If you spent too much time watching the Alabama-Georgia game last night, and neglected to take anything out of the freezer, you, like me, might be wondering what’s for supper Tuesday night. Slow cooker to the rescue and read on….
Looking for Thanksgiving posts on More Time? Basics/Organization. Starters, Soups, Sides. Gluten Free+Vegan Thanksgiving (Baking post in process–coming up soon.)
If you’ve been following the blog, you’ll know I have a stack of much-loved French cookbooks that are surely the stuff of which dreams are made…well, at least my dreams. I’m not as much of an armchair cookbook reader as some, though there is always a stack next to my reading chair–even at Christmas. Maybe especially at Christmas. (List of said books upcoming on a blog page. I promise.)
Despite devoting the lion’s share of my time to cooking, even I sometimes just have to throw something in the slow cooker, pray for success, and run. A couple of fairly recent keepers in that category are:
In the Southwest, we have more recipes than we need for toothsome green chile—all of them purporting to be the very best. And they are. Each and every one. I promise. Continue reading
The blog, along with Dave,”the babies,” and I, will be on vacation until late in October. Until then, make my easy Slow Cooker Pumpkin-Black Bean Chili. Happy Fall!
I’ve been making pumpkin chili off and on for years now… It seems to be my fall go-to for chili because ,#1 I’m not happy unless there’s chili in the freezer and, #2 making different kinds of chili changes up the menu and wakens the palate. Today’s version creates a pretty smooth, but not-too-spicy chili that doesn’t taste pumpkiny, but still has all the potassium, fiber, nutrients, and overall health goodness pumpkin offers. Pumpkin is also low in calories: go, pumpkin! If you are partial to chunky Pumpkin-Chicken Chili, try my stovetop version made with boneless chicken thighs and lots of vegetables like zucchini, along with both pureed and chunks of pumpkin. Continue reading
My niece Jamie is a married mom of three with a demanding full-time job as an accountant for a big company. With no time to cook, she just laughs and says, “I don’t even know how to feed my family!” Husband Jerry is not an admitted cook, either. And that’s the way it is for lots of young moms and dads. Continue reading
If you wanted a slow cooker pot roast recipe, I doubt you’d look here. (I don’t do a lot of slow cooker.) Maybe you wouldn’t look anywhere; you’d just put your meat and vegetables together into the pot with your wine, broth, or herbs and turn it on. That’s what I do on the occasions I make this meal. I decided to blog it, though, because I had such good luck getting a big frozen piece of meat cooked and on the table quickly using a slow cooker. No more excuses if you’ve forgotten to unthaw your meat and the morning has disappeared; you can still make a great no-watch meal in a short afternoon. The rest of the time is yours to take a bath, watch the dogs sleep, read the paper, garden, call your daughter, or binge-watch Downton. So put this one in your back pocket for when you need it…
(Below: Right after the Super Bowl. All worn out.
TRY THIS:
1. Place potatoes and 1/2 teaspoon salt with 1/4 teaspoon pepper in a 6-quart pot and cover with water–plus an inch or so. Cover and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes or until potatoes are just tender.
2. Drain and put potatoes back in the hot pan with the butter and the cheese. Mash well and then stir in about half-cup of the milk. Mash again, adding more milk if needed, until potatoes are moistened and tender. Taste, adjust seasonings, and spoon into a bo
wl. Garnish with green onions or chives, if using, and a little of the grated cheddar.
**I don’t peel these, but you’re welcome to if you’d like. I like the texture of hand-mashed and unpeeled potatoes and am all over that fiber.
MEAL OPTIONS: Replace carrots in the slow cooker with butternut or acorn squash pieces. Trade fennel for celery. Skip the wine and use low sodium beef broth.
WINE: Côtes du Rhône or another light red such as Pinot Noir or Beaujolais (not nouveau)
NEED MORE? Green salad and crusty bread with butter are the quintessential accompaniments if you’re really hungry or have more people. You might like my Apple-Cheddar Green Salad with Spicy Honey-Apple Cider Vinaigrette.
DESSERT: Maybe none at all…. But if you need something: Apples and cheese if you haven’t made the salad above. If you have, try Pears with Stilton, and Walnuts.
USING UP LEFTOVERS TO MAKE A BEEF-VEGETABLE SOUP:
Sauté an onion, two chopped carrots, 2 chopped stalks celery, and a minced clove of garlic in a tablespoon of olive oil in a large soup pot over medium flame. Season with 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, 1/4 teaspoon fresh ground pepper, a pinch of crushed red pepper, a teaspoon of dried thyme, a bay leaf, and 1/2 cup fresh minced parsley. Cook until the vegetables are starting to soften.
Stir in 1-2 cups of chopped, well-trimmed leftover pot roast, all of the sauce or gravy, 1 15-ounce can of chopped tomatoes, two quarts of low sodium beef or chicken broth, 2 or more cups of water, and a few drops of hot sauce. Bring to a boil. Add two peeled and chopped potatoes, 1 cup of chopped cabbage, and two cups frozen mixed vegetables or fresh vegetables such as trimmed and chopped green beans, English peas, zucchini, etc. Lower heat to a steady, but gentle boil, cooking until everything is tender. Stir regularly and add any leftover, cooked, and chopped vegetables from the slow cooker for the last 5 or 10 minutes to heat through. Pour in more water or broth if the everything isn’t floating very freely in the liquid.
