Four Pounds of Pork by Carl

It was great to see my roommate Carl (the shorter one in the middle of my profile picture) take a shine to our slow cooker because it made me a little less embarrassed. Don't get me wrong it's a great utility, but aren't we supposed to be eating ramen? When I started looking through recipes, pulled pork sandwiches was one that consistently made my mouth water. I really love anything between bread, and most meals can be improved by being put between two slices. I was thrilled when I came home and saw his massive slab of pig on our cutting board and his copy of Better Homes and Gardens Special Ultimate Slow Cooker opened to the pulled pork MASTER RECIPE! The result was a shelf of tupperware full of delicious meats just waiting to be stuffed into your favourite hoagie. Especially tasty on some crock pot bread!

THE INGREDIENTS


  • 3.5lbs boneless pork shoulder (bought at a local butcher! Exciting!)
  • 1 large chopped onion
  • 6 gloves of minced garlic
  • 350 ml or 12 oz of chili sauce (ours was pretty ketchup like)
  • 2 tblsp brown sugar packed
  • 2 tblsp of cider vinegar
  • 1 tblsp Worcestershire sauce
  • 1 tblsp chili powder
  • Pinches of salt and pepper

VARIATIONS

The Better Homes and Gardens Special Ultimate Slow Cooker has a few recipes to use this meat for other than straight up submarine sandies. I am reading about an Asian soup that looks tasty as well as an apricot pulled pork sandwich that uses apricot jam and dried apricot. Some hot chilies would be great as well, I imagine pulled pork to be popular with patient cowboys.

DIRECTIONS



Simple for so much tasty meat.

  • Trim fat off pork and fit into slow cooker, halving or quartering if necessary. Add onions and garlic as well.
  • Mix chili sauce, brown sugar, cider vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, chilli powder, salt and pepper and pour over meat and onions.
  • This is a recipe worth the long haul, so go for low on 10 to 11 hours rather than 5 to 6 on high.
  • When cooked through, transfer pork to a large bowl. It should shred easily with two forks, add some of the cooking liquid to moisten.


Apparently this pork can be refrigerated for up to 3 days of can be frozen for up to 3 months. Makes a lot, there is a ton of this stuff in our house. Carl made a larger recipe, the one posted makes about 6 cups.

THE TASTIES

Big meaty sandwiches can do no wrong. Slap some cheese on that thing I could eat it as lunch for a month! Bravo to roommates who make great food and share interests. We seriously sit around the place talking about recipes we want to try. Take that parents, we can feed ourselves! I am concerned about the expiration date on ththough, how much longer can we store this stuff for? Best be brown bagging today!

So Are These Enchiladas?

Slow cooker Mexican food is something I hadn't tried yet, and I decided enchiladas would be the maiden dish. I've never had enchiladas having limited myself to fajitas, burritos and quesadillas in the past. I'm not entirely sure if these are what Mexico meant, but I was inspired by a recipe over at Fud or Something Like It that looked pretty tasty. Shredding chicken and mixing in sour cream and cheese? Sour cream and cheese are the essentials of any wrapped food in my opinion. I figured the recipe was lacking a bit in substance and spice, and I couldn't find enchilada sauce, so I ran with this recipe, adding a can of cooked beans and some peppers for filling.


INGREDIENTS







  • 2 lbs or 1 kg or boneless skinless chicken breasts
  • 1 package of chicken fajita seasoning
  • 1 large onion chopped
  • 1 cup of sour cream
  • Lots of shredded cheddar
  • Ketchup
  • 1 cup of green chile salsa
  • 1 package of flour tortillas (I used all 10 in of a small tortilla bag)
  • 1 can of cooked red kidney beans strained and rinsed
  • 1 green bell pepper sliced

VARIATIONS

Something more spicey and more genuinely Mexican has been earmarked for the next attempt, but there is no denying how good these are. The sauce itself was a variation, so it shows how much leniency there is. I would add some spice to these for sure.

DIRECTIONS

  • In a sauce pan, mix the green chile salsa with the fajita mix. I wasn't sure how this was going to turn out, but it was very appropriate. I think enchilada sauce is mostly green chile based, so it worked out well. I stirred well, and added some ketchup to mild it out a bit.
  • Place the chicken breasts on the bottom of your crock pot. Pour salsa fajita sauce on top. Cover with sliced onions.


