My Recipe Box - Slow Cooker General Tso's Chicken

March 2019 - Toronto ON

I was craving Chinese food but we don't have any good take-out delivery and I prefer making my own.But was also lazy when I came across this recipe. It worked out really well!  Note that this is six servings so adjust if necessary. My changes are in red.

Slow Cooker General Tso’s Chicken
Author: Christine of Must Love Home
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Cook Time: 3 hours
Total Time: 3 hours 5 minutes
Yield: 6 servings

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Ingredients
3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (1.5 – 2.0 pounds total), cut into bite-size chunks I used boneless skinless chicken thighs
1/4 cup cornstarch
1/2 tsp black pepper
2 TBSP vegetable oil didn't use
1/2 cup hoisin sauce
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar
1 TBSP minced garlic
1 tsp fresh minced ginger
1 tsp sriracha
pinch red pepper flakes
sliced green onion for garnish (optional)

Instructions
Place cornstarch, black pepper and chicken chunks into a plastic bag. Shake until chicken is evenly coated with cornstarch.
In a large skillet, heat vegetable oil of medium-high heat. Add the chicken to the skillet and cook until chicken is browned on all sides, about 5 minutes. Chicken will not be cooked thru. I said I was feeling lazy and skipped this part and put the cut up chicken into the slow cooked and tossed in the corn starch.
Remove the chicken from the skillet to the slow cooker.
In a small bowl, combine the hoisin sauce, soy sauce, honey, rice wine vinegar, garlic, ginger, pinch of red pepper flakes and sriracha. Stir until well blended. Pour over the chicken in the slow cooker.
Stir the chicken until coated with the sauce. Turn the slow cooker to high and cover.
Cook for 3-4 hours until the chicken is cooked thru and the sauce is thick.
Serve over rice.

Notes

Start checking the slow cooker at 2 hours. Depending on the size and power of your slow cooker, this dish may be done in less time. I added chicken stock as required.

My Recipe Box - Slow Cooker Mongolian Beef

I have seen hundreds of recipes for slow cooker Mongolian beef online that are pretty much all the same. Some claim this is as good as P.F. Chang's, I have made P.F. Chang's and this IS better.

I made this for the first time. John pronounced as a keeper so here it is. I found it a little salty due to the amount of soy.

Red are my additions.

Ingredients
4 SERVINGS

1 ½ pounds Flank Steak, sliced
¼ cups Cornstarch
2 tablespoons Olive Oil
½ teaspoons mince Garlic, Cloves
¾ cups Soy Sauce I used gluten free soy
¾ cups Water
¾ cups Brown Sugar
½ cups grated Carrot
⅓ cups slice Green Onion (Scallion)

Green peppers
Snow peas

Onions

Sriracha sauce (hot chili sauce)
Chinese 5 spice
Ginger

Directions


Coat flank steak pieces in cornstarch. Add remainder of ingredients to crockpot and stir well to combine. Place flank steak into the crockpot and cook on high for 2-3 hours or on low for 4-5 hours.

Serve over rice.

My Recipe Box - Slow Cooker Tomato Sauce

It's tomato season and I had so many, so I scouted out slow cooker recipes for tomato sauce and cobbled together this one.

Slow-Cooker Tomato Sauce

6 pounds of tomatoes, roughly chopped
2 medium onions, roughly chopped
6 cloves garlic
1 – 8oz jar of organic tomato paste
1 and 1/2 tablespoons organic dried Italian seasoning
1/2 tablespoon dried basil
1 teaspoon dried tarragon
1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
Some honey to sweeten
1/2 cup white wine or water
salt & pepper to taste

Dried chili flakes to taste


 In a slow-cooker, combine all ingredients and mix until everything is well-distributed  Turn the slow-cooker on low and allow to cook for 8 to 12 hours, mixing occasionally.

Some recipes placed the tomatoes in hot water to remove the skins.

Others stated that  removing the seeds from the tomatoes will prevent the sauce from turning bitter.

Many added brown sugar or white or honey to sweeten.

My Recipe Box - Slow Cooker Spare Ribs

Photo taken April 2013 - Memphis TN
UPDATED DECEMBER 2021

I had some ribs in the freezer (forever) and wanted to use them up without going to any effort of grilling etc.

I scoured some recipe sites and found a slow cooker recipe and thought, perfect! No work!!!
I played around with several recipes and added some of my own ideas and came up with this.



INGREDIENTS:

4 pounds pork baby back ribs
salt and pepper to taste
2 cups ketchup or use a homemade mix
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
Sriracha hot chili sauce - however much works for you
4 tablespoons vinegar
4 tablespoons of Dijon mustard
2 tablespoons of honey
2 teaspoons oregano
2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
OPTIONAL
I added celery, carrot, garlic and onion to sauce that I discard before serving

Chicken or beef stock can be used if the sauce is too thick

DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). My slow cooker has a browning feature so I use that! Perfect as it doesn't dirty an extra dish.
2. Season ribs with salt and pepper. Place in a shallow baking pan. 

Add chopped celery, carrot, garlic and onion to slow cooker.

