Slow Cooker Love!

So sorry for the total lack of posts in the past month and a half or so. You all know how crazy the holidays can be, and then when you add in the stress (and fun!) of moving to a new place, it's quite an adventure. Mr. C and I are slowly but surely getting settled into San Antonio, and we've both fallen in love with the city already! It's such a neat place with lots of culture to it, and the food is absolutely to die for. I'm a huge fan of Tex-Mex (especially since it's so corn based and usually pretty gluten-free!) and San Antonio is the Tex-Mex capital of the world. Now, I just need to find some good Pilates classes to make sure all of this great food doesn't go straight to my butt!

Speaking of food, one of my resolutions this year is to use my slow cooker more often. I love the fact that you can plop everything in there, turn it on and forget about it while you go about your day. There is nothing more satisfying than coming home after a long day out and about to dinner already cooked and waiting for you! Even better, I've been using the Reynold's Crock-Pot Liners, so when we're done I can just pitch the liner and not even have to clean the pot. Really, the main reason I hadn't used my crock-pot more than a handful of times in the first year of marriage was simply because I thought all crock-pot recipes involved boring old chicken in some bland sauce. Totally not the case!

I found the most amazing blog called "A Year of Slow Cooking" where Stephanie, the blogger, made a resolution to use her slow cooker everyday in 2008. The result is this wonderful blog filled with outside the box recipes for everything from main courses to drinks and desserts, all made with the crock-pot! I've already made quite a few of her recipes, and have the Margarita Chicken cooking as I write. I think my favorite so far has been the Thai Beef. This took literally five minutes to put together and was as simple as opening the can of coconut milk, opening the bottle of peanut satay sauce, pouring both onto the beef and making sure it was good and saucy, and finally dumping in a bag of baby carrots. Then I hit "cook" and walked away for eight hours. Like magic, that evening I had a delicious and healthy meal. When we were done eating, I pitched the liner, put the crock-pot away and my kitchen was still completely clean. That was the moment I fell in love with my crock-pot.

Do yall have any good slow cooker recipes? I'm always on the hunt!

Finally... a post!

So sorry for the lengthy delay between posts! Between Thanksgiving and our move out to Texas, I haven't had much free time lately! We made it out here safely last week, and thankfully all of our personal belongings arrived on Monday. So far the move has been relatively uneventful, and for that I am VERY thankful! I've already fallen in love with San Antonio and am really looking forward to exploring all that the city has to offer. We've already checked out the outlet mall in San Marcos, and I had the chance to shop at a Pottery Barn/Williams-Sonoma/West Elm outlet. I thought that I had died and gone to heaven! If you've never had the opportunity to go to one, just picture a building slightly smaller than your average Target but completely filled with fabulous kitchen and home supplies, accessories and decor and all at discount prices. I really need to find a job, because I can already tell that it's going to be a DANGEROUS store!

On an unrelated note, today marks the 111th Army-Navy game! I had the opportunity to attend two Army-Navy games during Mr. C's time at the Naval Academy, and it is one of the most spectacular things I've ever seen. It's always a game filled with so much tradition and patriotism, not to mention fun! If you have the chance, tune in today at 2:30 EST on CBS and check it out. It's an awesome sight to see these young men duke it out on the football field while knowing that off the field they'll all be working together to keep our country safe. It will make you very proud to be an American!

With that said...

Go Navy! Beat Army!
(Image found here)