  • Cook on low for 6 hours.

  • When cooked and well tender, transfer the chicken breasts to a large bowl and shred with forks.
  • Mix one cup of sour cream with the chicken. Also add the chopped onions from the slow cooker and a couple hand fulls of shredded cheese.
  • Grease some oven safe dishes and pre-heat oven to 350F.
  • Scoop the chicken mixture into the flour tortillas and wrap with beans and green pepper.
  • Place wrapped tortillas side by side in oven dish. Cover with the salsa fajita sauce from the crock pot and layer with more shredded cheese.
  • Bake in the oven until beans and peppers are warm and cheese has melted. About 20 minutes. Seperate with a knife and you'll need a fork to eat!




THE TASTIES

Really great, especially as leftovers. These can feed quite a few people and I would consider bringing it to a pot luck some time since it can be carried around in a dish. As I mentioned before, I will keep an eye out for enchilada sauce for the real deal, or at least try to find a REAL recipe. More chili pepper, since we ran out, or hot sauce. So good, especially the sour cream and cheese chicken. Sloppy messes but worth the struggle and the additional use of an oven!

A College Kitchen Guide: Essential Utensils



Putting together so many meals has really helped developed my kitchen arsenal, but so has being the only child in the city left for my mother, my aunt and grandmother to spoil. Our kitchen might be a bit messy by their standards, but for three male college types we've done pretty well for ourselves. Since not everyone is fortunate enough to have three French Canadian mother's, I went about putting together lists of food and cooking staples that any enthusiastic John/Jane College should have to eat well. I got the inspiration from Kent P. Frandsen's Where's Mom Now That I Need Her? which I bought upon moving into my first apartment. It cost me $5 at one of those subway book stands. We don't necessarily own everything I post, but I probably used it recently off someone else. Thankfully we have a lot of cupboard space at our place, because as you can see they can get pretty full. Second hand goes great with college kitchens, most of our stuff was donated by our parents and their friends. They've gone miles to feed the hungry.



Kitchen Tools and Containers




  • 9 by 13 baking pan
  • Aluminum foil
  • Plastic wrap
  • Various sizes of tupperware
  • Bread pan (meat loafs AND baking)
  • Casserole dish
  • Can opener/bottle opener OBVIOUSLY
  • Colander/strainer
  • Cookie sheet
  • Casserole dish with cover
  • Frying pan/sauce pan with lid
  • Good grater
  • Vegetable peeler
  • Pots with lid, one big one
  • Measuring cups
  • Measuring spoons (actually we still don't have these. Promises have been made though)
  • Mixing bowls
  • Serving and mixing spoons
  • Spatulas
  • Whisk
  • Garlic press (very handy indeed)
  • Hand zester


EXTRAS
(if we were all so lucky...)


These were a nice bonus from either as thrifts, gifts or raids. The most obvious being:
  • Slow cooker crock pot! (Obviously, because you certainly don't read for the humour! Ha, ha.)
  • Food processor, with different deadly blades
  • Waffle iron (a recent addition, very valuable)
  • Baking dishes
  • Recipe books that are lots of fun to read!


No Mo Beans Please



Baked Beans was high on the list of simple crock pot recipes to try, but I think this went wrong when I tried mixing maple syrup with tomatoes. It was in truth an awkward attempt all together as I hadn't soaked beans in awhile and tried to combine a number of recipes. My girlfriend is a veggie head so I omitted the salt pork as good as that sounded. I also had to consider Grandmama Therese's French Canadian heritage so maple syrup was mandatory. The result was a very sweet, kind of dry, and slightly spicy mess. It was the night before Montreal's famous St. Patrick's Parade so I am guilty of getting a bit carried away with the warm ups. I will post the list of ingredients I wrote up myself to use only as an idea of how to mess up slow cooked beans.

