30 Clove Garlic Chicken

When I told Scott I was making a 30 clove garlic chicken he was very scared. It's a LOT of garlic! I have to tell you, peeling that much garlic was one of the worst things I have ever done. I think I almost prefer peeling potatoes, and I hate peeling potatoes! Next time I make this, I want to try this way of peeling garlic. We'll see if it works!

As standard with slow cooker chicken recipes, the chicken ended up very tender! The garlic seemed to caramelize and create this just amazing flavor. And make sure you eat some of the cloves too (trust me)! This can be made with anywhere between 20-40 cloves of garlic, whatever you have on hand (it's a great pantry meal). I might try this next time with a whole chicken!

30 Clove Garlic Chicken-adapted from Make it Fast, Cook it Slow by Stephanie O'Dea
Total Time:  6 Hours
Serves 6

• 1 large onion, diced
• 3 to 4 pounds of chicken
• 1 tablespoon canola oil
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 2 teaspoons paprika
• 1 teaspoon pepper
• 20 to 40 garlic cloves, peeled, but in tact 

Spray the inside of a 6-quart slow cooker with cooking spray. Place onion on the bottom of the stoneware, with chicken on top. Sprinkle the chicken with the remainder of ingredients. Cook on low for 6-8 hours, or until chicken is cooked through and tender.

Hot 'n Spicy Shrimp

This was a very quick slow cooker recipe, that can be thrown together in a pinch. The original recipe is titled, 'Barbecued Shrimp,' however, I don't really get the barbecue. The hot sauce gives it a great flavor, but I'd more call it a buttery shrimp. They were still tasty and easy to make!

Hot 'n Spicy Shrimp-adapted from Make it Fast, Cook is Slow by Stephanie O'Dea

Total Time: 2 hours

Serves 8

• 2 pounds frozen, peeled and deveined shrimp
• 1 stick butter
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1/4 cup worcestershire sauce
• 1 1/2 tablespoons tabasco sauce
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/4 cup lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon dried basil

In a 6-quart slow cooker, place all ingredients and toss lightly to coat. Cover and cook on high for 2 hours.

Chicken and Brown Rice Casserole

I made this recipe while I went to work one day, and then we ended up having other plans that night. So the slow cooker went straight into the fridge. Eating this the next day wasn't very good. However, the blog I found it on (A Year of Slow Cooking), said it was great so I'm going to try it again someday!

Chicken and Brown Rice Casserole-adapted from Make it Fast, Cook it Slow by Stephanie O'Dea
Total Time: 8 hours
Serves 6

• 1 1/2 cups chicken broth
• 1 1/2 cups milk
• 3/4 cup flour
• 1 1/2 cups raw brown rice
• 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika
• 1 small onion, diced
• 8 ounces sliced mushrooms
• 5 boneless chicken breasts

Combine all of the chicken broth and 1/2 cup of milk in a sauce pan and heat over medium heat on the stove. In a separate bowl, whisk the remaining 1 cup of milk with 3/4 cup flour.
When the broth and milk have begun to boil, reduce heat, and slowly stir in the milk and flour mixture. When everything is fully incorporated, set the pot aside to cool.

Spray the inside of your crockpot with cooking spray.

Add the rice and seasonings to your crock. Chop up the onion, and add it with the mushrooms. Stir in your broth, flour, and milk mixture. The rice will turn a bit red from the paprika.

Lay the chicken pieces on top. 

Cover and cook on high for 4 hours, or low for about 8. I cooked ours on high for 4, and let it stay warm for another 2.

When you take the lid off of the crockpot, stir the rice. If the rice is fully cooked and you have extra liquid, keep the lid off for about 15 minutes. The liquid will absorb quickly.

Taco Chili

Tacos are awesome. And I still have yet to make the perfect chili. This was different, I'd probably make it again, but probably won't be requesting it anytime soon. It was like it sounds-taco chili. Also make sure you use AT-LEAST a 6-quart slow cooker!

I only remembered to take pictures of the onions....oops!

