Category Archives: Tasty Tuesday

Crockpot “Baked” Potatoes

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When I went up to Asheville for the Becoming Conference a couple of weeks ago, I had a chance to hear Jen Schmidt‘s talk on Ten Minute Dinners. I’ve been reading her blog for several years now, so most of the concepts were not new to me. But as she talked about feeding a group of thirty in a mountain cabin by setting up “assemble your own” bars for various foods, I found myself brainstorming, and I wrote in my notebook, “Baked potatoes in the crockpot?”

I got home and Googled it, and of course I was not the first to wonder if you could do this. Various sources told me to wrap the potatoes tightly in foil before placing them in the crockpot. Others told me to oil and salt the outsides of the potatoes and puncture them before cooking. Still others said to do nothing, not even poke them, that they would cook just fine.

My original plan was to do a few in foil and a few “naked” as an experiment, but, uh, we ran out of foil the night before I made these. So naked potatoes in the crockpot it was!

I rubbed the skins with some olive oil and kosher salt for flavor and popped those suckers in for the day:

I left them on low while I was at work and came home to cooked potatoes! A few caveats: the skins don’t get crispy, and the flesh is a little yellower than a normal baked potato. But don’t let those turn you off! They tasted great (and this is coming from the girl who doesn’t even like potatoes that much).

I had picked up a can of turkey chili at the grocery store, so our topping options were chili and cheese or broccoli, cheese, and yogurt (in place of sour cream).

Along with some cut up fruit, this was a warm and satisfying meal! This would be great for a crowd, because I think you could pile the potatoes into the crockpot with no dire effects. The potatoes produce a bit of moisture, so it’s almost like they’re steamed rather than baked. And you could go crazy with the toppings! Another one we had in our fridge that was tempting to me was some shredded chicken with cheese and barbecue sauce.

What would you put on your crockpot baked potatoes? Have you used your crockpot for anything new lately?

I’m linking up to the Tasty Tuesday Parade of Foods at BeautyandBedlam.com!

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Orzo with Parmesan and Basil

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I recently made a recipe that I found on Pinterest called Orzo with Parmesan and Basil, originally from a contributor to Tasty Kitchen. I feel like coming up with side dishes is sometimes a struggle for me, so I love discovering options that are low-effort but unique and delicious. Plus, having fresh herbs makes me want to find ways to use them!

Here’s the recipe as it was posted:

  • 3 Tablespoons Butter
  • 1-½ cup Orzo
  • 3 cups Chicken Or Vegetable Stock
  • 6 Tablespoons Fresh Chopped Basil
  • 1 cup Parmesan Cheese
  • ½ teaspoons Salt
  • ¼ teaspoons Pepper

Melt the butter over medium heat. Add the orzo and saute for a few minutes, until the orzo starts to get golden brown. Add the broth and cover and simmer for 20 minutes, until all the broth has been absorbed. Remove from the heat, add the basil and Parmesan and salt and pepper to taste.

It turned out unbelievably creamy! I definitely would have thought it had more “bad for you” stuff than just a small amount of butter and parmesan cheese. As advertised, it seems like a great alternative to pasta side pouches (like we used on our camping trip). I’ve always thought those were unfortunately delicious, so I’m glad to have a somewhat healthier replacement!

The first time I made this I added about a cup of frozen peas a minute or so before I turned off the heat. I’ve since made it a second time, and I chose to add some diced zucchini. I bet you could also add chicken, or maybe even shrimp, if you wanted to make it more substantial. I love recipes that are versatile and can use ingredients you have on hand, and this one did not disappoint. Plus, the leftovers were just as good if not better! Next time you’re looking for a side to try,  I would highly recommend this one.

 

Olympic Ring Salad

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On Sunday, Andy and I were invited over to a new friend’s place to watch the Olympics. She asked if I would bring a salad or some type of fruit/veggie side. I’ve spent so much time on Pinterest lately that of course I had to try and do something Olympics themed! I wanted it to be pretty quick and easy and not a dessert, so my options were somewhat limited. I went to the grocery store with only the colors of the rings written down and decided to just see what foods in those colors struck my fancy.

Here’s what I ended up with:

An Olympic rings salad!

The snap peas came in the salad kit I bought, and the red and yellow rings are bell peppers that I simply cored and then cut into rings. The black ring is made up of olives on toothpicks–that one was the most difficult, between getting them to stay on the toothpicks and then getting the straight toothpicks to somehow form a circle! The blue ring was a stretch. I thought blueberries would have been weird in a savory salad, so I used blue cheese. I know, I know, it’s more white than blue, but it’s the thought that counts, right?

I jostled it as I was getting it out of the fridge to take to your get-together, but luckily I had snapped this picture earlier! And I think it still got the point across. Simple, healthful, tasty, and fun.

Have you been watching the Olympics obsessively like I have? What food would you bring to an Olympics-themed event?

