Do I have to write about my failures? I made a commitment, so I guess so. Well, tonight I thought I'd repeat my recipe for zuppa toscana (day 1--wow!). The recipe is great, the soup is great, but tonight's dinner was not great.
I started that "Day 1" post by saying that I have a "love/hate" relationship with my crockpot. Today there was emphasis on the "hate." I would like a new one. Here are my requirements: timer (or time setting), and lock for the cover (easy to transport), and LARGE (family size). Gifts can be delivered to my home address. ;)
Anyway, I usually only use my crockpot on days that I'm home, which I feel defeats the purpose. In my mind, it's supposed to provide a meal for those "crazy" nights when there is no time to cook. When I'm home all day, I have time to cook. But when I'm at work, I'm out of my house for 9+ hours, which is just too long for a lot of slow-cooker recipes. This soup cooks on "high" for 3-4 hours and "low" for 5-6 hours. I've always thought the "low" setting on my crockpot was pretty hot. So I didn't feel comfortable cooking it on "low" for so long. I've come home to boiling dishes with burnt bottoms before while set on low. So today, in a leap of faith, I kept the setting on "warm" all day. And guess what, it didn't cook! There are potatoes in this soup, and even though I diced them pretty small, they still didn't cook. We have to eat early on Thursdays so we can get to lifegroup, but it wasn't ready in time, even though I turned it up to high when I got home. So, Abby had a sandwich, Noah had sweet potatoes, corn, and green beans, and I had cereal. Fail.
To add insult to injury, the recipe calls for heavy cream, which I had none. How did I overlook that? Note to anyone trying this recipe: 1% milk doesn't cut it! The soup was kind of ready to be eaten for my "babysitters" (brother-in-law Eric and sister-in-law Christy) but it was too spicy for them--maybe because there was no heavy cream to help cancel some of the spice? We like spicy things in this house, but I also want my food to be "user-friendly" if you know what I mean.
Oh well. For now I'll stick to using my crockpot on days I'm home. (While I wait for a special delivery, of course!) ;)
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