slow cooker black bean soup with cilantro pesto

a couple weeks ago i made these black bean burritos with cilantro lime pesto for dinner, substituting my own black beans for the relatively flavorless version in the recipe. while the beans were delicious as usual, it was the cilantro lime pesto that really was the star. ever since i've been looking for an excuse to top something else with it. 

at the same time, i've been thinking lately that it's time for us to start going meatless one day a week. i know meatless monday is a thing for a lot of people, but at our house, it could be any day of the week. when this black bean soup showed up in my feedly, i knew it would be delicious topped with the cilantro pesto. and it was. 

secret recipe club: snickerdoodle bars & slow cooker chicken fajitas

for this month's secret recipe club pick at anna's bcmom's kitchen, i followed the same format as last month: a delicious dessert and an easy dinner. and while both were delicious, i have to give it to the snickerdoodle bars. the fajitas were easy - chop, dump, and cook for 8 hours - but i forgot how much i love the still crunchy texture of vegetables in fajitas. anyone that's slow cooked vegetables knows they don't stay crisp. so while the flavor was good and the ease of making them spot on, the texture of the vegetables weren't the best for me.

and then there were the bars. when i was making them, i honestly didn't think they would be anything special and was pleasantly surprised when i had my first bite. they have the perfect balance of sugar cookie and cinnamon sugar goodness, in bar form. so good, i had to hide them from my toddler. otherwise, i heard "mama! bar!" a couple times a day when he saw them sitting on the counter.

secret recipe club: meyer lemon iced raspberry yogurt cake & slow cooker chicken cacciatore

a couple weeks ago, a friend of mine mentioned making a blueberry lemon cake on facebook. after reading that and seeing the post, i couldn't get the thought of a meyer lemon layer cake out of my mind. the very next day i scoured claire k creation's blog for cake recipes. i bypassed - and pinned for later - this best ever carrot cake, this lemon tea cake, and this coffee cake for this greek yogurt & raspberry cake. topped with meyer lemon buttercream, it made two pregnant women - she 38 weeks, me 32 - very happy.

slow cooker honey mustard drumsticks with tangy apple slaw

i've mentioned before how big of a fan i am of my slow cooker. now that we're in the thick of winter, there are few things better than coming home to a big pot of soup, stew, or chicken, with relatively little work. the problem is that i quickly get sick of those things - there's only so much chicken breast i can eat. so i was pleasantly surprised when flipping through my copy of slow cooker revolution to find a couple recipes for drumsticks. these are delicious - just enough sweetness for my taste and crispy from the blast in the oven at the end. coupled with the slaw and a loaf of italian bread, it is a nice reminder of food to come in the summer.

slow cooker chipotle chicken & rice

the first time i made this for dinner, i followed the recipe exactly and found out that cooking bone-in skin on chicken breasts on the stove takes literally forever - or at least much longer than i want to wait on a weeknight. when we finally sat down to eat, the three of us gobbled up our plates. between forkfuls, jason had the best idea: throw everything into the slow cooker and let it work it's magic.

secret recipe club: slow cooker beans & mushrooms

how's the weather where you live? our summer started hot and humid for about two weeks in may. then the rain came. and came. and came. and is still coming. sometimes it's obnoxiously hot and humid and other days, it's cool as a crisp fall day. it's really strange. so for this month's secret recipe club, instead of picking a fun and festive fourth of july recipe, i chose something more appropriate for fall apple picking or as a quick dinner before trick or treating.

and i'm really glad i chose this basic recipe from stephanie at sustainable cooking for one. when i came home from work, i wasn't expecting the beans to be so broken down and creamy. after a couple stirs i realized this is the perfect base for a soup. next time i'll add even more mushrooms, carrots, celery, spinach, and any other vegetables i have laying around. some cooked barley would be a great addition also. so even if the weather is hot and humid where you are, bookmark this one for fall, when soup is back on the brain and in heavy rotation.

slow cooker creamy tomato artichoke parmesan soup with brie, ham, and apple panini

when i lived in downtown rochester, i ate a lot of lunches and dinners at magnolia's on park avenue. more often than not, my companion and i would share one of their thin crust pizzas and i would always order a bowl of their signature cream of tomato artichoke and cheese soup. i cannot tell you how many people i have turned onto this soup. it's killer.

so good in fact, when i am sick, it's what i crave. in the dead of winter, when it's freezing cold out and we're buried until feet of snow, it's what i crave. so much so there have been a few times since we moved into the burbs that jason has made the 13 mile drive for a bowl of this soup. it's that good.

slow cooker tex-mex chicken stew

ah, martha, you almost got me again. for me, she's always been hit or miss. on one hand, my favorite basic yellow cake comes from martha stewart. her peach pie is out of this world. chicken & pearl couscous with tomato and lemon is one of the best meals i've had this year. and then there are the flops, which i also need to get better at documenting. these peanut butter swirled chocolate cupcakes sounded delicious but are far from it. and her one bowl chocolate cake? while not a disaster, i'd take ina's version over martha's any day.which brings me to this stew.

martha's slow cooker beef stew

for the month of october, i eased going back to work, working one day a week. tuesday. so for the five tuesdays in october, i went to work and jason stayed home with baby winn. this beef stew was perfect for one of those tuesday nights, when i wanted to play with the baby as soon as i got home and jason wanted to relax or do one of the dozen or so things on his to do list that can't possibly get done when you have a baby around.

slow cooker apple stuffed pork tenderloin with root vegetables

everybody knows pork chops and applesauce are a classic combination. do kids still watch the brady bunch? i am a child of the '80s and remember very vividly coming home from school and watching it on tbs, back when all shows on tbs started 5 minutes late, like at 1:05 instead of 1:00, what was up with that?? or do today's kids watch who's the boss?, full house, growing pains, and the other shows from tgif back in the '90s?

