Crockpot Chuck Roast

I bought a 2 lbs beef chuck roast on sale but had no clue how to cook it. I knew that the crockpot would be my "safety" - so I looked for different recipes. I found several and decided to kind of combine some stuff. It turned out GREAT! The Gravy it made was a dark gravy and was really good. The meat was uber-tender too. I served it with mashed potatoes and a salad. Will definitely make this one again!

Ingredients:
2 lbs (ish) Chuck Roast
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 can of Dr. Pepper (or any dark soda I think will do)
1 packet of Lipton Onion Soup Mix (dry)
Salt, Pepper, Parsley to taste



Directions:

Season the meat with salt, pepper and parsley. Put it in the crockpot.

Dump cream of soup, soda and onion soup mix on top.... kind of stir to combine. (You could also do this in a separate bowl and then dump it all on top. Whichever you like)

Cook on low for 6 hours or so

Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Chili

http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/2009/05/sweet-potato-chili-vegan-crockpot.html

This is actually a Vegan dish, but I un-veganized it (and added more calories) by adding chopped bacon in the crockpot, then cheese and sour cream to top it off. I also added a can of black beans. It didn't taste of a chili as much as a thick stew. But put it in a sourdough breadbowl and it's a GREAT meal on a cold night. It's a pretty cheap meal too! :)

The Ingredients:

2 sweet potatoes, peeled and in 2-inch chunks
1 yellow onion, diced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 (15-ounce) can red kidney beans, drained and rinsed (or 2/3 cup dried beans, soaked overnight and boiled briskly for 10 minutes because of the freaky red bean toxin thing)
1 red bell pepper, seeded and chopped
1 (14.5-ounce) can tomatoes (whatever's on sale, mine had oregano and roasted garlic)
1 tablespoon chili powder
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
1 teaspoon chipotle chili powder
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup water
1/2 cup orange juice (If you don't have any in the house, use water)


The Directions:

Use a 5-6 quart slow cooker. This is enough food to feed a family of 4 regular-sized, or 6 smallish people. Peel and chunk the sweet potato and add to the pot. Add diced onion. Follow with the red bell pepper, can of tomatoes, the beans, garlic, and seasonings. Pour in OJ and water. Cover and cook on low for 6-8 hours, or until the onion is translucent and the sweet potato is fork-tender (if you want the sweet potato to get really squishy and disappear when stirred, cook longer).

Pork Chop Delight

A friend of mine fowarded me an e-mail FULL of crockpot recipes! I recently bought some pork chops on sale and thought that I'd take one of the recipes to cook up my chops. This was a GREAT meal, easy and really good. I actually made this the day before, then things happened and we never were able to eat it - so, instead of putting in the sour cream, I stuck it in a tupperware dish and popped it in the fridge. The next day, I just dumped the entire contents into a deep pan, let it heat up, then added the sour cream/flour mixture to cook for 15-20 minutes. It turned out just fine! We had our brother and sister over and they liked it too! The pork was nice and tender and the sauce it made was really good. I would either make rice (or mashed potatoes if you want something heavier) and veggies with it. The only FYI I would say to remember is, as with any kind of meat with bones you put in the crockpot - the meat falls offthe bone very easily. Which means bones mix in with the meat and sauce. So just be careful or maybe try to fish out the bones before you serve. It wasn't that big of a deal, but I don't want to have to wory that I'll bite down into a bone when eating!

Anywho - here it is!

http://www.50plusfriends.com/cookbook/crockpot/pkchpdel.html

From the Kitchen of: Pepper
4 - 6


boneless pork chops

seasoned flour for dredging (add salt, pepper, etc. to flour)
2 tbsp. vegetable oil
1 lg. onion, sliced
2 c. chicken broth
2 tbsp. flour
8 oz. sour cream

Heat oil in a skillet over medium high heat. Dredge pork chops in seasoned flour and brown in skillet, turning to brown both sides.

Layer chops in Crockery Pot with onion slices. Pour chicken broth over layers. Cover and cook on low 7 - 8 hours.

Stir the 2 tablespoons of flour into the sour cream until smooth. Stir sour cream into the Crockery Pot and blend into the cooking juices. Raise the Crockery Pot to high for 15 - 30 minutes or until the liquid has thickened.

Serve the chops and sauce over rice or noodles.

Italian Crockpot Chicken

My friend, Britni, makes this recipe and she says it's OH so good - plus super easy. Hopefully, I'll get a picture once I actually make it!

