Crock Pot Recipe Day 15

Carolina Pulled Pork

From Hands Off Cooking

Serves 6

1 3-4 lb boneless Boston butt (pork shoulder), excess fat trimmed I bought one that had a bone in it (didn't know it) and it was roughly 6.2 lbs

Salt & freshly ground black pepper

2 cups (one 19 oz bottle) tomato based barbecue sauce I used a Kraft bbq sauce.  It said 18 oz and measured just under 1 cup.  I ended up using 2 1/2 bottles of bbq sauce

Red pepper flakes or cayenne pepper, to taste (optional) I didn't use this

1 cup apple cider vinegar I used regular white vinegar

1. Preheat oven to 400* F.  I put mine in the crock pot on high.

2. Remove any strings or net on the meat.  Sprinkle it all over with salt & pepper.  Put the pork in a large, heavy pot like a Dutch oven.  Taste the bbq sauce and add red pepper flakes if it isn't spicy enough for you.  Pour the vinegar on top of the meat, then the bbq sauce.

3. Cover the pot & braise the pork in the oven for 3 1/2-4 hours, or until the meat is falling apart and shreds very easily when pushed with a spoon.  Remove the pot and shred the meat by pushing it against the pot.  Stir it together with the sauce.

4. If you want, you can pour the meat and sauce into a colander set over a bowl to drain off any excess fat.  The meat will have absorbed most of the sauce already.

5. Serve immediately.

Ok, so like I said, I used a pork shoulder that had a bone in it & was roughly 6.2 lbs.  I did trim off the excess fat.  I put mine in my crock pot & cooked it on high.  Since I was using about double the meat, I doubled the vinegar & bbq sauce.  My suggestion is this: if you like a LOT of sauce, use what is in the recipe.  If you don't like a lot of sauce, you could likely get away with only doing about 3/4 of what it calls for.  There was TONS of extra sauce with mine.  Not sure if it's because I cooked it in the crock pot or if it is because it was doubled.  When I took mine out of the crock pot to shred it, I used a knife so I could get around the bone but was still able to use a fork for most of the shredding.  I then put the meat back in the crock pot with all the sauce and let it cook about 30 more minutes.  They turned out really good - they kids scarfed them right up.

Brookelyn

Sister finally has 2 teeth!  The 2 bottom front teeth she's been working on for the last 6 months have FINALLY come through!  Yes, I did do the happy dance when I saw them last night!

Took B to InstaCare again tonight.  Poor girl had eyes that were red, goobery, and nearly swollen shut since Thursday.  I thought she either had a cold & it had gone to her eyes or possibly had an allergic reaction to cinnamon.  Nope.  Sister has pink eye...in BOTH eyes.  Great.  Got some eye drops for that.  Twice a day for the next week.  Sister didn't care for that much.  Awesome.  Good news is her ears look great.

However, since she started back up with the diarrhea again I asked the dr. about it.  The dr. we saw tonight consulted with the dr. we saw last time we were there.  Decided we'd better put her on the rx we talked about last time.  I guess she has an infection from being on too many antibiotics for too long (four rxs in about six weeks).  So, she gets to be on this rx FOUR times a DAY for the next TEN days.  Then we have to follow up with her regular pediatrician to make sure the infection is cleared up.  Kinda weird they want to put her on a rx for diarrhea that she got from being on too many rxs for too long of a time!

She now weighs 21 lbs even and is 27 3/4 inches long.  I think it's time to take her out of the baby carrier and put her in the upright carseat facing backwards.  Not sure how she'll like it since she's still not a huge fan of being put into her carseat in the first place, but, maybe this will be better for her.

On a random side note, a piece about Caleb:
Tonight I left him with my mom & dad while I took B to InstaCare because Trav was doing homework & the older kids were with my sister in law.  When I came by to pick him up my mom told me my Grandpa Maughan had stopped by.  Grandpa was trying to talk to Caleb and get a conversation going.  When Grandpa asked "What's your name?"  Caleb answered "DON'T look at me!"  When Grandpa asked him how old he was, Caleb answered with, "I'm NOT telling you."  Grandpa kept asking him questions and finally Caleb looks at Grandpa and says "You're messing with the WRONG Boy!"  That kid apparently has waaaay too much of his mother's attitude!

