Cooking Recipes

Lasagna is many people’s favorite Italian recipe. There are various kinds of lasagna, so whether you enjoy a classic beef lasagna, a salmon, and ricotta one or even a vegetarian lasagna, there is a recipe for you.

The main ingredient in this dish is noodles, which are several inches in diameter and rectangular; you layer these with your chosen filling in between them. This recipe is served hot, cut into squares or rectangles, and you might like to serve some parmesan cheese on the side, to sprinkle over the top.

Not only can you choose from lots of different varieties of this dish but you can also choose your preferred cooking method. This Italian recipe does not have to be baked. You can make it in your slow cooker if you want to and it comes out really nice.

Crockpot lasagna is just as good as the oven-baked kind, perhaps even better because the flavors have plenty of time to blend perfectly. The following recipe, which serves six people, is vegan, vegetarian and low calorie as well as low fat since tofu is used instead of cheese.

What You Need:

• 1 package silken tofu
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 box lasagna noodles
• 4 cups tomato sauce
• 20 oz frozen spinach
• 1/4 cup soy milk
• 3 tablespoons chopped fresh basil
• 1 package firm tofu
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

How To Make It:

Thaw the spinach and pat it dry. Add both types of tofu to a blender or food processor, as well as the salt, basil, garlic powder, lemon juice and soy milk and process the mixture until it is smooth. Stir in the spinach.

Add a cup of tomato sauce to the slow cooker, and then add a third of the noodles and then a third of the tofu mixture. Repeat these layers a couple of times, finishing with tomato sauce. Cook for six to eight hours on low or until the noodles are soft.

What To Serve With Lasagna

Technically this is a meal in itself and in Italy, where this dish is from, it is served alone or perhaps with a basic green salad. A couple of types of lettuce leaves and perhaps some sliced tomato or cherry tomatoes is nice, then you can have a vinaigrette dressing on top or maybe some lemon juice and extra virgin olive oil. Keep the salad simple so the main focus is on the tasty entree itself.

In the United States, the United Kingdom and some other countries, this meal is commonly served with garlic bread or fries on the side, which makes it really filling but if you do not want to eat that many carbohydrates forget the fries and bread and opt for the salad instead. The pasta used in this recipe makes it satisfying enough on its own and the vegetables and herbs give plenty of nutrition.

You probably already know that you can make breakfast, lunch, dinner, side dishes, and desserts in a slow cooker but what about crockpot drink recipes? It is possible to make delicious beverages in your crockpot.

When you slow cook food the flavors really blend well together and the same can be said about drinks. You can make all kinds of beverages in your slow cooker from mulled wine to hot fruit punch recipes.

Crockpot Mulled Wine

For this delicious drink, you will need to add a cup of light corn syrup, a cup of water and two bottles of dry red wine to the slow cooker. Something meaty like Cabernet Sauvignon would be good for this recipe.

Wrap the peel from an orange, eight cloves, one nutmeg and one cinnamon stick broken into a couple of pieces in a piece of cheesecloth and tie it with string. Add this to the crockpot.

Cover and cook on high for about two hours, then discard the spice bag and ladle the mulled wine into heatproof glasses or mugs. You might like to garnish each glass or mug with a thin slice of orange. This is a great recipe if you are having an outdoor party and the evening is chilly. It is also nice to make around Christmas.

Crockpot Mulled Cider

Your house will smell amazing if you make this crockpot drink recipe. The mulled cider is spiced with cloves, ginger, and cinnamon and you can add a shot of brandy to each serving mug before ladling in the cider if you want to give it more of a kick.

Put two quarts of apple cider, a pinch of ground ginger, an unpeeled orange and quarter of a cup of brown sugar in the slow cooker. Tie a teaspoon of cloves and two cinnamon sticks in a cheesecloth bag and add this. Cover the crockpot and cook for about three hours on low. Take the bag of spices out and serve the hot cider. This makes enough to serve about ten people.

