Tex-Mex Beef Sammies

Yay! I'm officially back.  The test is done.  I've been celebrating my freedom from studying by trying out some new recipes and revisiting some old ones.  There's tons to post about.  

I'll start with my latest and greatest crock pot discovery:  Tex-Mex Beef Sammies.  This dish is essentially one of the best shredded beef sandwiches I've had: subtly spiced with smokey tex-mex flavors, and topped with an array of fresh garnishes, like guacamole, cheese, and red onion.  Yum!  

What caught my eye about this particular recipe was the use of...wait for it...cocoa powder.  Keep reading now!!  Cocoa powder and/or chocolate is actually an authentically Mexican ingredient.  It adds to the depth of flavor, rather than tasting like meat-flavored hot chocolate.  However, if you have any squeamish family members, I highly recommend that you keep the cocoa powder a secret until you are sure they like the dish.  

I made this recipe for Father's Day.  In fact, I cooked it overnight the night before and kept the crock pot on the warm setting for the rest of the morning.  I figured, what could be better than celebrating the men in my life with a large crock pot full of meat?  To my relief, the family agreed.  This was definitely a winner.  It seemed to suit everyone's taste, since the spice factor is subtle rather than powerful.  If you desire a powerful kick, just chop up a chipotle pepper or two and add to the crock pot before cooking.  It'll be beautiful.  

A note about serving: Make sure you utilize the savory broth (as in beef "au jus") that the meat cooks in when constructing your sandwiches.  In order to do that, I got hoagie rolls from my grocery store's bakery section that could stand up to being dipped into the juices without disintegrating, but weren't so hard that all the meat would gush out the other end of the sandwich with the first bite.  I HIGHLY recommend that you do the same.  Regular hamburger or hot dog rolls will not cut it.  Go for high quality rolls that are slightly chewy on the outside and softer on the inside.  

A final note about points:  I had a bit of trouble calculating the points per serving with my normal on-line points calculator.  When that happens I usually just make an educated guess.  Just know that chuck roast is fattier than leaner cuts (that's why it practically melts in your mouth.)  A 3 oz portion of cooked chuck roast is about 7 points.  Hopefully that will help you gauge your "pointage" for the day.   

Deconstructed Crockpot Stuffed Cabbage

I'm beginning to notice a trend:  Everything I make, when photographed, looks like a big, red, gloppy mess.  Perhaps I have a taste for such concoctions?  I don't know. 

What I DO know is that this cabbage dish is divine.  It was born from two different recipes.  One gave me the idea of using the flavors of stuffed cabbage, without actually going to the trouble of stuffing the meat in the leaves.  That's EXACTLY how I roll!  Or don't roll.  Get it?!?!  Anyway, I had to try it.  Another recipe suggested better flavors than the first, so I went with that one for taste purposes. 

Cabbage is something I don't cook with much, but it's actually super cheap.  One head of cabbage ended up giving me 8 cups of chopped cabbage.  That's a lot!  Do keep in mind that it cooks down a lot, so what looks like a mountain of cabbage will actually reduce to a very manageable pile after applying a bit of heat. 

My family and I gobbled a whole crockpot of this up in the span of a few nights.  However, the next time I make it I am going to reduce the sugar content by AT LEAST HALF.  If not more.  It was too sweet for my taste.  But even with the extra sweetness, it was still a magical dish. 

NOTE: You may be wondering why I am still putting out crockpot recipes when the weather is decidedly warmer. Here's the deal: I believe that the crockpot is actually a warm weather friend. Aside from browning the meat in the beginning of the recipe, you don't need to slave over a hot stove. And most of the time, the stove-work will be done earlier in the day, when your kitchen is much cooler. I am a HUGE fan of crockpot cooking all year round.

This is the perfect dish to make on a weekend, when you have a little bit of extra time to do some light chopping (nothing too taxing) and to let the crockpot do it's thing.  It keeps well in the fridge and improves with each day it sits.  So feel free to make this on a weekend and serve it during the week, merely reheating what you need.  I served this on top of instant brown rice.  My Dad informed me that egg noodles are the traditionally appropriate side dish to go with such a meal.  I actually thought the rice was perfect, because it soaked up the yummy juices.  Go ahead and serve whatever makes you happy.

