Continuing the adventure of learning how to cook, I have fallen in love with my crock pot.  Winters hit Minnesota pretty hard, so it’s really nice to have warm food at the ready.  

mmm…vegetabley!

meaty!

overnight magic in the crock pot

My favorite part about cooking is that you get to add as much as you want of the things that you love, and leave out the parts that you don’t.  My chicken soup, for example, is heavy on the carrots and celery, while I left out black pepper, which I am allergic to.  When I cook, any dish that calls for some vegetables usually ends up with at least twice the prescribed amount.  I was a vegetarian for a number of years, and while I do eat meat as an adult, I tend to eat a largely vegetarian diet to this day.

Here’s what I used:

• 2 1/2 pounds of chicken breasts
• 1 pound of carrots
• 1 pound of celery
• 1 medium white onion
• 2 cloves of garlic, quartered
• 64 ounces of chicken broth
• soy sauce to taste (a few dashes will add a lot of flavor!)

Chop the vegetables to your desired shape/size.  They will spend 8 hours overnight in the crock pot, and then up to a week in your fridge as leftovers to be reheated – there is less than zero chance that they won’t be cooked thoroughly.  Place the vegetables at the bottom of the pot, layer the chicken on top, pour in the chicen broth and a few dashes of soy sauce, cover, and go to bed!  

Make sure the chicken is covered in broth so it doesn’t dry out.  I like to pour just enough broth in to cover the chicken, and then the rest in the pot when I’ve shredded the chicken, but to each their own.  In the morning, your house will smell wonderful, and you’ll have lunch sitting and waiting for you on the counter.  Shred the chicken with a fork, stir, and dig in!  

I like my soup to be brothy, but chock-full of good stuff like chicken and veg.  This recipe yielded a beautiful result.  In fact, I’m off to have a bowl right now!  

Enjoy your weekend, stay warm, and see you tomorrow for the Sunday Night Knitting Report – I’ve been busy knitting lots of cute critters this week!