Crock Pot Marsala Pears
Filed under: Appetizer, Breakfast, Dinner, Recipes, Side dishes, vegetarian
Lately, I’ve been more interested in making crock pot desserts. I think it’s the farthest thing from what grandma used to make– this amazing kitchen appliance is meant for more than just soup and meat! I have a couple pounds of fresh seckel pears. They are still firm and their skins are colorful and fragrant with just a few blemishes. Since we’ll be cooking these down, I think it’s best to use fruit when it’s just a day or two ahead of being ripe.
Some of the recipes I’ve seen for seckel pears require the cook to peel the pear, but that’s it. I have issues with this prep. First off– it’s rediculously difficult to stand pears up on the crock pot. Have you ever seen a flat-bottomed pear?! Plus, it might make a nice presentation in it’s orginal form, but then you have to worry about cutting around the tough middle and not eating any of the seeded parts. Why not just half it and use a melon baller to remove the part you don’t want to eat?? Or you can be even lazier, like I am, and just slice the halves off just outside of the core so you don’t even have to scoop it out. So there you go, that’s my suggestion. Either way, it’s a couple minutes more prep work, but it’s just as good to eat with less hassle at the dinner table.
Marsala wine is great for cooking. It’s full flavored and a little sweet. I opened a bottle to make chicken marsala one night and now it’s been sitting on my shelf. It’s not a wine I would drink from a glass, but it’s great for cooking. So I think the combination with fresh fruit really makes mouth water. Plus, it’s really sad to let the bottle gather dust between chicken marsala nights. If you don’t have marsala, try another red wine and maybe add some raisins or craisins to the recipe to add a little sweetness.
Try these pears for pretty much any meal. They would be amazing next to some cinnamon oatmeal for breakfast, a nice snack with a side of vanilla greek yogurt or serve it for dessert after a steak dinner and top it with some dark chocolate shavings. However you discover it, I hope you like experimenting with this fresh fruit. Enjoy!
12 seckel pears, halved and scooped (see above note)
1/2 c. marsala wine
1 T. sugar
Place pears in the crock pot, pour wine in and sprinkle sugar. Stir it all around and cook on low for 2-3 hours. The pears should be soft enough to cut with the edge of a fork, but not mushy like apple sauce.
Crock Pot Peach Cobbler
Filed under: Breakfast, Recipes, Side dishes, vegetarian
The only thing better than a local farmer’s market is a neighbor with an amazing garden and fruit trees. I had the pleasure of pillaging the peach trees yesterday and came home with about two dozen little peaches, ripe and ready to be enjoyed. They were sweet and juicy, broke easily off the pit and cooked down perfectly into my peach cobbler. I’m not sure what makes me happier– the warm cobbler with it’s sticky sweetness stuck to my spoon… or the fact that I can walk next door, fill my basket and make another pot full tomorrow.
I like the keep the flavor of my cobbler simple. The peaches are already so sweet, I really just want to be able to cook them down a little. And I like the oatmeal topping, it makes me think of a cookie up on top. This recipe definitely craves a big scoop of vanilla ice cream, but it’s also really good with some vanilla yogurt or just a little half and half… or nothing at all. It’s really good that way, too. Enjoy!
(You’ll see in the recipe directions that I use the crock pot in an unconventional way. I cook the dessert on low, half uncovered, for the last hour. This helps the peach portion thicken up and the crumbly top crisp a little bit.)
4 lbs peaches, peeled, pitted and sliced
1/4 c. brown sugar, not packed Read more
Crock Pot Apple Brown Betty
Your crock pot isn’t just for cooking main dishes, I’m on a kick cooking desserts too! If you are a fan of baked apples or even just apple sauce, you’ll love this take on what I call “apple brown betty”. If you look up the meaning, it’s still unclear who this “betty” is and why her apples were so brown. Most sources date the dish back to colonial times and confirm that the dessert is truly as American as… well, apple pie.
The flavor and composition of my apple brown betty is similar to a cobbler, so if you’d like to try this with peaches, berries or any combination of fresh fruit, give it a try and please post a comment and let us all know how it turns out. Enjoy!
6-8 medium apples, peeled, cored and sliced
1/3 cup brown sugar, packed
1 T. vanilla
1 t. cinnamon
1/4 t. nutmeg
For the crumbles– Read more
Crock Pot Carrot Cake
I would like to begin this post with an argument. The title of carrot cake is really a misnomer. This shouldn’t be considered a dessert. It is based foremost on a VEGETABLE for goodness sake! It is a carbohydrate next and then a treat after that. It is vegetarian, kosher, can be low fat and I’d almost put the gold sticker of “healthy” on it!
Based on these clear and evident facts, I would like to share with you my recipe for crock pot carrot cake. Serve it for breakfast, after lunch, for an afternoon or evening snack or just about any point of the day. Chalk it up as doing a good deed for yourself. And trust me, this tastes soooo much better than drinking v8!
1 c. flour
1 c. oatmeal
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. applesauce Read more
Passover Puffs– not done in a crock pot
Due to popular request, here is my recipe for Passover Puffs. These are great for making sandwiches. Yes they are made with matzah meal, but no– they don’t taste like Passover food.
If you want to add some variety, try adding more or less sugar, depending if you are serving them with sweet or savory foods. Also, you can add cheese into them before cooking or seasonings to spice them up. I like them plain, with some cream cheese and jam.