INGREDIENTS

  • 450g or 1/2 lb or 2 1/2f cups of dried white navy beans (these were not what I expected)
  • 1 cup of tomato juice
  • 1 large onion chopped
  • 1/4 cup ketchup
  • 1/2 cup molasses
  • 1/2 cup of maple syrup (where other recipes used 1/4 cup of brown sugar, probably a good idea)
  • 1/2 tsp dry mustard
  • 1/2 tsp ground cloves
  • 1/2 tsp ginger (I used dry, but I think fresh is the better option!)
  • 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
  • 1 1/2 tsp salt
  • A large pinch of cayenne (wrong?!)
VARIATIONS

A whole lot, considering these didn't work out. The beans didn't swell as much as I would have liked, but they were still soft. As I mentioned, I probably shouldn't have mixed so many tomato ingredients with maple syrup, and some of those spices look out of place. They may be mentioned in maple baked bean recipes though, and I'm sure I will gives these another try. Also this is a vegetarian recipe and I would like to try it with meat, especially since my roommate just found a cheap butcher up the street.

DIRECTIONS


Remember, this didn't work out well.

  • Follow the directions on the back of your bean bag considering soaking. Most say something like soak beans in 6 cups of water over night, but I needed to heat the navy beans before they got soft. So soften up d'em beans! Make sure to strain and rinse before adding to the slow cooker.
  • I then heated up the tomato juice with the clove and mustard and ginger and brought it to a boil.
  • In a separate bowl I mixed the maple syrup, ketchup, molasses, and Worcestershire sauce.
  • Finally I combined the strained beans and onions in the crock pot and added the tomato mix and the dark syrupy mix. I also added a pretty liberal pinch of cayenne and gave it a good stir.
  • Cooked on the crock pot for 6 hours.
THE TASTIES

Worth trying again because I know a big bowl of beans can be very tasty. I would probably try without the maple syrup because I would like them better as a dinner. Already mentioned adding salt pork which I think could be really hearty. My navy beans never really swelled, and I'm not sure if that's because of how they are or who I am. I think I would prefer a thick, meatier bean like the kidney variation. People did eat these though and liked them, but let's keep in mind that they started drinking at 10 am!

Must be the Curry, Beef Curry

A basic curry, beef or otherwise, is good to know off the top of your head. Crock pot curries are really simple but are so tasty and filling on a bowl of steaming rice that I often have to hold myself back from announcing curry and a jug nights. I figured it was time to cover this casual crowd pleasure after Mark over at DA BEEF BUCKET asked me a very good question, where's da beef? Well Mark, it's in the slow cooker, and trust me it will be pretty tender. I figure this curry recipe could easily work with some chicken, but the I really like the minimalism of this and so prefer to use some cheap chopped stewing beef. I threw this together with the ingredients I had on hand and it came out really well.


INGREDIENTS



  • Splash of oil
  • 1lb or 450g of chunked stewing beef
  • 2 medium onions
  • 1 green bell pepper sliced
  • 1 jalapeno pepper chopped fine
  • 1 tsp ground ginger (notice the cute label my mom made for my spice kit?)
  • 2 gloves of minced garlic
  • 14 oz can of chopped stewed tomatoes. That is half the quantity we normally use.
  • 1 cup of beef broth (we diluted ours)
  • 1 tbsp of curry powder (if not a bit more)
  • Salt and pepper

VARIATIONS

Too many possibilities, vegetables to meat to what you serve it on. I kept this one simple, but I do love throwing cauliflower or spinach in curry. Some people also find many curries too tomatoey, and truthfully I do make many curries with a can of stewed tomatoes. My next one I might find a recipe that is just coconut milk or something, like a butter chicken meal. Also, naan bread mmmm.

DIRECTIONS

  • Heat oil in a frying pan and brown beef. (Is browning before slow cooking always neccesary? More reserach needed.) Transfer to slow cooker, leaving fat.
  • Fry jalapeno and garlic in beef fat until tender and add ginger.
  • Add stewed tomatoes and juice and curry powder. Stir thoroughly and bring to a boil. Add salt and pepper as necessary
  • Quarter your onions and slice your green pepper. Mix them in with the beef.
  • Top veggies and meat with pan sauce and add beef broth. Stir well.
  • Cook on low for 6-8 hours. We did hours on high for 4 hours and a few pieces could have gone a bit longer, but some were still very tender.



THE TASTIES

For an improvised curry I was really impressed how well this turned out. It filled our apartment with a rich smell and my roomies were anxious for the spicey! I think we added a bit of extra curry to the mix since it was the last of it. Pretty liquidy but perfect to serve over some rice. I have since read a few recipes that brown the meat in flour and I am going to find out what the PROS of that method are. Probably something about searing...Man I love curries!

