Crock Pot cooking.....might as well... to cold to do anything else....

I know it's a super long title...but says exactly how I feel today. -9* below(without the winds) and just plain icky! Hubby just took off for the store....asked me to come along...ya..right. I'm like a bear, hibernating till warmer weather heads our way. THOUGH..I did receive 5 new seed catalogs in the mail this week!! That is always a good sign to me....lets me day dream of those fabulous, bug free, weed free gardens I'm going to have this year. Those Martha Stewart gardens....you know the ones...huge, perfect rows....no bugs..and not a weed to be seen. I just feel sorry for the gardener that has to do all that. Her doing it?? Spare me!!

Anyhoo.....Crock pot cooking it is today. In the last blog I told you I was cooking a wonderful roast. It came out so yummy, and with half of it leftover,I decided to today make BBQ Beef! Sound good?? So I'm sharing with you both my recipe for the roast and my BBQ recipe. Something yummy to warm away those cold evenings!

PJ's Roast
1- nice sized roast (4-6) lbs
1- small onion finely chopped
1- bag of carrots peeled and quartered
6-7- large potatoes peeled and quatered
1 tsp- salt
1/4 tsp- pepper
1/2 tsp- garlic powder
4- chicken bullion cubes
1/8 tsp- cajun seasoning
1/4 tsp- celery seed
1/2 tsp- dried ground mustard
1/2 tsp- ground nutmeg
1/8 tsp- ground cinnamon
enough water to just cover the roast

Place your roast in your pan or Crockpot. (I use a pan that has a lid if your cooking it in the oven)
Sprinkle all of your seasonings on your roast, and place the bullion cubes on both sides in the bottom of the pan/Crockpot. Pour enough water to just barely cover the top of the roast.
Add your carrots & potatoes and cover.

Depending on the size of your roast:
cook till beef is tender, should fall apart with a fork. At any time, add more water if needed.

Crockpot-cooking time for a 5-6lb roast: high 5-6 hours/low 7-8 hours
Oven - cooking time for a 5-6lb roast: cook at 350* for 7-8 hours


Pj's BBQ
1- large onion finely chopped
1-1/2 cups- catsup
1/2 cup- water
1 tsp- liquid smoke(at any grocery store by the seasonings)
2 tsp- celery seed
3 T- brown sugar
3 T- Worcestershire sauce
3 T- dry ground mustard
1 T- vinegar
1 T- lemon juice
1/3 cup- butter
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper

combine all ingredients in a crockpot and cook on low for 4 hours. Add your cooked shredded beef(4-5lbs) and cook on high for 1-2 hours.

If your using less meat, take out and save some of the BBQ sauce in a covered container for up to 2 weeks in the refrigerator. Use the remaining as you would store bought BBQ sauce. Only this is better!

I hope you enjoy both recipes. Please let me know how they turned out for you. I've now added the ability for you to post your comments to my blogs, so share! Love to hear from you.

Now..onto life adventures.
The snowmobile saga continues......(deep sigh)
After the heater idea was kiboshed by myself.....I thought the whole machine deal was over till Spring thaw. I was wrong.

Hubby and son dragged out the water hose from the basement, and hooked it back up to the facet outside. Hubby's idea......to stretch out the hose(and it WAS a stretch) to the machine, and let the water melt the ice off the track.
Now, here is where I have to get on my knees and hail hubby because for the first time EVER, a stupid idea actually worked!! Yes, the water did melt the track, and the machine was lose from it's hold to the ground. Next came the part where they hooked the machine to my SUV and dragged it to the basement door...rather quickly before the water froze again. Did I mention that they got my SUV stuck....and had to dig it out of the 5 foot high snow pile..and then AGAIN remelt the frozen ice which was deeper now because of the flood they caused with the hose!

After releasing the machine, and carefully dragging it with my SUV...I'm having heart pains even as I write this.....manage to drag it to the basement door. They unleash it, turn it so it's heading DOWN the basement stairs, and son jumps on for the ride of his life!

WE HAVE LIFTOFF!!

The house shakes as the machine rubbles down the set of 12 steps to the basement....son holding on for dear life...me praying to God..and hubby laughing hysterically! The bug eyes on my son says it all as he finally comes to rest balancing between the last step and the basement floor.

NOTE the silence that hung in the air for a very long time....then suddenly son jumps off..and yells...DAD, that was a blast! Can I do it again!?!

Lord help me.

So now the snow machine is down in the basement being repaired. I shall update you on 'HOW IN THE WORLD ARE THEY GETTING IT OUT OF THE BASEMENT'!!

AAhhh...just checked out temp.....it's NOW -4* below. We're having a heatwave....


I'm off to check on the BBQ sauce and toss on an extra pair of socks.

Hugs to all!