Cooking chicken in the crockpot is probably the best idea I’ve ever had. It’s almost completely hands-off, and turns out the BEST shredded chicken I’ve personally been able to produce! The recipe I’ve included below is the one that I found on Food.com and used to get the basic idea for cooking chicken in the crockpot.

I tend to use just a regular 2-3 lb pack of chicken (I’m cheap, and it’s just me, so I don’t need a ton of chicken), and I usually put closer to 2 cups of water in the crockpot rather than the suggested 1/2 cup, and the chicken is usually done within 4-5 hours in the crockpot. It’s wonderful because the chicken practically shreds itself when you pull it out!

See the chicken is already coming apart in the crock pot? Wonderful!

I used a large pack of chicken the first time and froze a bunch to use at a later time. It kept beautifully in the freezer. I’ve also made this shredded chicken to portion out to top salads, make homemade chicken caesar wraps, and chicken salad. Freezing 2 cup portions for recipes that call for cooked chicken would also be a great idea!

I actually just pulled my third batch of chicken for shredding out of the crock pot a few minutes ago and turned it into a batch of Chicken Salad… so easy I may never cook chicken any other way!

Chicken in the Crockpot for Shredding
Source: Food.com

6 -12 chicken breasts (use as many as you want)
1/2 cup water
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

Place the chicken breasts in the crock pot, Mix water and spices together and pour over the chicken.
Cook on the low setting for 8-10 hours.
Remove chicken breasts, shred or pull the meat from bones, removing skin (it should all fall off easily at this point anyway!).

Recently I found myself with both bananas that were slowly rotting on the counter, and a bag of Butterfinger Bites that I had impulse purchased while at the grocery store. So it was pretty much kismet that the very first recipe I came across when searching for a recipe to use my bananas in was this one for Butterfinger banana muffins!

I got 18 muffins out of this recipe, using a standard muffin pan and filling it with an ice cream scoop. The tops of the muffins that expanded over the top of the liner/pan got a little over done, so I probably would have been better off to fill them a little less full and get a few more muffins out of the batter in the process. Even with the slightly crispy tops, these muffins were still good and quite moist. (Unless you’re one of the many people I know who hate the word moist… then they were just good. Not moist.)

I did feel like the butterfinger just disappeared behind the banana, and I couldn’t really taste the candy in the finished product. The chocolate chips were definitely a necessary addition. In any case, if you have the butterfinger on hand already, go ahead and make these. If not, I wouldn’t go out of my way to buy them just for this recipe. There are also other things you could make where the Butterfinger would really be the star… eating the remaining Butterfinger Bites while I wrote this definitely seemed like a better use for them!

Your mileage may vary.

Loaded Butterfinger Banana Muffins
Source: Inside BruCrew Life

1 cup butter
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg
3 brown bananas
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 and 1/4 cups flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup miniature chocolate chips
1 cup crushed Butterfinger candy bars

Cream the butter and sugars until creamy. Add the egg and vanilla and beat again. Smash the bananas and stir in gently.
Sift together the flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda. Slowly add to butter mixture. Stir in the chocolate chips and candy bars by hand. Fill muffin liners about 3/4 full and bake at 350* for 25 minutes.

I don’t know what took me so long to make this. I’ve had this recipe bookmarked for a year, easy. I made something similar a few years ago, called Creamy Taco Mac, which I wasn’t crazy about. The cheeseburger macaroni I’m sharing today is really similar, only better. It is everything that I wanted the Creamy Taco Mac to be that it wasn’t.

This is a slightly spicy flavored homemade hamburger helper. Making this is slightly more hands-on than Hamburger Helper, because you have to make the roux and the cheese sauce separately and add it, but it really isn’t any more complicated to make. It was delicious, and I served it with bread and butter on the side. Yum.