Crockpot Tex-Mex Chicken

This taco changed my life.  OK. Maybe not.  But it was pretty darn awesome.  What it did do was transport me back to a time when I lived in downtown Los Angeles.  There was a lovely little tacqueria next to my apartment building.  On nights when I didn't feel like cooking, I would go downstairs to the lovely hole-in-the-wall establishment and get a chicken combo plate.  The chicken was juicy pieces of shredded chicken in a zesty sauce.  Each plate would come with rice, refried beans, warmed corn tortillas, a lovely chopped mixture of cilantro and green onion, and as many wedges of lime as I desired.  It was a beautiful thing.  I would take the plate back up to my apartment, sit on the floor and build my own soft tacos.  Glorious. 


Recently, I put a call out on Facebook for crockpot chicken recipes, and my friend Meg responded with this one.  She originally got the recipe from a Prevention Slow Cooker cookbook.  I've changed it just a tiny bit because that's what I usually do. 

Let me extol the virtues of this chicken dish by telling you it has many lives:  

• You can use it as taco meat. 
• You can make nachos with it.  
• You can freeze it for use later.  
• You can make tortilla/taco soup by adding some chicken stock or broth to it. 
• You can put this over baked potatoes and melt some jack cheese over top. 

This is my kind of recipe.  Lots of options! 

Chipotle Barbecue Pulled Pork

This recipe is BEYOND easy.  It's ridiculously easy.  Just throw everything in the crockpot in the morning.  Turn it on.  Dinner's done.  'Nuff said.  The meat is flavorful: barbecue sweetness with a kick of peppers to spice it up.  Delicious. 

This was a team effort between my mother and I...my mother and me...whatever.  I overslept on the morning I was supposed to put this in the crockpot, so I asked her to do it instead.  The meat was straight out of the freezer.  Frozen hard as a rock.  By the end of the day, it was gorgeous. 

About the meat:  Pork tenderloin.  This is an incredibly versatile, low-fat cut of meat.  Therefore, you get more meat per point.  To me, more is more.  Not the opposite.  I usually get my tenderloins at Costco.  They come packaged in 2 lb packs, I think.  Don't quote me on the size.  Just wing it.  They freeze easily and can be cooked in a crockpot from the frozen state.  Beautiful.  Brings tears to my eyes. 

About the chipotles:  If you've never ventured into the Hispanic or Mexican foods aisle of your grocery store, please do.  Great and wonderful things await you there.  One of those gems is chipotles in adobo.  Basically they are roasted jalapeno peppers, packed in a vinegary tomato sauce called adobo. They are glorious, but very spicy.  A little goes a long way.  

Which brings about the question...once you've opened a can, what do you do with the leftovers?  If you're anything like me, they usually end up as one of the UFOs (Unidentified Fuzzy Objects) in the back of your refrigerator.  So here's the plan to be less wasteful.  I do the same thing for my tomato paste, as well: 

Once you open up a can of chipotles, use what you need, and then freeze the remainder in a freezer bag (labeled, of course, or it will just end up as another UFO:  Unidentified FROZEN Object!)  Then, when you need more chipotles pull the frozen block 'o chilies out of the freezer and cut off a chunk to use.  No need to defrost.  Just add the frozen hunk right into your pan.  The heat of your cooking vessel will defrost them.  It's a lovely plan.  Just lovely.  Brings order to the universe.  

Enough talk.  On with the meat!

Crockpot Sausage Chili

Three words in this recipe caught my eye: “Italian sausage,” and “crockpot.” I had to try it! Once I tasted it, I was surprised at how subtle the sausage flavor was. The extra seasoning in the sausage seems to add an extra depth to the chili. The fact that you let it cook in the crockpot all day is an added bonus.

One word of caution: I doubled the original recipe and it FILLED my crockpot to the top before cooking. However, the amount cooked down a little with cooking. I’m aware that crockpot enthusiasts and food safety folks say one should fill a crockpot no more than two-thirds full for optimal cooking. However, since I like to make BIG batches for freezing, and my crockpot is smaller than I would like, I choose to live on the wild side! If this sort of reckless crockpot-usage makes you uncomfortable, just reduce the ingredients by half. It will still be delicious.

I served this chili with standard toppings, such as chopped green onions, chopped cilantro, reduced fat cheddar cheese, and reduced fat sour cream.  Just be sure to count any additional points from your toppings.  I also served corn muffins along side.