Crock Pot Review

Recently I’ve been posting quite a few slow cooker recipes, so I thought I would share with you which slow cooker I use to make these yummy meals in! Whether it’s chicken soup, pork loin, chili, or quinoa dressing for Thanksgiving, the slow cooker is an essential kitchen tool! It’s a great way to make easy, healthy, delicious meals the whole family will love!  Once I finish my ebook guide to nontoxic living, I’ll be releasing another one with slow cooker recipes.  Can’t wait to share it with you!

When I rented my first apartment, my mom gave me a small 1 quart Crock Pot. It was an old one with an ugly print, but it worked and I was a broke college student, so I didn’t complain. It was perfect for me as a single woman and even a few years into married life. When we got to the point where we needed to do meal prep for an entire week, though, the small slow cooker wasn’t working.

At different functions I attended, I kept seeing these large slow cookers where the bowl was removable from the base. That was one of the bigger selling points for me aside from the size. It was always so awkward to try to wash the old-style cooker where it was all one piece and I was trying to avoid getting the controls/wiring wet. This was pretty difficult with a 1 quart pot, so imagine how much more difficult that would be with a 6 quart pot! While there are several brands of slow cookers to choose from, I chose to buy the Crock Pot brand since that’s what I had before. I think the one I had was the 1970s version and was still working in 2012 when it was time to upgrade. For that reason I felt that I could trust the Crock Pot brand and decided to stick with it. Late 2012 was the time when I reached my breaking point with hypothyroidism and decided to change my eating habits. The problem was that my husband and I both were commuting two hours a day. My husband was doing pretty much all the household chores because I was pretty exhausted most of the time. We really needed something that we could use to make easy, healthy meals for the week. It became a Sunday ritual for us (him) to make a healthy Crock Pot meal and we that’s what we ate for the majority of the week. It really was a life saver for us.

We purchased the 6 quart version so that we could make large meals for the week, for pot lucks and/or family gatherings. It’s all black and the design is sleek and modern. The base is metal, the bowl is ceramic, and the lid is made of glass with metal trim around the edges and a plastic handle. There are also handles on the side of the cooker which make it easy to carry even when the cooker is hot. There are rubberized feet on the bottom of the cooker that help keep it in a sturdy position while it’s sitting on a flat surface. The definitely thought of everything with this product! It’s really been a life saver when it comes to meal prep. I’m so happy that we decided to get this cooker.

If you have a need for quick, easy, tasty meals (who doesn’t?), you need a slow cooker! The Crock Pot brand is the original and in my experience a trustworthy brand and the price is very reasonable for such a useful product. You can get one here: http://astore.amazon.com/mycrnoli-20 .

Hopefully you found this review to be helpful.  Thanks for reading!  Wishing you a Happy Healthy Thanksgiving!!

Homemade Cod Salad

When I first made this, I was fresh off of a visit with my Naturopath, who suggested that I eat fish at least three times per week.  She said pretty much any white fish or salmon would be the best ones to eat.  Other items she wanted me to eat more of included probiotics (from things like fermented foods) and dark leafy greens.  So, I’ve been eating a lot of sauerkraut (a fermented food), purchased from our local health food store, which has all the probiotics intact.  Most commercial brands have been pasteurized to kill off bacteria, including the beneficial ones.  On top of that, they smell like vinegar, which I cannot stand!

The beets give the salad a pink-ish tint, which can be off-putting for some people, but I actually like it.  Beets are not my favorite vegetable, but they are so good for you that I had to find a way to incorporate them, and pickled is it for me.  To me, beets taste kind of like dirt – not very appetizing.  However, pickled beets don’t have that “dirt” taste, nor do the ones I bought have the vinegar smell that I dislike.

In an effort to keep from getting bored, I wanted to change up the fish & a few of the ingredients each time I made it.  Lately I’ve had salmon salad with avocado quite a bit, so it was time to switch to another fish.  Cod was next on the list.  I was able to find some wild-caught cod so that’s what I changed to.  I like to eat clean, so whenever I make something, the ingredients are organic and as close to their natural state as possible.  I also understand that eating organic is more expensive, so if you’re on a budget, know the dirty dozen and the clean fifteen.  Animal products should be the #1 priority to purchase organic.  After that, the dirty dozen should be organic whenever possible, and the clean fifteen are safe to buy non-organic.  If you can’t purchase organic, please keep in mind that fresh food is better than processed food with a bunch of added chemicals any day.

Ingredients:

• 1 Wild caught cod fillet
• 1 large Kale leaf
• 1/8 cup Red Onion
• 1/4 cup Sauerkraut (make sure probiotics are intact or it defeats the purpose!)
• 2 Pickled baby beets (personally I don’t like the typical stuff in the grocery store that smells like vinegar, so I bought Othentic brand, which doesn’t have that vinegary odor)
• 1 tbsp Organic mustard
• 1 tbsp Organic mayo

Instructions:

• Cook the cod (wrap in foil with olive oil, salt & pepper, 300 degrees 30 – 45 minutes from frozen or 15 – 20 minutes from thawed)
• Chop all the veggies into very small pieces
• Chop the fish after it cools
• Stir in mustard & mayo
• Season with salt & pepper to taste
• Serve on gluten free bread, crackers, or my favorite:  Lundberg Quinoa & Red Rice Cakes

One thing I really love about this is that the fish can be cooked while you’re doing something else.  You can start it in the morning, take it out of the oven and cool it in the fridge so it will be ready for lunch.  What we typically do is make this part of our meal prep for the week.  You can cook the fish and wait until the next day to make the salad.  Once you put the salad together, it will keep for up to 4 days.  It makes eating healthy pretty easy.  Put in the work on one day and you’ve got 3 – 4 meals, depending on the serving size you use.

Hope you enjoy this recipe.  Thanks for reading!!