Brown in oven/slow cooker 15 minutes. Turn over, and brown another 15 minutes; drain fat.
3. In a medium bowl In the slow cooker, mix together the ketchup, chili sauce, brown sugar, vinegar, mustard, honey, oregano, Worcestershire sauce. Place ribs in slow cooker. Cover  ribs with sauce, and turn to coat.

4. Cover, and cook on Low 6 to 8 hours, or until ribs are tender.

Recipes To Try

Crockpot chocolate lava cake

Maple glazed ham steaks

Chinese orange barbecue cashew chicken

Buffalo balls as seen on the Rachael Ray show made by Guy Fieris

New Recipes To Try

Photo taken at St. Lawrence Market

Some more interesting recipes I found this week while blog hopping.

Crockpot Recipes
Apple crisp in the slow-cooker
Crockpot boeuf bourguignon

Other
Buckwheat blini with caramelized shallots witled arugula and creme-fraiche
Moo shu pancakes with pork  a favourite of mine when ordering Chinese food.
Buttermilk biscuits would be great with soup.

Recipes to Try - Chicken

New additions at the top.
Asian Orange Chicken

Juiciest-most-flavorful-roast-chicken


Curry chicken


Ultimate-Chicken-Fingers 


Sweet and Sour Chicken

Chinese Roasted Chicken
Tandoori chicken

Graham cracker crusted chicken bites


Sweet chili chicken

Pepper patch pasta with grilled chicken

General Tso chicken

Slow cooker ginger orange chicken Do read Katy's comments about the recipe as well.

Forbidden City Chicken

1 chicken, 17 meals

Quick and-easy chicken- and sausage jambalaya
Sweet and Sour Chicken

smokey-paprika chicken with sour cream biscuit dumplings

Roast chicken with turnips
UPDATE made this on Jan 17 for Sunday dinner and it was very good. Turnips turned out nice and sweet. Would do it again. Will post pictures separately

Curried honey dijon roasted chicken

Roast Sticky Chicken Rotisserie- Style

Recipes To Try

Chocolate cream cheese bars from 33 Shades of Green. I just happen to have everything I need in the house so these may get made shortly!
Smores cupcakes OMG to die for!!
Lemon blueberry yogurt cake
How good is this?? Crockpot carrot cake!

Koftas - I've been trying to find my recipe.
Beef dip sandwiches
Pork meatball banh mi another winner from Brenda over at her Canadian Kitchen.
Hawaiian pork chops

I was watching daytime TV (now that I'm home!!) and came across Rocco touting his new cookbook. I became intrigued when he said most of his recipes are really low in calories.
Flash Fried Finger Lickin Chicken

Recipes to Try

Orange ginger flank steak

From More than Burnt Toast lamb kofta appetizer with tzatziki.

Crockpot scalloped potatoes and ham

Spinach squares

Cracker barrel chocolate pecan pie anyone who knows me knows I am a HUGE Cracker Barrel fan.
If you like Olive Garden recipes then  The Copykat is for you.

Recipes to Try

French toast casserole sounds much easier than the usual messy way of making it.

Fat free crockpot apple cake what could be easier and no fat!

Hello dolly bars lightened up

Lemon ginger carrot soup

And in honour of St.Patrick's Day this week here are some great recipes:

Irish coleslaw from The Daily spud site - Irish of course!
Potato cups
Roasted cabbage looks yummy!
Crockpot corned beef

Crockpot Pork Barbecue

Another tried and true favourite. I'm not sure where I got this from but there are many versions online.

1 pork roast

1 1/2 cups cola

1 (8 ounce) bottle barbecue sauce (your favorite)

Directions:

Prep Time: 10 mins

Total Time: 1/2 day

1 Cut all visible fat from roast, put in crock and cook 12 hrs (You could set this to cook all night) on low.

2 Note: I pour a soda over the roast to give it a little extra flavor.

3 Remove meat from crock and drain all juice from crock.

4 Shred meat and return to crock add 1 bottle barbecue sauce and cola and cook 5-6 hrs more.

5 MAKES A LOT!

6 Freezes great.

You could also do this in the oven.
Season the meat with salt & pepper at least 24 hours before the pork has to be cooked. Put the marinated pork in a roasting pan and place it on a rack in a preheated oven at 250 degree F.Add the cola and barbecue  sauce to the pork. Ensure the meat is placed with the fat side up. Bake for at least 8-9 hours

Recipes to Try - Beef

New items will be added to the top of the post.

Greek Beef Stew made in a crockpot

Autumn Veal Stew

Salisbury-steaks-in-french-onion-sauce
Mini meat loaves

Korean Beef Rice Bowl

Mahogany Beef Stew with Red Wine and Hoisin Sauce found the link for this over at Katy's blog.


hoisin cashew beef in lettuce wraps

beef stew booster

Mongolian Beef

Bulgogi traditional korean bbq beef

Recipes to Try - Slow Cooker

New items will be added to the top of the post.

sweet-smell-of-pork-in-the-morning-slow-cooking-overnight