Back To Basics Cooking & A Little Note From Me (Original Post 05/30/2009)

The past week I was in a pretty bad funk and didn't feel like doing much of anything, so that explains my lack of posts.  This week and next week, I am trying to get myself and my son ready for the new school year.  We are beginning a new school venture this year.  He will be starting online schooling and I will be his "learning coach".  This is so very new to us.  I plan on writing about our new journey, but need to experience it first. LOL   In the meantime, I'm going to just re-post some stuff so you don't start to miss me.  XOXO




Today, I started thinking about when I started cooking. When I was younger, my mom worked two jobs and I was left to make dinner for the family. As a teenager, I didn't want to spend time in the kitchen cooking, so I made really quick easy meals. Why don't I do that know? I think it is because I am an adult with my own family that I feel the need to cook a nice dinner every night.

Well, I don't. Why can't I make meals like I made when I was younger. It is OK, and it is also a wonderful and easy way to get my son involved in helping to cook meals. So, I am going back to basics. I am going to start making those meals that I made when I starting cooking. Now, I won't make these every night, but it will be nice and it might give me inspiration to simplify other meals.

For my meal tonight, I am going to make English Muffin Pizza. I am going to toast the english muffins in the toaster, so I don't have to turn the oven on and then melt the cheese in the microwave. Totally Old School cooking.

Other things I use to make were chicken nuggets, corn dogs, sandwiches and actually one of my favorites, cereal for dinner. When did that become wrong to do? I don't feed it to my family every night.

So, if you have back to basic recipes or ideas, please share them with me. I would love to have more suggestions.

Crock Pot Beer Brats

Sorry, I didn't take any pictures of this meal.  It is pretty easy to make.  I took two packages of Johnsonville Beer Brats, Blue Moon beer and about a cup of water.  Threw everything in the crock pot and turned it on high.  Cook it for about 4-6 hours.  Basically, you are just boiling the brats.


You can serve these on hot dog buns or with mashed potatoes.  I'm serving ours on buns with some chips.


Easy, peasy, lemon squeezy. Simple and delicious dinner with little effort.

Epic Crock Pot Fail

I made dinner tonight and used the crock pot.  I was so very excited.  I had boneless pork chops, rice, carrots, broccoli and orange sauce.  Sounds delish!


I put the rice, pork chops, salt, pepper and water in the crock pot.  Turned it on low.  Checked it throughout the day. About an hour before serving, I added the frozen carrots, broccoli and the orange sauce.


I went to serve the kids dinner.  Put the food on a plate and it smelled delicious.  I tasted it.  It was ice cold.  The crock pot was unplugged, but not all the way. It was in the socket, just not plugged all the way in.  When I added the frozen veggies it must have gotten unplugged.


Anyway, I plugged the crock pot back in, but I'm not sure how dinner turned out.  We all had chicken nuggets for dinner.  Here are the pictures I took.  It looks good.  Lol

The ingredients 

The finished product (sort of)

Crock Pot Refried Beans (Original Post 5/10/2009)

This is a very loose recipe. I'm not one who follows recipes. I kind of just make things up as I go along, and I go by my own taste.

Anyway, I use to think that making refried beans would be difficult, boy was I wrong. They are so easy to make. And very inexpensive. You can buy a bag of pinto beans for a little over a dollar at most grocery stores. I use 1/3 of a bag for my family of four. You can use as much or as little as you need.

Put the beans in a bowl full of water. Make sure the water covers all the beans. Soak the beans overnight or for at least 8 hours. This softens the beans and releases some of the gasses.

Drain the beans and place them in the crock pot. Cover the beans with water. Now this is were you add your seasonings. I add different things all the time. You can add whatever your family likes. I always add onion powder and garlic powder. And a few other things that I find in the cabinets. Go crazy and have fun with it.

Turn the crock pot on low and cook for 8 to 10 hours. After the beans are cooked and soft, turn the crock pot off or if it has a warm setting you can choose that. Get a potato masher and mash the beans. You can mash them as little or as much as you like, it is what you prefer.

When you are ready to eat, take the beans and put them in a pan and fry them. That is what makes them refried beans.

You can top them with cheese or put them in your tacos or burritos. Enjoy!