I have a bunch of pictures from the concert last night that I'm going to try & download to the computer tonight so I can blog about it tomorrow.  It was most fantastic!  Three and a half hours of music & awesome special effects!

Crock Pot Recipe Day 14

Chicken Soft Tacos
From Fix It & Forget It Big Cookbook
Page 348

Makes 6 servings
Prep time 5 minutes
Cooking time 6-8 hours
Ideal slow cooker size 5-6 qt

1 - 1 1/2 lbs frozen, boneless, skinless chicken breasts
14 1/2 oz low sodium diced tomatoes with green chilies
1 envelop low sodium taco seasoning I used a chicken taco seasoning packet


1. Place chicken breasts in slow cooker.
2. Mix tomatoes and taco seasoning.  Pour over chicken.
3. Cover. Cook on low 6-8 hours.
4. Serve in soft tortillas.  Top with salsa, low fat shredded cheddar cheese, guacamole if your diet allows, and fresh tomatoes.  Travis fried some tortilla shells instead of just using them straight out of the bag.


These were awesome.  My kids inhaled them.  I worried they'd be too spicy for the kids but they apparently weren't!  Will be making these again (probably often).

Crock Pot Recipe Day 13

Ok.  I decided I need to explain why today is only day 13 despite being January 22nd.  With Travis being gone most of the time I end up with a lot of left overs (especially if the kids don't like what I've made).  So, we've eaten left overs on more than one occasion.  Also, we have eaten at Travis's parents house once or twice.  Only once have I ordered pizza (Sam was having a sleepover over here)!  I haven't had any recipes turn out bad enough that we had to scrap it and start over (shocker).

Ham-Broccoli Casserole
From Fix It & Forget It Big Cookbook
Page 451
Makes 4 servings
Prep time 20 minutes
Cooking time 4-5 hours
Ideal slow cooker size 4-5 qt

16 oz pkg frozen broccoli cuts, thawed & drained I used a 14 oz bag and I didn't thaw or drain it.
2-3 cups cubed, cooked ham  I had about 2 1/2 cups.  I used the left over ham from when I made Ham in Foil.
10 3/4 oz can cream of mushroom soup I used cream of chicken
4 oz of your favorite mild cheese, cubed I used mild cheddar & I grated it, not cubed it
1 cup milk
1 cup instant rice, uncooked
1 rib celery, chopped I just used celery salt because no one here likes celery
1 small onion, chopped I used about 3/4 cup white onion


1. combine broccoli and ham in slow cooker.
2. Combine soup, cheese, milk, rice, celery, and onion.  Stir into broccoli.  My cheese grater was in the dishwasher so I didn't add the cheese until it had been cooking for about an hour.
3. Cover.  Cook on low 4-5 hours.

Ramblings

I realized today that I've only done one post that wasn't recipe related since the beginning of the month.  Oops. Things have been busy around here I guess!

Nash started piano at the beginning of January.  Now I have 2 kids that have to practice!  He's doing pretty good.  Unfortunately, he wasn't born with the innate rhythm like his older sister was.  I told Travis I think it's because he didn't play his guitar much while I was pregnant with Nash or for about the first 2 years after he was born (we lived on the third floor of an apt).  He seems to be enjoying it though, which is what I was hoping for!

Samantha is getting quite good with her piano.  I'm impressed with how much she's learned in just under a year.  My thanks to her piano teacher!  I have taught her very little - what do I know?  I'm just the mom!  She's still enjoying dance too.  I did have to tell her today that if she didn't start listening better I'd tell her dance teacher she wouldn't be able to go to Disneyland.  Not sure if she believes I'll do it or not.  Hmmm...better figure something out there!

Caleb has been loving preschool.  He's not quite so clingy when I drop him off.  Don't get me wrong, he still has his days where he semi freaks out if I try to leave before he's ready.  But, for the most part, drop off isn't too bad.  I'm surprised by his growing vocabulary.  Not sure if it's from preschool or listening to his older siblings.  I realize it could be a combination of the two.  Either way, the boys is getting a very LARGE vocabulary & it generally catches me off guard when he throws a big word out and uses it in context.  Caleb is finally out of nursery and a Sunbeam.  Should be interesting to see how that works out.  He's quite particular about who he'll stay with and acknowledge!