slow cooker chicken cacciatore

i don't know about you, but we are supposed to get a lot of rain over the next few days, today included. and finally, the rain is bringing lower temperatures with it. i know it seems like everyone is talking about how hot the summer is, so i'll spare you those details. besides, this meal isn't meant for hot summer nights. instead, it's for those cool, lower seventies days that accompany day long rain and thunder storms. those days make me long for warm, comforting dinners. and now that produce is so plentiful, delicious, and cheap this time of year, it's the perfect time for slow cooker dinners with farm fresh vegetables.

slow cooker beer barbecue pulled chicken

i love a good barbecued chicken sandwich, but hardly ever order one when i am eating out. the few times i have, i've always been disappointed. the chicken breast is usually dry and over cooked and it's either slathered in way too much sauce or there's just enough there to say it's topped with sauce. this slow cooker version is the best of both worlds - super tender and juicy chicken swimming in beer barbecue sauce. 

my favorite part? it's made in the slow cooker. on these hot ninety-plus-degree days, the last thing i want to do is turn something on inside to offset my air conditioning or stand over a blazing hot grill. and this recipe makes a ton of chicken, plenty for a party, or freeze the leftovers in dinner size portions and enjoy the next time it's too hot to turn on the stove.

slow cooker honey lemon chicken

even though it's may, and summer is starting to rear it's head with highs in the mid-eighties, my slow cooker is still going strong. and since it's may, my rosemary and thyme are also growing full speed ahead. so this time, i decided to couple two of my - and jason's - favorite things: lemon and fresh herbs with chicken.

it's the perfect way to usher in spring, especially if it happens to be raining on any eighty degree days or there's a break in the temperature and you're staring at a week's worth of highs in the upper sixties.

and sandwiches with the leftovers are amazing.

slow cooker bolognese

in the early 2000s, when i was still in college and for a few years after i graduated, i visited my good friend melina for a weekend each summer. i would make the drive from upstate new york down to new jersey and we would take the train into new york city for a day. each trip we would find something different to do during the day - visit the statue of liberty, walk through central park, see a concert at jones beach - but we always ended up in little italy for dinner and dessert. and each and every time, while i was scanning the menu for prosciutto, melina had her eyes on bolognese. i can't eat it without thinking about those trips and warm summer evenings eating outside along mulberry street.

slow cooker chicken & mushroom stew, aka crustless chicken pot pie

i've only had chicken pot pie once that i can recall and it wasn't anything special. the filling was ok, somewhat flavorless, and the crust was a chewy, gummy, soggy mess. so when i spied this slow cooker version of chicken pot pie that purposely doesn't have a crust, i was sold.

slow cooker lasagna soup

i've professed my love of lasagna a few times already, i just wish it didn't take all afternoon to put together. enter deconstructed lasagna, a short cut version i made last october that has all the same flavors of layered lasagna without the fuss of layering noodles, sauce, and cheese. i didn't think it could get any easier, until i stumbled upon this slow cooker version a few weeks later and mentally tucked it away. until a couple weeks ago, when it was cold and dreary and winter looked like he still wanted to rear his ugly head. there's nothing better than coming home to a slow cooked dinner on those days.

slow cooker chicken santa fe

as i've said before, it's been my goal this winter and spring to get a lot more use out of my slow cooker. and this chicken santa fe is one of my new favorites. i've been craving mexican food like crazy the past couple months and this is an easy way to curb the cravings. usually when we have tacos, they're ground beef, simply because it seems to be a bit easier and quicker to cook than chicken - all the cutting or poaching and shredding before spicing it up is more than i want to deal with some nights. but this chicken comes out perfectly spiced and falling completely apart from the slow cook. sure, you can shred it with forks, or use a set of tongs to break it up with one hand. it falls apart that easy.

slow cooker minestrone

i know what you're thinking: hey kate, why is your soup purple? because i used purple cabbage. which dyed everything - except for the carrots - purple. even the green beans had a tinge of purple.

but don't let the look fool you: this soup packs a good punch of flavor. especially for a simple vegetable soup.

slow cooker chili

one of my unofficial new year's resolutions is to spend less time cooking. sound counter-intuitive? i'm all for spending hours in the kitchen, on occasion, to make great food, but during the week, i want good food, fast. a typical workday for us means we leave the house at 7:30 and get home by 6:30. and the days we stop at the gym after work, it's more like 7:30. the last thing i want to do is spend 45 minutes cooking on a monday night. which is why i'm on the lookout for shortcuts.

and a slow cooker is one of the best kept secrets (ok, maybe you already know how much of a time saver they are, and i'm finally jumping on the band wagon). i've heard it a million times from friends, family, and coworkers, but it's taken me a couple meals to really understand how great it is to spend 15 or less minutes preparing dinner. i love it. so much so, that i've added a slow cooker tag to my recipes so you can get to all of them even easier. even though there are only a few posted now, i hope to continue using mine about once a week.

have a great slow cooker recipe?? leave a link in the comments!

slow cooker french onion soup with beef

i really need to get on the slow cooker bandwagon. what has taken me so long?! it all started with the chicken tacos i made a couple weeks ago - before vacations and conferences and weddings got in the way - and i realized the only thing better than eating a homecooked meal every night, is eating one that's been cooked while you were at work. 

this time i tackled soup. french onion soup. one of my absolute favorite soups. i attempted a garlicky version  a year and a half ago but have yet to master the original. this time i decided to let the slow cooker do the work of cooking down the onions and added beef. yes, i know beef is not traditionally in french onion soup, but around these parts, i knew i needed to add some meat to the soup to get a certain someone to at least try it.