow Cooker
In Japan, simmered dishes are called Nimono (煮物) and a typical home-cooked meal usually includes one or more nimono dishes. For simmered dishes that contain both vegetables and meat, we usually cook for 20-30 minutes at most. Sometimes people do use a pressure cooker to cook ingredients “faster” but we don’t really cook them “slowly.”
Before using the slow cooker to test out recipes, I had one big concern about cooking Japanese food in a slow cooker. Will the ingredients become too salty being cooked for such a long time?
For Japanese cuisine, one of the fundamentals is that the taste of the ingredients themselves is very important. We tend to be careful not to overcook the fresh ingredients and not to overpower the original taste of ingredients. Due to this, Japanese food can be considered “bland” for some people especially if you’re used to seasoning food with lots of spices and seasonings.
Despite my concerns, the dish didn’t come out too salty. The chicken wings were really tender and the meat came off the bone very easily after cooking for 5 hours. The daikon was also very tender, yet still kept its shape in the pot and absorbed all the umami juice coming from the chicken and dashi.
If you don’t own a slow cooker, you can simply simmer the ingredients in a regular pot for 20-30 minutes. The meat will not come off the bone, but it’s still delicious and it’s one of my favorite simmered dishes!
What Slow Cooker Do I Use:
If you are wondering what slow cooker I own, I received this IP-DUO60 from the Instant Pot.
It has both a slow cooker and a pressure cooker function. I was hesitant to get it but Mr. JOC heard from co-workers saying they loved this particular model and use it almost daily. Here are my favorite things about this slow cooker so far:
- It has an electric timer, so I can set it and not worry about it.
- There are different modes built-in, including saute so I can brown the meats and ingredients directly inside the pot without using my stove.
- Fairly easy to clean up, just throw the pot and small parts into the dishwasher and wash the lid by hand.
- It also has a pressure cooking function, which I have yet to test.
Ingredients Substitutions
For this dish, you can make it vegetarian or vegan by omitting chicken and egg (for vegan) and replacing them with all kinds of root vegetables such as carrots, radishes, turnips, etc. If you want to add leafy or soft vegetables, add them toward the end of cooking so you won’t overcook them.
In Japan, this particular dish always includes both chicken wings and daikon. You can use other types of meat if you like. Daikon can be found in Japanese grocery stores as well as other Asian grocery stores, especially Chinese and Korean ones. Daikon releases moisture while being cooked, and absorbs all the flavors back so it’s a perfect ingredient for all kinds of Japanese simmered dishes. Try finding daikon for this dish, but if you still can’t find it, you can replace it with other root vegetables of your choice.
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Slow Cooker Chicken Wings
Video
Ingredients
- 1 lb daikon radish (about ½ daikon)
- 1 knob ginger (1 inch, 2.5 cm)
- ¼ tsp Diamond Crystal kosher salt (for blanching the daikon leaves)
- 1 Tbsp neutral oil
- 9 pieces chicken wings (flats/drumettes) (patted dry with a paper towel)
- ½ cup water
- 2 hard-boiled eggs (peeled)
Instructions
- Gather all the ingredients. For a slow cooker, I used my 6 QT Instant Pot. If you don’t own a slow cooker, you can simply simmer the ingredients in a regular pot for 20–30 minutes, let cool for a couple of hours while the ingredients absorb all the flavors, and then reheat again to serve.
- Peel 1 lb daikon radish and cut into rounds ½ inch (1.3 cm) thick. Peel 1 knob ginger and slice thinly.
- If the green leaves are still attached to your daikon, cut it into 2-inch pieces and blanch in salted water (just sprinkle ¼ tsp Diamond Crystal kosher salt in some boiling water before adding the leaves). When the leaves are tender, take them out and soak in ice water to stop cooking further.
- Add 1 Tbsp neutral oil to the inner pot of the slow cooker and brown 9 pieces chicken wings (flats/drumettes) thoroughly.
- Add the sliced daikon and ginger to the pot.
- Add the seasonings: 3 Tbsp sake, 1 Tbsp sugar, 2 Tbsp mirin, 3 Tbsp soy sauce.
- Add ½ cup water and 2 hard-boiled eggs (peeled). Set the slow cook timer for 5 hours.
- After cooking for 5 hours, the chicken is done. Serve the chicken wings, daikon, and eggs along with the blanched daikon leaves.
Hello, and thank you for this recipe. I was planning on making it; have you tried doing it under pressure? I’m the opposite of you: I’ve never used my Instant Pot as a slow-cooker, only for pressure cooking, as I find that for most (but not every) dish, pressure cooking yields better results.
