Thrifty Eats

I had the pleasure of breaking in a new Crockpot this past week. The crock of the giant Calphalon one that our friends gave us for Christmas ten years ago broke. I lent it to them, it developed a hairline crack after going in the dishwasher and the Internet was inconclusive as to whether it was still safe to use or not. So I received a new large Crockpot because our friends are awesome like that.

It started to smoke right away and apparently this is normal - but I thought it was defective! It made a bit of an odour which went away in about an hour.

Anyhow, I highly recommend this Mississippi Pot Roast recipe. I've made it a few times now and it's just amazingly flavourful. The hot peppers give it a nice zing and it's deliciously salty and easy.

Now, some slow cookers are not like the others and I was worried that I had ruined an $18 roast when I looked in on it and saw that it was a little brown looking on the edges. Most of the liquid had disappeared, eeek! Fortunately the roast was not tough, but next time I'll throw a tea towel over it to keep the moisture in. The lid isn't as tight sealing as it should be.

Hubs asked me to make hamburger soup this week, but I ended up making a soup with the leftover beef and beef stock. I loosely followed this recipe and I think it was made more delicious by using fresh parsley that I always have on hand for the birds.

This recipe made a lot of soup, so much so that I we had it for dinner, dinner and lunch! It used up a lot of things I had in the fridge which was pleasing. We're getting better at saving money by NOT having to throw things out :-D

Chicken Divan with Broccoli and Rice

Hehe, I stole this picture from the recipe's website. My divan didn't quite look like this. Putting up with a hormonal parrot meant chucking the whole thing in the oven before the cheese sauce could thicken. It still turned out delicious and it was very easy to make with frozen broccoli and pre-cooked chicken.