Crispy Chicken Thighs with White Beans & Tomatoes

Crispy Chicken Thighs with White Beans & Tomatoes

This recipe for crispy chicken thighs with white beans is an easy one pot meal that delivers on flavor and nutrition.

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A stainless steel pan with crispy chicken thighs with white beans, tomatoes and spinach on a wooden table with a wooden spoon sticking out of it.

Easy One Pot Weeknight Meal

Everyone loves a good one pot meal and this Crispy Chicken Thighs with White Beans and Tomatoes is just that. This meal comes together very quickly. The only time you really need to pay attention to is when you are browning the chicken thighs. After that, it’s just time in the oven and only 20 minutes at that. That’s just enough time for you to clean up your work space, leaving you just one pot to wash at the end. Everyone also loves just one pot to clean up! 

Chicken thighs browned in a stainless steel saute pan.

How to Get Crispy Chicken Thighs

Time. Time is the answer when you want crispy chicken skin. We are sometimes overly attentive when we’re working on the stove. We turn things, flip things, check on things, move things around. Try not to. Just leave the chicken, skin side down in the pan for a good 8 to 10 minutes. Let the chicken brown properly. That is the first step in getting crispy chicken thighs. The next step is to make sure that you just rest the chicken on top of the beans when you send it to the oven. The skin of the chicken should be above any moisture and able to continue browning and crisping in the oven. Do these two things, and you’ll have crispy chicken.

Chicken thighs with white beans and tomatoes before being baked.

Canned Beans versus Home-Cooked Beans

You’ll notice that this recipe calls for using the liquid in the canned beans. This is really up to you, but here are my thoughts. The liquid that beans cook in is delicious. Now, I say that because when you cook dried beans, the bean liquor is delicious. I also try to purchase good quality canned beans and I always taste the liquid inside the can before adding it to any recipe. (After all, you should like all your ingredients that you put in your foods.) If you taste the bean liquid in your canned beans and don’t like it, don’t use it. Instead, drain the beans, put them back in the can and fill the can with either chicken stock or water. Add that to this recipe. I will also mention, however, that bean liquor has a thicker consistency to just stock or water and helps to give this recipe body. 

Two plates of chicken thighs with white beans and tomatoes on a wooden table with a saute pan, wine glass and bottle of wine.

How to Serve

Being a one pot recipe, this is also a one plate dinner! Put one or two chicken thighs on a bed of the beans, tomatoes and spinach and scatter some of the crispy bacon on top (if you like, but who doesn’t like??). You could serve it with a side salad or a piece of crusty bread to sop up the sauce. Easy. Then, go clean that one pot!

Looking down on a white plate and a saute pan both with chicken thighs with white beans and tomatoes in it.
 

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Crispy Chicken Thighs with White Beans, Tomatoes & Spinach

Nutrition Info Print Recipe
  • Prep Time: 10 m
  • Cook Time: 35 m
  • Total Time: 45 m
  • Servings:
    4
    people

Ingredients

  • 4 rashers bacon chopped
  • 2½ pounds bone-in skin-on chicken thighs (8 small thighs)
  • Salt and freshly ground black pepper
  • olive oil
  • 1 onion sliced
  • 3 to 4 cloves garlic smashed
  • 1 to 2 sprigs rosemary
  • ¼ cup dry vermouth or white wine
  • 2 15-ounce cans white beans (do not drain)
  • ½ cup chicken stock
  • 1 cup cherry tomatoes
  • 2 to 3 cups baby spinach

Instructions

  1. Pre-heat the oven to 425˚F.
  2. Cook the chopped bacon in a large sauté pan over medium heat until crispy. Remove the crisped bacon to a side plate, leaving at least 2 tablespoons of bacon fat in the pan.
  3. Season the chicken thighs with salt and freshly ground black pepper and place them skin side down in the pan. Brown well on one side in the bacon fat over medium-high heat – about 8 to 10 minutes. Resist the urge to move them or check on the browning, but let them get very brown. Remove the chicken from the pan and set aside.
  4. Add the onion to pan and sauté until it start to brown slightly – about 5 minutes. Add the garlic cloves and rosemary and continue to sauté for about a minute. Pour in the vermouth or white wine and deglaze the bottom of the pan by scraping with a flat spatula.
  5. Add the white beans to the pan (including the bean liquor from the can), along with the chicken stock. Return the chicken thighs to the pan, resting them on top of the beans, and scatter in the cherry tomatoes.
  6. Transfer the pan, uncovered, to the oven for 20 minutes.
  7. Remove the pan from the oven (remember that it is very hot) and remove the sprig of rosemary (and garlic cloves if you can find them). Remove the chicken thighs to a plate to rest for a few minutes and stir in the spinach to wilt.
  8. Serve the chicken thighs over a bed of the white beans with tomatoes and spinach. Scatter the crispy bacon on top.
Enjoy,
If you made this recipe, please add your comments and ratings below.

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Comments (7)Post a Reply

    1. Hi Kelley,
      Yes, this recipe is gluten free. Since I don’t specialize in gluten free cooking, I don’t always mark my recipes as such, but I do have a collection on my website of gluten free recipes. If you look at the recipe tab, you can select the “gluten free” collection.
      ML

      Reply

  2. Could you please give some advice about replacing the canned beans and liquid with prepared dry beans? Since my husband’s heart surgery, I’ve been hydrating and cooking dry beans for my recipes to avoid the sodium in canned products. Thanks so much!

    Reply

    1. Hi Karen,
      I would cook the dried beans on their own and then add the cooked beans along with some of their (even more delicious) bean liquor. I like to cook dried beans in lots of water with a halved onion, a quartered carrot and some halved celery (very large chunks of vegetables like this are easier to remove at the end of cooking), a bay leaf or two and some fresh herbs (like thyme, parsley). You can soak the beans ahead of time if you like, or just cook them in one go for longer. They will be done when tender to the bite – 45 minutes to 2 hours, depending on whether you soak them, how old they are, etc… Add about ½ to 1 cup of bean liquor.

      Reply

  3. 5 stars
    This is without a doubt a very, very flavorful one pot meal. I did add more garlic than the recipe called for and totally forgot the cherry tomatoes but remembered the spinach! That chicken was so moist and tender and for canned beans….amazing and I used cannellini beans. Adding my homemade French bread, toasted and spread with garlic butter really hit the spot tonight!

    Reply

  4. I’ve commented on this recipe before…..we LOVED IT…. but I wanted to tell you that I sent my 40 year old grandson a picture of the finished dish and he asked for the recipe. So I sent him the link to your website…

    Reply

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