Here's the recipe:

1 can cream of chicken soup
4 chicken breasts (or i used a whole chicken)
1 envelope dry italian dressing seasonings


I put the soup on the bottom of the crock pot. I spread it out so it's evenly on the bottom. Then you put the chicken in and pour the seasonings on top. (When I did the whole chicken, I spooned some of the soup on top of the chicken and rubbed it in before I sprinkled on the seasonings.)Cook on low for 6 - 8 hours.

**Variation -- to make it a little more creamy - many recipes call for 1 block of cream cheese. **

Thanks Brit for the yummy recipe!

Drunken Onion Chicken

So the pic isn't the best. It tastes good though!!

OMG - this is good! Again, this is another "let's throw stuff together and see how it turns out" dish. So no real recipe, sorry. Here's what I did:

Cream of Chicken soup and some White Wine (maybe like 2/3-1cup. I just poured in the rest of what was in the bottle) - mix together and pour in the bottom of a crockpot.

Take a packet of Onion Soup Mix and rub half of it (or so) over a whole raw chicken or chicken breasts. For the raw chicken - separate the skin from the flesh and stick some of the soup mix underneath the skin.

Put the chicken in the crockpot and spoon some of the cream of soup/wine mixture over the top. Sprinkle the other half of the onion soup mix over the top. Start the crockpot. Low for about 6 hours or high for 4 hours.

Carmelize onions. You can use some balsamic vinegar, wine or even a little bit of the soup mixture to deglaze the pan afterwards. Pour the onions and the juices over the top of the chicken.

Cook, then eat and enjoy. Sooooo good.

Mushroom Wine Chicken in a Carmelized Onion Sauce garnished with Spinach, Mushroom and Pine nuts

I was grocery shopping the other day and instead of getting a package of chicken breast, I noticed that they had whole raw chickens for 57 cents a pound. Not being able to resist a great deal, I ditched the breasts and grabbed a whole chicken for only $2.17. SCORE! :) Since I now had an entire chicken, we called up my brother and sister in law and they came to help us devour it. They thought it was pretty good so I thought I'd add it here in case I wanted to try it again. Or, of course, if any of my 4 followers ever wanted to try it! :) FYI - I didn't have a recipe for this - so I just threw a bunch of stuff together and hoped it turned out well. Here's what I did - sorry that it's so scatterbrained and not too too specific.

For the Crockpot chicken:

• 1 whole raw chicken (cleaned and gutted, of course)
• Whatever herbs you want mixed wtih some Extra Virgin Olive Oil (EVOO)
• Salt and Pepper (with the herbs)
• A couple cloves of garlic (number of cloves depends on how much you like garlic)
• White Wine
• Can of "Cream of Mushroom" soup (can be any cream of soup if you don't want to do mushroom)

Directions:

First - take the cream of mushroom soup and mix 1- 1 1/2 cups of white wine (about a half bottle or so -- not a big deal, just eye ball it) together. Dump that in the crockpot.

Take the herbs that you want (I did rosemary, oregano, thyme, basil, garlic powder, salt and pepper) and mix them together in a small bowl. Add some EVOO. Take the mixture and rub ALLLLL over the chicken -- both on the outside, inside the cavity, and then take some and rub it inbetween the skin and meat. Basically -give the chicken a good massage with the mixture. If you have fresh herbs, then stick a bunch in the cavity. Take the garlic and either stick it in the cavity or just drop it on the bottom of the crockpot.

Put the herb-massaged chicken in the crockpot. Turn on low for 6 -8 hours depending on the size of the chicken. Check it after 6 hours.



For the sauce (make about 20-30 minutes before you're ready to serve) :

• 1-2 whole onions (doesn't matter what kind - sweeter onions, like Walla Walla or Vidalia carmelize quicker than others, but you can use whatever you have)
• Some of the crockpot juice (just have a ladle ready so you can add as much or as little as you want) and some of the leftover white wine
• 1/2 - 1 cup of sliced mushrooms
• 2-3 good handfuls of fresh spinach
• Raw or roasted Pine nuts -- just for a little texture and garnish. You can have as much as or as little as you want.

Directions:

Carmelize the onions:

• Cut onions in half, then cut into half rings.
• Add EVOO and some butter to the pan on high heat. Heat until the oil ripples, but not burning the butter - turn heat to medium-low
• Add in onions, some salt, pepper and sugar (optional) and stir - watch and continue to stir until all the onions get a limp and browned all over - about 15-20 minutes.

