Crockpot Potato Soup

This soup is so easy and delicious. The first thing my husband said after having it the first time was to definitely put this on the rotation! Although it IS a crockpot recipe, its one of the faster crockpot recipes out there. Which can be good for those days where you forget first thing in the morning to get the crockpot going!

Ingredients: 

1.5 bags frozen hashbrowns
32 oz chicken broth 
1 can cream of chicken soup
8oz light cream cheese
1 cup diced carrots
1 onion
2-3 cloves garlic, minced
1 cup frozen peas
1 cup milk

Directions:

Dice your onion & carrots.

In a steamer add your carrots and onion until softened. You can also saute them in a little olive oil if you do not have a steamer.

Once softened add carrots, onion, garlic, chicken broth and frozen hashbrowns into the crockpot and cook on HIGH for 1 hour.

After one hour, stir, and turn your crockpot to LOW and cook for 1 hour.

Cube your cream cheese so it melts a little easier, remove lid and add to crockpot. Add your frozen peas and cook for 30-40 minutes on low.

Add your cup of milk and let cook for an additional 15 minutes and your done!

Easy Crockpot Lasagna

So remember my last post about how I mentioned that since becoming a mom, cooking lately has needed to be something quick and fairly easy? Well, my crockpot has been getting a lot of love from me lately because it does just that. Its easy and is automatically done at dinner time. Earlier in the day is when Lincoln is content playing with something for a few minutes and its an easy opportunity for me to throw together a crockpot dinner. This recipe is one of my favorites! 

Ingredients:
*1 lb ground beef (You could use ground turkey or veggie meat substitute to make this vegetarian)
*Lasagna noodles
*28oz of marinara (or your favorite jar spaghetti sauce)
*1 small onion, diced
*1 container low fat cottage cheese
*12 oz light mozzarella cheese
*Parmesan cheese & dried parsley for topping
*salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

Brown ground beef with the diced onion. Drain the fat. 

Spoon 1 cup of your marinara in the bottom of your crockpot.

Mix the remaining sauce with the beef. 

Place your lasagna noodles over the sauce in the crockpot. Doesn't have to be fancy. Mine sure wasn't ;)  

Spread about 1/3 of the meat mixture over the noodles. 

Put about 3/4 cup cottage cheese evenly over the meat mixture.

Top with around 1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese (you guys should know by now I don't measure, these are all close estimates ha!)

Do another layer of noodles, meat mixture, cottage cheese, shredded cheese

Repeat once more and end with your shredded cheese on top. 

Sprinkle on some Parmesan and some dried parsley and cook on LOW for 3.5-4 hours. 

Serve and your done!

I made mine with some lazy garlic bread (basically just french rolls with butter, granulated garlic, parm & parsley broiled in the oven!) :) Enjoy!

Lentil, Sausage and Spinach Soup

Lentil, Sausage and Spinach Soup

This was the first time making this recipe, and it was SO good I had to make a blog post about it even though I forgot to take pictures of each step. However, its basically just throwing it in the crockpot so its pretty easy!! 

Ingredients:

• 1 onion, diced
• 2-3 carrots, diced 
• 2-3 celery stalks, chopped
• 1 T olive oil
• 3-4 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 tsp fresh thyme (or dried if that's all you have)
• 1/2-1 tsp cayenne (this is definitely to taste, add a little and add more in the end if you want more kick)
• 4 links precooked chicken sausage, I used garlic herb chicken sausage from Trader Joes
• 1 can diced tomatoes, with liquid 
• 7 cups chicken stock
• 3/4 cup lentils 
• 1 package of Trader Joes 10 oz brown rice, found in the freezer section, cooked in the microwave (or make your own brown rice)
• 2-4 (per taste) cups fresh spinach
• 2.5 T Balsamic vinegar 
• Salt and Pepper to taste. Its a large batch so it will definitely take a little bit. You can add more at the end if need be. 

Dice your carrots, celery, and onion. Heat olive oil in a pan and saute until softened. Around 5 minutes. Add minced garlic, fresh thyme, salt and pepper. Cook an additional few minutes. Add to crockpot.

Slice your sausage, add to crockpot. 

Add the stock, canned tomatoes, lentils, a little more salt and pepper and cook in the crockpot on high for 3 hours. 

Add the rice and spinach, cook for 1 more hour. 

Stir in balsamic vinegar and cook an additional 15 minutes. 

Serve!

This soup is SO good, AND healthy! Perfect for a cold evening. Enjoy!