Hi, Scott! Thank you for reading Nami’s post and trying her recipe.
We have not tested this dish with the pressure cooking method, but it should work. The cooking time will be approximately 10-15 minutes.
If you give it a try, please let us know how it goes.
OK, I’ve given it a try. First, I doubled the recipe, because I had a huge daikon from my farm share. I seared the wings in two batches, to ensure they fit, then made as directed. I didn’t have sake so I used Chinese cooking wine. 13 minute pressure cook (middle of the suggested range), then natural pressure release. It came out well, though somewhat salty (for my lower-salt tastes)–presumably a consequence of the cooking wine.
So I went out and bought a decent sake to make a batch with the last third of the daikon (like I said, it was HUGE). I cooked it a bit shorter–12 minutes, and I opened the vent before it had released on its own. This was an improvement on try #1–more texture to the radish and the seasoning was just right.
Hello, Scott! Aww. Thank you very much for sharing your experience in detail!
We’re happy the pressure cooker method worked nicely! Happy cooking!
Do you have to brown the chicken first or can you go straight to slow cooking?
Hello, Chika! Thank you for trying Nami’s recipe!
We recommend browning the chicken first to give the dish more flavor depth. It also makes a difference in the texture of the meat. We hope this helps!
This was delicious! Thank you!! A lot of sauce was still left in the end , do you have an advice on how I could use it? 🙂
Hi Nadine, Thank you so much for trying Nami’s recipe and for your kind feedback!
You may add boiled potatoes or eggs to the sauce and simmer them, or cook Yasai Itame and use the sauce.
https://www.justonecookbook.com/stir-fry-vegetables/
We hope you like it!
For your Slow Cooker Chicken Wings and Daikon recipe, what setting on the slow cooker do you use? Low or high for 5 hours? Can I substitute the wings for boneless thighs?
Hi Audrey! Thank you for trying Nami’s recipe!
Nami used the “normal” setting on her Instant Pot, which is equivalent to the “low” setting on a traditional slow cooker.
As for another type of meat, bone-in thighs are recommended for more flavor, but boneless thighs will also work. If you try it, please check the meat and adjust the cooking time as needed.
We hope this helps!
Hi Nami, if I don’t have an instant cooker, is it possible to use a Thermal pot for this recipe? Thank you!
Hello, Serene. Thank you for taking the time to read Nami’s post and try her recipe!
Yes, you can use it if your thermal pot can cook at a low temperature for 5 hours.
We hope this was helpful!
Hi Nami,
I had daikon and was looking for a new recipe to use it in. Found this recipe. I don’t have an Instant Pot (but am planning to buy one now), so I used my Dutch Oven. I also did not have chicken wings, so I used two smaller chicken breasts, which I sliced up. Followed your instructions by simmering for 30 minutes, then letting it cool for several hours before reheating to serve. Turned out wonderfully. Chicken pieces and daikon were so tender and flavorful!
Thank you for your wonderful recipes!.
Hi Marsha, Thank you very much for trying Nami’s recipe and sharing your cooking experience with us.
Nami and JOC team are so happy to hear it turned out wonderfully. Thank you for your kind feedback.
Hi Nami,
Thank you for the wonderful recipes. I wanted to try this recipe but I don’t have a daikon so I asked my local grocery and they recommended mooli. The mooli seems to be a slimmer version of Daikon. However, after we have cooked this recipe with mooli, there seems to be a very strong bitter taste which seems to came from the mooli. I wonder if this bitter taste is an intrinsic taste of this dish or it is just my mooli is bad? Thank you.
Hi Wiliam! Yeah, from reading online, it seems like it’s a similar vegetable. But even Daikon, if you don’t get a good one, it can be quite bitter. I usually make sure daikon is fresh, more green color on top (sweeter) and avoid using tip area (tends to be bitter). When you use good daikon, it tastes juicy, and even sweeter.
I just googled and found an interesting article. It’s due to the soil that gives stress to the daikon which cause bitter daikon!
http://minnano-mag.jp/konosa_thema/konosa-72-daikon.html (Use chrome to translate to English)
So I’d say it’s probably same for this mooli… maybe this mooli was raised in stressful condition (hard soil).
Hello. I really enjoy your recipes. I don’t have a slow cooker. I wanted to know if it’s possible to do the first part in a pan and the rest in a rice cooker?
Hi Johanna! Thank you so much! I think you can… or just make this in a pot on low heat. 🙂