Crock Pot Chicken Teriyaki

Once again, this idea came from Rachael Ray, with a few adjustments. Sometimes I sign my checks "Rachael Ray" and then tear them up. Not really. Not really at all.

Dump the following ingredients into the crock pot...

2 cups brown rice (I used brown basmati rice and it was great!)
1 onion, sliced
3 carrots, cut into matchsticks
1 red or orange bell pepper, sliced
1 cup Teriyaki sauce
2 cups chicken broth
3 cups water
1/4 cup honey
3-4 cloves of garlic, minced
About an inch and a half of ginger root, grated

If using raw chicken pieces, go ahead and add it now. I used previously cooked and shredded chicken breast, so I added it much later, just an hour or two before serving. Cook on low for 6-8 hours. Check on the liquid levels as time gets closer to 6-8 hours; you may need to add a little more water to keep the rice from drying out, depending on how long you plan to cook it.

Apparently I did not take a picture of this one! I'm so sorry!

But...enjoy anyway!

Crock Pot Chicken and Dumplings

So, I am a Rachael Ray junkie. And this week she is doing an awesome thing...every day she is introducing a new slow-cooker recipe. I loooove slow cooker recipes. It is so satisfying to do the work in the morning and then have the aroma of home-cooked food drifting throughout the house all day. Well, old Rach gave a slow-cooker chicken and biscuits idea the other day that inspired me. I liked her idea, but I modified it and added dumplings instead of biscuits. Because everyone loves dumplings. Or at least they should. They should especially love this version, because it has relatively little fat, and is full of nutritious vegetables.

Start by chopping up...
5 carrots
2-3 ribs of celery
1 butternut squash

Put these vegetables in the crockpot, along with a bag of frozen peas.


Sprinkle about 1/4 cup flour over the veggies. Cover with chicken broth - about 3 to 4 cups. Add salt and pepper; turn it on low and forget about if for about 6 hours.

An hour before you are ready to eat, turn the temperature on high and add your cooked, shredded chicken to the pot. Then make the dumplings...

2 cups whole wheat flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk

Mix together and drop little pieces of it into the hot crock pot. Stir to incorporate and then pop the lid back on and let it cook for 45 minutes to an hour.

And then...


Thoroughly enjoy!

BBQ Cubed Venison

Confession...10:25 PM. I just went to the refrigerator, pulled out the leftovers of this meal, and started eating cold potatoes from the top of the bowl. If that's not a recommendation for this one, I don't know what is.

Besides the amazing potatoes, another great quality of this meal is the fact that it took me 10 minutes to prepare before I walked out of the house this morning.

Spread out 2 pounds of cubed venison in the bottom of a crock pot. Pour one bottle of good quality (meaning NO high fructose corn syrup or any ingredients that you can't pronounce) BBQ sauce, 1 cup beef broth, 1/4 cup soy sauce, and 2 Tablespoons Worcestershire sauce over the meat. Slice up one red bell pepper and one onion and add to the pot, then fill the rest of the pot with cubed potatoes. I used probably 6 or 7 small Idaho potatoes.

That's it. Pop the lid on and cook on low for 7 or 8 hours. I actually cooked it for 10 hours, and it was still great. Serve alongside roasted broccoli or another green.

Enjoy the midnight leftovers!

Asian Style Cubed Steak

We had some cubed venison in the freezer, and here is the problem...I don't love cubed venison. I love love love deer burger and deer sausage, but other than that I'm not a huge fan of deer meat. I've just found one way to cook cubed deer and I didn't really want it again tonight. So I found a recipe from Rachael Ray's website and adapted it a teeny bit to fit my ingredients and style.

Heat 2 Tablespoons olive oil in large skillet. Sprinkle flour onto cubed steak. Place in skillet and brown on both sides. Cut into strips or pieces and put in crockpot.

Chop an onion, a red bell pepper, and an orange bell pepper into strips; put on top of steak in crockpot.

Grate several cloves of garlic and a two-inch piece of peeled ginger root over the pot.

Pour one cup of tomato sauce, 3/4 cup reduced sodium soy sauce, 4 Tablespoons brown sugar, and black pepper over everything. Cover and turn on low for 6-8 hours.

A little less than an hour before serving, prepare rice and let it cook according to package directions.

Serve steak and veggies over rice, with steamed or roasted broccoli on the side.

I have to admit, it was really good. The steak was so tender it pretty much fell apart in my mouth.


The end. Enjoy!