Best of the Best: Top Recipes of 2014

Wow, I'm flattered! 

All Free Slow Cooker Recipes named my crock pot orange chicken one of its top recipes of 2014!  

This recipe goes way back to when I first started blogging years ago, and somehow, it caught on right when Pinterest took off.  Since then, it's gotten more hits than I could have ever imagined on my little old blog.  It's really an awesome recipe and one of my absolute favorite from the last several years.  You must try it out if you haven't yet!

BBQ Pulled Chicken Sandwiches

Another attempt at the crock pot came out great!

These BBQ pulled chicken sandwiches were really good and very easy to make.

Ingredients:

• 1-2 lb of boneless, skinless chicken breasts
• 18 oz. bottle of BBQ sauce (we used Sweet Baby Rays)
• 1 medium sweet onion, diced
• 1/2 t salt
• 1/2 tpepper
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 5 cloves of garlic, minced
  
• hamburger buns
• optional: slices of cheese
  

Spray crock pot with non-stick cooking spray.

Remove fat from chicken breasts and put in pot.

Pour diced onion, minced garlic, salt, pepper, and brown sugar over chicken.

Pour BBQ sauce over chicken

Cook on LOW for 8 hours.
If you're home, give the chicken a stir every couple of hours to keep from burning.

About 30-45 minutes before the chicken is ready, shred the chicken.
I think it's easiest to use two forks and pull the chicken apart.

After cooking for 8 hours, give the chicken a final mix and place on buns.
Add a slice of cheese to the top if you'd like.

Yum! And great leftover as well!

Crock Pot Orange Chicken

First off, I apologize that I don't know where this recipe came from. If it's yours, please let me know and I'll give you credit.

And now to this awesome dinner we had the other night...

Ingredients:
• 3-4 boneless chicken breasts, chopped into small chunks
• 1/3 cup flour
• olive oil
• 1/2 T salt
• 1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar
• 3 T ketchup
• 6 oz. frozen orange juice concentrate (thaw or throw it in the microwave for 45 seconds)
• 4 T brown sugar

In a bowl, mix the orange juice, brown sugar, vinegar, salt, and ketchup.

Pour the flour in a small bowl.
Cover the chicken breast chunks in flour and shake off the excess.

Pour a small amount of olive oil in a skillet and brown the flour-covered chicken.

The chicken doesn't need to be fully cooked since it's going in the crock pot.

After the chicken is done cooking, pour the pieces into the crock pot.
Then cover the chicken with your sauce mixture and give the pot a stir.

Cook on low for 5-6 hours or on high for 2-3.

Serve over rice and even add veggies if you want a healthier meal.
Enjoy!

EASY Crockpot Chicken & Stuffing

I took out the crockpot over the weekend for another attempt...and it came out great! This chicken & stuffing recipe is SO simple and only uses a few ingredients. It was a big hit in our house!

Ingredients
• 4 thawed chicken breasts
• 6oz. package of Stove Top stuffing mix
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1 can of cream of chicken soup

Only 4 ingredients! Awesome!


First put your chicken in the crock pot.

Pour the package of stuffing on top.

Mix sour cream, soup, and 1/4 cup water in a small bowl.
Pour the mixture over the top of the chicken and stuffing.
Cook on LOW for 4 hours.
Fluff and serve! Yum!

Crockpot Cream Cheese Chicken & Pasta

I'm very inspired by the blog, A Year of Slow Cooking because she makes it look so fun. Since my first crock pot experience didn't go as well, I wanted to try again with this recipe from Stephanie's blog. Yum! Great result this time!

- 2 cups of cream of mushroom soup (I used half cream of mushroom and half cream of chicken)

- frozen chicken (I used 3 frozen chicken breasts)

- 2 tablespoons Italian seasoning

- 1/2 teaspoon celery seed

- 1 tablespoon onion powder

- 1 tablespoon sugar

- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper

- 1 teaspoon salt

- 2 cloves minced garlic (or garlic powder works too)

- block of cream cheese (I would cut this a little next time. Maybe 3/4 of the block)

Put everything but the cream cheese in the crockpot and mix. Cook on low for 6 hours, or until the chicken is cooked through and begins to shred. Shred the chicken with two large forks, and mix in the cream cheese. Change the settings to high and cook for another 30 minutes, or until the cream cheese is fully melted. We left ours in longer since we were busy and it still turned out good.

Boil a box of spiral pasta, drain water, and mix into crockpot. Serve and enjoy!

Very happy with how this turned out and I've been eating the leftovers every day for dinner!

The first experience with the crock pot

I've never used a crockpot before and everyone has been raving about how great they are.  Mine has been in storage for 2 years and I finally found it last week!  

The recipe started out great...

And it smelled really yummy while it cooked all day...

But it looked a little weird at the end...

Maybe it's supposed to look more like mush than a meal?? It did taste good and that's all that matters, right?