This would be a quick and easy weeknight dinner, for sure. The only thing I had to buy specifically for this recipe was the beef broth, and the ground beef. I had everything else already in my pantry. I will definitely be making this one again. Though, I just realized I forgot to add the salt and pepper to the cheese sauce when I made it… oh well, it was still good!

Cheeseburger Macaroni
Source: Kevin and Amanda

1 lb lean hamburger meat
1 pkg taco seasoning
1 can Rotel tomatoes and green chilies (or petite diced tomatoes)
2 cups beef broth (or water) [I used 1 can of beef broth and added enough water to bring it up to a full 2 cups]
1 cup elbow macaroni
2 Tablespoons butter
2 tbsp flour
3/4 cup milk
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper

Brown and drain hamburger meat. Stir in taco seasoning, Rotel, beef broth, and macaroni. Heat to boiling. Reduce heat and cover pan. Simmer 12-14 mins until macaroni is tender.Meanwhile, make the cheese sauce.
Melt the butter in a saucepan. Whisk in the flour and cook, whisking for 5 minutes until fragrant and light brown in color. Whisk in the milk and bring to a boil. Whisk until smooth and thickened. Remove from heat and stir in the shredded cheddar cheese until melted. Add the salt and pepper to the cheese sauce. Pour the cheese sauce over the hamburger mixture. Stir gently to combine.

First of all, let me apologize for the crappy quality of these pictures. Out of respect for my coworkers, I made and ate these ham and beans AFTER work instead of before or during. Since I work afternoon shift, that left me cooking and eating these in the dark, hence the bad lighting. And I was too lazy and hungry to spend time prettying it up, hence the messy bowl.

Don’t let that chase you away though! This was a seriously simple and tasty crock pot full of comfort food. Not to mention, it was relatively cheap: a bag of beans, some ham, and seasoning you should already have in your pantry. I chose to use a pound of diced ham to make mine, both for the easiness factor and because it seemed to be the best option at my grocery store. I also ended up using an equivalent amount of minced onion instead of the onion powder, only because I discovered I don’t have any onion powder in my pantry.

I cooked this in the crockpot for about 7 hours, I think. It could have been done earlier (even the low setting on my crock pot is super hot), but I cooked it longer to let the beans break down and thicken up a little more. Don’t forget to serve it up with some sweet corn bread!

Crockpot Ham and Beans
Source: Plain Chicken

1 lb package dried northern beans
ham bone, hocks, shanks or diced ham (about 1 pound)
2 tsp onion powder
6 cups water
salt & pepper to taste

Rinse and sort the beans for any pebbles. Add the the rinsed beans, onion powder, salt, pepper, and ham to the crock pot. Add water. Cover and cook on low about 8 hours, until beans are tender. Remove ham bone, shanks or hocks and pull off the meat. Add meat to the crock pot and mix. Serve with cornbread.

My idea of corn bread is, and always has been, making a box of Jiffy corn muffin mix. If you are also from a Jiffy corn bread family, you know that Jiffy is sweet, and a lot of corn bread you can find out there is not. I’ve had plenty of non-sweet corn bread, and I just wasn’t digging it. I was starting to think I’d be eating Jiffy forever.

But then I found this Sweet Corn Bread recipe. With both sugar and honey in the ingredient list, it looked promisingly sweet enough that I decided to go for it. I bought a box of Jiffy mix, just to be safe, which made it easy to do a side by side comparison.

Homemade sweet corn bread on the left, Jiffy boxed mix on the right. Now, it’s not the fairest comparison, as you can probably tell that the Jiffy mix got a little well done on the top. However, I think it was good enough to get a pretty good feel for the difference. Really, it’s no contest. The homemade was much denser, actually held together very well (Jiffy crumbles apart if you look at it funny), and had the perfectly sweet taste I was going for.

It mixed together quickly enough that the boxed mix doesn’t even have much of an advantage there either. Move aside, Jiffy. I’ll definitely be making this homemade version again in the future.