Taste and adjust seasonings as needed, including hot sauce. Serve hot with crusty bread for dunking.
Options: You can add a 1/2 cup (or more) of a very small pasta — such as tubetti or elbow macaroni– during the last 15 minutes of cooking or, if you’ve time, 1/2 cup barley, which takes 45 minutes. If you’d like to use spinach, add it during the last five minutes.
STORAGE: You can cool, put into containers with tight lids, and store in the refrigerator 2-3 days or in the freezer for 4-6 months. Label and date your soup! It freezes better without potatoes or pasta, if you can manage it. If not, it’ll still be a good dinner you didn’t have to cook that night.
Sing a new song while your beef cooks happily without you,
Alyce
I cooked Monday for Inter-Faith Hospitality network (IHN) families; it’s something I’ve done for years at more than one church. It’s a way of living life that makes a lot of sense to me; I like to cook and there are people who need dinner. Here in Colorado Springs at First Congregational Church, we bring already cooked or nearly finished complete meals to a church kitchen where families without physical homes gather, eat dinner with us, and then spend the night. A group of churches and temples work together and the homeless people spend a week at one place and then move to another while awaiting jobs and/or permanent housing. It gives all of the congregations a chance to participate without burdening any one financially or otherwise with the full-time housing of the ever-changing group.
Continue reading |
| Vegan and Gluten-Free |
and after I eat a late lunch that I never cook, I typically read something a wee bit ephemeral like the current book club book, a Diana Gabaldan novel, a P.D. James or a Dorothy Sayers (I’m re-reading all of her mysteries this winter). Right now I’m stuck, really stuck on a book called, FROM HERE, YOU CAN’T SEE PARIS, by Michael S. Sanders (2002, Harper Collins) I’ve read a lot of books about living in France (Isn’t there a plethora?), and enjoy them all, but this guy describes things so vividly I feel not only like I’m right there, but perhaps I’m the one writing or maybe participating in some way. Quite touching, quite moving, quite arms-open-wide-here’s-how-it-feels.
There are times on Sunday that we go for a long walk with the doggies; we live near the Mississippi River and there’s a beautiful, miles’ long parkway with walking-bike trails. In the winter, it’s the only time we go to The Mall of America, despite the fact that it’s ten minutes away. Great place to walk in bad weather if it’s not too crowded; I seldom buy anything but lunch.
If you’re like me, you’ll be all over MSNBC Tuesday night like icing on wedding cake. Like blue on jeans. Like red on Merlot. Like chocolate on chips. Oh well, whatever you’re on, you might want something done and done to get you through that long night. Just, please, God…let be over and clean and obvious. No hanging anythings and the Ohio machines all working fine.
I already made my chili and froze it. I just run that 4 quart container under hot water in the morning til it “pops” and then gently slide the frozen chunk into my crock-pot on “low” for the whole day. (Make sure and add a little water to the crock-pot before the frozen chili.) But since you didn’t know ahead of time…. Try this spicy, filling crock-pot chili that only asks you to….
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| 1. Saute two onions, four cloves of garlic, 1 red bell pepper, 1 green bell pepper, and 3 stalks of celery ( all chopped) in 2 tablespoons olive oil. (I do all the chopping in the food processor.) |
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| 2. Brown 2 pounds turkey Italian sausage (1 pound each hot and sweet or to taste.) in another skillet. |
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| To speed things up, I do it at the same time. |
Pour the vegetables and meat into a 6 quart crock-pot and add:
2 28-ounce cans chopped tomatoes
3 tablespoons chili powder
1 tablespoon each: dried basil and oregano
1/2 teaspoon each ground cumin and fresh ground black pepper
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 tablespoons each: Dijon-style mustard and lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper, optional (if you didn’t use hot Italian sausage)
1/2 cup red wine (or chicken broth)
2 cups water
1/2 cup green or brown lentils (well rinsed and picked over)
1 15-ounce can each: black beans and pinto beans (drained and well rinsed)
Stir well, taste and adjust seasonings. Turn crock-pot to low and cook 6-8 hours or on high for 4-5 hours. Serve hot with tortilla chips and grated cheese.
two-dog kitchen and around the ‘hood
please help
Hurricane Sandy Relief: Donate to Food Bank for NYC … right after you vote!
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| On the back porch: still ripening cherry tomatoes Dave picked 3 weeks ago. |
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| African chard from Wendy’s garden. I’m eating this in my egg-white omelets. |
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| Basil growing in the south DR window. |
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| My eastern garden smoke bush. |
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| Burning Bush–great fall color |
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| More of Wendy’s sage–picked last week and in water in a glass. |
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| Up close chard. Still eating from the yard in November. Thanks, God. |
Sing a new song,
Alyce
Sorry to be late in posting…I hate leaving my blog sit stale. Family illness has kept me away. Things are on the upswing now…
And I’m so glad the election is (hopefully) about to be over. Please pray for those without homes, heat, and power on the east coast. Our daughter now has power in New Jersey, but many don’t.
