My new favorite helper.

Ok.  So my crock pot has always been my biggest kitchen helper, but I am learning to take advantage of it in other ways as well. 

I wanted to share this with you in hopes that you might come up with other creative ways to use yours also.

There are many crock pot recipes out there.  I use them all the time.

I have also found that I can use my crockpot just to keep dinner warm and ready. It doesn’t have to be something I put in the crockpot to cook all day.  I can make dinner early, and put it in the crockpot to keep warm until we are ready to eat.

I am always running around doing something else during the time I should be making dinner.

Selfishly, I am either at Zumba.

…or, I am running kids around to their events.

I hate that.

I have started making dinner earlier in the day, and then just putting it in the crock pot to stay warm until we get home.

This is picture of sloppy joes.  I made these  at about 2 in the afternoon.  I put the slop in my crockpot, and turned it to the keep warm setting.

We ate dinner at 6:30 that night, and I think they tasted even better because the mixture has time to simmer together and become flavorful.

I have also made these foods early:

homemade chicken nuggets

stroganoff

buffalo chicken filling for tacos or quesadillas

Parmesan chicken

stir fry

homemade mac n cheese

I can’t wait to try other recipes.

What recipes do you have that this method would work with?