Old Timer's Roasted Potatoes and Cabbage

Slow cooking doesn't have to take a long time, but detailing a blog can. One woman you really have to admire is Stephanie over at A Year of CrockPotting who tried a new crock pot recipe everyday for a year. She even organized a crock pot diet which seems like too much effort, but a worthy idea. I found her recipe looking for more cheap cabbage recipes after the pork chop sauerkraut went bad. Right on time for St. Patrick's day, Slow Roasted Potatoes and Cabbage, an hommage to our famine fleeing heritage! So potatoes, garlic, white cabbage and some oil is all you need and is pretty hearty and tasty. You don't even use water, the roasting is a neat effect!

INGREDIENTS



  • A medium head of white cabbage
  • 12 smallish or baby red potatoes
  • 10 whole peeled cloves of garlic
  • 1/2 cup of olive oil
  • 2 tblsp of balsamic vinegar
  • Salt and pepper

VARIATIONS

I wonder if roasted brocolli would work? Maybe that would be delicious. I don't know how meat roasts in a slow cooker, but I'm sure it could be adapted. I would have used a bit more balsamic, or at least stirred the veggies a bit more often.

DIRECTIONS

  • Chop potatoes into cubes.
  • Slice cabbage into wedges.
  • Mix cabbage, potatoes and garlic.
  • Combine balsamic vinegar, olive oil, salt, pepper and stir well.
  • Toss potatoes and cabbage with dressing, making sure everything is coated in balsamic.
  • That's it, cook on high for 3 or low for 4-6.
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THE TASTIES
I really liked this. There is no denying it's simplicity, affordability, and heartiness. I would maybe use a bit less oil, or more vinegar, or mix it up an hour and a half into the cooking time to spread it out a bit better. Could easily be used as a side to some meat (would pork be most appropriate?) but this is generally a good veggie or even vegan option. Cheers!

Slow Cooked Cannabutter

How appropriate that I should have a particularly green post on St. Patrick's Day. We won't be chopping up vegetables today, that is unless you're trying out Stephanie's roasted potatoes and cabbage recipe, we'll be slow cooking noxious dairy! Interested in making it a group activity? Check out this friendly and hassle free recipe-dio that I iMovied all by myself! Movie not as hassle free as I claimed? Not surprising! I've written some annotated directions for the less visually inclined.

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 Oz or 28 grams of pure B.C. shakey cheech (if you aren't fortunate enough to have access to B.C. bud other cheeches are fine, but I worked with broken up bud shake, and not stems of leafs.)
  • 1 lb or 450g-500g of non-salted butter or ghee. I say non-salted because I will be baking and extra salt isn't always called for. I also used ghee because there is no water and so the THC is absorbed/distributed more fully.
  • 2 cups water
  • Cheese cloth
  • Coffee grinder or food processor or hand grinder (necessary to rip your weed into flour)
  • Plastic tupperware large enough to hold two cups of water and your butter
  • Rubber bands
  • Plastic gloves
VARIATIONS

Cannabis is also smoked ritualistically in cigarettes and pipes!

DIRECTIONS

Part I - Dissolving
  • Pour the two cups of water into your slow cooker and turn it on high. The butter will melt in the hot water and prevent any of the butter or THC burning off.
  • Using your food processor or coffee grinder chop the weed until it is extra fine and powdery.
  • Cut your butter or ghee into cubes, and when the water in your slow cooker is hot (20 minutes?) Melt the butter in the crock pot. Let butter melt completely, stirring to help remove any chunks
  • Combine grass flour and butter and stir in well. Make sure to scrape the crystal kief off the sides of the food processor or grinder.
  • Turn slow cooker on high for 1 hour. After one hour, change to low setting and let sit for no more than 24 hours. We left it on over night (a total of 15 hours) and it stank up the house, but is incredibly potent.

