super easy chicken stew

No time to cook? No problem! Just spend 15 minutes for preparation and turn the slow cooker on. That's it. Super easy. No need for slow cooker or stew mix. It's a great dish for busy moms. :)

Ingredients: 

Chicken breast or thighs - 1 lb

Carrots - 4 medium
Sweet onion - 1 medium
Potatoes - 3 medium
Mushrooms - 6 medium

Chicken stock - 3 cups
Salt & pepper - 2 tsp each
Basil or Italian seasoning - 2 tsp
Paprika [optional] - 1 tsp 

[Chicken marinade]
Soy sauce - 2 TBS
Pepper - 1 tsp
Sugar - 2 tsp

[Tomato sauce mix]
Corn starch - 1 TBS
Water - 1/3 cup
Tomato ketchup - 3 TBS

Rice or bread 

Prep: 

1. Cut chicken into big bite pieces (2 inch chunks). Marinade for 5 minutes.
2. Cut all veggies into big chunk pieces. 
3. Cook rice if you want rice.

Cook:

1. In a slow cooker, put veggies and top with chicken. 
2. Add chicken stock, salt, pepper, italian seasoning and paprika. Mix slightly. 
3. Cook at low for 6-8 hours (depending on how much time you have) or high for 4-5 hours. 
4. 1 hour before done (or 30 min for high), mix 'tomato sauce mix' ingredients together and pour into it. Mix slightly. Let it cook for 30 min - 1 hour. Adjust taste.

Serve: 

1. Serve with salad and bread/rice. 

hearty slow-cooker beef stew

This is my mother-in-law's recipe. It's from a slow-cooker premix, but my mom-in-law  made it taste much better. All her sons know how to cook this dish. It saves you time since all you need to do is put everything in the slow-cooker. It's definitely mommy-friendly (or college student-friendly) dish. Thanks, mom for sharing your recipe!

Ingredients: 

Beef (your type of cut) - 1.5 lbs (cut in 2 inch cube)
McCornick beef stew seasoning mix - 1 pkt
Cornflour - 1 TBS
Salt - 1/2 tsp
Cooking oil - 2 TBS
Water - 3 cups

Button mushroom - 1 small can
Carrots - 2 med (cubed)
Celery - 3 stalks (wedges)
Potatoes - 4 med (wedges)
Tomato -1 big (wedges)
Onion - 1 big (wedges)

Get few of these and keep them in the pantry.

Prep:

1. Marinate beef cubes with light soya sauce (2 tsp), pepper and cornflour (1 TBS) for about half hour.

Cook:

1. Heat oil up and stir fry onions lightly.
2. Put in the beef cubes and fry until all sides are brown but not completely cooked.
3. Add in the seasoning mix and water. When water is boiling, reduce heat, cover and simmer for 10 minutes.
4. Add carrots, celery, potatoes, tomato and button mushrooms. Allow it to cook for 5 minutes.
5. Add salt and thicken the gravy with cornflour (1/2 TBS).
6. Pour the stew into a slow cooker. Turn to 'low' and cook for 5-6 hours. (**see TIPS)

You can put veggies directly in the pot, too.

I only browned the meat in a frying pan

Liquid should come no more than half of the ingredients

Serve:

1. Serve with rice and salad, or with toasted garlic french bread toasts.

TIPS

• If you are running short on time, no worries! Just put on high for 3-4 hours.
• You can also put veggies directly into the slow-cooker and just brown the meat in the frying pan
  

pulled pork sandwich

Happy 4th of July, everyone! July 4 is the perfect holiday for... BBQ! But if you are like us - live in an apartment and don't have your own backyard (or BBQ grill), then bring BBQ inside. This slow-cooker recipe brings BBQ inside the home and what's even better? You don't even have to stand by it and cook!

Ingredients:

Pork tenderloin (or your favorite cut of meat) - 2 lbs
Root beer - 1 can (12 fl. oz)
Garlic cloves - 3 (skinned and cut in half)

Favorite BBQ sauce - 1 (small bottle - at least 18 oz)

Prep:

1. Prepare garlic cloves by taking off the skin and cutting in half (you will have 6 pieces total). If you are garlic fan, please add more of them! If you're not, just omit or reduce the number.

Cook:

1. In a slow cooker, add meat, root beer and garlic cloves. Root beer should at least be at the halfway mark of the meat. 
2. Let it cook under LOW for 6 hours. 
3. An hour and half before completion (so 4 and half hours into cooking), take the meat out, drain the root beer/garlic liquid out. Shred the meat using two forks. Mix in the whole bottle BBQ sauce and mix well. 
4. Return the BBQ-sauced meat back into the slow cooker and cook for another hour. 

meat + root beer + garlic

After 5 hours

The other side of the meat was nice and brown

Shred it using two forks (my husband does better job shredding meat)

Mix in BBQ sauce

Pretty awesome BBQ sauce - very tangy, good for slow cooker meats

Serve:

1. Serve with homemade bread roll and cole slaw. 
2. Add more BBQ sauce for dripping-BBQ-goodness.

TIPS

• 2 lbs of meat will make about 6-7 big pulled pork sandwiches

slow cooker chicken and biscuits

allrecipes.com is probably my favorite online site to get recipes. I found this recipe on the website and made couple of times already. It's very simple to make - just takes 10 minutes to prep and let your slow cooker do the rest! I used to make my own dumplings, but store-bought ones are much easier & quicker (plus, I get more time for myself!) :)

Ingredients: 

Chicken breast - 4
Butter - 2 TBS
Condensed Cream of Chicken soup - 2 (10.75 ounce)*
Onion - 1 (diced)
Mushroom - 1 cup (diced)
Carrots - 1 cup (diced)
Water -1 cup 

Refrigerated biscuit dough - 1 (8 pieces)
Frozen peas - 1/4 cup

Prep:

1. Cut butter in 1/2 inch cubes. 
2. Cut all vegetables in cubes. 
3. Combine cream of chicken soup with water until well blended.

Cook:

1. In a slow cooker, line with diced vegetables. Place chicken breasts on top.
2. Pour the soup mixture on top of chicken.  Place butter cubes on top.
3. Cook on HIGH for 5 hours. 
4. 60 minutes before completion, open the lid, shred the chicken (in the slow cooker) and place 8 pieces of refrigerated biscuits. Make sure the biscuits are immersed completely in the soup. Pour the frozen peas on top. Cover and cook for another hour. 

After adding the biscuits on top, use ladle to scoop soup over the dough.

I used jumbo biscuit so it became really big. :)

Serve: 

1. The whole meal is in this one dish! Enjoy while it's hot. 

TIPS

• Cream of Chicken soup - use less sodium type if you don't want it to be too salty. Just add 2/3 cup water instead of 1 cup since it's less thick. 
• You can also try other cream soup (such as cream of mushroom, cream of tomatoes) for variations.