Crock Pot Lovin

So, have I mentioned I love my crock pot? Oh I do. I can't tell you how much sanity it saves me. 4:45 is a crazy time at my house. I've just picked up the last of my kiddoes from school, and everyone is all "Mom! Mommy! Mom, I need help with my homework! Mom, Jake is pulling the cats tail! Mom, where's my Thor hammer?! Mom, someone peed on the seat and didn't clean it up. MOOOOMMM, I still need help with homework. Mom, I'm hungry. Moooooooooommmmyyy, what's for dinner?" And I'm all "Honey, I'll be right there after I make Jake stop pulling the cat's tail, clean up this nasty toilet, and find a Thor hammer. And CRAP, I forgot to thaw the chicken." 

Ah, the crock pot. Now dinner is one less thing yelling for my attention at 4:45. But the thing with crock pot recipes is that so many of the traditional recipes or crock pot cook books have a lot of icky cream of something soup in them or contain lots of artificial ingredients. Or, a lot of recipes I've found require you to cook ingredients BEFORE throwing them in the crock pot. Excuse me? You want me to dirty extra dishes? No thank you. That just takes the whole joy of the crock pot thing and throws it out the window. And, besides, if you know me, I'm too ADD to follow a recipe anyway. (Turns out, crock pots were created for people with ADD. Its a fact, you can check me on that.) So, in my mind, a good crock pot recipe contains only natural, simple ingredients, can be thrown into the pot with minimal preparation, and has a total hands on time of less than 10 minutes.

So, for my first week of blogging, I'm hoping to share one good ADD approved crock pot recipe per day. Here's hoping you enjoy them. My family has given each of them two thumbs up. Eventually, when I get my blogging game on, I'll actually post pictures as well. But for now:

Crazy good beef tacos

2 pounds of beef stew meat (or whatever cut of beef is on sale in your store)

2 limes

2 onions

1 green pepper

2 tablespoons cumin

3 tablespoons chili powder

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

2 to 3 cloves crushed garlic (or garlic powder if you don't want to dirty any extra utensils)

1 tablespoon kosher salt

1 can diced tomatoes with jalapenos (or simply throw in a half cup of salsa)

Line the bottom of your crock pot with sliced onion and green pepper. Toss in the beef. Squeeze the limes over the beef and toss in the limes just for some extra flavor. Sprinkle remaining ingredients over the top. Cook on low for 6-8 hours or high for 3 to 5. Serve with warm corn tortillas or taco shells. I like to serve this with black beans (from my smaller crock pot) and hominy. You can use this recipe in taco salads, nachos, or serve alone over brown rice. So yummy and so easy. The only work you've got to put into it is slicing the onion and green pepper. This one has 5 minutes of hands on time....tops!