Part II - Buttering
  • You now have a dark mess of dank green fat. You need to filter out the plant material to get the good stuff.
  • Fold cheesecloth over itself until it can serve as a filter.
  • Place folded cheesecloth over tupperware and affix using elastic bands.
  • Pour pot butter through cheesecloth into the tupperware.
  • When the butter has stopped dripping through, remove cheesecloth and squeeze out the remaining butter wearing your rubber gloves.
  • Reattach cheesecloth and pour remaining liquid and squeeze again. Discard useless dope.
  • Spatula and collect all the butter, put a lid on the tupperware and store in the fridge until solid.
  • When the butter has risen and solidified on top of the water, use a knife to cut out the mass of green butter. Throw out the nasty swamp butter. You can keep in your fridge or freezer for as long as your original brick of butter to use at well!


USE

I would test out your serving suggestion by teaspoon and work your way up from there. You want to cook with about 0.5grams of grass per serving, so this recipe should make almost 60 servings by my calculations (and I assure you they are not extensive). I think it would even be possible to combine infected butter with clean butter for larger recipes or if you want to spread it out. Since the THC is ready to go, you can simply enjoy a slice of green toast and jam!

Ditching the Blue Box: Homeschooled Mac and Cheese

Finally a chance to try my all time favourite meal, macaroni and cheese! If I had to live on one meal my entire life, it would be mac and cheese with tuna. Some might cringe at the addition, as I did when I first heard the suggestion, but give it a shot and you'll never be able to go back to plain M+C. For the sake of experiment, we've actually made this batch straight up, and I found the most basic (and apparently surefire) recipe from A Year of Crockpotting which has proven to be an invaluable source of inspiration. I would suggest some slight alterations, but it is a pretty solid recipe and worth the try for a healthy tose of cheesy comfort goodness.

INGREDIENTS



500g uncooked elbow macaroni (uncooked, SWEET!)
4 cups of milk (other recipes call for evaporated milk, but I just used 1%)
2 eggs
4 cups of shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1 tsp dry mustard

VARIATIONS

And there are many! Again I strongly encourage the addition of a can or two of tuna (maybe two for this quantity). It would probably be added in just before the noodles are ready to be taken out, as the fish just needs to be heated through. Lots of other possibilities as well. We almost went with sausage, but we had a vegetarian around so opted out. Spicey sausages would be great. Concerning veggies, I think onions or brocolli would go really well. Onions could go in at the start, but brocolli probably later on to avoid getting too soggy. Minced garlic would be super tasty. Some crumbled saltines and a layer of parmesan would add some girth and make this a bit more of a casserole. Our own personal touch was a teaspoon of cayenne better to give it a bit of bite. Seasoning is really important in this recipe, and I would possibly have added more pepper to the mix. Run with it!

DIRECTIONS

Super simple, nice.

Grease your slow cooker well. I didn't do this and the mess is minimal, but I can imagine it could get pretty bad.
Beat together eggs and milk and mix in spices.
Combine pasta and cheese in slow cooker and mix well.
Pour liquid mix onto pasta, ours was almost completely covered.
Cooking times are a bit unspecific. My source says 2-4 hours on low, or 1-3 hours on high. Apparently it gets al dente after an hour and a half on high. We used the low setting since we were out of the house for a bit, and it was welldone after 3. After another hour on warm it was pretty mushy. This is a recipe worth keeping your eye on, especially if you like it al dente!

Pork Krautten!

For my friends and I, cabbage has been a seriously overlooked budget staple because many of our parents ate way too much of it during their youths to pass it on. We've used red cabbage on a few occasions, going for days living off a huge bowl of a variation of this RED CABBAGE SALAD to which I add carrots, green onions and canned corn. It tastes better and better each day I leave it in the fridge. I discovered the utility of sauerkraut after a 500 dollar trip to Costco in which one of the Most Valuable Purchases was a 4 litre jug of fermented cabbage that my roommate Max insist we buy. It proved to be a great condiment on sandwiches, especially ones made on dry bread that need a bit more moisture. I was interested in ways to use our new jar and found this really easy and basic recipe for pork chops. Unfortunately there were a few mixing errors, too much chicken stock and I don't think I rinsed the sauerkraut off enough so this meal was a bit too salty and vinegary hence earning the name Pork Krautten (get it?!)