Hot Spiced Apricot and Orange Drink

Add three cups of orange juice, a forty six ounce can of apricot nectar, two tablespoons of lemon juice and half a cup of brown sugar to your slow cooker. Tie two cloves and three sticks of cinnamon in a cheesecloth bag and add this. Cover and cook for four hours on low, then serve. This recipe serves eight people.

Warm Tomato Cocktail

This healthy savory drink recipe is easy to make and it is really warming. You need to put ten ounces of condensed beef broth, half a teaspoon of dried marjoram, a tablespoon of lemon juice and a forty six ounce can of vegetable juice cocktail in the slow cooker. Cover and cook for two and a half hours. This makes enough to serve eight people.

There are several slow cooker ham recipes you can make with your crockpot, and the great thing about them is that they are easy to prepare, but you will not be able to tell this with their great taste. Here are a couple of examples.

Ham Mixed with Corn

Combining ham with corn and other garnishing can make for a delicious and yummy treat anytime. The ingredients are 4 cups of corn (frozen kernel, whole), 2 and a half cups of ham (these need to be chopped or diced first), half a cup of chopped onion, 1/3 cup of red pepper, 1/3 cup of green pepper, a can of cream mushroom soup, half a cup of cheese (cheddar will be fine) and some pepper.

This slow cooker ham recipe is begun by sprinkling some cooking oil into the crock pot. Once this is done, you can add in the diced ham and the corn. Now take the other garnishing and place them in the crockpot on top of the ham and corn. Add the cheese in last. Now put the cover on, set it to low and cook for four hours. This can serve up to five people.

Ham with Pork Tenderloin

The ingredients for this dish are as follows: a head of lettuce (small), some pork (a pound will do), celery (diced), 1 medium sized onion or a couple of small ones, sweet pickle (half a cup), a cup of peas (cooked); this slow cooker ham recipe also requires three tomatoes and half a cup of chili pepper, garlic and salt.

Making this recipe is real simple. First you need to cook the pork tenderloin in a skillet (be sure to add garnishing like onion and garlic to give it flavor). Once that is finished, you can put it in the crockpot. Once in the pot, you can top it off with the diced ham, the celery, pickle, tomatoes and other ingredients. Put the cover on and let it cook on low for six to eight hours. Alternatively you can turn it on high and it will be ready in four hours. Once it is done you can serve it for up to four individuals.

These slow cooker ham recipes are designed not just for folks who love tasty meals, but also for that want dishes easy to prepare and serve. While they are cooking you can attend to your other tasks, saving you time. By the time your work is finished, your meals will be all ready.

I am including some of my favorite recipes passed down from my mother, grandmother, and as far back as my great grandmother. Including some of my favorite appetizers made easy and also some family meals and special dishes.

French Onion Meatballs (my favorite for any birthday, football or baby party)

2 pkgs of frozen meatballs
1 jar of beef gravy
1 pkg of Lipton’s dry onion soup mix

Place meatballs crockpot in bowl combine gravy and soup mix and add to meatballs. mix well

Cover and cook on low setting for @3hrs. Serve with fondue fork or long toothpicks.

If you like can also cook meatballs in Hunts chili sauce with grape jelly and have Cocktail Meatballs. Cook the same way in crock pot but only ingredients is 3 bottles of chili sauce and half jar of grape jelly. Makes great appetizer for football party. Can also do same ingredients with cocktail weinies.

Slow Cooked Chili ( always a fall favorite)

2lbs hamburger meat (ccoked) 1 small onion, finely chopped garlic salt (to taste) 1 can diced tomatoes, undrained 1 can tomato sauce 2 cans pinto beans, undrained 1 can green chiles 3 tsp chili powder 2tsp worchestershire sauce.

In slow cooker combine all chili ingredients, mix well

Cook, covered on low setting for 1 to 2 hrs

Top with sour cream, shredded cheese, and sliced green onions if desired.

Pull Pork Sandwiches

3lb Boneless Pork Tenderloin, 12 oz A&W Diet Root Beer, 1 bottle SweetBaby Ray’s BBQ sauce

Put pork and root beer in crock pot on low for 8 hours. When done pork should be falling apart, drain root beer and pull pork apart. Return pork to crock pot and add BBQ sauce keep on low for another 2hrs and serve with buns. Great BBQ sandwiches!

