Mexican Pot Roast

I got out the ol' crock pot again the other day and made this delicious roast.

And we made it into tacos because my family had not had tacos this week.

Plus, we had some people coming over, and this will go a long way.

I had this roast for the first time a few months ago when my friend Rick made it.

It instantly turned into one of my favorite things.

I have made basically the same thing with chicken many times

and never thought to use a roast.

  

I started with a hunk of frozen meat from my deep freeze.

Not sure about the weight, but it was pretty big.

Then i dumped some of these things on it.

You don't need to add water.

The meat will make it's own liquid.

I added the tomatoes last.

Then I covered it and cooked on high for 6 hours.

And it looked like this.

There was a ton of liquid in there!

A little over 2 cups!

I dumped the juice into a cup and let it sit for a few minutes.

The fat separated and I dumped it out.

There was about a cup of fat.

Yuck

Then I poured the rest of it back into the crock pot.

And it shredded easily.

It was ready to eat at this point.

I turned it on low and left it alone while I got the other stuff ready.

The other stuff was tortillas and cheese and avocado and sour cream.

You know - all the stuff you would put on a taco.

Letha made guacamole and I forgot to take a picture :(

You can't see the meat - but it's in there somewhere.

I also made a dump cake for dessert, but for some reason I didn't take any 

pictures of that either!

We'll save that one for another time I guess.

Mexican Pot Roast

3-4 lb chuck roast

1 pkg taco seasoning

2 tbsp dried minced garlic

(you can use fresh if you have it)

3 tbsp chopped dried onion

(again - you can use fresh)

2 tbsp cumin

1 can rotel

Put roast in crock pot and sprinkle all seasonings on top.  
Add tomatoes last.  

I'm not sure why.  

Cover and cook on high for 6-7 hours if meat is frozen and 10-12 
hours if thawed.

Remove meat and drain juices.

Separate fat and dump the rest back in with the meat.

Shred meat and mix it all up.

Of course, you could eat this by itself, but I think everything is 

more fun on a tortilla :)

Busy Thursday and Jackie's Salad

I did not cook last night.

We had Little Caesars.

I have turned Thursday into the busiest day ever.

I have lunch duty at school from 11-12:00.

Then the kids get out at 3:00.

We go straight to gymnastics till 5:00.

And football immediately after till 7:30.

I should have thrown something in the crock pot in the morning, 

but I wasn't thinking.

So, I pulled into Little Caesars last night for some hot and ready.

Problem was- nothing was ready!!

It took 20 minutes :(

  But it was hot.

Everyone was sweaty and dirty and needed a shower or bath.

And we had to study for tests and do homework.

Kids got to bed way later than I would like.

So, even though I didn't cook for dinner, 

I did make a yummy simple salad for lunch.

My friend Jackie and I went to eat at a restaurant called Red Rock 

Canyon Grill or something like that.

They have a really good house salad!!

Jackie went home and tried to duplicate it.

I think it's pretty close.

Jackie's Salad

Spinach leaves or mixed greens

Broccoli Slaw

Cranberries N' More Mix

Goat Cheese

Poppyseed Dressing

Chicken (optional)

I didn't have spinach.

But I did have this half and half salad mix that has spinach in it.

And I had some left over grilled chicken that I need to eat, 

so I threw it on top.

I love to make a ton of grilled chicken when we have it so I can use it on a salad for lunch during the week.

If I made this salad as a side to go with dinner, I just wouldn't add the chicken.  It's just as good.

Broccoli Slaw.

I never knew this existed until Jackie put it on the salad.

It scared me, but I liked it.

This also scared me.

It's a little sour and mushy and weird.

And really good.

You can buy this already crumbled in a little tub, but they were out of the tubs when I went.  So I got this log.  This goes much further than the tub.  And when you slice it - it crumbles itself.

And then there's this stuff.

This comes from walmart.

(As does almost everything else I buy).

I love salad with nuts and crunch things, so I like to add a lot of this.

Use this dressing.

I tried the other kind and it's gross.

It looks like I dumped a whole lot of dressing on it, but I really didn't.

The only thing different about this salad and the Red Rock salad is they make these unbelievable cornbread croutons and put them on there.

I don't even know how to begin to make cornbread croutons.

And that would be a lot of work, and it wouldn't really be a 

simple salad anymore. 

So, if you know how to make cornbread croutons - go for it!!

But I think it's just fine without them.

I like to think that my light and healthy salad that I ate for lunch helped to balance out the half a box of Little Caesars cheesy bread I ate for dinner.

Sesame Chicken

I tried a new recipe!!

My family LOVES Chinese food.

We love going to a Chinese buffet.

Sometimes it's gross.

And sometimes it's yummy!!

Everyone loves sesame chicken, so I thought I'd try it out.

I googled this recipe.
It called for chicken that wasn't fried and I liked that because 
I'm scared to fry chicken.

Sesame chicken

3 lbs boneless skinless chicken

2 garlic cloves

1/2 cup and 1 tbsp water divided

1/3 cup apple juice

2 tbsp soy sauce

1 tbsp ketchup

2 tsp sesame seeds

1 tbsp brown sugar

2 tbsp sliced scallion

dash ground red pepper

1 tsp cornstarch

I wasn't sure how much 3 pounds of chicken was, so I had to guess.
I started with 6 small breasts, but then added 2 more because that just didn't look like enough for my family.