INGREDIENTS


  • 15ml 1tbsp vegetable oil
  • 6 thick pork chops
  • 1tbsp all purpose flour
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp black pepper
  • pinch cayenne pepper
  • 1 tsp dry mustard
  • 500ml/2cups sauerkraut
  • 1 granny smith apple, peeled and shredded
  • 125ml or 1/2 cup condensed chicken broth (undiluted)
Note: Apparently the chicken broth can be replaced with 125ml of apple juice or cider, which I think would help kill the vinegar and certainly includes less salt than the undiluted chicken broth

DIRECTIONS

  • Many slow cooker books advice to brown meat before putting it into a slow cooker, but it is a debate as tough as the old "slow cooking frozen meat vs not frozen." I think it is part safety, part grease remover and part presentation points (meat doesn't always brown well in slow cookers?)
  • Regardless, I browned my pork chops in the heated oil before placing them in the slow cooker.
  • Sprinkle spices on top of chops. Notice in my photo that I didn't sprinkle them all over. This was a mistake since some tasted more of mustard than others. I would recommend mixing the spices in a small bowl first.
  • If you're using store bough kraut as opposed to home made, make sure it rinse it off thoroughly in a colander.
  • Mix the kraut with the shredded apple, and layer onto chops
  • Pour chicken broth or apple juice/cider on top of kraut
  • Cook on low for 5 hours or high for 2.5 until the pork has a touch of pink left.


Granted I didn't think the spicing worked out well, but the meat was super tender and I'm sure will work well as leftover sandwich meats

Budget Beans and Tuna with Aioli

I tried this recipe when I was looking to incorporate more beans into my diet because they’re so cheap and apparently good for your heart. Another red meat free meal, it includes the staples of a frugal kitchen: stewed tomatoes, cans of tuna, beans and cheap white wine. This is another recipe with leeks that are sometimes a bit expensive out of season. Along with the clam juice, it’s often cheaper to try and pick these up at an ethnic grocery. Once I had this loose stew together, I honestly wasn’t enthusiastic about it and was warning my roommates that it might not be great. But scoop in some of the easy aioli and the meal takes a huge swerve. Finish the bottle of wine and you’ll have a proper French feast.



INGREDIENTS

  • 15ml or 1 tbsp vegetable oil
  • 2 leek whites, halved and sliced thinly
  • 4 stalks celery
  • 1 hot pepper. Serrano or otherwise
  • 10 ml or 2 tsp dried thyme
  • 5ml or 1 tsp pepper
  • 1/2 tsp or 2 ml salt
  • 1 can (796 ml/28oz) coarsely chopped stewed tomatoes including juice
  • 1 can (540ml/91oz) drained and rinsed white kidney beans or 500 ml/2cups cooked and drained beans
  • 2 cans of tuna in water, drained and chopped


Easy aioli

  • 3 gloves of minced garlic
  • 250 ml or 1 cup of mayonnaise
  • chives or chopped parsley
VARIATIONS

Use another fish? Maybe not one bought in a tin can. Red kidney beans, more spicey sauce. This meal reminds me of the french bouillabaisse, so maybe something stolen from such a recipe.

DIRECTIONS

  • Heat oil in a skillet and add the celery and leeks
  • When vegetables are soft add the hot pepper, thyme, pepper and salt and stir for 1 minute.
  • Add tomatoes, clam juice and white wine and bring to a boil.
  • Stir liquid until it is reduced by one-third, about 5 minutes
  • Transfer liquid to slow cooker with beans and stir
  • Cook until bubbling on low for 8 hours or 4 hours on high
  • Add tuna and heat on high for 20 minutes
  • For the aioli, combine ingredients well and top on the fish stew


Classy Potato, Leek and Mushroom Stew with Blue Cheese

This is another of the 150 Best Slow Cooker recipes, and I made it for the first time trying to impress a vegetarian. I have never been fond of strong cheese but I knew that the melted blue would be super tasty. It’s pretty basic stew, but the porto-b shrooms and blue cheese put an elegant spin on it. Serve with thick bread and a salad and you’ll forget there’s no meat.



INGREDIENTS


  • 14g dried porcini mushrooms
  • 250ml or 1 cup of boiling water
  • 1 tbsp vegetable oil
  • 2 large leeks, mostly just whites, cleaned and sliced thinly
  • 4 stalks celery
  • 2 cloves of garlic, minced
  • 1 tsp dried thyme leaves
  • 1 tsp pepper
  • 1 tsp sat
  • 500g – 1 lb Portobello or cremini mushrooms
  • 1 can (796 ml/28 oz) chopped stewed tomatoes, including juice
  • 250 ml or 1 cup of undiluted vegetable stock
  • 2 to 3 potatoes peeled and cut into small cubes
  • 125ml of whipping cream
  • 90g or 3 oz of blue cheese, grumbled. The better quality, the less harsh it will taste (apparently)

VARIATIONS

Use less blue cheese since it can get pretty strong, or don't use it at all!

