Crock Pot Pork Chops

I've been making a lot of crock pot recipes lately.  It doesn't heat the house up nearly as much as running burners on the stove, so it has been great.  This is one of those where you can just walk away until dinner which is nice.

Start off with squash, garlic, and chopped onion.  I used 2 medium squash that were fresh from my sister-in-law's garden and delicious, half an onion, and a heaping tablespoon of garlic.

Next, dump in a can of collard greens and sort of spread them over the top.  Don't drain them.

Add about 1/2 a bag of baby carrots...

And layer on some pats of butter...Oh yeah.

Next, add some kale.  There's about 2 handfuls dumped in there, and I just tore it with my hands instead of chopping because I find it easier to skirt the big veiny parts on kale that way.

Add a heaping teaspoon of spicy mustard...

...then drizzle balsamic vinegar over the top, then pour in about 1/3 cup of water.

Now, layer your pork chops on, sprinkle them with salt, pepper, and a bit of meat tenderizer if desired, then drizzle a bit of Siriacha sauce over them.

 Put the lid on, set the heat to low, and go away!  No touchy for at least 4 hours!  After that, check to see if the pork chops are done and if they are, then you are good to go!

This is as good as it gets as I completely forgot to take a picture once it was plated up!  It was super delicious and healthy, though.  The vegetable tasted just amazing.  I could live off of greens, I think.

NOM!

<3
WookieWifey

Chicken Tostadas with Black Bean and Corn Salsa

Wooo, I'm back to typing-able for the least.  That one-handed typing shit is for the birds, man.  I'm still having to take it easy, so I apologize if the posts seem short or boring!

Lots more posts coming up.  I had so many planned then...yeah.  My accident-prone life.

So here's the recipe I was supposed to post over a week ago!  >.<  I originally found the idea here, but it is very heavily modified.

First, bust out the crock pot.  Put in 4 chicken thighs, defrosting optional, a half cup of water, about 1/4 cup of salsa, and a packet of taco or fajita seasoning or your own blend.  I usually just dump in salt, pepper, chili powder, cumin, garlic, basil, onion powder, cilantro, and a bit of cayenne until it tastes right, but I was feeling lazy, so I just used a packet this time.  Put the lid on, crank it up to high, and let it go for about 4-5 hours.

It should be about falling off of the bone.  Remove it to cool and turn the crock pot to warm.

While the chicken is cooling, you should make the salsa.  I put in 1 can of sweet corn, drained, 1 can of black beans, drained and rinsed, 1/2 tbsp of cilantro (fresh is best but dried will do), 2 garlic cloves, 1/2 small purple onion, 1 cup diced cherry tomatoes.  Mix it all up, cover it, and pop it in the fridge.

Once the chicken has cooled enough to handle, remove the bones, shred the meat, and spoon in some of the sauce left in the crock pot until all the meat is nicely coated.  Pour the left over sauce out of the crock pot and put the chicken back in to keep warm until it is ready to layer.

(not pictured)
Warm up a can of refried beans in a sauce pan and season with sea salt, black pepper, garlic, chili powder, onion powder, and paprika.  I used about 1/2 tsp of each.

Add enough oil to a skillet to cover about 1/4 inch or so and let it get nice and hot.  Fry up the flour tortillas until crispy.  I use the small taquito-sized ones and this recipe made 8 tostadas feeding 4 people.

Spread a layer of refried beans on a fried tortilla.  Add a layer of chicken, a layer of shredded cheese, and some of the salsa, and whatever other toppings you prefer.  I also had guacamole and salsa on mine and these were so delicious.  This is a recipe I'll be making again!

<3
WW

Hungarian Pot Roast

This is a recipe I saw here first, but it has been greatly, heavily modified...Mainly by the fact that it seems I somehow forgot how to recipe halfway through, but it still turned out absolutely amazing.

You can thank my sister-in-law for the punctuality of this recipe.  I'm usually a few days behind in posting, but I just made this yesterday afternoon and, after she sampled it, was told it was to be posted today so she could thaw her pot roast and make it, and she could totally kick my ass, so here it is.  =P

Start off with a roast.  This was about 1 3/4 pounds.  The recipe calls for a rump roast, but I couldn't locate one at the store I was at, so I just grabbed a chuck roast.  Rub it down with sea salt and black pepper, put it in a heated skillet with about 2 tbsp of olive oil on medium-high heat and let it brown on all sides.  You may want to kick the heat up a little if you're not using cast iron.

Here's where my version of the recipe became truly my version.  And I totally did it on purpose.  I forgot my roast was half the size of the one in the other recipe and ended up with double vegetables and gravy.  While the roast is browning, cut up 4 medium onions into thick slices.  I used white.

Once the roast is browned on all sides, put it in the crock pot (which should not be on yet), add another tablespooon of olive oil to the skillet, then toss in the onions and 2 heaping teaspoons of paprika.  Cook that, moving the onions frequently so they cook evenly, until they are soft and browned.