Sweet Corn Bread
Source: The Country Cook

2 tbsp. honey
1 egg
4 tbsp. butter (melted)
½ cup milk
½ cup water
½ cup sugar
1 cup yellow corn meal
1 cup all-purpose flour
½ tbsp. baking powder
½ tsp. salt

Preheat oven to 350F degrees. Spray 8×8 baking dish with nonstick spray. In a medium bowl, whisk together all your wet ingredients: honey, egg, butter, milk and water. In a separate bowl, combine all your dry ingredients: sugar, corn meal, flour, baking powder and salt. Give it a gentle stir with a fork to combine.
While whisking, slowly add your dry ingredients to your wet until all combined. Batter may be a little lumpy, that’s okay.
Pour mixture into greased 8×8 baking dish. Bake for about 25-30 minutes, or until set in the middle and an inserted toothpick comes out clean.

I’m sad that this picture doesn’t look like a whole lot because I feel like it really doesn’t do this meal justice. I’ve had this Enchilada Lasagna bookmarked for quite awhile now. The original recipe has a picture that looks AWESOME, so go look at that, and don’t let my crappy picture deter you, okay?

I put this together on Monday, when my friend Sarah was coming over to hang out for a few hours. She even said she wasn’t hungry, but after smelling this Enchilada Lasagna she changed her mind! She raved about it, and so did her husband, when I sent a couple servings home with her. As for myself, I thought it was really good. It reminded me quite a bit of my original Creamy Chicken Enchiladas. It was super easy to throw together, and I only made small changes. I didn’t measure my green chiles, but I think the can I used worked out to be about 1/2 cup instead of the 1/4 cup in the recipe, and I used the entire 2 cup container of sour cream instead of 1 1/2 cups and ended up with what I felt was the perfect amount of sauce. I also think that 5 cups of cheese is a little ridiculous, the 3 1/2 cups I ended up using was still plenty ridiculous! I also exchanged all of the soups and dairy products for the healthy request/light options. You couldn’t even tell that it wasn’t full fat!

This definitely is going to be on my “make again” list. It’s a recipe that lends itself well to adjustments. Next time I think I’ll try it with a can of Rotel instead of the green chiles, and possibly 2 cans of cream of chicken soup instead of one and one can of cream of celery. If you make this, and make any adjustments, I’d love to know what you come up with.

Make this one, you won’t regret it!

Chicken Enchilada Lasagna
Source: Mogwai Soup

2 tbsp of vegetable oil
1 lbs chicken breast, chopped to bite pieces
5 cups of mexican blend cheese
1 can of cream of celery
1 can of cream of chicken
1 1/2 cups sour cream
1/4 cup canned and chopped green chiles (drained)
small corn tortillas
1 tsp cumin
2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper

Brown the chicken in 2 Tbs of vegetable oil, and season with the salt, pepper and cumin.
Combine the cream of chicken soup, cream of celery soup, sour cream, and green chiles in a bowl.
Spread a thin layer of the sauce mixture in the bottom of a large pan or casserole dish. Place one layer of tortillas on the bottom (I used six of the small corn tortillas in each layer). On top of this place approximately one-third of the remaining sauce mixture, and one half of the chicken. Add cheese and then another layer of tortillas. Continue with another third of the sauce mixture, the rest of the chicken and cheese. Finally top with another layer of tortillas, the remaining sauce mixture and more cheese.
Bake at 425 degrees for 25 minutes.

I impulse purchased a jar of Nutella the last time I was at the grocery store. Call it a fringe benefit of going to the store hungry, with a half-assed grocery list, and needing to walk down the Nutella aisle more than one time due to forgetting something I was after the first time.

And boy, am I glad I did! I decided I wanted to bake something, but wasn’t interested in venturing out in the cold and snow for any supplies, so it had to be something that I had all of the ingredients for. I started looking in the same place I always do: Pinterest. Just a couple short minutes on my food board, and I found these cookies. Wouldn’t you know it? I had everything I needed, down to the impulse-purchased Nutella. It was destiny.