DIRECTIONS

  • Soak the dried porcini mushrooms in the boiling water for 30 minutes. Keep the water, but pat mushrooms dry and chop finely.
  • Heat oil in a pan, add leeks and celery and stir until softened.
  • Add garlic, thyme, pepper, salt and the porcini mushrooms and stir for 1 minute.
  • Stir in the portobello or cremini mushrooms. Add the can of tomatoes, vegetable stock and the mushroom water that was set aside and bring to a boil.
  • Combine potatoes and the contents of the pan and mix well.
  • Cook until potatoes are soft: 8 to 10 hours on low or 4 to 5 hours on high.
  • When potatoes are ready add the whipping cream and blue cheese. Cover and cook until the cheese is melted and bubbling.
This isn’t the most budget light meal even though it’s vegetarian, but it’s hearty and delicious and impresses the meatless

Slow Cooked Hangover Cure

I never figured that the slow cooker could be used for breakfast, but when this breakfast casserole recipe was posted on the facebook group SLOW COOKER RECIPES it opened my mind to a whole new world of slower cooking. My roommates and I love big breakfasts, especially on weekends when you have the time to make a big mess of eggs and bacon and hash browns. All the randoms who passed out on your couches/floor/bed if you’re lucky, can get together and talk about the debauchery of the night before. Unfortunately after a night out we’re often lacking the energy or motor skills to feed a whole group of hungover college students. This casserole is the perfect solution because it can feed as many people as you want, it’s ready for you when your cottonmouth and headache force you out from under the covers, and the slow cooker keeps it warm for any tardy wake ups. Best of all, it’s easy enough to make while pre-drinking the night before. I made this casserole for the first time on New Year’s Eve while doing shots of Jameson and it rescued us the next morning. I modified the recipe posted to feed more, as there were easily a dozen people crashing our apartment. Honestly the units are pretty variable and there are many possible variations.

INGREDIENTS




  • 500g or 1lb frozen hash browns
  • Half a package of bacon, chopped
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 1 green bell pepper, chopped
  • 1 1/2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
  • 45g or 1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
  • 6 eggs
  • 120 ml or 1/2 cup milk
  • 2 Tbsp. flour
  • salt and pepper to taste

VARIATIONS



For those who like some spice in their eggs and might want to sweat out the toxins, any sort of chili sauce works really well and can be mixed with the eggs or layered if you like it really hot. Jalapenos can be thrown in with the onions and peppers. I would like to try replacing the frozen hash browns with either left over potatoes or raw chunks. As far as seasoning, I’ve only listed salt and pepper but we often throw in some dried chives and cayenne or chili spices. For more formal breakfast meetings (like The Link's Board of Directors meeting) consider those who might follow a kosher diet and swap the pork.

DIRECTIONS

  • This recipe is all about layering. Start with a strong potato base, break up a third of the hash browns so you don’t need to cut through them when serving.
  • Follow with some of the bacon. I cut the strips in half to simplify serving serving.
  • Mix up the onions and green pepper, the third layer. Get some colour in there!
  • Top with loads of cheeses.
  • Repeat this series of layers two or three times or until all your ingredients are used up.
  • In a mixing bowl, combine the eggs, milk and flour and give them a good beating.
  • When you’re ready to start, pour the egg mix into the slow cooker so it seeps into the cracks. It should fill to the top layer.
  • Cover and cook on low for 10 hours, perfect amount of time to crash and forget last nights mistakes, that is unless they’re joining you for breakfast!


THE TASTIES

A good crock pot breakfast casserole is enough to warrant sleep overs, these things are wicked. In fact, the promise of an amazing hot breakfast the next morning is easy bait to alluring members of the opposite sex. If you want a gooier omelet, I would let it go on low for maybe 8 hours? I would be interested to know if softer ones work out, because mine are always WELL BAKED!