Crockpot Applesauce Recipe

Hi!

A while ago I found a recipe on Pinterest for Easy Crockpot Applesauce (posted on the Frugal Girls website) and I finally tried it!  It's such an easy recipe, our apartment smelled wonderful while it was cooking, and there's almost no sugar in it, which is good!!  I eat too much sugar :)

Here's their recipe:

Ingredients:
Six medium apples (I used Gala apples, and they were pretty huge)
1/2 cup water
1 tsp - 1 tbsp cinnamon (I used 1/2 tbsp)
1 tsp sugar (this can be adjusted based upon the sweetness of the apples you use)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
Crockpot

Directions:
Peel and core apples
Chop up into chunky pieces
Place apples in crockpot
In a separate bowl, combine water, cinnamon, sugar, and vanilla
Pour mixture over apples in crockpot, and stir around, so apples are evenly coated
Cover crockpot, and cook on low for four hours or until soft 
Once apples are soft, remove from crockpot and mash with hand masher
This will make a chunky style applesauce
For creamier applesauce, mix with hand mixer (that's what I did!)

Makes about six servings









We had the apples in the crockpot on low for about four hours and then turned it to warm for about two more hours (I had improv rehearsal in the middle of the cooking!).  Then I put them into a bowl and used our Cuisinart Hand Blender to make it super smooth!





It is so yummy!!  It's tastes almost like there's cream or something in it (probably because of the vanilla, and because I blended it a lot)!  I would say the six apples made about six servings, so cost wise it's more than buying a six-pack of applesauce from the grocery store, but it's much more fun (and healthy, I'm sure), so I definitely want to keep making it!

The recipe says that it keeps well in the refrigerator for four or five days, and it freezes well for up to several months!

Especially now that it's getting warmer, this is a yummy cold snack to have during the day!  I think it would be fun to try adding other fruit to it sometime, like strawberries!

Thanks for reading!

Chicken and Salsa Crockpot Recipe

Hi!

We've had some boneless skinless chicken breasts in the freezer so I looked for a recipe on Pinterest today so we could use them!  I found this recipe and somewhat followed it.  Here's my version:

Ingredients:
3 frozen boneless skinless chicken breasts
1 can of corn, drained
1 can of black beans, drained
7/8 of a 8oz block of cream cheese cut into pieces
Most of 1 jar of salsa, we used hot
Shredded cheese of your choice

Directions:
1) Place all ingredients except the shredded cheese into crockpot and cook on high for 4 1/2 hours.
2) Where there are about 30 minutes of cook time left, shred the chicken using two forks and add shredded cheese to melt on top of everything.
3) Enjoy!

It turned out sooo good!  We loved it!  Plus we had a ton of leftovers for the next few days.  

We just got to Skype with my brother and his girlfriend.  She is so nice!  We'll get to meet her for real when we go to our aunt's wedding next month!

Thanks for reading!

Yummy Banana Bread

Hey!
Alex and I love banana bread and since we had a couple of bananas that were getting pretty ripe, I looked for a good recipe to try.  I found this one on Pinterest.

I pretty much followed the recipe exactly.

Ingredients:
2 eggs beaten
1/3 cup milk
1 tsp lemon juice
1/2 cup oil
1 1/4 cup mashed ripe bananas (I used 3 medium)
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cup sugar
1 3/4 cup flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2/3 cup chopped walnuts

Directions
1) Preheat oven to 340 degrees.
2) Spray bottom and sides of loaf pan with Pam.
3) In a large mixing bowl, beat eggs.
4) Combine milk and lemon juice together in a separate bowl and let sit for two minutes.
5) Add oil to eggs and beat again.  Add milk and vanilla and beat again.
6) Mash bananas and add to eggs, oil, and milk.
7) In a separate bowl, combine sugar, flour, baking soda, and salt very well.  Slowly stir in wet ingredients.
8) Fold in walnuts.
9) Pour into prepared loaf pan and bake for 1 hour and 20 minutes or until an inserted knife comes out clean.



Your house will smell wonderful!!  I let it cool partially before taking it out of the pan and wrapping it in foil.  This kept the moisture in and it was good until we finished it - about a week later.

Thanks for reading!

Blueberry Yogurt Pops

Hi!

It's been fun unpacking and putting everything away in our new apt!  We've found a lot of things that we'd forgotten about.  I found popsicle molds the other day and decided to look for some recipes!

I found this one on Pinterest and they turned out delish!  I don't know if I used the same amounts as this recipe, but I just eyeballed the three ingredients (that's it - just 3!), used our Magic Bullet blender, and poured it into our 4-popsicle mold.  

Vanilla Greek Yogurt
Frozen Blueberries
Honey



They are very yogurty and yummy!  Alex loves them, too!  I just made my second batch.  I'm going to try them with different fruit when I use up the blueberries!

Thanks for reading!