Easy Slow Cooker Chili (recipe)

As promised, here is my recipe for an easy slow cooker chili.  The great thing about this is that there is very little cutting/cleaning of vegetables involved.  Just 1 medium onion is needed.  The rest of the flavor adding ingredients come in a jar, can or bottle.  Instead of chopping up the jalapeno and green peppers I'd normally use, I grabbed a jar of chunky salsa at the grocery store.  The flavors and added texture are already there, ready to go into the pot.

Easy Slow Cooker Chili w/Rice

Easy Slow Cooker Chili, with rice

1 lb lean ground beef
1 medium onion, diced
1- 1 1/2 jar chunky salsa (heat level up to you)
1 T chili powder
1/4 t cinnamon
1 1/2 T Cajun seasoning
1 T garlic powder
1 T worcestershire sauce
1 can diced tomatoes, not drained
2-3 cans light red kidney beans
salt & pepper to taste

Brown beef and onion in skillet.  Add to slow cooker.  Add in the rest of the ingredients, stir.  Cover and cook on low for 6-8 hours or high for about 4 hours.
Serve over rice or with your favorite biscuits.  May also be garnished with a bit of shredded cheese and some sour cream.

The slow cooker may not be entirely necessary for this dish, but I like my chili best when the flavors have had a chance to mingle and get to know each other.  The cinnamon and worcestershire sauce were a new experiment to go with my regular recipe and I must say that they brought on a whole new level of flavor and were delicious!

What do you like to eat with your chili?  Do you have any recipes that you'd like to share?  I have another recipe that I haven't made in a while, but got some very good reviews and even won an award.  It's my own little concoction that I like to call "Holy Mole Moo-Steak Chili" and uses a different variety of seasonings and a bit of cocoa.

Honey Chipotle Yams (recipe)

A little back story on this recipe: The grocery store had yams on sale for 39 cents a pound a week or so ago, so I decided to get a few to experiment with.  Prior to this recipe, I'd tasted sweet potatoes/yams prepared in 3 ways: French-fried at a friend's house, baked with mango rum butter at Farlow's in Englewood, FL (quite delicious!!!), and baked into a pie by another friend's mom.  I'd never cooked one myself, but after a bit of Pinterest searching and considering the flavor of the root vegetable, I decided to go with something sweet and spicy.  Thus, Honey Chipotle Yams were born.

Honey Chipotle Yams

Honey Chipotle Yams 
1 yam, peeled and diced         1/16 t cinnamon
1/4 medium onion, chopped    1/8 t chipotle powder
1 clove garlic, minced             1/8 t chili powder
1 1/2 T vegetable oil               1-1 1/2 T honey
Salt & Pepper to taste

In a large skillet, heat oil over medium heat. Add yam, onion and garlic.  Mix cinnamon, chipotle powder, chili powder, salt and pepper and add to yam mixture.  Cook, stirring occasionally, for about 5 minutes.  Stir in honey and cover.  Cook until yams are fork tender.

I made this recipe for breakfast one day after waking in a particularly "ready to eat" mood.  As you know, I don't normally eat breakfast in the morning and stick to a cup of black coffee with some sugar.  However, on this morning, I decided to cook something up.  It turned out to be rather filling and kept me going until lunch time... definitely a recipe to add to the stash.

A possible change to the recipe: Adding a bit of ground sweet sausage might add more depth of flavor and some necessary protein, making it into a hash.  Serve with some flaky, buttery biscuits, and you've got yourself a meal.

The honey chipotle yams might make a nice side dish to go along with a spicy roast or turkey.  What would you eat with your honey chipotle yams?

Menu Monday: Leftovers & Multi-purpose ingredients

Welcome to this week's Menu Monday!  I'm up dark and early... can't believe that I'm up before the sun, haha.  Oh well, this is a great time to really look through the ads from the Sunday paper, plan this week's meals and plan my shopping route.  Of course I am nowhere near expert levels of the plan ahead/stick to plan thing when it comes to a menu, but I'm slowly getting better at it and am enjoying the journey.  It's possible that I am merely using the calendar as a basic guide for what to make/when.  For example, before I can make a sloppy cheese steak omelet, I have to make a sloppy cheese steak sandwich.  However, I might decide to use the pork chops up first.  Really, it has a lot to do with what I'm in the mood for each day and what I have in stock.

