Joseph asks everyday what's for dinner and I'm loving that I have a new response everyday. Everyday is a new experiment. A new journey for me to take. I try new recipes on the reg.. if we like them, I file them in my "Turner Recipes" box, if we don't (which has yet to happen) then I'll move on and forget it happened.
During this pregnancy, I've loved Chicken (I always have but I feel like I eat it more often than I did pre-pregnancy.) So most of the meals I've been cooking have been of the poultry kind.
In the past 2 weeks, the slow cooker has been used more often than not I think. We are still huge fans of grilling out but, the slow cooker is getting good use lately.
All the recipes are QUICK, EASY and DON'T require much time for prepping or a number of ingredients. You can leave the cooker on while you're at work or while you're doing other things around the house throughout the day. My cooker says "Stay or Go, Stay or Go." Kind of gives me a laugh.
Some of the chicken recipes that I have done in the slow cooker so far have turned out to be phenomenal. If it sounds good to you, give it a shot!
1) Cheesy Chicken on Rice -- (4 servings)
Ingredients: 6 Chicken Breast Halves
2 (11 oz) Cans Cream of Cheddar Soup
1/2 Cup Milk
1 TSP Garlic Powder
Salt & Pepper (to taste)
White Rice
Directions: 1) Spray slow cooker with cooking spray, add chicken
2) Mix soup & milk and pour over the chicken
3) Add salt + pepper and garlic powder
4) Cook on high for 6 hours-all day, covered
5) Make rice as directions say when you're ready to eat
6) Serve cheesy chicken on top of rice
2) Chicken & Dumplings -- (4 servings)
Ingredients: 2 Chicken Breasts
1 TBS Butter
1 Can Cream Of Chicken
1/2 Onion, Finely Diced
1 (10 oz) Package Biscuit Dough, Torn
Optional: Sprinkles of Cumin & Parsley (These are the
spices I added, original recipe does not include them)
Directions: 1) Place the chicken, butter, soup and onion in slow
cooker
2) Fill cooker with enough water to cover ingredients
3) Cover & cook on high for 5-6 hours
(around 5 hours is when I sprinkled in the spices that I
added)
4) 30 minutes before serving, place the torn dough on
top & cook until the dough is no longer raw
3) Delicious Italian Chicken Pasta -- (5-6 Servings)
Ingredients: 4 Chicken Breasts
1 Package Dry Zesty Italian (You can use any dry Italian,
I chose Zesty)
1 (8 oz) Package Cream Cheese
1-2 Cans Cream of Chicken (I only used 1, it depends
on how thick you want it)
Bowtie Pasta
Directions: 1) Place chicken in crock pot & pour dry Italian
powder over it
2) Combine cream cheese & soup in small pot
on low heat then pour over chicken
3) Cook on low for 4 hours-all day
4) Leave chicken whole, cube it or shred it and then stir
into the sauce (I cubed it)
(if sauce is too thick, add milk)
5) Cook pasta as usual according to box
6) Serve chicken over pasta
4) BBQ Pulled Pork
Ingredients: 6 Chicken Breasts
1 (12 oz) Bottle of BBQ Sauce (Of your choice,
I used a sweet BBQ)
1/2 Cup Italian Dressing (I used Olive Garden's
Italian Dressing)
1/4 Cup Brown Sugar
2 TBS Worcestershire Sauce
Directions: 1) Place chicken in slow cooker
2) Mix BBQ sauce, Italian dressing, brown sugar and
Worcestershire sauce until smooth in mixing bowl and
pour over chicken
3) Cook for 3-4 Hours on High or 6-8 Hours on Low
The best feeling? Watching Joseph get up to get 2nd's and then eating all the leftovers. It means I'm doing something right. That's how I feel anyway. I think I got the most response from the Delicious Italian Chicken Pasta. You could tell he really enjoyed that one. (Shhh!
I'm not a huge fan of BBQ but it is one of Joseph's favorites. Every now and then I give it a shot and I have found some BBQ dishes that I actually really like. Pulled BBQ Pork Sandwiches is definitely one of them. So I gave that recipe a shot! YUM! We ate our sandwiches with baked beans, potato salad and green beans. I think that might have been my favorite meal this week!
I have so many recipes to try. A long list is ahead of me. There are even cookbooks that I haven't gotten to open yet, but you best believe I'm getting there! I'm looking forward to it, Joseph & I (and Caroline too, trust me...she has a strong opinion in all of this) are discovering new favorite foods together.
Next on my list? I'm about to start practicing dishes for our Thanksgiving meal together. This is Our 1st Thanksgiving together and both of our 1st Thanksgiving's away from our families. It'll be just the two of us. So I'm going to combine some of my family Thanksgiving traditional dishes with some of his family's traditional dishes and we will start our own tradition together.
