Recipe #8: Thanksgiving Chicken Enchilada Dip

Not the best photo, but man, was this delicious!

For the first time, I was officially assigned a dish for Thanksgiving.  Normally, my main contribution to the meal is sending out the invitation email and filling the water glasses, so this was a pretty big deal.  I was assigned appetizers!  So, I flipped through my cookbooks and, since oven space was going to be at a premium, I decided to do a slow cooker dip.  After much deliberation, I decided to go with a chicken enchilada dip.  

I gathered all of my ingredients then headed to my mom and dad's house for Thanksgiving.  After having been burned by strange can sizes before, I made sure I had all of the sizes for the cans right.  

I dumped in my chicken, bell pepper, diced chilies and tomatoes and reassured every single member of my family (separately) that YES, THE CHICKEN IS SUPPOSED TO BE RAW WHEN IT GOES IN THE CROCKPOT!  

Then, I cooked that deliciousness for about 4 hours.  Then, I added my cream cheese and my cheese.  However, at the final step, I realized that my meticulous can measurement counting had been for naught.  The recipe called for one package of cheese.  I assumed this was the regular, normal-person-sized bag.  However, this recipe's one package of cheese turned out to be the Costco family-of-seven-sized bag.  Dang it.  So, I ended up foraging my family's fridge for assorted cheese.  I came up with half a block of sharp cheddar and a few slices of American cheese.  Eventually, the final product tasted delicious.  

Recipe #6 How-I-Bribed-My-Boyfriend-To-Decorate-for-7 Hours Chicken & Dumplings

It was chicken-y and dough-y and dumpling-y.  It was magnificent!

Christmas comes just once a year, and although I have been celebrating half-Christmas, I am usually chomping at the bit to get to the holiday season immediately after Halloween.  I start furtively listening to Christmas carols and lighting pine candles as soon as Trick-or-Treating ends.  My favorite part of the Christmas season is putting up the Christmas tree.  I held out as long as I could.  I really did.

I only made it until November 17.

Since I have managed to stuff 3 Christmas trees (one of which is 8 feet tall), 43 feet of garland and countless other decorations into my tiny apartment, I knew I could use help with the decorating—particularly the box-hauling, which is my least favorite part of decorating.

Enter my saint of a boyfriend, who not only volunteered to help me with all of this, but also agreed to haul boxes and unwrap ornaments with a smile on his face and a Santa hat on his head. 

Me with the hero of the hour!  

As a preemptive “thank you” for the help with the decorating, I made him chicken and dumplings.

It was amazing.  The recipe only calls for a few things too, so it was very inexpensive.  I only needed two chicken breasts, 2 cans of cream of chicken soup, some celery, butter, a bit of milk and refrigerated biscuit dough.  I added carrots too, since I had some on hand.

After chopping the celery and grating the carrots (and one knuckle), I dumped all but the biscuits into the crock pot and let it sit for about 6 hours. 

It was gorgeous, even if the carrots did cost me the first layer of skin on my  right, middle knuckle.

Then, about 30 minutes before serving, I just broke up a bunch of the biscuits and dumped them into the soup mixture.  In those thirty minutes, they turned into divine dumpling lumps.

It was delicious!  We ate a ton and still had leftovers to sustain us through our long 7 hour decorating day.

The house also looked amazing!

Recipe #2: Ridiculously Easy Cranberry Pork Roast

First of all let me apologize for my significant lack of posting over the last couple of weeks. Time has flown by and gotten away from me. The recipes have been made, so I have kept up with that half of the blog. Now to finish what I have started. I began this post a few weeks back and am now finishing it (along with the others).

Through the chaotic whirlwind that was my weekend, I have failed to post about the masterpiece that turned out to be my second recipe. Now that Fall is underway, I've proclaimed it to be Crock pot season in my apartment. My ancient Crockery Cookery book will be my best friend in this celebration of sorts.
While I was flipping through it last Wednesday night, all the recipes were capturing my attention until I stopped at one I could not resist! Cranberry Pork Roast! My mouth literally watered at the thought! ( I'll admit, Autumn Pork Chops almost tied and will likely be made this week or next!)
The ingredients could not have been more straightforward. Pork loin roast, check! Cranberries, spices, honey! Triple check! Then all I had to do was dump it all in the crock pot, done!

Recipe #2: The Soup with the Most Jaunty Name Ever

A delicious chili-taco hybrid of excellence!  

While flipping through my cookbooks and trying to decide which recipe to make, the Easy Slow Cooker Recipes book caught my eye.  This week is very busy at work and the weather is starting to get cooler, so I thought this was the perfect week to bust out the Crock-Pot for the season.  Besides, there is something really gratifying about having one's dinner figured out before leaving for work.  

While flipping through the book, I saw it: Amigos Taco Soup Olé.  

To paraphrase the famous jam company, with a name like Amigos Taco Soup Olé, it has to be good.  

I gathered my ingredients, which mostly involved foraging for cans.  Instead of the two cans of chili beans that the recipe called for, I got a can of chili beans and a can of black beans.  I figured, I may as well mix it up.  My can gathering was going fairly well until I got to the tomatoes.  Thank goodness the ingredients were clearly labeled.  Do you know how many kinds of canned tomato products there are?  TOO MANY.  Seriously?  They're tomatoes.  How are there 30 different canned preparations!?  Despite the canned tomato enigma, I made my way home with my ingredients.

Sometimes you cook fancy foods and sometimes you do a lot of dumping cans into things.

I cooked my ground beef the night before, then I plopped all of the ingredients in the Crock-Pot before heading to work.  Thus, my dinner preparation was completed before dawn... like a champ!

When I came home, what awaited me was the greatest hybrid of chili and tacos the world has perhaps ever seen.  I added the cheese that I left out this morning, for fear of soldering it the side of my Crock-Pot for all eternity.  I also garnished it with chips.  If I had been thinking, I would have diced up some green onions, but I didn't think of it until I was halfway through my bowl.  

It was absolutely magnificent.  My dinner guest and I very much enjoyed it and both cleaned our bowls.  

I defy any judge on Chopped to fault my presentation!  They probably even wouldn't call it "rustic," which is the Food Network term for "I just slopped in there and it was totally on purpose."  This is the same kind of fancifiying that goes on when they call a piece of toast a "crostini," even though we all know it's just toast.

I also had plenty of leftovers, which I divided up to fit into my miniature fridge.  I also realized what a price performer this soup is.  My total cost for ingredients was about $13, including tortilla chips.  I will easily get 5-6 servings out of this dinner.  At just $2.60 per serving, this soup is a much better price performer than that $5 Subway sandwich that I ate yesterday.  This recipe was a winner for convenience, budget and taste!

Not the most attractive presentation of the soup, but the recipe yielded a massive quantity.  The cutest squirrel salt & pepper shakers ever are included for size reference.  

2 recipes down.  50 to go!