It's Easy Being Green.

Hi Ho!  Kermit the Frog here, and turns out, it's easy being green.

I've been on a breakfast smoothie kick for quite some time.  These smoothies are a great way to make sure we get a good heap of veggies daily.

When I'm whipping up these smoothies, I try and bust out a whole bunch of them at once.  If I'm gonna get the kitchen dirty, I might as well make it worth my while.

I purchased a few dozen Wide-Mouth Ball mason jars in both the pint and quart sizes from Fresh Preserving thanks to some sweet online coupons.  I also picked up some Ball Wide-Mouth Freezer Lids  at good ol' Amazon.

These jars are fantastic for freezing make ahead smoothies, soups, stews, veggie sides, just about anything.

I whipped up these 2 bad boys in my recent batch:

Pineapple Chard Smoothie

Raspberry Cinnamon Green Smoothie

I like to throw in some flaxseed and chia seeds for some extra nutritious flava'.  The best part about smoothie-making is that it's REALLLLY hard to mess them up.  Plus, it's a great way to use up some of the extra chard and collared greens from this summer's garden harvest.

Do your green thang, folks!

Crock Around the Block Tonight.

This ain't no cookin' blog, and I am definitely no Marth (Martha Stewart, that is).  But lately, due to late nights in the art room prepping student works for a few shows (this time of year is rough stuff for art teachers in my district), I have been rocking the crock.

This baby is the paint to my brush, the soup can to my Andy Warhol, the mustache to my Dali.

We purchased this 7 quart slow cooker from good ol' Costco.  The best part about this particular model is that once your meal finishes cooking, it automatically switches to "Keep Warm," so if I start the meal in the AM and don't get home in time to stop the cooking, the meal will not keep on cooking and burn, but instead stay warm, toasty, and ready to eat!

I spent 2 hours last weekend busting out some make ahead crock pot meals.  I made 5 large gallon bag meals and immediately froze them.  The meals are large enough so that the hubs and I get dinner and lunch out of them (sometimes even an additional meal).  I pull them out and defrost them the night before, then throw them in the slow cooker in the AM, and VOILA! Dinner is served.

Here are the meals I put together:

Chicken Teriyaki

Pepperoncini Chicken

Red Pepper Chicken

Chicken Curry

Mushroom Chicken with Rice

I like to write the cook time and any reminders about side dishes directly on the bag.  For example, if some of our frozen garden green beans would be a good addition to the meal, I make note of it, so brain-fried Miss French Fry remembers to cook those up too.


I stuck with the chicken family this go 'round and used a variety of organic chicken thighs, drumsticks, and breasts.  Next time, I'm going to dive into some other meats.  Thus far, I've tried the chicken teriyaki and the mushroom chicken, and they are GOOOOOD.

Crock 'n roll, folks.