Homemaking on the Homestead

This recipe was not on my menu last week. I'd planned something else, but life happened and I wanted a quick meal for the day that I could put in the crockpot and not think about until dinner time. This was the ticket. I found a recipe but had to tweak it some to make it to my liking. A warning.. it is a big recipe. You can cut it down, or just freeze some of it if it is too much for your family size. This lasted us one night for dinner, a couple meals for my hubby's lunch and my kids finished up the leftovers.   Crockpot Aloha Chicken 5#'s boneless, skinless chicken thighs... I'm sure breast would work as well. If using frozen chicken, defrost first 1 can coconut milk 1 cup frozen orange juice concentrate (undiluted) 1 cup soy sauce ¾ cup brown sugar 2T lemon juice Combine everything in the crockpot. Cook on low for 6 to 8 hours. Serve over rice. Add a nice green salad and you have a delish meal!  Talk about simple and yummy!!    ...

I made this meal last week. It was not on my menu but I had about 3# of chicken thighs in the fridge that needed to be made into something. So I put this meal together based on what I had to work with. It turned out very good and was super easy to make. I served the Italian chicken with some buttered pasta sprinkled with parmesan cheese. I started by cutting up a medium size onion in slices. Then cut up one can of olives and about 5 or 6 large mushrooms. For spices I used pepper, granulated garlic, Italian seasonings and pink Himalayan salt. I put a few of the chicken thighs in the bottom of the crockpot and sprinkled my seasonings over the top... Then put a layer of onions, olives and mushrooms... Then continued repeating the layers until I had used up all the veggies and all the chicken... I cooked it on low for around 7 hours. Served it with the pasta and a green salad... Like I said, it was good and very simple to make. Easy Crock...

This was a super simple meal (seems to be my favorite type of meals at the moment.. ~smile~ ) and tasted oh so good. The family ate it up!! It was a great winter nights meal. It was a cut up the meat and veggies, put all the ingredients in a crockpot and let it cook all day. The best type of meals... I served it with cornbread and a salad. Crockpot Creamy Mexican Chicken over Rice 3#'s boneless, skinless chicken (breast or thighs), cut into bite size pieces 1 medium onion, chopped 1 large pepper (red, green, yellow.. your choice), chopped 2 cups sliced celery 1 can rotel tomatoes 8oz cream cheese 2T chili powder salt and pepper to taste Combine all ingredients in crockpot. Cook on low for about 6 to 8 hours. Stir occasionally while cooking to distribute the cream cheese. Serve over rice, top with a bit of cheese and sour cream (add salsa it you want too) and enjoy!!  

If you need a pretty easy meal, this may be the one. I was going to be gone for the day and wanted to make sure I had dinner pretty much ready when I got home. I did not have a lot of time before I left to prepare. Meatball subs seemed like the perfect answer. I put 2#'s of meatballs in my crockpot. These can be homemade meatballs or store bought. I had a big bag of meatballs that I had purchased from Costco in my freezer. So used some of those. I poured a 24oz jar of spaghetti sauce over them, set the crockpot on low and headed out the door. When I got home, I stirred them up, and they were ready to go (they had been on low in the crockpot for about 6 hours) ... I used hoagie rolls and put the meatballs and a little sauce in each sandwich and sprinkled some cheese on the top. I served them with coleslaw that I had picked up from the deli while I was in town and potato chips. My guys gave this meal a big thumbs up!

Today's video is on making on of my favorite, easy, go to meals, Easy Crockpot Chicken Chili. I love this meal because it is so easy to throw together. My most loved crockpot meals are ones that don't take a lot of prep ahead of time and I can have the basic pantry ingredients on my shelf ready to go. These types of meals are perfect for busy days at home or when you just need to get dinner started before you head out for the day.    You can find the recipe for this meal here: http://homesteadinghomemaker.blogspot.com/2014/08/crockpot-recipes-im-up-and-running-again.html Also if you'd like to sign up for my YouTube Channel you can do that here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5muL8lxJ2Chiv_ikuZT5nQ   Hope you find the video helpful!!  

My new computer arrived and I’ve got it all set up and running, thanks to my IT tech son! And thankfully I was able to avoid Windows 8 and still running Windows 7. So hopefully I’ll be back to blogging regularly again! With summer here I’ve not wanted to heat up my kitchen any more than necessary so I’ve been using my crockpot a lot. Also I’ve been in a “the simpler, the better” mood when it comes to cooking. The outdoors calls my name and the kitchen does not this time of year! ~smile~ Here are a couple recipes I’ve made recently that were very good and simple to throw together. Crockpot BBQ Kielbasa (you can adjust the size of this recipe easily to work for your family) 3lbs kielbasa (I actually used chicken sausage from Costco. The brand was Aidells) 1 onion, sliced 5 or 6 large mushrooms, sliced 1 bottle (more or less) bbq sauce (the size is not that important as the main goal is just to cover the sausages & veggies with it. I used about 2 or 3 cups) ...