Crockpot Beer Chicken

I found a recipe on Pinterest I decided to try.  It's a slow cooker recipe using spices and a can of beer.  It had rave reviews.  It sounded intriguing enough that I just had to try it :) Other than a can of beer, the only other ingredients are 1/2 tsp of five different spices...and the recipe said you could use whatever spices you choose. I used 5 boneless breasts and a pack of 6 boneless thighs.  I served it with jasmine rice cooked in chicken broth.

The way everyone was ranting and raving over it, I was expecting fireworks to go off in my mouth when I tasted it :)  To be honest, I wasn't overly impressed.  It was good, but didn't make me ooooh and ahhhhh....however, there was a nice amount of chicken and broth left over; I used a fork and a spoon to shred the remaining chicken, which I proceeded to warm up this evening to use as chicken BBQ.  Now, THAT, I enjoyed ;-)

I can see me making it again; it was a great way to make one meal, plus have chicken left over to make BBQ with for another meal.  And it had much more taste than the way I currently make BBQ (boil some breasts, shred them and add a can of cream of celery soup).

The author of the recipe also mentioned that they've made the same recipe using pork, and then made pulled pork....which sounds like something I may try at some point, too.

Overall, I'll be making this again.  It's easy and was good.  In addition, if I throw in some extra breasts, the shredding part went so quickly, I can easily another meal for another time.

Crockpot Beer Chicken

4-6 chicken breasts, boneless or bone-in...or any combo of chicken
1 can of any kind of beer
1/2 tsp of each:
garlic powder
basil
paprika
black pepper
kosher salt

*You can use whatever spices you prefer

Put all ingredients into slow cooker.
If frozen, cook on high 4-5 hours or low 8-10 hours
If fresh, cook on high 3-4 hours or low 7-8 hours

LOL!

Not even sure what's going on here, but it's too funny :)

Yum! Yum! New England Clam Chowder

I found this recipe in the Northampton Press this week. I've never made New England clam chowder, but it looked pretty easy to make, so I thought I'd give it a shot. We all really liked it :)

Recipe:

1/2 cup butter
1/2 onion, diced
1 teaspoon minced garlic
2 stalks celery, diced
1 teaspoon dried thyme (If there's anything you'd cut back on a bit, this'd be it!)
1/2 cup flour
8 (6.5 ounce) cans clams with juice
2 cups cooked diced potatoes
1 quart half-and-half
3 strips bacon, cooked and diced (I used 4 strips)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
3 dashes Tabasco sauce

1.  Melt butter.  Add onion, garlic, celery and thyme.  Saute until onions are transparent.  Add flour; cook, stirring 5 minutes.

2.  Add clams and clam juice.  Cook over medium-low heat 20-30 minutes (do not boil).

3.  Add potatoes and half-and-half; heat on low.  Do not boil or cream may break.

4.  Stir in bacon, salt, pepper and Tabasco.  Makes 2 quarts.

(Now this is the part I didn't look at until after we were done :)  Per 1 cup serving: 448 calories, 24 gms fat, 193 mg chol, 36 gm protein, 26 gm carbs, 1 gm fiber, 1227 mg sodium.  Minor details....)