Well work is in full swing and I'm back to 12 hours days, which makes dinner so hard to pull off on a regular basis. The weekend was a bit of a wash as we ate out on Saturday and Sunday. Saturday we did date night and had a tasty dinner at Queen Margherita Pizza, the best pizza in this part of town by far, and Sunday we went to the bar to watch my poor Patriots get outcoached and outplayed by the Jets. It was not a happy night for me, but luckily I got to stuff my face with some Rickard's White and yummy nachos. Nachos make everything better in my book.
Here's how the last few days have gone:
Day 9 - Jan 15 - Dinner out at Queen Margherita Pizza
Day 10 - Jan 16 - Football at The Fill Station - my poor Patriots!
Day 11 - Jan 17 - Meatless Monday: Pumpkin Mascarpone Ravioli
Day 12 - Jan 18 - Slow Cooker Spicy Apricot Chicken (recipe below)
The week started off smoothly since I'm generally good at planning ahead for Meatless Monday's. I think it's because I'm still not totally comfortable pulling off totally meatless meals, but I'm getting there. Making the ravioli the day before and freezing them was key. Paired with a salad of mixed greens, blueberries and pomegranate balsamic vinaigrette, dinner was done in less than 20 minutes. If you like making pasta or want to try, while the ravioli are a bit labor intensive, knowing you have a bag of frozen ravioli's in you freezer as a quick and wholesome go to is pretty awesome!
If you follow me on Twitter, you'll know I had a little freakout Monday afternoon looking for slow cooker recipes that would utilize ingredients I already had on hand. Thinking ahead I knew that I'd need something easy and I also knew that I'd need a recipe to post today. The slow cooker is my go to about once a week when I'm working because you get that slaved over a hot stove all day feel with very little effort. Plus if I get stuck at work late I know the Boy will have dinner that's not McDonald's or takeout pizza. While I got some great suggestions from @rachelcurrier (an awesome link to BHG slow cooker recipes) and @ericmanczuck I actually came up with this one on my own. I remembered that I had made a slew of apricot jalapeno jam over the summer and in googling apricot chicken found quite a few recipes. Many utilized apricot jam, french dressing and onion soup mix. I'll try just about anything but that sounds absolutely vile to me and completely overprocessed. Considering I went to great pains to use local apricots, organic lemon juice, organic cane sugar and jalapenos from my own backyard for the jam it just didn't seem right to pair it with those things. So yesterday morning I threw a bunch of ingredients into the slow cooker and crossed my fingers!
Slow Cooker Spicy Apricot Chicken
5 bone-in chicken thighs
2 medium onions - sliced
3/4 cup apricot jalapeno jam - if using plain apricot jam, I'd put in 1/2 a fresh jalapeno or a bit more pepper flake
1 clove garlic - minced
2 Tbsps ponzu
1 Tbsp packed brown sugar
1/2 tsp jalapeno flake - can substitute red pepper flake
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/4 tsp salt
cracked black pepper
1. Layer sliced onions on the bottom of the slow cooker. Place chicken thighs on top. Mix the rest of the ingredients in a bowl and pour over chicken. Cook on low for 6 hours.
2. Spoon sauce and onions over rice and top with chicken and fresh cilantro.
This worked out quite nicely, the chicken itself wasn't too spicy but the sauce had some good heat that really complemented the sweet. It wasn't my favorite, but the Boy enjoyed it and I'd venture a guess that it was much better than the french dressing/onion soup business I had seen on other sites.
5 bone-in chicken thighs
2 medium onions - sliced
3/4 cup apricot jalapeno jam - if using plain apricot jam, I'd put in 1/2 a fresh jalapeno or a bit more pepper flake
1 clove garlic - minced
2 Tbsps ponzu
1 Tbsp packed brown sugar
1/2 tsp jalapeno flake - can substitute red pepper flake
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/4 tsp salt
cracked black pepper
1. Layer sliced onions on the bottom of the slow cooker. Place chicken thighs on top. Mix the rest of the ingredients in a bowl and pour over chicken. Cook on low for 6 hours.
2. Spoon sauce and onions over rice and top with chicken and fresh cilantro.
This worked out quite nicely, the chicken itself wasn't too spicy but the sauce had some good heat that really complemented the sweet. It wasn't my favorite, but the Boy enjoyed it and I'd venture a guess that it was much better than the french dressing/onion soup business I had seen on other sites.
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