Another slow cooker win

[calzephyr]

So I made the best oatmeal ever in the Little Dipper this morning. I set the timer to turn it on about an hour before I woke up and that seemed to be the perfect amount of time to cook one 1 cup of Bob's Red Mill Muesli. I love that stuff! The package suggests soaking the muesli in milk overnight, but I've never liked it that way. About 1 and a quarter cups of water seemed to be the perfect amount too. I wasn't sure how much water the oats and groats would absorb overnight. I also tossed in a handful of raisins and some interesting spices such as ground ginger. I bet this could do wonders for apples too :-D

I had my oatmeal on top of yogurt and sliced bananas. Oh, it was a good breakfast :-) Sure you can just nuke oatmeal in the morning, but soaking overnight and slow cooking made it very tasty. All those tough grains that my crappy teeth fear were quite palatable.

Now the Little Dipper's bigger cousin is making beef noodle soup. I'm trying harder not to let things go to waste - the beef stew I made earlier in the week required beef broth and just 2 tablespoons of tomato paste. It's unlikely that I'll use either again before they expire, so into the slow cooker they went with some snacking carrots that aren't being eaten, a green pepper and a lot of celery. Given how far food travels, I feel I'm not only wasting the actual product but the resources spent delivering it - can you tell I'm reading The Omnivore's Delimma right now?

Comments

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

Mmmm, I think it's time for pea soup this week. :)

[calzephyr77.livejournal.com]

Ahhh! You know, I have never liked canned pea soup, but I bet I would if I made it from a recipe!

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

I do something like 1 lb dried cracked peas, 4 cups water, 2 chicken boullion cubes, 1 onion chopped, 1 smoked ham hock, 1 cup carrots chopped, assorted spices. The smoked ham hock makes a BIG difference. Remove the bones at the end. Many recipes say 6-8 cups of water for the pound of dried peas, but I like it thick, and besides you can always add more water later. Cook on low all day or overnight.

[calzephyr77.livejournal.com]

OK, I am sooo trying that! Thanks :-) And I can better control the amount of sodium that way too.

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

You should probably skip the chicken boullion cubes then, since they're usually high in salt. The ham hock will likely give enough flavor without them.

[calzephyr77.livejournal.com]

Oh right...I could also de-salt the ham hock overnight in water.

[zandperl.livejournal.com]

But that loses all the flavor then! :( Maybe save chicken bones from a previous meal? That'd probably get a lot of the flavor w/o as much salt.

[calzephyr77.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'm so used to flavourless food :-D Dad believes in boiling the flavour out of everything, so the first time I had Chinese vegetables I was like, ooh, these aren't soft and mushy, and is the bok choy ever green! I did a little Googling and it is possible to get low sodium chicken base for soup. Maybe Safeway will have it. I didn't think it was possible!