Things I Can’t Live Without #7: Crockpot, part 2

Posted: January 13, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: Cooking | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

I have a frequent desire for tasty Mexican food–not from the average rotgut joint where chips and salsa is the highlight of their menu–but something more authentic, or at least where the meat is seasoned (that doesn’t seem like too much to ask). I’ve found the crockpot to be an antidote. I usually put a pound of ground beef in the 2-quarter along with a taco seasoning pack (like this one), some water and a healthy helping of salsa, and then cook it all day. The result is tangy and tasty.

Still, I’m always open to a twist on this or even an improvement and while grocery shopping on Monday stumbled across a line of “Gourmet Mexican Cooking Sauces” from Chef Rick Bayless who has a weekend show that airs on PBS. His food always looks incredible so I bought a taco skillet sauce and tried that yesterday, combining a pound of ground beef with an onion and a small potato and cooking it for four hours in the crockpot, then I poured in the sauce and let it cook for another four hours.

The directions actually called for the whole meal to be prepared in the skillet and in only thirty minutes or so but one reason I like the crockpot so much is that I put this all together early in the a.m. while the two boys were both messing around and when I still had energy. At 5:30 p.m., when I more resembled the walking dead, I just took the top off the pot, scooped some meat on a tortilla, added shredded cheese and tomato, and dug in. Mmmm, it was pretty flavorful (the Corona was nice as well), and a nice change from my usual recipe. Apparently, Bayless has a couple of packets actually oriented for the slow cooker so I’ll try those soon, too.

Things I Can’t Live Without #7: Crockpot

Posted: January 9, 2012 | Author: | Filed under: Cooking | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

I am no cook and that goes double for the wife. However, I was given a 6-qt. crockpot a couple years ago, and then last year a 2-qt. one, and they have changed everything. All of a sudden I’m able to prepare dinner most nights of the week, and it’s really hard to imagine life without my crockpots.

The real genius of the crockpot is that it’s so easy and inexpensive. For instance, Mama’s sister gave me a beef barley bean stew mix for Christmas. I browned some stew beef I got on sale at Food Lion along with an onion and put that in the crockpot along with the mix and beef broth, plus some mushrooms and salt and pepper, six hours later I had a hearty, savory stew–the kind that might help you survive a frigid night in Alaska–that we ate for dinner the past two nights. I’ve got enough left over that I’ll freeze  the rest and dig it out later this winter.

Since the stew mix was a gift it was an exception to the recipes I generally use that are simpler and in smaller quantities. Often, I will look in the fridge and pantry to see what kind of ingredients we have and then simply Google that along with “crockpot” and some kind of suggestion will come up. For instance, I had a few slices of pork  in the freezer and after searching found a simple enough recipe. In the 2-qt. crockpot I added a can of baked beans and a little mustard and ketchup. Eight hours later, I had a surprisingly tasty pork and beans ready for dinner.

Occasionally I need a break from the crockpot fare–something that isn’t cooked for hours and hours and seeped in whatever it has brewed in–so we’ll have pasta or maybe carry out from a local eatery. I think that’s what we’ll do tonight, but then it’s back to the crockpot. Tomorrow, I think I’ll try some beans–perhaps Pinto, with some chili and garlic powder, an onion and a dash of red pepper. Too bad Mama won’t eat legumes, but we’ll figure out something, perhaps I’ll throw in a little sausage or ham to make it more appetizing. Voila!

What Are You Doing?

Posted: September 7, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , | Leave a comment

This morning, as I was getting everything ready to throw in the crock pot, B ran into the kitchen and said he had to pee. I suggested the potty but he wanted to go outside and off the back deck (which is a favorite spot for the both of us). It was raining a little but whatever.

So I opened the back door for him and went back to cutting vegetables when I heard him tinkling into a pool of liquid–not the normal pee-off-the-deck sound–so I stuck my head out back to see him urinating in one of my rubber Crocs sandals that I left by the back door. It was filled to the brim (I assume some of it was rainwater).

“What are you doing,” I said. “Why did you pee in my Crocs?” “I didn’t,” he said. “I only peed in one.” He was technically correct, I did mistakenly use the plural. I didn’t really know what to do except to say not to do it again and then dumped the shoe out and set it further out in the rain.

Later that afternoon, I told his mama about the incident and she laughed of course, but then asked B why he peed in my Croc. “There was a lot of water in there,” he said. “I thought it was a toilet.”