I enjoy reading all the food blogs, especially Citymama who shares her yummy recipes and Stephanie Odea who blogs about crock pot cooking. Recently we signed for organic fruit and vegetable delivery and started getting the kids involved with cooking. Luckily I love organizing the list and shopping while my husband likes leading my boys in family cooking sessions. One of my 9 year old twin boys has also declared he wants to be a cook when he grows up!
This morning my husband and 9 year old son made a crock pot lasagna that is slowly cooking away (making the house smell great) and waiting for it’s last coat of cheese. When I posted a picture on Facebook of my 9 year old son preparing the lasagna this morning, one of my friends asked for the recipe. Because we used a really old slow cooker recipe book, I decided to find one online that is similar to the recipe we used. Stephanie O’Dea of “A Year Of Slow Cooking” has a recipe for super easy crock post lasagna that we will try next time. We like to cook vegetarian lasagna to mix in non-meat meals into our dinner schedule, using all types of vegetables including eggplant, mushrooms, spinach, zucchini and more.
Slow Cookers ( or Crock Pots as many call them) is a great cooking gadget that provides a simple way to get a hot meal on the table for busy families. The main benefit of a slow cooker/crock pot is the ability to throw in all the ingredients and then have it cook on it’s own without monitoring it. Some crock pots have features such as removable inserts, handles for carrying to pot lucks, timer to set a specific time to cook and a setting that turns the dish to warm after it is finished cooking.
My new slow cooker challenge will be to find one we can brown meat in – which will enable our famous Brisket recipe to be prepared fully in the crock pot instead of using a saute pan first to brown. During my research for a new slow cooker that browns meat in the same container, I found information on Breville Slow Cooker with EasySeal that has a removable non-stick coated cast aluminum stove top insert. But I did not see any timer features (other then the low, high and auto) which I like to use to set to a specific time to cook.
Does anyone have any slow cooker recipes to share? Or does anyone have a recommendation for a slow cooker that also browns meat?
