Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Huge disappointment...

I think this story pertains to a lot of things in life. Sometimes no matter what you put into something, no matter how much work or how much you think it is a sure thing... disappointment can still happen.

I prepared a crock pot meal for dinner tonight. I have a great little cookbook that is all low-fat crock pot recipes. Found tons of great meals in that thing!! So when I was preparing my menu for this week and picking out new recipes to try, I perused this book. I found 4 never-tried recipes to add to my list. I decided to use one of them today. My daughter had her first soccer practice at 5:45. No way we could wait till afterward...my son goes to bed at 7:30-8, no way we could be eating dinner at that time. So I decided we'd eat a light lunch and have an early dinner....we had some errands to run before dinner, so crock pot was perfect...it'd be ready to eat when we were.

I followed the recipe to a tee...chopped everything up, put it all in just like it said...and turned it on. It said low for only 3 hours. Sounded a bit funny, but the meat was precooked (turkey kielbasa) so I went with it, against my better judgment. We go out, we run to the stores we needed to go to and returned home. The kids play outside while hubby is doing some yard work. I'm getting things ready for soccer and dinner. 4:30 comes and I check on the food....potatoes are hard as a rock. There is no time to make something else. I leave it on, we get ready and leave the house and do a Mickey D's run and eat it at the park before soccer practice. (If you've never had their Southwest Salad with grilled chicken...yum! Very low in fat!!)

We get home at 7:45 and I check the food. Figured we could save it and eat it tomorrow..or hubby could take it for work...whatever. Um, no. It was the blandest meal I have ever made in my life. Every ounce of flavor from the sausage was removed...not exactly sure how that happened.....and though the potatoes were perfectly cooked....they had zero flavor.

Lesson learned: Go with my gut first of all...if I would have cooked it on high it would have been done. Second..... always be prepared. You never know how things will turn out.

6 comments:

  1. Ugh! I've done that too! Especially with new recipes, they just don't always turn out the way you expect. And potatoes are tricky in the crockpot to get cooked so that they're not too hard or soft. Good thing for McDonald's!

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  2. I am almost always terrible with new recipes. I like trying new things but it makes me nervous. I've ruined many a cake this way :)

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  3. I try new recipes occasionally and it seems they always turn out horribly. My boyfriend is too sweet to complain so he eats it anyway. But I've gotten to where I'm not nearly as courageous with my cooking!

    My favorite crock pot meal? Just take some chicken breasts and some cream of mushroom soup, and toss it in the pot. I don't pre-cook the chicken even...they cook fine. I leave it on low all day and 8 or 9 hours later, dinner. The soup keeps the chicken from overcooking and getting too dry. I also throw in some mushrooms for extra flavor but my boyfriend and I are mushroom NUTS so you may not want that much mushroom in your chicken!

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  4. Not a muchroom fan here! LOL! I am always trying new recipes...I get bored very easily with food.....we rarely have the same thing twice in the same month. I have a ton of tried and true recipes and pick at least 2-3 new ones to try each week. They're not all great..some are just okay....the good ones get added to my binder of recipes.

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  5. I hate when that happens! I know I don't, but I always feel like I need to apologize when things go blah.

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