Here's a couple good links on how to carmelize onions -- an article and a you tube demo:

• http://allrecipes.com/HowTo/Caramelizing-Onions/Detail.aspx
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDdC-kCHSGg&feature=related

*If your pine nuts are raw - stick them on a baking sheet, add some EVOO, salt and pepper. Pop them into an oven on 300 or 350. Just watch them so they don't burn. About 5-10 minutes. Just keep checking on them and pull them whenever they're roasted. You can do this anytime too - so if you want to roast the pine nuts in advance - feel free to do so.

Once the onions are carmelized, add the mushrooms and a couple of ladles of the crockpot juice to deglaze the pan -- this will start a good sauce as well as pick up all that good stuff stuck to the bottom. Add as much as you'd like as you go along as well as adding some of the leftover white wine to thin it out if it's too rich. This is all to taste - so you just kind of gotta see what you like as it cooks. Cook for about 5 minutes or so.

Turn heat off, dump in the spinach and pine nuts. Stir until the spinach is wilted - about a minute.

Serve the chicken, sauce and whatever else you'd like! Angel hair pasta toseed in butter tastes great with this dish. Or you can do potatoes or veggies and garlic bread. Or whatever you want!

Enjoy!

****Next time, I want to try adding a can of cream of mushroom soup to the carmelized onions and crockpot juice so it makes more of a gravy. Let me know if you try it and how it works for you!

Crockpot Corned Beef

By Karen Waters
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Corned-Beef-and-Cabbage-3/Detail.aspx


A couple years ago, I was searching for a corned beef recipe to make for St Patty's Day. I ran across this recipe on AllRecipes.com. This is by far the BEST recipe for corned beef. It taste SO good! The only problem is that corned beef can be expensive - so I keep my eye on it and stock up when it goes on sale. It freezes nicely - although I've noticed that if I cooked from frozen, it tastes a little freezer-burnt. So thaw it out first overnight or so.

Here's the recipe - check out my tips and changes below:

INGREDIENTS
1 medium onion, cut into wedges
4 medium potatoes, peeled and quartered (optional)
1 pound baby carrots (optional)
3 cups water
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 bay leaf
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons cider vinegar
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 (3 pound) corned beef brisket with spice packet, cut in half
1 small head cabbage, cut into wedges (optional)

DIRECTIONS
Place the onion, potatoes and carrots in a 5-qt. slow cooker. Combine water, garlic, bay leaf, sugar, vinegar, pepper and contents of spice packet; pour over vegetables. Top with brisket and cabbage. Cover and cook on low for 8-9 hours or until meat and vegetables are tender. Remove bay leaf before serving.

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Ok that was the real recipe and this is how I do it:

Same ingredients expect no carrots, potatoes or cabbage.
Added ingredient - about 2 Tbls brown sugar

Cut onions into wedges and place on bottom of pot. Take the brisket and all it's bloody glory and rub the brown sugar all over. **Make sure to put the sugar in a separate bowl first, then throw out whatever you don't use. Put the brisket, fatty side up, in the pot over the onions. Wash hands. :) Measure the water in a measuring cup and then add the garlic, bay leaf, sugar, vinegar, pepper and contents of spice packet. Stir it up and pour over the brisket. If the brisket isn't covered (mainly) with water, top it off with some more water. Cover and let it cook for 8+ hours on low. Serve with some mustard.

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Tips:

1. I put "optional" by the carrots, potatoes and cabbage. I do not put those in the crockpot. I've noticed that if I put all the stuff in one pot, it all tastes the same. So I just cook the beef and whip up the carrot and potatoes by themselves as a side dish.
2. I just have crushed bay leaves -- not whole. So I put in a good teaspoon or two. It works just fine.
3. I love onions so if it's a small onion - I'll use 2. you can play around with the type of onion too - mahalo sweet onions are a good choice along with just regular yellow onions.
4. I don't cut the brisket in half - unless it can't all fit in my crockpot.

Crockpoting

I LOVE to crockpot. I really think that it's one of the greatest inventions ever created. Seriously - you just throw in meat (frozen or fresh) along with some kind of liquid (whether that be a soup, or salsa, soda, broth.....whatever) and BAM in as little as 4 hours or as long as 12, you got a meal. It's the perfect contraption for anyone that doesn't want a lot of prep time or for a family that works and wants dinner practically made when they walk through the door. Really, anyone CAN cook with one of these. It's practically fool proof! So either run out and get yourself one, or break it out from the back closet. It'll soon become your favorite gadget in the kitchen!