I normally am really good about sticking to my meal plans. If you know me at all, that’s not surprising. I plan out the meals and buy everything I need on the weekends so on the weekdays I can workout when I get home, write a blog post or two, and efficiently make dinner in a timely fashion. This allows me to make the most of the little time I get to spend with the Viper Pilot in the evenings.
I have to be flexible with dinners because the Viper Pilot never gets home at the same time every day. Slow cooker meals are the bomb-diggity (yo) because if he will be home early, I can throw it in the slow cooker on low in the morning and have it ready whenever we both get home.
It’s also awesome for night weeks when he gets home really late, like 10 or 11 pm. I can whip up something in the crock pot when I get home from work, put it on high, then workout and write. Six to nine hours later, the Viper Pilot will walk in the door and dinner is ready.
In summation, slow cooker = dinner is ready whenever the Viper Pilot is.
Which is usually after he proof-reads my blog posts for me. Behind every good blogger is an even awesomer proof-reader. In a flight suit with a cute dog.
I’ve never in my life tackled ribs for dinner. (That sounds funny.) I don’t have to have meat in every meal, but the Viper Pilot is a meat ‘n potatoes kind of man so I try to cater to him more often than not and he allows me to try my weird stuff every now and then. It’s a good compromise.
I don’t know the first thing about making ribs and I don’t have a smoker (don’t you need one to make ribs?) but I found a recipe that cooks them in a dutch oven. Ah-ha! I have one of those.
When I got home from work yesterday, I set about getting the ingredients for the ribs out and realized that we were out of beer. (I know, that’s criminal.) The recipe called for a can of beer. I don’t know the first thing about improvising a rib recipe so I panicked. But just for a moment.
I found a pork loin in the freezer and I had some sweet potatoes. I made do with what I had. It was a speedy slow cooker kind of night anyway since the Viper Pilot wasn’t getting home until late. A few hours later I had a juicy pork loin in a flavorful au jus sauce (of sorts) and smashed sweet potatoes. I forgot a green veggie so I grabbed a can of green beans to heat up at the last minute. If you wait until the last minute it only takes a minute, ja?
It was a huge hit and fell into our “this one’s a keeper” category. We say that to each other when we try new recipes that we like.
And also because it was pitch dark when the Viper Pilot came home and I like to think of myself as a natural light (amateur) photographer, the food pictures are minimal and gross. Entschuldigung.
Slow Cooker Seasoned Pork Loin
adapted from my cranium
- 2 lb pork loin
- 3 Tbsp low-sodium soy sauce
- 1 Tbsp minced garlic
- 1 cup water
- 2/3 cup chicken broth
- 2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar
- 1 packet Lipton’s Savory Herb with Garlic soup mix
- fresh ground black pepper
Place pork loin in slow cooker and pour liquid ingredients over top, turning the loin to coat. Spread minced garlic over the pork, leaving as much as possible on top. Cook on LOW for 7-8 hours or on HIGH for 4 hours. Serve with cooking liquid as au jus.
Mashed Sweet Potatoes
from Cook’s Illustrated
- 2 lbs sweet potatoes, peeled, quartered lengthwise, and cut crosswise into 1/4-inch-thick slices
- 4 Tbsp unsalted butter, cut into 4 pieces
- 2 Tbsp heavy cream
- 1 tsp sugar
- 1/2 tsp salt
- pinch pepper
Combine sweet potatoes, butter, cream, sugar, and salt in a large saucepan and cook, covered, over low heat, stirring occasionally, until potatoes fall apart when poked with a fork, 35 to 45 minutes.
Off heat, mash sweet potatoes in saucepan with potato masher. Stir in pepper; serve immediately.
If you’ve never tried almond butter on your sweet potatoes, you’ve never had sweet potatoes. |
The pork loin melted in our mouths. It soaked up the juices as it cooked and was amazing. The recipe is really simple making it the ultimate weeknight dinner.
Speaking of poatoes, let’s learn some German just for fun. Potatoes are popular in Germany so it is important that we know the German word for potato. You should learn it too, so you are prepared when you come to visit us! 😉
Potato = Kartoffel (car-taf-el)
Sehr gut! You say potato, I say kartoffel!
Check back tomorrow for a thing I need to do more often post. In the meantime, I’m off to go learn how to photograph food in the dark. (Sad face.)
xoxo,
E
PROST!