Dishes to enjoy this week include leftovers from the weekend's chili and beef roast... nothing fancy, they are both delicious on their own and turned out fantastically.  For dinner this evening, I'll make a bit more rice than I usually do to go with my chili.  That way, I'll have some left over for Tuesday's soup lunch without having to dirty another pot.  A quick trip in the microwave and lunch will be served!  Sloppy cheese steaks and smoky Cajun potatoes, sloppy cheese steak omelet, pork chops, pulled pork chop sandwich with slaw, pesto pizza, etc. will also be enjoyed.

I don't purchase pork chops often, but they're on sale this week and I do enjoy them and think they will go very well with some buttered or cabbage and noodles (get more use out of the bag of slaw by using it in 2 or more dishes) and vegetables.  A nice apple pie for dessert on pork chop day might be good too and apples are on sale.  The possibilities are endless.

Check back for my grocery list.

I haven't forgotten that I promised to post recipes for easy chili and easy slow cooker beef roast.  I'm still working on them and will likely go on a recipe posting binge at some point once I get those recipes and others typed up.  What recipes would you like to try?

WMW Bonus: Pantry Chicken Moscato (recipe)

Welcome back for a special Wine Me Wednesday bonus!  Tonight's wine was pretty darn tasty, but I couldn't quite drink it all and got hungry when there was about a glass left in the bottle.

I haven't made it to the grocery store yet this week due to snow and tires in desperate need of changing, so the menu for the week will be experiencing a few alterations.  In place of the chili for this evening's supper and tomorrow's lunch is an easy new dish I'd like to call "Pantry Chicken Moscato."  The chili will be made in the slow cooker for supper tomorrow and probably lunch and dinner on Friday after I get back from the store.

Here is the updated menu:

The grocery list really didn't change much, so that's exciting.  Everything I used in the Pantry Chicken Moscato was already in my freezer or on the pantry shelves.  The only thing to restock is the bag of frozen green beans.  I do like having those around.

Now for the recipe (or some very basic guidelines, i didn't measure anything) to make Jenn's Pantry Chicken Moscato:

Pantry Chicken Moscato

Jenn's Pantry Chicken Moscato

1 can cream of mushroom soup
1/3 can Moscato white wine
1 can chicken breast, not drained
1 handful frozen green beans
crushed red pepper (to taste)
fresh ground black pepper (to taste)
salt (to taste)garlic powder (to taste)
1 T flour/water mixture (to thicken sauce)
rice, prepared

In a sautee pan over medium heat, combine cream of mushroom soup, wine, pepper, salt and garlic powder.  Stir until fully combined.  Cook for a couple of minutes more to allow some of the alcohol from the wine to cook off.  Add canned chicken and broth to sauce mixture, stir.  Allow to heat for about a minute.  Add frozen green beans, stir.  Let cook until ingredients are heated through.  Stir in flour/water and cook for about 10 more minutes.  Once sauce begins to thicken, serve over prepared rice.  Enjoy.

Please bear with me as I continue to learn to write recipes.  When coming up with something new like Jenn's Pantry Chicken Moscato, I rarely keep track of the process while going through it and only mentally note approximate ingredient amounts as I go.  This is something I hope to improve upon in order to provide better directions on how to create some very tasty dishes.

Do you have any suggestions or tips on how to keep track of what you are doing as you come up with new recipes and recipe variations?  Please share in the comments below.  

Wine Me Wednesday: Gallo Family Vineyards Moscato

It's that time again, time for Wine Me Wednesday.  Today's wine is currently being enjoyed courtesy of my good friend Bruce.  He brought it over to celebrate my recent acceptance into the MSW-Direct graduate course through IUPUI.

As Bruce works on his homework assignment that is due tomorrow (he's a typical procrastinating college student), I'm taking a moment to write my amateur review of Gallo Family Vineyards Moscato.

This white wine is very sweet and has a relatively bold fruity flavor.  For a sweet wine, it is pretty easy to drink and we will probably have the bottle emptied in short time.  This is the 3rd Moscato I've blogged about on here... so clearly I'm a fan of the variety and each has had its own unique attributes and flavors. :)  This one is, by far, the sweetest one I've tried yet.  I'm still figuring out what would pair well with a sweet Moscato... any suggestions?

Menu Monday

Happy Veterans' Day to our nation's finest men and women in uniform (and of course, those who have retired or finished their contract honorably)!  Thank you for your service to our country.

This week's menu contains some of my favorites and the slow cooker will be used for at least 2 dinners.  I'd be lying if I said I wasn't excited for this week's belly-warming menu!  Check back later this week for a couple of easy slow cooker recipes: chili and pot roast.