My mom is hoping that I’ll bring a couple of these cookies when I go to visit her in about a week, but it’s not looking promising for her… I ate a couple of them still warm off the cooling rack, and they were absolutely divine. Another one bit the dust when it fell apart between pan and the cooling rack… I was CLEARLY obligated to eat that one as well. The rest of the batch will end up going to work with me, if only so I don’t end up eating the other 37 cookies all by myself over the next few days.

Not that that would break my heart in the slightest. Yum.

Nutella Swirled Peanut Butter Cookies
Source:Buns in my Oven

1/2 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup smooth peanut butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup Nutella

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Combine butter, peanut butter, sugars, egg, and vanilla. Mix until well combined.
Combine flour, baking soda and salt in a large measuring cup or bowl. Slowly stir in to the peanut butter mixture.
Drop spoonfuls of Nutella on top of the dough and swirl it through the dough with a butter knife.
Chill the dough for 15 minutes in the refrigerator.
Roll into balls by hand.
Place the balls of dough on a parchment lined cookie sheet.
Use a fork to lightly press the balls down and make a criss-cross pattern.
Bake until the edges are very lightly browned, about 7 to 10 minutes.
Allow to cool for 2 minutes on the cookie sheet before transferring to a cooling rack.

I intended to make this post about a sugar free Black Forest trifle, but unfortunately, that one met an untimely end on my kitchen floor:

So instead you get (yet another) mint themed recipe. That’s okay though. I love chocolate mint. Like chocolate and peanut butter, chocolate and mint just belong together. (Hmm… maybe it’s that chocolate goes with everything? Food for thought.)

Anyways, I’ve been eyeballing the bags of Andes mint chips in the baking aisle for ages. I kept thinking I would eventually buy them and find a chocolate cookie to put them in. I still may do that at some point in the future. In the meantime though, I decided to just go ahead and go with the recipe on the back of the bag. I am not disappointed. The cookies have also received a big thumbs up from my coworkers who have sampled them.

I still plan on making these with a chocolate cookie dough at some point in the future. I think they would be awesome! In any case, buy Andes mint chips… make these cookies. Or just eat the mint chips and eat them straight out of the bag, like one of the officers said he would do. Either way, I don’t think you’d be too disappointed.

Andes Crème de Menthe Cookies
Source: Tootsie.com

1/2 cup salted butter – softened
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup white granulated sugar
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. vanilla extract
2 eggs
1 package (10 oz.) Andes® Crème de Menthe Baking Chips or 2 packages 4.67 oz Andes Crème de Menthe or Toffee Crunch Thins, chopped.
2-2/3 cups sifted all-purpose flour

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350° F.

Blend butter, sugars, baking soda, baking powder, vanilla and eggs until mixed.
Stir in Andes Baking Chips and then flour. Chill approximately one hour in the refrigerator.
Measure out approximately 1 oz. of dough. Form a ball and slightly flatten.
Raise oven rack one level above the middle and bake on non-stick baking pans.
Bake at 350° F for approximately 8 – 10 minutes.
Cool on pans for two minutes before removing.

This is a minty play on the “Better Than Sex Cakes” that you see around. Usually with sweetened condensed milk and heath bits. Only this cake ups the ante, with peppermint flavored creamer mixed into the sweetened condensed milk and a pepperminty fudge layer under the coolwhip frosting.

The original recipe that I found (on Pinterest, of course), called for peppermint dairy creamer, and peppermint crunch Andes bits for the topping. I found myself at the grocery store on a day that was absolutely INSANE. I was going crazy dealing with the large amounts of people in the aisles, so when I got to the creamer section and all I found was “Peppermint Mocha” flavored creamer, I didn’t have the patience to try and find out if there was a difference. (There isn’t, I found out later). I couldn’t find the peppermint Andes chips at any store in my area either, so I decided to improvise and turned my cake into a York Peppermint Patty cake. I utilized the York Peppermint Patty creamer currently available from Internation Delight as well as York Pieces from the candy aisle for the decorative topping.