Brown Sugared Ham ( wonderful Christmas recipe)

8lb Bone in Ham, 2 cans of sliced pineapple in juice, box of brown sugar

Mix half of juice from pineapples with 1 cup brown sugar coat bottom of crock pot, Put ham flat side down on brown sugar put sliced pineapple on top of ham keep in place with toothpicks. Mix remaining pineapple juice with 1 cup brown sugar and pour on top of ham. Cover and cook on med setting for 8hrs.

Are you considering the purchase of a programmable crock pot?

Are you looking for a method to decrease your time spent slaving over a hot stove?

If you answered yes to these questions, then you need to know these 4 vital tips before buying.

Programmable Crock Pot Tip #1: The Background

Crock pots have grown to be a must-have product for any modern kitchen. Busy mothers all over the world have come to rely on these little marvels to help them prepare a home cooked dinner the whole family can enjoy. The meal preparations are taken care of in the morning hours prior setting off to work or school. The food will be set to cook in a programmable unit during the day and will be ready to serve by dinner time. These units are ideal for anyone who wants to save their time on cooking but manage to serve delicious food to their family.

Tip #2: Size Is Important

As you might anticipate, a programmable crock pot can be purchased in a variety of sizes. A typical family of four will likely be pleased with a five-quart model. 6 quart or 7 quart crocks are targeted for larger families, or those with a number of teenagers to feed.

Small crocks, sometimes referred to as mini’s are typically four quarts in size and so are designed with regard to singles or smaller families. Additionally these types of scaled-down units work well for sauces, dips, or side dishes.

Tip #3: Programmable Features

The programmable crock pot has produced quite an impact on the general slow cooker industry. Prior to the 1990′s, slow cookers had only a high and low setting, that truly restricted the creativity of the cook. Nowadays the modern crock pots are programmable, which offers more flexibility and better opportunity to create a dinner masterpiece.

They generally use a touch pad that offers a variety of settings, typically 4, 6, 8 or 10 hours. As soon as the unit is programmed, and the fixed time has passed, the programmable crock pot changes to a warm setting. This attribute becomes important on those occasions when the cook is late, or else neglects to turn the temperature down manually. With a programmable unit there’s no need to worry about a fire threat or an over-cooked meal.

Tip #4: Consider Other Features

A lot of people find the cleaning up part of the family meal to be extreme drudgery. If you are one of these people who don’t enjoy washing the dishes, you will really like the easily-removed lining.

In addition, you may want to contemplate a unit which provides multiple crocks. These handy pots have 2 or 3 small crocks in a single programmable crock pot device. This useful device might be ideal for preparing stews, desserts, soups, etc. for a significant dinner or perhaps a family celebration. Another advantage is the removable interior pot, which is detachable and be used as its own serving dish with no need to shift the contents to a separate serving bowl.

Conclusion:

The programmable crock pot could be a handy kitchen device for new mothers, working parents,and anybody else who has better things to do rather than slave over a hot stove!

Like many people in the world today, I have a type of heart disease which limits the amount of salt I can take in per day. I try to keep my salt intake to less than 500 mg’s per meal or right around 1500-1800 mg’s per day. Prior to my diagnosis, I never knew how much salt I ate. I really didn’t care. But how that changes when the cardiologist sits down to have “that talk” with you.

When cooking, I try to find creative ways to enhance flavor and minimize salt. What you discover after eating this way for a couple of months, is how much better food tastes. You would be astonished at how salt covers up the natural flavors of food. It is such a dominating ingredient, it becomes very difficult to truly enjoy the other flavors available to your tastebuds.

So when I am tinkering in the kitchen, I tend to use the crock-pot a lot. It makes the meat so much more tender and really helps the kitchen novice pull off some wonderful meals. It also helps with meal planning and clean up as well.

