You said you were leery of putting food near her? How is she eating? Make Mr. Rooster go away, if you need to, (in a crock-pot, even the toughest old birds get tender eventually!) but mom has to have access to food and water.
I have two new mom hens, that while they were broody, were very calm and sweet, let me pick them up every day to check for new eggs and so on. Now, however, they will peck the heck out of me when I'm trying to help them get their babies back inside at dusk. They are fierce defenders of the chicks. There are actually 3 hens, (the 3rd one always tried to kill me when I checked under her) who are sharing 10 chicks. They started out with 11, but one was evidently killed in a squabble or something in the coop. Two of the hens were brooding in a large group nest, a couple of feet from each other. They had eggs due to hatch a week apart. When the first set hatched, (3 of 4 eggs hatched) both hens decided they now had 3 chicks and were done setting. I moved the abandoned eggs to another broody with eggs due the same date. They were still warm, so no problem.
Another broody, in the only "private maternity suite" that I have available, hatched hers the same day. One of them got out through a small crack, (tiny little bugger) and joined up with the other 3 chicks. I was confused about where the heck the forth chick came from, until I counted the other bunch and she now had 7 instead of 8. When I let her out of the private room, (and moved a different broody in to replace her) the whole bunch of chicks started playing "musical moms". They don't seem to care which hen they go to, and all three hens seem to be happy to take care of any or all of them.
If she's where other hens can't get in and lay eggs, you only need to check once in a while to make sure there's no broken eggs getting stinky in the nest. Otherwise, make sure her eggs are marked so you know which ones they are, and you can remove unmarked eggs daily. Some hens start to calm down about this procedure after about a week. Some don't.
If you take a good-sized pot lid with a handle, you can hold it like a shield between your hand and her beak, and while she pecks the shield, you can slip your hand under her from behind, (make sure there aren't any eggs tucked under her wings) and lift her up to have a look. I've used this tactic many times. An empty egg carton works pretty well, too.