Seriously, you can live on these for the next week. Enjoy!
1 c. boiling water
1/2 c. vegetable oil
1/2 t. salt
2 t. sugar
1 c. matzah meal
1/2 c. cake meal
4 eggs
Boil water, oil and salt. Add dry ingredients, remove from heat and mix. Add eggs, mix. Drop in big scoops (or use a muffin pan to make them pretty) onto greased cookie sheet. Bake at 425 degrees for 30 minutes and then 325 for 30 minutes.
Crock Pot Bread Pudding
If you could smell my house right now, it is sweet and a little spicy with a creaminess swirling around with every breath. Somehow, it is like a combination of slow Sunday mornings and early weekday diner breakfasts. If you are preparing your house for the Jewish holiday of Passover– this is the ultimate way of using up the last of your chametz (leavened bread). You can use any combination of plain breads, but I’d recommend using white, wheat, french, italian… even leftover hamburger or hot dog buns if you’ve got them. Honestly, this might be for dessert, but if I had more bread to use, I would totally make it again for breakfast.
As this time of year seems to fill with baby and wedding showers in preparation for summer celebrations, I would also absolutely recommend making this to share at a brunch. Since it only takes three hours, you can start it when you wake up and be ready to entertain guests with ease. For my male readers and/or sports fanatics– you might be spending too many nights staying up and watching March Madness basketball games; start the following day with this hearty dish to help wake you up and fill you up (and maybe even absorb that last bit of “adult beverage” festering in your belly).
So no matter what catagory you might fit into from this post, I think you all will fall in love with this sweet dish. Enjoy!
6 c. cubed bread
8 eggs, beaten Read more
Crock Pot Shrimp and Grits
Anytime I make shrimp, I always feel the need to call everyone “Bubba” and watch a repeat of Forrest Gump. I love the scene where Bubba lists off ”shrimp is the fruit of the sea. You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, saute it. Dey’s uh, shrimp-kabobs, shrimp creole, shrimp gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried. There’s pineapple shrimp, lemon shrimp, coconut shrimp, pepper shrimp, shrimp soup, shrimp stew, shrimp salad, shrimp and potatoes, shrimp burger, shrimp sandwich. That- that’s about it.” But Bubba forgot about one of my favorites– shrimp and grits.
Living in the South, recipes for grits are as common as dinner rolls– you can have traditional ones, flavorful ones, different recipes for breakfast, lunch or dinner and no matter how you fix it, it’s good. Depending where you go in the South, grits take on different traditions. In Charleston, the beginning of the grits is a few pieces of bacon and that has become a common trend across the country; the smokiness of the bacon is a nice balance against the other flavors. I’ve read that grits is actually the official state food of South Carolina. Maybe we should petition to make it an official food of our whole country!
I prefer this recipe because it’s not too spicy and has a lot of flavor without being overwhelming. Keeping it simple makes it easy to serve for any meal of the day or as a special side dish. If you’d like to spice it up, add a few drops of Tobasco to the whole mix or to your own bowl.
4 cups water or chicken broth
1 c. quick-cooking grits, uncooked
2 garlic cloves, minced Read more
Crock Pot Pomme de Tara
A friend of mine wants to use her crock pot more, but has an allergy to tomatoes. After doing a little research, I agreed with her– most crock pot recipes seem to have some sort of tomato or tomato-based product in them! It is an injustice that my friend should not be able to embrace easy crock pot cooking more often. So, my next few recipes will definitely not be red. And if it’s just that you don’t like tomatoes, these might just become some of your new favorites too.
This is an easy potato casserole that gets jazzed up by the cheese and chips. Since the french word for potato is “pomme de terre”, I am honoring my friend Tara with this recipe for “Pomme de Tara”. Enjoy! 
(Is there a recipe you’d like to see or an ingredient you’d like to avoid?? Click on my contact page and send me a note– I’m happy to post something just for YOU!)
6-8 potatoes, diced
1 onion, chopped
4 T. butter, melted
1 c. milk Read more
Crock Pot Tapioca Pudding
Growing up, my dad really liked tapioca pudding and I could never understand why he enjoyed eating eyeballs. They looks gooey and slimey and smelled like playdough. I also remember seeing vats of it at chinese buffet restaurants and was again reminded of things like eyeballs and fish eggs.
Then I discovered that with a little love, it could actually be a delicious treat. The addition of vanilla and cinnamon make this more of a dessert, but I wouldn’t be opposed to eating it for breakfast. As an additional note—tapioca pearls are also a great way to thicken up desserts, stews and sauces, but use the small pearls in those instances.
Try serving this dish with vanilla wafers or a few little chocolate cookies that might be “thin” and “minty”. If you eat it warm, you might also like it with some pound cake and fresh fruit.
4 cups milk
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. tapioca Read more
Crock Pot Fruity Oatmeal
Good morning, friends! While this is technically breakfast and not dinner, I figured a nice, warm meal would be a good way to start Monday morning. After reading pages of posts online, I decided that the only way to figure this recipe out would just be to avoid all the major complaints that people had about the other recipes. So, to save you the time of researching everyone else’s negativity, here is the insight and recipe that I have to share with you.
1. Cook time: I suggest 8 hours on the “keep warm” setting. Everyone else said to cook the oatmeal for 4 hours on low, but who wants to get up in the middle of the night to start breakfast?! Cooking on “keep warm” means you can Read more
-
Recommended
