This recipe is a family favorite. It would not be the holidays without spiced apple cider, ladled from a waiting, simmering slow cooker into mugs lovingly cupped in cold fingers. We serve this at Christmas parties and to carollers, sip it while making pfefferniuss and while watching our favorite Christmas movies. I can’t eat Thanksgiving pie without a cup of spiced apple cider nearby. Nor open Christmas presents. A waft of this and I am home. Spiced Apple Cider adjust to fill your particular Slow Cooker Enough apple juice to fill your slow cooker. Growing up, we always used the frozen concentrated variety and I’m not above using that now! For every “can” of prepared frozen juice (or approximately 32 ounces of juice if you are using fresh or bottled [... To read more, click here ...]
I had such a great week sharing with you my new favorite slow cooker recipes! My goal was to both share a few recipes I’ve never shared before, as well as open up the spectrum of the slow cooker a bit by offering a recipe for a different type of food each day, breakfast, a condiment, dinner, dessert and even a beverage! I’m hoping you start thinking of your slow cooker in a different light! Granted, I also frequently make chicken stock in my slow cooker (same recipe, different means of cooking) as well as all of my chili and soup recipes, and even my green chile roasted, shredded pork roast in my slow cooker, not to mention keeping that baked spinach and artichoke dip warm come SuperBowl Sunday, but [... To read more, click here ...]
Wait, let me repeat myself. Double Chocolate Cake with Hot Fudge Sauce And did I mention it is entirely whole wheat? Yes, yes it is. Oh, and cooked in your slow cooker? Yes, yes it is. You know you’ve seen recipes like this before. I had. And I thought, “Baking? In a crock pot?” At first I only found recipes in old, original crock pot recipe books that had you baking inside of a metal coffee can inserted in your slow cooker. Quaint, I thought, but I have an oven. But then I saw a recipe I couldn’t ignore. I tried it. It was good. I fiddled around with it and it became better, and better for you. And I’m here to share it with you today. Because Yes, you [... To read more, click here ...]
I have been eating this dish since I was a little girl. This recipe has been adapted by my dad from the original cookbook that came with their first Crock Pot, which they received as a wedding gift, 35 years ago. Dad remembers that crock pots were quite expensive at that time, compared to average wages, and three families went together to buy them one. What a gift. And for me, growing up, a gift that kept on giving. I was the happy recipient of hundreds (thousands?) of meals from that crock pot, and it’s even the happily featured dial that is pictured on the “For the Love of the Slow Cooker” button. See that burnt orange looker? Fantastic! There’s really not much difference between this recipe and Julia Child’s [... To read more, click here ...]
There is something beautiful that happens when you cook a bunch of onions, low and slow with butter. They become sweet, almost smoky with a depth of flavor that you’d never believe could come from the sharp, acrid taste of fresh onion. I love caramelized onions. As the base for French Onion Soup, piled on top of leftover roast beef in a sandwich or strewn over a pizza (maybe with some sliced granny smith apples and fontina cheese? How good does that sound? Yum.) But the thing is, to make really good caramelized onions, you have to be prepared to babysit a skillet of onions for 40 – 60 minutes or longer. You have to make sure not to get antsy and turn up the heat. You always, always end [... To read more, click here ...]
I am the last person you would think who would be making yogurt. I never thought I would. I thought that, unless you ran a dairy farm, yogurt was just one of those things that you just had to buy. Like butter. Or cheese. Something that normal people just didn’t make. I was almost proud of the fact that I bought it. Though I had friends who had made yogurt in the past, their recipes sounded complicated. Some involved specialty yogurt-making equipment. Others involved thermometers, special processes for keeping the milk a specific temperature like putting it in a thermal-lined ice chest or ovens that could be kept at really low temperatures (which mine never could). I just didn’t have the space or the time or the equipment, I said. [... To read more, click here ...]
Now that I’m a mom of two (active, rambunctious, beautiful) boys I find myself paring down my cooking repertoire to those that are easy, tasty, nutritious, nourishing and . . . oh, did I mention easy? My new (old) favorite? My crock pot. I love it. I’ve rediscovered my crock pot these past few months. We just got a new one right after Luke was born with (thank the Lord) a removable insert and I have been going to town. Being able to toss in ingredients and head to the library story time or a day of shopping with one strapped to me and another hefted into the cart (I call it exercise. When else would wearing a 20 lb weight vest and trudging for hours on end not be [... To read more, click here ...]
Welcome to the Heartland! Reformed Urbanites, we are enjoying new life on a small family farm/homestead in the Midwest. Join us as we garden, cook, read and enjoy our boys; becoming better stewards of the Earth while raising our family.
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