My recipe was a little confusing.
It didn't tell me to cut the chicken up or anything!

So, I cut it up into small pieces.

 I heated up a pan and sprayed some cooking spray.
And threw in the chicken.
It took about 5 minutes to brown it.

Then you take it out of the pan and set it aside.

Then, mix the water, apple juice, soy sauce, ketchup, brown sugar, 
garlic and red pepper.  
I didn't have any scallion, so I skipped it.
And I misread about the ground pepper, so I added red pepper flakes.
Heat this up for a few minutes.

Then mix the sauce with the chicken again.
  I really didn't have to remove my chicken from the pan because I used a different pan for the sauce.
But, whatever.
Now cover it all up and cook for about 20 minutes.

In the meantime, I had my rice cooker going with some broccoli 
steaming on top.


So after 20 minutes, you take the chicken out of the pan again!!
Can you believe it?!?

It was time to thicken the sauce, but I hardly had any left in my pan!
I had to add a little more of everything!!
Then I dissolved the cornstarch in a tbsp of water and 
poured it in and mixed it up.

Then I put the chicken BACK into the pan again!!
And added sesame seeds.

Look at these cute little mini eggrolls I got from Sams.

 
MMMmmmm

Fluffy jasmine rice.

  

My plate.

So, this wasn't exactly the kind of sesame chicken that 

we get at the restaurant.

Actually, it wasn't even close!!!

Must be because I didn't add that scallion :/

Mac and Cheese

Last night, Russell grilled steaks.

If he had his way- we would eat red meat every night!!!

And that would be fine with my kids too.

But, I'm not much of a steak eater.  I'll eat a little if there's nothing else.

I made macaroni and cheese.

It's so much better than the box stuff.

I'm not saying that I never make the box stuff, I'm just saying that this is way better.

Mac and Cheese

1 1/2 cups elbow macaroni or 8 oz

(about 1/2 the box)

2 tbsp butter

2 tbsp flour

2 tsp salt

2 cups milk

2 1/2 cups shredded cheddar cheese

Preheat your oven to 350, and start a pot of water to boil.

Start with the butter and flour.  

Whisk them together till it gets pasty.

Then add salt

Whisk milk in a little at a time until its all smooth and blended in.

Add about 1/2 cup of cheese at a time until you've added 2 cups.

Save the other 1/2 cup for on top.

You should have a thick cheese sauce like this.

Your noodles should be boiling by now.  

Don't cook them all the way - they're gonna cook more in the oven and you don't want mushy macaroni!!

Drain your noodles and mix with the cheese sauce.

Spray a baking dish like this one with cooking spray.

Dump the noodle mixture in.

Sprinkle the rest of the cheese on top.

Bake for about 20 minutes.

It's all hot and bubbly when it comes out :)

Russell's steaks were ready when I took the macaroni out of the oven.

I had some squash and zucchini in the fridge.  

I marinated it in Italian dressing and Russell threw it on the grill with the steaks.

They turned out great!!

My plate

I wish I had remembered to warm up my loaf of "everything italian" bread from Walmart.  But I guess we didn't need the extra carbs since we ate almost the whole pan of mac and cheese.

Crock Pot BBQ Pork

I LOVE my crock pot.

Like.... I Really Love It!!!

Sunday morning, we still had a few people at the house from Word Explosion.

The missionaries were still here and we had some boys from Missouri here too.  Their dad was coming to pick them up sometime on Sunday.  So, i wasn't sure how many people I was going to have in the house for dinner that night.  So, I wanted to make a pork roast that could feed 15 people if I needed to.

I took a frozen block of pork out of the freezer.

And dumped it in the crock pot.

I cook frozen meat all the time :)

I'm not really sure how big this was.  Maybe 3-4 pounds?

I sprinkled some garlic powder and red robin seasoning on top of the frozen meat.

I think red robin seasoning is like seasoned salt with some other stuff.

I covered it and cooked it on high for 6 hours.

If you meat was thawed, you could probably cook on low for 6-8 hours.

This is what it looked like when I opened the lid.

Perfect

Then I took it out and scraped the fat layer off the bottom. and I dumped all the juice and fat out of the crock pot.  And I scraped the stuff off the bottom of the pot and threw it away.  

My meat was falling apart while I was trying to do this.

This is what you want!!!

I put it back in the pot and broke it up.

Then I poured BBQ sauce on it.

I used about 2 cups of sauce.  You can use your favorite.

I used a mixture of allegro marinade, head country original and some garlic and rosemary seasoning.

Mix it all up and turn it on low until you are ready to eat.

But, in my case - no one ate it!!!

We ate a late lunch, and everyone left the house at 5:00 to go see Kenneth Copeland at church.

So I dumped it in a container and threw it in the fridge.

And we ate it last night for dinner.

I warmed it up in the microwave and made some sweet potato french fries (which were wonderful), and warmed the leftover corn souffle from the other night.

This is a horrible picture, I know.

I don't like to over-sauce the meat when I add the sauce.

Just enough to add good flavor, and you can add more later if you want.

I added some spicy sauce to mine.

All my kids ate this up, and Kailey asked for more 3 times!!!