<p>I purchased a Rival 5 quart slow cooker on Black Friday. (It was $10 so I couldn’t pass it up.) Now I have to figure out what to do with it. We tend to eat alot of dishes made from dried beans and lentils, so I’m hoping the slow cooker will make the preparation easier. We need to watch cholesterol levels here, so when I do make meat, I use very lean cuts. If anyone can suggest cookbooks or recipes, I would really appreciate it. thanks</p>
<p>Fix it and forget it has a series of fairly good slow cooker recipes. Williams-sonoma sells a slow cooker, so they have some recipes also - although they are sized for their slow cooker which is a little larger than average.</p>
<p>one family favorite of ours - take a small chuck roast or brisket, trim off as much of the fat as possible (the one thing I hate about slow cookers is the meat swimming in fat phenomenon), salt and pepper and garlic powder then brown thoroughly. Place in slow cooker with the contents of one jar of mild banana pepper rings (the kind you see sliced on salad bars) juice and all. Slow cook all day. Separate the meat into strings juice on the side and serve with crusty Freench bread, either as sandwiches or just to soak up the vinegary, peppery juice.</p>
<p>Go to your library and check out a few. I’ve had my cooker for a long time (I made soup in it last week and I’m thinking it may need to be replaced…too bad I didn’t see your deal.) The best book (may be out of print) is by Jacqueline Heriteau , The Best of Electric Crockery Cooking, lots of recipes with a French touch. I also rely on Crock It by Barbara Murray-Neslen but I try to cut down on the fat in her recipes. I have Sandra Lee’s Semi Homemade but she wastes a lot of space on non slow cooked recipes. Mable Hoffman has written several cookbooks but I haven’t really found them too useful.</p>
<p>
Towards the end of cooking a pot roast I take all the meat and vegetables out of the slowcooker. I pour the liquids into a large fat seperator and let it stand for a few minutes for the fat to rise to the top while I shred the meat. Put the meat and veg back into the cooker, then pour the liquid back into the pot, stopping before the fat goes back in. Just takes a few minutes but reduces the amount of fat a lot.</p>
<p>Got this from a friend. It is very good!</p>
<p>Italian Cream Cheese Crock Pot Chicken</p>
<p>4 boneless skinless chicken breasts (whole or cut up)
1/2 stick butter
1 package dry Italian salad dressing mix
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 8 oz package of cream cheese (room temp)</p>
<p>Melt butter and pour over chicken in crock pot. Sprinkle packet of
Italian dressing mix over chicken. Cook on high for 4 hours.
Mix cream of chicken soup and cream cheese together. Stir into
chicken. Cook an additional 1/2 hour. Serve over angel hair pasta.</p>
<p>(it sounds fattening but use Healthy Request/reduced fat soup and Light cream
cheese)</p>
<p>Crock pot is cooking today 
Basics - veggies on bottom, meat next, liquid poured over. You can thicken sauce at end with some flour/water combination. Cook on low all day, or high for about 2/3 the time. Or combine high first hour or so and then switch to low. </p>
<p>Today - Put some sliced potatoes in the bottom, layered on sliced onion and some baby carrots. Meat on top of that. Today I happen to have some round steak. Sometimes it is a pot roast, london broil, any thing from the freezer. Pour liquid over it, (today it is beef broth with packets of brown gravy, hidden valley dressing mix and Italian dressing mix blended in) other days it is can of ff cream of mushroom soup mixed with ff sour cream. </p>
<p>Chicken is same philosophy. Here is an easy one.
Salsa Chicken
3 large, frozen chicken breasts
2-3 cups salsa
Place chicken in bottom of crockpot. Cover with salsa. Cook on low 10-12 hours. Serve over brown rice or whole wheat pasta or couscous. </p>
<p>Lots of good recipes if you google crock pot or slow cooker.</p>
<p>Check out this site. Crockpot Lady vowed to use her crockpot every day in 2008, and she has! I’ve made several of her recipes and they were very good. I believe I am not supposed to post a link to a blog, so I’ll just suggest that you search for Crockpot Lady blog on Google, and you will easily it at the top of the results page.</p>
<p>I rarely use a recipe. I just throw stuff in. Usually a frozen piece of meat and various vegies, red wine if appropriate, onions, garlic and spices, cream of mushroom soup, etc. </p>
<p>You can make great chicken and noodles by putting everything in along with a packet of ranch salad dressing mix. You can do beef stroganoff by adding regular ingredients (plus potatoes or noodles as you prefer) and add sour cream at the end.</p>
<p>Our family favorite is doing barbecue in the slow cooker. Any meat (chicken, country style ribs, beef ribs), add sliced onion and a bottle of your favorite barbecue sauce. You can add garlic and other spices to doctor up the bottled sauce. Like switcatsmom, if the meat is fatty, I pour the liquid into a fat seperator and just return the sauce to the pot.</p>
<p>Don’t forget those wonderful slow cooker bags you can get. They’ll fit almost any size cooker, and they make clean up a breeze!</p>
<p>If you are really in a hurry, your local grocery store has Slow Cooker meals in a bag. Just take directly from the freezer and dump in. Set the machine to cook and go away.</p>
<p>I do a Swedish meatballs recipe in the slow the cooker that is both easy and tasty. You use frozen meatballs.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone. The recipes look delicious. I like the CrockPot Lady blog. She posts pictures of the ingredients and finished dishes for all her recipes. She uses alot of the Trader Joe products I have in my house, nothing exotic.