What I was left with was a super rich, delicious cake, with a fairly subtle peppermint flavor. It was a big hit with both my family at a our Christmas dinner on Saturday, and my coworkers that I shared leftovers with on my way home. My only complaint about the cake was that I followed the recipe directions and used the handle of a wooden spoon to poke holes in the cake instead of a fork like I have for previous versions of “Better than” cakes. I felt like this led to a fairly uneven distribution of the sweetened condensed milk/creamer throughout the cake itself. Not a deal breaker, by any means, just a little procedural thing I would do differently in the future.

Peppermint Better Than Cake
Source: Something Swanky

1 chocolate cake mix, prepared and baked according to the directions on the box.
1 cup peppermint dairy creamer
14.5 oz sweetened condensed milk
1 jar Smuckers hot fudge sundae sauce
1/4 cup peppermint dairy creamer
1 cup crushed Oreos
8 oz Cool Whip
Andes Peppermint Chips for topping (approximately 1 1/2 cups)
Crushed Oreos for topping (approximately 1 cup)

Once the cake has cooled, use the bottom of a wooden spoon (or go to town with a fork!) to poke 20+ holes in the cake.
In a small bowl, whisk together the sweetened condensed milk and 1 cup of the peppermint dairy creamer. Pour over the cake, trying to fill in the holes.
In the same bowl, whisk together the hot fudge sundae sauce and 1/4 cup peppermint dairy creamer. Mix in 1 cup crushed Oreos.
Pour and spread the fudge mixture over the cake as evenly as possible.
Spread the cool whip over the fudge. Sprinkle on the Andes candy bits and crushed Oreos (as much or as little as you want).
Refrigerate for 4-6 hours, until the sweetened condensed mixture has soaked into the cake and it’s thoroughly chilled. Cut and serve.

What a bad little blogger I am. Look at me, not posting a single thing after Father’s Day, and here it is almost Christmas. Unfortunately, I hadn’t been cooking much at all, and certainly not anything new that I haven’t already shared with you. But if you are still looking for something to make last minute before Christmas, you are in luck!

I whipped up these cookies last night, and they were super easy. Just grab a bag of candy cane Hershey Kisses from the store, as you probably already have everything else. (If I were you, I’d also buy some red and green sugar though. You can make your own with regular sugar and some food coloring, but why?)

These are just a simple sugar cookie, rolled in colored sugar before baking. Then you simply press an unwrapped kiss into the center of the cookie after pulling them out of the oven. It should be no surprise that I enjoy these types of cookies as I have done the Kiss + Cookie combination a couple of times before! (See here, here, and here.) I can’t help it. They are always good, are usually pretty easy, and provide bang for the buck! This particular cookie + kiss combination is a winner in my book as well. I can easily see myself making these cookies in future years. Cute, festive and tasty!

The recipe states that you will get 4 dozen cookies. I used a cookie scoop to portion mine out and ended up with 32 cookies. That leaves me a handful of kisses left over for eating… how disappointing.

Candy Cane Kiss Cookies
Source: Hersheys.com

48 HERSHEY’S KISSES Brand Candy Cane Mint Candies
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons milk
Red or green sugar crystals, granulated sugar or powdered sugar

Heat oven to 350°F. Remove wrappers from candies.
Beat butter, granulated sugar, egg and vanilla in large bowl until well blended. Stir together flour, baking soda and salt; add alternately with milk to butter mixture, beating until well blended.
Shape dough into 1-inch balls. Roll in red sugar, granulated sugar, powdered sugar or a combination of any of the sugars. Place on ungreased cookie sheet.
Bake 8 to 10 minutes or until edges are lightly browned and cookie is set. Remove from oven; cool 2 to 3 minutes. Press a candy piece into center of each cookie. Remove from cookie sheet to wire rack. Cool completely. About 4 dozen cookies.