Crock Pot=bff!

Cooking!!!!!!!!!!!

Recipes are so fun to look through! With these constant "resting" moments recently I have looked through lots of recipe books searching for healthy, fast, economical, and of course yummy meals! I love anything with veggies! This past week I think I used my crock pot everyday! I would sit in the kitchen and chop veggies or get small things ready, use my new best friend (crock pot) and by 5:30pm dinner is done! For any of you who have kids or are working and don't utilize this amazing kitchen friend, try it, I think you'll be amazed at what all you can cook and "try" in your little friendly crock pot! This week I had about 8 apples that were a little to soft to eat, who likes a soft apple? So after peeling them, and cutting them into slices, adding no sugar, one little slice of butter, and lots of cinnamon, after about 6 hours of cooking on low, and my house smelling like a warm cozy fall spices, we had delicious apples sauce! I was amazed at how sweet these apples were- without adding any sugar! For kids- Graham won't eat apple sauce out of the jar, but he loved this! Try it, I think you'll really enjoy- I am not a apple sauce lover either!

If you have some frozen or any chicken you need to use up, I always try and get my chicken on sale and freeze a few breast saves a little here and there! This week I put 3 chicken breast in the crock pot (mine weren't frozen), I had a green, red, and yellow pepper that was starting to get a bit mushy- so I chopped them all- added them to the chicken, along with some sliced fresh mushrooms-then put two cups of water, and a little pepper on top! I am not using salt right now on anything just to encourage the whole "low sodium" diet- trying to stay far far away from pregnancy hypertension (yikes!)! Closed the lid- and let it do it's thing! At 5:00pm- everything had cooked down- I boiled some pasta- made a little sauce and added the chicken and veggies to the pasta! It was great, and the greatest part was I didn't spend lots of time in the kitchen! Love that! Ellie will be here soon so I need to master a few quick and easy recipes to help manage having my energized 18 month old, along with a new born! So with that being said if any of you have favorite recipes or quick family meals- send them my way!!!!!


Saturday morning is such a sweet day to me! To wake up with Mike still in bed, not trying to run out the door, and knowing we can have a day just us doing small things around the house, going to lunch, whatever our little family wants to do- perfect! This morning Graham decided to sleep until 8:30 am- he is normally like an alarm cloth- up between 7 or 7:15 am sharp! I wanted to make something for Mike- he is finishing up his first semester of MBA classes- he will be finished tomorrow until Jan! shewwwwwwwwwwww! So, even though this isn't a "healthy" recipe- it sure is amazing-every Thanksgiving the Bruner's have to have a pumpkin roll at their dessert table! If you've never had one- try it- you'll love it!


Pumpkin Roll!!!!!!!!!!!
3 Eggs
1 cup Sugar
2/3 cup Pumpkin
1 teaspoon Lemon juice
3/4 cup All-purpose flour
1 teaspoon Baking powder
2 teaspoons Cinnamon
1 teaspoon Ginger
1/2 teaspoon Nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon Salt
.
Filling:
8 ounces Cream cheese -- softened
4 tablespoons Butter -- or margarine
1 cup Powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon Vanilla
Preparation:
In large bowl, combine eggs and sugar, beating with an electric mixer until thick and light yellow in color. Add pumpkin and lemon juice, mixing until blended.
In separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder, spices and salt. Add to egg mixture, mixing well. Spread batter into greased and waxed-paper lined 10-by-15-inch jelly-roll pan.
Bake at 350 ° for 15 minutes. Remove from oven. Cool for 15 minutes. Place cake on clean tea towel sprinkled liberally with powdered sugar. Cool 10 minutes longer. From 10- inch side, roll cake up in towel. Set aside.
While cake is cooling in towel, prepare filling. Beat together cream cheese and butter; stir in powdered sugar and vanilla and blend until smooth. Unroll cake. Evenly spread filling over cake. Roll up cake (without the towel). Wrap in plastic wrap. Cover and chill at least 1 hour. Slice before serving. Keep leftover slices refrigerated. This pumpkin roll freezes well.