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Baked Macaroni with Chicken and Mushrooms

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I finally had another of my Adventures in Making the Recipe Up! Now that I use Pinterest so regularly, I’ve hardly had the need to be creative in the kitchen. But last week I found myself with a cast of ingredients on hand that were just screaming to be combined into something. Using this recipe from All Recipes as an inspiration, I created Baked Macaroni with Chicken and Mushrooms! While I doubt I’ll ever create this exact recipe again, it was a tasty, easy use of some ingredients that may have gone to waste otherwise.

It all started with this container of shredded chicken leftover from my attempt at Slowcooker Greek Chicken Pita Folds. They weren’t nearly as flavorful or fun as I had hoped, and they made a LOT of chicken!

I also had some remnants of a few types of tomato sauce,

and half a box of elbow macaroni.

I chopped up an onion, a clove of garlic, and some mushrooms

which I sauteed for a little bit while the macaroni cooked. Once they were softened, I added in the chicken and the tomato sauce, letting it all simmer together for a few minutes. Then I folded in the drained macaroni and some shredded cheddar cheese.

I transferred the whole shebang into a greased casserole dish and topped it with more cheese and bread crumbs. After 15 minutes in the oven at 350, voila!

This would be great with just about anything you have on hand–any short noodle, any meat or vegetable, any cheese. The original recipe called for diced fresh tomatoes, or I’m sure you could use a can if you had that around. Basically, it’s a blank slate! Shredded chicken is one of my favorite things to build a meal creation around, and this concoction did not disappoint.

Have you played around in the kitchen lately? How do you get creative with leftovers?

I’m linked up to the Tasty Tuesday Parade of Foods!
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I feel like I haven’t posted a recipe in ages! The hardest thing for me about posting recipes is remembering to take pictures of the food as it’s being cooked and again once it’s done and plated. And even when I do remember, my pictures usually aren’t all that great, so it doesn’t make me particularly excited to share them here. Food photography is an art form unto itself! But I initially said that this blog would be an outlet for me to share recipes and cooking adventures, and I do cook new things fairly often, so I should stick to that more!

I’ve cooked some pretty delicious things lately (thank you Pinterest!), and I want to share a few of them with you so you can join in the fun.

For the 4th of July I made Plain Chicken’s Slowcooker Baby Back Ribs. I had never cooked ribs before, let alone bought them, so I was pretty clueless at the grocery store. I’m also not used to buying meat full price, so I was doubly overwhelmed. But I managed to find a package (a rack? a slab?) of “pork loin back ribs” for a reasonable price at Publix, so I bought them. I wasn’t sure if they were the correct type for the recipe, but I figured how bad could they be? I had no idea how to remove the membrane from the back as the recipe directed, so I didn’t. I also ended up needing to cut the slab in half in order to fit it in my crockpot, and I couldn’t get them to stand up as the recipe called for, but slow-cooked meat with a delicious rub can hardly turn out bad. Once I broiled the ribs briefly with some barbecue sauce, they were absolutely delicious. We enjoyed 3 each that night and 3 for lunch the next day! The meat came off the bone so easily that I actually made mine into a sort of sandwich on Hawaiian rolls. Mmm! If you don’t have a grill, or don’t want to grill, this is a great way to still have that festive barbecued meat.

Plain Chicken is one of my favorite blog resources for simple, unpretentious but delicious recipes, and I can also highly recommend her creamy jambalaya pasta, her slowcooker ham and beans, and just about any casserole she features on her blog!

For a quick, weeknight meal these pizza quesadillas have been a lot of fun. I’ve had, erm, issues trying to make quesadillas before wherein the smoke detector went off, but the guidelines in this recipe have opened up a whole world of quesadilla making to me! You can definitely play with the ingredients here and honestly use just about anything you have on hand. I like recipes like that.

For some reason during summer I find myself craving Southern foods like pimento cheese and chicken salad. I’ve made this skinny pimento cheese twice now. Andy doesn’t normally like mayonnaisey foods, and even though this uses Greek yogurt instead of mayonnaise I was worried it would hit the same textures triggers, but even he loved it! It makes up a nice-sized batch, and it’s great to have a dinner option that doesn’t heat up the kitchen at all.

And finally for today, check out Jessica Alba’s turkey meatballs. (Who knew that she was multi-talented?!) I found these on a whim when I had some ground turkey in the freezer that I decided I wanted to make into meatballs. A quick Google search turned up several recipes, from which I picked this one, and I’d say it was a success! The recipe could have been easier, but since it yielded enough for one meal and more for the freezer, I’ll forgive it. :-) I love that these use turkey instead of beef and even have some sneaky vegetables in them.

I’m usually really bad about making a recipe once, declaring it delicious, and then never making it again. But I’m starting to have some go-tos, a few of which are included here. How do you find recipe inspiration? Do you tend to make the same thing frequently, or do you flit around like I do?

P.S. If you’re interested in keeping closer tabs on what I’m cooking, or gleaning some ideas, you can follow me on Pinterest! I make my meal plan from my pins every week, so it’s highly likely that I’ll actually try the things I pin.