Taco Chili-adapted from Make It Fast, Cook It Slow by Stephanie O'dea
Total Time: 8 hours
Serves 12

• 1 pound ground beef, browned and drained
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 2 (15-ounce) cans kidney beans
• 2 (15-ounce) cans pinto beans
• 2 (15-ounce) cans corn with their juices
• 1 (28-ounce) can diced tomatoes with their juices
• 1 (14-ounce) can tomatoes with chiles and their juices
• 1 packet taco seasoning
• 1 packet ranch dressing mix
• sour cream and cheddar cheese for garnish

Put the meat and onion in a slow cooker. Drain and rinse beans, and add to the cooker. Add corn and tomatoes. Stir in the contents of both seasoning packets. Cover and cook on low for 8 hours. Once done, top with sour cream and cheese if desired.

Baked Potatoes

Baked potatoes are so awesome and easy to do. And this is the best way I've found to do it! Wrap them in aluminum foil and put them in the crock pot. Then they're done when you come home from work! Just try it--you'll love it!

Baked Potatoes - adapted from Make it Fast, Cook it Slow by Stephanie O'dea
Serves 10-12
Total Time 10 hours

• 10 to 12 baking potatoes
• aluminum foil
• toppings of choice

Use a 6 quart slow cooker. Wash potatoes well and dry. Use a fork to prick the skin of each potato. Wrap each individually in aluminum foil. Put the foil-wrapped potatoes into the stoneware. Do not add water. Cover and cook on low for about 10 hours or on high fro about 6. Serve with toppings of your choice.

Stuffed Portobello Mushrooms

Mushrooms are one of our favorite foods! I feel as though fresh mushrooms go could with almost anything you make for dinner. I honestly think I'd even eat them on tacos if I ever thought of it. So Scott and I were really excited to try this recipe. There is quite a lot of prep work, but it is a crockpot recipe so not a whole lot of attention during the cooking is necessary. Definitely make the rice with these. Ours turned out almost soupy, and I kind of feel like it might be weird to eat these without anything else. But it would be good served with steak too. We had a hard time deciding how we felt about this recipe. It was a very different flavor than we are used to. I think it was the vinegar. Overall though, it was good-3/5. I'm just not sure if I'd make it again or not...maybe we'll try one more time to see.


Stuffed Portobello Mushrooms - adapted from Make it Fast, Cook it Slow by Stephanie O'dea
Total Time: 4 to 7 hours
Serves 2-3 adults

• 4 large portobello mushrooms
• 1 1/2 cups cherry tomatoes, chopped
• 1/4 cup bread crumbs
• 4 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
• 1/3 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
• 1 tablespoon dried basil
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 2-3 servings rice

Use a 6 quart oval slow cooker. With a paring knife, carefully cut the stems off the mushrooms. Chop the stems and put them in a mixing bowl. Use a spoon to scoop out the centers of each mushroom, and add to the bowl. Add the tomatoes, bread crumbs, 3 tablespoons olive oil, vinegar, Parmesan, basil, salt and pepper. Mix well and set aside. Spread the remaining 1 tablespoon of oil in the bottom of the slow cooker. Put mushroom caps on top of the oil. They will overlap a bit. Spoon the filling mixture on top of the mushrooms. Cover and cook on low for 4 to 7 hours. Serve with rice.

Baked Oatmeal

I can't remember if I've ever truly loved oatmeal. I never hated it, but I don't ever crave it. I think my years working at Perkins and trying to use regular oats to make instant oatmeal at 2 in the morning really turned me off. But, Stephanie O'Dea has always given me something new to try in the slow cooker. I was at least going to try this! My oatmeal turned out extremely dry to the point that it was almost uneatable. I tried to salvage it, but that just didn't happen. I think I might try this again, but I'll just have to watch it a little more. You can really make this your own by adding your favorite fruit or seasoning (some people in the comments of Stephanie's blog said they added cocoa powder). Overall, a 2.5/5, but I want to try this again!

Baked Oatmeal

Baked Oatmeal-adapted from "Make it Fast, Cook it Slow" by Stephanie O'Dea

Total Time: 5 hours

Serves 8

• 3 cups rolled (not instant) oats
• 1/2 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt
• 3/4 cup dried fruit
• 1 cup milk
• 4 tablespoons butter, melted
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Use a four quart slow cooker. Put the dry ingredients into the stoneware and add the dried fruit, milk, butter, vanilla and eggs. Stir well to combine. Cover and cook on low for 3-5 hours, checking after 90 minutes. The oatmeal is done when the edges are brown and are beginning to crust, the center is set, and a knife inserted comes out clean. Let it sit in the cooling cooker for at least an hour before attempting to cut it. The longer you let it sit, the more set and brownie-like the pieces will be.