Okay, time to take my crockpot out of the box.</p>
<p>Oh, lets keep this going so we can all be inspired for some winter meals. </p>
<p>I have used a crockpot for years and actually wore one out. I started with Mabel Hoffman’s book and branched out to just throwing in ingredients which almost always works fine. You don’t get fine and exciting textures and the color is not as zesty as stove-top meals–but you can’t beat coming home from work to something already cookiong.</p>
<p>I second the idea of going to the library rather than buying books until you know what you really want to own. And I’m excited about the online link that has been posted. </p>
<p>At holidays I use mine to keep a warm pot of spiced cider going. Makes the house smell great too.</p>
<p>This Thanksgiving I made a turkey breast in the crockpot, and I also made stuffing in another crockpot. Both recipes were from Crockpot Lady, and they turned out FANTASTIC!</p>
<p>ooh - I need to check out that crockpot lady stuffing!</p>
<p>for those of us without a fat separator, after you refrigerate the leftovers, the fat will coagulate at the top and you can skim it right off.</p>
<p>I made this recipe up.
Onion
Beef stew meat
Tomatillos
A few cut up fresh tomatoes
Jar green taco sauce La Victoria, the skinny neck bottle
garlic
Cumin
Red pepper
I don’t use any exact amounts
Cook all day
We eat it two different ways
Normally I take the meat and vegetables minus most of the broth and refry it in a frying pan to dry it out. Serve with soften corn tortillas as a soft taco. This is delicious.
We have also eaten it as a stew in a bowl with shredded cheese on top.</p>
<p>This is adapted from a recipe that called for pork.</p>
<p>Beef stew for Dummies.</p>
<p>1 1/2 pounds stewing beef
1 bag baby carrots
4 large potatoes cut into cubes
1 packet onion soup mix
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 tablespoon worcestershire sauce.</p>
<p>Put the meat, potatoes, and carrots in the crockpot. Put the onion soup on top of that, then the cream of mush soup, then the worcestershire sauce. Cover and cook on low for 8-10 hours.</p>
<p>The gravy is delicious. Use lean meat and you won’t have fat in the mix. It’s easy and delicious.</p>
<p>Just looked at the crockpot lady blog. She made SOAP in her crockpot yesterday! I love my crockpot, but soap would have never occurred to me!</p>
<p>P.S. Thumper: Have done the same beef stew recipe before and it is good!</p>
<p>After fat forms, float bread on the fat with a spatula. Use fat soaked bread as a source of fuel for your torchaire. Alternatively, we take slowcooker outside to cool and allow fat to solidify. Resume cooking if necessary after fat removal.</p>
<p>I made this Shredded French Dip recipe tonight and it was excellent. Be sure to toast the French rolls in the oven and add a slice of provolone or Muenster cheese to melt a little before heaping on the shredded beef. You could also add mushrooms to the crockpot or saute them separately and add them to your sandwiches. </p>
<p>INGREDIENTS:
1 (3 pound) boneless beef
chuck roast, trimmed
1 (10.5 ounce) can condensed
French onion soup, undiluted
1 (10.5 ounce) can condensed
beef consomme, undiluted 1 (10.5 ounce) can condensed
beef broth, undiluted
1 teaspoon beef bouillon
granules
8 French or Italian rolls, split </p>
<p>DIRECTIONS:
- Halve roast and place in a 3-qt. slow cooker. Combine the soup, consomme, broth and bouillon; pour over roast. Cover and cook on low for 6-8 hours or until meat is tender.
- Remove meat and shred with two forks. Serve on rolls. Skim fat from cooking juices and serve as a dipping sauce. </p>
<p>Everyone loves this – husbands, little kids, picky eaters – and it’s great for a crowd.</p>