Brookelyn is growing way too fast.  She is still toothless - although, I think I can FINALLY see one of her bottom teeth & occasionally feel it.  Perhaps before February she will have a tooth.  She is so slow to get teeth compared to the other three.  Maybe that means she will have better teeth than the older two?  I had her in the dr.'s office the day after Christmas and she had an ear infection in her left ear.  I took her back in almost 10 days ago because she had been pulling at her left ear for a week and a half.  She had also had diarrhea for two weeks and had spent part of the week throwing up.  Her left ear was infected (again or still?).  The dr. at Instacare said, "She's had four prescriptions in about six weeks.  She might end up needing tubes."  Yes, yes I laughed at him.  I then proceeded to tell him just how close of relationship I have with my favorite ENT.  The first two prescriptions she had were for sinus infections (reminiscent of Samantha) and the second two were for ears.  I think I'm seeing a familiar pattern here.  They gave her an antibiotic she hadn't tried yet.  She's quit pulling at her ear and I'm still crossing my fingers that she doesn't break out in hives any time soon.  So far so good, but, I'm not holding my breath that I'll get a kid that's not allergic to penicillin!  She is up to 20 lbs 9 oz and feels it!  I told Travis we need to take her out of the infant seat & put her into the upright rear facing.  Girlfriend is too heavy for me to pack around much longer!  She isn't full on crawling yet, but she will be any day now.  She gets up on all fours and she will move one knee forward before she plops down and army crawls.  Not sure if she doesn't trust herself (yes, she has had her face meet my wood floor) or if she knows she's faster on her belly.  We did buy another baby gate last time Travis was home and I did bust it out last night.  Won't be too much longer before it becomes a permanent fixture around here.

I am loving my job more and more every week.  The kids are fun to work with.  The schools are all really good schools.  The teachers and the principals have been really good to work with.  Next week in parent teacher conferences (at least at one school).  So, I've written up a short note for teachers to give the parents.  All but one of my schools has done their presentations for their research projects.  I can't believe the turn out we had.  Parents showed up and every 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade teacher brought their class to hear the presentations.  The SEM kids were thrilled that their classmates could come and listen to their presentations.  I was thrilled that the teachers would take the time out of their day to bring their whole class down to listen to and see what just a few kids in the class had been working on.  Just about every kid had a parent there too.  That was nice because I got parent emails so now I can email notes home.  I also finally got my uen website modified for the SEM job and emailed parents the link to it.  I think that will be very handy.  Next week I am going to the UAGC conference in SLC all day.  That should be interesting.  I've never been to one of their conferences.

My poor kids can't decide whether to wear shorts or sweats lately!  It has rained for days and days.  I told Travis that the field next to us had quite a bit of water in it and I was hoping it wouldn't venture over to our property.  So far, so good.  Today after it finally decided to quit raining, the snow started.  The kids were sooo excited to play in the snow.  Brooke was a good sport (kinda) and let me put her in her walker all bundled up out in the garage while I shoveled snow.  After I was done (and she had ventured out onto the wet driveway) I realized that her little shoes were getting quite small and are not the best for wet weather.  So, sister got some stylin' new sneakers when we went to Walmart tonight.  I wish they had them in my size!

Travis comes home tomorrow and we are all anxiously awaiting that.  Monday is a short day at school and there's no school Tuesday.  On Friday Travis and I are going to see (our favorite) Brad Paisley.  I'm so excited!  Sam's totally bummed we aren't taking her this time.  It just so happens that the concert is the same day that I have to be in SLC all day for the UAGC conference so Travis is going to have to meet me there.  Hope that works out ok and we don't end up late to the concert.  And on a completely random note: I've become totally addicted to the game Words With Friends!  I totally blame my husband!  Now if I could just quit getting spanked on just about every game I play, I'd be happy!  Guess I need Caleb's vocabulary!