Buffalo Chicken Lasagna

Scott was extremely excited to try this recipe! Once again, we love slow cookers and we love trying new things! I went shopping for this recipe and made a mistake and bought hot sauce instead of buffalo sauce. Scott wasn't happy. But we improvised and made our own instead! It wasn't the best sauce ever (I would suggest going with store bough stuff) but we definitely didn't ruin the dish because of it! Overall, I wasn't a fan of the dish, but it was just because of the heat from the sauce. I'm not a big hot sauce/buffalo sauce fan, in general. But if you are, it definitely brings something new to lasagna! Overall, I'd say 3/5 (Scott would give it 5, I would give it 3--we go with my number!) Once again Stephanie O'Dea comes through with another great slow-cooker recipe!

Buffalo Chicken Lasagna-Adapted from Make it Fast Cook it Slow by Stephanie O'Dea

• 4 cooked boneless, skinless chicken breast halves, chopped
• 1 26-ounce jar pasta sauce
• 1 cup buffalo wing sauce
• 9 to 10 uncooked traditional lasagna noodles
• 1 (15 ounce) container ricotta cheese
• 2 red, yellow or orange bell peppers, chopped
• 2 cups shredded cheese 
• 1/2 cup blue cheese crumbles
• 1/4 cup water

Use a 6-quart slow cooker. In a mixing bowl, combine the chicken, pasta sauce and buffalo wing sauce. Ladle a big spoonful of the sauce into the bottom of your stoneware. Cover with layer of uncooked lasagna noodles. You'll have to break them to get a proper fit. Add a smear of ricotta cheese to the top of the noodles. Add a layer of bell peppers and top with some shredded cheese. Repeat the layers until you run out of ingredients. Add the blue cheese crumbles. Put the water into the empty pasta sauce jar and shake. Pour the liquid over the top of the entire lasagna. Cover and cook on low for 6 to 7 hours, or on high 4 to 5 hours. When the cooking time is complete, unplug the crock and take off the lid. Let the lasagna sit for 20 minutes before cutting.

Creamy Corn and Spinach Enchilada Casserole

Scott and I are huge Mexican food fans! Almost every restaurant we go to is awesome: quick, delicious and relatively inexpensive! Now that we're cooking we want to make our own! I absolutely LOVE Stephanie O'Dea! Her blog, and two cookbooks (both of which I own, btw) are absolutely awesome! As I've said before, slow cookers are the greatest! They can make life so incredibly easy! I always do my best to use the slow cooker on low heat. This time, however, we put this together the evening we ate it and cooked it on high--it still turned out great!

But back to the recipe: we would definitely give this a 4.5/5! We used chicken, but these would definitely be great with shredded or even ground beef! We weren't sure about the corn, but overall we really enjoyed it! If we made this again next time, we would probably take out the jalapenos-we just dont need quite that much spice! Also, we though of maybe switching out the creamed corn for black or pinto beans, and just not draining them. The corn made the enchiladas a little sweet. We would also add black olives. But that's just because we love black olives! Overall, though, if you enjoy Mexican food--make these!

Creamy Corn and Spinach Enchilada Casserole-adapted from Make it Fast Cook it Slow by Stephanie O'Dea
Serves 6
Total Time: 5 hours

• 1 cup shredded cooked meat
• 1 (14.5 ounce) can creamed corn, or pinto beans, undrained
• 1/4 cup finely chopped fresh cilantro leaves
• 1 cup baby spinach leaves, chopped
• 2 tablespoons chopped sliced jalapenos (if desired)
• 3 tablespoons chopped blacked olives (if desired)
• 2 cups shredded cheese
• 8 to 10 corn tortillas
• 2 cups green enchilada sauce
• 2/3 cup sour cream

Use a 4 quart slow cooker. In a large mixing bowl, combine the shredded meat, creamed corn or bean, cilantro, spinach leaves, jalapenos, black olives, and 1 1/2 cups shredded cheese. Mix until spinach leaves are wilted and coated with the corn.

Place a corn tortilla into the bottom of your stoneware. Add a hearty spoonful of filling. Top with another corn tortilla. Repeat the layers until your crock is full. In a mixing bowl, combine the green enchilada sauce with the sour cream, and pour on top. Add the remaining 1/2 cup shredded cheese. Cover and cook on low for 5 to 7 hours, or on high for 2 to 4 hours. Let stand with the lid off for 20 minutes before cutting.