Some of the leftover pot roast will be re-purposed for use in Saturday's burrito bowl dinner.  A quick shred and additional seasonings for the meat to make it "burrito bowl ready", a bed of white rice and black beans and a healthy topping of shredded cheese, sour cream and salsa- can't wait for Saturday's dinner!

This week's grocery list is rather short due to my having a decently stocked pantry.  Here it is: sandwich bread, provolone cheese, beef or pork to roast, bag of potatoes, bag of onions, 1 lb of ground beef, chunky salsa, crackers and lunch meat.

Wine Me Wednesday: Funky Llama Chardonnay

This week's wine feature is an unoaked chardonnay by Funky Llama in Argentina.  I must admit that this was  not one of my favorite drinking wines.  I'm pretty sure that I only purchased it because it was on sale and had a fun name on the label.  The flavor was relatively disappointing.

In an effort not to waste the wine, I decided to use it in a creamy white wine sauce to go with wild mushroom ravioli.  The wine served its purpose and turned out to taste pretty good in the sauce.  However, at a regular price of $8.99 per 750mL bottle, I doubt I will be purchasing this particular variety again.  There are far too many other wines to try and wines I've found that I enjoy that also wear a better price tag.

 With a generous sprinkling of freshly shredded parmesan cheese, the wild mushroom ravioli and white wine sauce turned out to be edible.  Flavor-wise, the sauce turned out pretty well, but consistency-wise, it was a bit too thin.  The thin sauce did inspire an idea to make a creamy white wine soup with chicken and potatoes, though.  More on that later after I've thought about how to go about creating the soup and been successful in its creation.  With a bit of work and recipe tweaks, the sauce will be ready to post.

Bagel, Bagel, Bagel

Bagels are quite possibly one of my favorite foods.  The versatility and variety of flavors provide endless possibilities for a tasty, easy snack or meal.  Next time you're at the bakery and decide to pick up a few, why not try them in one of these recipes?

Pesto Mushroom Pizza & Plain

Pesto Pizza Bagel with Mushrooms
Ingredients:
1/4 cup pesto sauce
fresh mozzarella, sliced
fresh mushrooms, roughly chopped
plain bagel- toasted

Carefully remove hot bagel from toaster and place on baking sheet or a piece of foil.  Spread pesto evenly on each half of bagel.  Scatter mushrooms and mozzarella slices on each half.
Bake at 350 degrees F until cheese has melted (approximately 15-20 minutes).  Serve hot.  Enjoy.

Sweet Cinnamon & Pumpkin

Pumpkin Bagel w/ Sweet Cinnamon Spread
Ingredients:
2 T cream cheese
1/8 t ground cinnamon
1 1/2 t granulated sugar

pumpkin bagel

While bagel is toasting: combine cream cheese, cinnamon and sugar.  Carefully remove bagel from toaster and spread sweet cinnamon spread evenly on each half.  Serve immediately.  Enjoy.

Turkey, Brie & Pumpernickel

Turkey/Brie Pumpernickel Sandwich

Ingredients:

Pumpernickel bagel, toasted

2 slices turkey

2 t spicy brown mustard

1/4 inch slices brie cheese (enough to cover 1 side of bagel)

Carefully remove bagel from toaster.  Place cheese in even layer around one bagel half.  On other half, spread mustard and place turkey.  Put loaded bagel halves together as a sandwich.  Cut bagel sandwich in half.  Serve immediately.  Enjoy.

Each of the bagel combinations tried for this post were very tasty.  I'd have to say that my favorite this time around was the pesto pizza bagel with mushrooms.  It had a very nice flavor and the fresh ingredients went well together.  I will definitely continue trying different bagels and recipes.  They are filling, come in a variety of flavors and are not too expensive.

What kind of bagels do you like to eat?  What do you eat with your bagels?  Please share in the comments section.

Menu Monday: Baking Goodness

Nothing warms a house quite like baking delicious treats.  As the weather is continuing to get colder here on the mountain, I think I'll make a pie this week.  I'll also use the oven to make some pork chops, pizza bagels and a hand tossed pizza.  If there is enough pie crust dough left over, I'll make some "cinnamon rolls" as well.

The grocery list this week: pita chips, lunch meat, cheese, fruit, pizza dough, eggs, milk, ground cinnamon, butter.

Check back over the next day or so for a special entry on bagels, featuring 3 different recipes.