Add to the crock pot.

After the onions are out of the skillet, put it back on the stove and pour in 2 cups of beef broth.  Use a spatula or something with a flat end to scrape the drippings from the onions and roast off the bottom of the pan so the incorporate into the broth.  Let it cook down until it reduces by half.  Should only take a few minutes.  When that's done, pour it into the crock pot, too.

Drain some roasted red peppers....

Add those and a can of diced tomatoes (don't drain the tomatoes) to the crock pot, give it a stir, and season with pepper.  Set it on high, put the lid on, and let it cook for 3-4 hours or until it is tender when you fork it.  (heh.  heheh.)  After it cools enough to take the crock out, drain off the juice and save it.  Put the vegetables back in the crock and turn the crock pot down to warm.

The recipe said to slice the roast at this point, but mine just sort of fell apart when I poked at it with the tongs...

...so I just put it back in the crock pot and stirred it up with the vegetables.

 Remember that juice you saved?  Put it in a sauce pan and cook it down until it reduces by half.

Once it reduces by half, remove it from the heat, whisk in 1.5 cups of sour cream and it will form a gravy, then pour it over the roast and vegetables in the crock and let sit on warm or low until it is all heated through, then you're ready to go.

I'd planned to make sides with it, but since I ended up with double vegetables already and there's just the two of us I decided to skip it.  I've been making exceptionally ugly-looking recipes lately, I know, but this stuff just tastes incredible and is definitely worth trying.  I'll be cooking this one again.  

<3

WW

BBQ Sandwiches with Baked Sweet Potato Fries

I'm not huge on anything with barbecue sauce.  In fact, there is only one time in my life I've had anything with barbecue sauce on it that I liked that I didn't make and tweak myself.  We'll not discuss that one time, the place in question that served said barbecue sauce on their food closed down and broke my heart and it just...It hurts too much...I can't.

This is also another one of those "What do I do with all the fajita-seasoned skirt steak I bought on sale" posts.

Back to business.

Put the fajita-seasoned skirt steak into your crock pot on high...If you don't have one a regular one on the stove over medium-high will be fine.  This is about half a pound uncooked and it made 3 HUGE sandwiches.

Add in about 2 cloves of chopped garlic.

About 1/3 cup of your choice of BBQ sauce.

About 2 tablespoons or so of Worcestershire sauce.  Worcestershire is a word I can not say in real life.  True story.

...And top it all off with about 3 or 4 tablespoons of honey.  Make sure its the real thing, not that weird "honey-flavoured syrup"...stuff.  Add just enough water to where it almost covers the meat, put the lid on, and let it stay like that for about 3 hours or until the meat starts to fall apart.  Keep adding enough water so it doesn't dry out or burn, but if it cooks down and gets thick then that's good and will make your life easier later.

Now, here we're missing some pictures because I got impatient.  Cut up a large sweet potato.  Or more depending on how many people you're feeding.  I only made enough for the two of us because if I'd sent them with the Wookie to work with that extra sandwich I don't know how they'd hold up to travel and microwaving since they are rather tender, so, yeah.

De-railed myself again, damnit.

Cut up the potato french-fry style and put it, a little at a time so they all get covered, into a zipper baggy with about 1 tablespoon of olive oil and a sprinkling of salt and rosemary - but be careful on the rosemary, it can get strong fast - then shake it all up so they get coated.  Repeat with more potato/oil/spices until you're out of potato, then line them up on a cookie sheet and pop them into the oven.  The oven that you should have preheated to 450.  You know.  Yeah.

So that meat in the crock pot?  If that hasn't cooked down to a shredded mess with a thick-consistency sauce, then we're about to fix that.  If it did cook down to a shredded mess with a thick-consistency sauce, then you can skip this part and you had more foresight than I did.  The potatoes should cook in about 20-25 minutes, so while they are going, add the meat (shredding it the rest of the way with a fork or tongs if necessary - I was on a time crunch) and whatever juice is left to a pot large enough to hold it, put it on your stove over high heat, and keep stirring until whatever juice is left has turned into a thick consistency sauce.

Now we're talkin'.  Take that off the heat to cool so the sauce can thicken a bit more, lid on.

When your fries look like that and are soft when you probe them with a fork, then they're done.

Now, for my sandwich, I used the end of a baguette and tore the bread out from the inside so I had a nice, hollow crust.  Greedily devour the parts you took out.  Yes, this is a required, necessary step.

Stuff it with the beef, serve it with some fries.

The Wookie prefers his on regular bread.  I sometimes mourn for his taste buds' lost sense of adventure.

Oh yeah, and dessert was banana pudding...Sugar free, low calorie, low fat with LOTS of banana slices.  Mmmm.

<3
The Wookie Wifey