I hope this post finds you all well. I think crock pots are the best thing for new mom’s and old. The mom that inspired this post is Eliza expecting her fourth! Stop by homemom3′s blog to check out her story…
I will teach you the easiest recipe to get you started and post a new one every few days… I will assume you are feeding three or more people and have a large crockpot… obviously you have to adjust the recipe to your crowd. Keep in mind that a crock pot is a great way to be creative so feel free to substitute, here are some guidelines.
You can use different types of meat: beef chunks for stew, large chuck roasts, bite sized chicken or fish. You can also use different types of beans, preferably types that you do not have to soak (small white, split pea, lentils). Please buy them dry in the bags versus cans. Cooking beans in a crockpot is a super easy way to enhance your kids’ diet, not to mention they are cheaper and healthier! TIP: keep spaghetti sauce or jelly jars, boil them out and dry thoroughly and you will have a nice, air tight way to keep your beans nice for display… they look VERY pretty.
For this first recipe I will use the beef chunks you can find already cut in packages to make it super easy. So here are the ingredients:
2 – 3 lbs chunks of meat, large potatoes (5?), handful of carrots, some scallions, some onions, 1 cup of some type of beans, couple of stalks of celery, bouillon & seasonings (you could also use a 1/2 cup of rice if you think you’ll need the extra food)
The crucial step to crockpot cooking is the meat, you must sear the meat to seal in the juices or you’ll have lots of gunk scumming up your soup/stew. Huh? what? get a frying pan, heat it, put some oil or butter (not too much), cook your meat on medium heat on all sides… throw it into the crockpot… put the onions and cook them so they wilt and pick up all that meat flavor… this will take a good 10 minutes to do on a lower heat.
Meanwhile you are chopping and slicing your other stuff (potato’s, carrots, celery) and throwing them into the pot, measure your beans, throw them in…
The next step is filling up with water, make sure you use water you would drink as you want your broth to be the best it can be. Select your seasonings… you need some (2?) bouillon (choose cubes or packets), salt, pepper to taste, a bay leaf won’t hurt, herbs de Provence and/or any seasoning your family is used to.
Once you’ve got everything in, cover and put it on high for the first three hours or so, then you can keep it on high or low depending on your time frame. I like to have everything in the pot by 11 a.m. at the latest and we usually sit down to dinner by 5:30. If you have it done earlier that’s fine too! Keeping the top on there tight is crucial so it will not dry out/burn up, so resist the temptation to mess with it.
Now as Eliza has mentioned, kids may not be up to all this crock stuff. So in addition to the usual bribery ( be prepared for at least three battles)… you could mention that cowboys love stews and soups. Maybe you could watch a western movie or t.v. show like Little House on the Prairie, Ma’s always serving up a stew and everyone is eating it up. Maybe even make it a theme night at your house… don’t forget to mention that Woody from Toy Story is a cowboy and I’m sure he’d love some stew (does your kid have this costume?). Or maybe you could work it into the early settlers and dealing with the Native Americans, my son came home with a shield and hat he made at school in preparation for Thanksgiving.
When I first started, my son was about 3 and didn’t like soup, so I just strained and separated the different foods for him on the plate, he liked that and ate pretty well. I hope these strategies work for you, keep at it, eventually they will come around and like it. Don’t forget that living vocab - stock, broth… difference between stew and soup…
More to come shortly…
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