A Month Long Slow Cooker Celebration

“As a child my family’s menu consisted of two choices – take it or leave it.” ~ Buddy Hackett

We all loved the first round of crock pot celebrations so much, I decided we’d do it again. Plus, we are:

• coming up on an annual Big Cook
• already practicing for several Christmas performances
• celebrating two birthdays in November, plus Thanksgiving!

So simple meals will be a blessing. Today, I’m doing some big shop cooking in the crock pot. Cooking rounds of ground turkey to be ready for some of these recipes.

I polled the Hodgepodge audience for requests. So I’ll start with those. A few repeats from last time and a few new finds:

• Hot dogs – a request for youngest girl’s birthday supper (talk about simple! we’ll put them in the crock pot with some chili).
• Crock Pot Hamburger Patties by Year of Slow Cooking – this recipe shows you how to make a tiny grill out of aluminum foil! Eldest boy requested burgers.
• Crockpot Cranberry Chicken by Hillbilly Housewife (eldest girl’s request)
• Crock Pot Macaroni and Cheese (middle girl’s request)
• Crock Pot Chicken and Cornbread Dumplings by $5 Dinners (Hodgepodgedad’s request)

• Crock Pot Spinach Lasagna from Menus for Moms – a family favorite
• Crock Pot Manwich Chicken sandwiches – a new, made-up meal
• Crock Pot Chicken Stroganoff
• Slow Cooker Cheesy Chicken and Rice by Southern Plate
• Crock Pot King Ranch Chicken by Southern Living
• Simple Slow Cooker Meals by Southern Living – I’ll pick a couple more from here
• Slow Cooker Ultimate Breakfast Casserole by Year of Slow Cooking – breakfast for supper!
• Connie’s Mexican Mess from $5 Dinners contributing writer
• Slow Cooker Mashed Potatoes from Taste of Home

• maybe Meatball Subs – toss those meatballs in the crock pot with some sauce

• Slow Cooker Cube Steak at $5 Dinners – really pleases those meat and potato types
• another selection from Fast food for Slow Sundays
• Pizza x 2 on Friday nights
• We had Crock Pot Pizza by Taste of Home tonight and it was a big hit!

A few more ideas plus planning ahead:

The coffee milk punch looks really good from the November Southern Living recipes. There’s also a full list of sides as well as a Thanksgiving planner.

Coming up, I’ll be posting details on plans for a Big Cook. We’re giving food for Christmas! Plus the children will be busy with teacher gifts and more that day.

The plan is still to use last year’s Thanksgiving menu. I’m already getting some canned ingredients to be ready. We’ll do an overnight turkey again as well as the crock pot dressing. See Thanksgiving Tips I’m Thankful For.

Lunches:

Leftovers! Nibble trays from Back to basics: The Lunch Lady plus Sunbutter® sandwiches, pimento cheese, cheesy pasta

Cooking Fun – rolling the children into the mix:

• Youngest girl is having a Milk and Cookies birthday party. With allergies we can’t be having just any ol’ store bought cookies. So we’ll be making another double batch of our favorite, homemade oatmeal flax chocolate chip cookies…

• and maybe some Cookies & Cream…
• definitely, we’ll try a new Sunbutter® recipe

• a batch of Pimento Cheese
• plus there will be plenty of opportunity to join in on making recipes for the big cook, especially our favorite Italian Stuffed Shells, Batch Cooking style
• and maybe I’ll put a different older child in charge of filling the crock pot each night 🙂

This post inspired a Month of Cooking Fun. Easy, simple, fun recipes to make with children.
*all Hodgepodge meals prepared with care due to our Trials and Triumphs with allergies