With that all said, please enjoy my easy Pork Tenderloin recipe:

1. Place about 1 1/2 – 2 pounds of pork tenderloin, trim any excess fat, in the crockpot
2. Cover with 1/2 cup of any lower salt red wine vinaigrette salad dressing (read the label)
3. Season with 2-3 tbsp’s of salt-free brisket rub
4. Add 3 tbsp’s of any lower salt BBQ sauce (read the label)
5. Cover and cook on High for 5 hours or until meat is fork tender

Remove and plate with brown sugar acorn squash (steamed), black pepper asparagus and small fruit salad.

Total salt put in the crockpot in my recipe was about 700 mg’s. That’s a pretty low sodium per serving total and trust me, you won’t even miss it.

I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as my family did.

I like to make beef stew, especially as days get cooler. It’s a crock pot meal; tasty, easy, and it lasts for days. It also tastes generally the same no matter how much you try to play with the recipe. Unless you start adding strong flavors like chipotle (not a bad idea) or other off the wall ingredients, it’s going to come out as the same comforting beefy goodness that’s familiar to all of us. Here’s how I make it, with a couple of tips if you don’t have any stock around.

The Beef

The best stew beef is chuck. You want it fresh, with a decent marbling of the meat, just like if you were looking for primal steaks like ribeye. This is the best rule of thumb I can give when choosing beef: look for the cuts with the most intramuscular marbling. This isn’t the larger pieces of fat around the meat, it’s the fat in the muscle that you will be eating. For the tastiest, tenderest meat you want a lot of it, even if it’s for pot roast. That’s why I generally stay away from London broil or other big sirloin cuts. They don’t have the fat necessary to make it tasty.

Preferably you can find some bone-in chuck to give your broth some extra body and flavour. The bones of any meat are what contain the gelatin, and the gelatin is what gives body to the soup. If you can’t find bone in you can get gourmet and add some short ribs, or just get boneless.

The supermarket near me has small packs of short ribs for sale. They add fantastic flavor but the meat can fall apart after a long cook time. If your watching the budget go ahead and get the boneless chuck. Boneless beef is usually a better bargain because the bones are the first to spoil. This makes anything you buy with bones need a quick turn around time, and more of a risk for the butcher.

The Prep

When I get the beef home I trim up some of the fat and cut it into large chunks. You don’t want to go too small here because you want to have chunks of meat left after the long cooking process. Season the meat well with salt, pepper, and Worchestershire sauce. If you like, you can get funky with different spices, though it doesn’t make that much difference at the end. Garlic powder doesn’t hurt.

At this point if you can let the meat rest at room temperature for an hour before cooking or so I’d recommend it, but that’s probably me being too cheffy. Rest or not, throw it in the crock pot. Add some chopped veggies. Carrots, onions, celery, potatoes. Any combination that you like. I like the carrots so my ratio of carrots is a little higher. I don’t add anything too creative here, no sense messing with tradition.

The Broth

The broth arguably the most important part of a good stew. You have several options; bullion, broth, homemade broth, cream of mushroom soup, Liptons onion soup mix, beer, wine or water. All of them are flavored liquids used for the same purpose: to boil the meat. If you use beer or wine you will need to keep the ratio to about 25% of the total liquid in the stew. The rule here is that the ingredients must be covered in liquid. If you don’t have enough of one thing, just add some salted water. It’s very important that you have some salt in the stew at this point. This allows the salt to marry with the other ingredients, making each bite seasoned.

My order of preference is: homemade broth, bought broth (chicken), cream of mushroom soup, water (see below), onion soup mix, and bullion. Beer and wine I don’t really use, but it’ll happen if I feel the need. Here’s a little trick if you use water, it turns out surprisingly good. Season the water well and add some soy sauce and Worchestershire. It darkens it like broth and gives it good flavor. I like to stay away from the bullion powders, they are full of crap. When I use store-bought broth I use chicken, it’s generally a better quality then the beef.

Put your crock pot on high while your gone for the day, and dinner should be served when you get home. Don’t forget to check and re-season before serving. I don’t adorn my stew too much, though I will crush the potatoes as I spoon it into a bowl so they absorb more of the broth. No butter necessary.