Slow Cooker Corned Beef is the easiest way to make a tender, flavorful corned beef — and it comes out perfect every single time. If you’ve never made it in the slow cooker before, this is going to be a game changer. I love making this every March for St. Patrick’s Day. You just set it in the morning and by dinnertime the house smells amazing and the meat is practically falling apart. No babysitting, no fussing — just a really good meal waiting for you at the end of the day. Try our Slow Cooker Corned Beef Brisket (Tender, …
This slow cooker corned beef comes out fall-apart tender with almost zero effort — and the vegetables cook right alongside it, so dinner is completely hands-off. It feeds a crowd, reheats beautifully, and the leftovers make the best sandwiches the next day. I make this every St. Patrick’s Day, and honestly it’s become one of those recipes my family asks for in February, well before the holiday even shows up. My husband grew up eating corned beef made on the stovetop — boiled for hours, which works but takes constant attention. The slow cooker version gives you the same deeply …
My friend Linda brought something like this to a potluck maybe three or four years ago — one of those neighborhood things where everybody’s supposed to bring a dish and half the people show up with a bag of chips and call it a day. Linda showed up with a slow cooker still plugged into an extension cord she’d run from her kitchen, which is exactly the kind of person Linda is, and she set the whole thing on the folding table and said, “It’s just pasta and cream and garlic, don’t overthink it.” I had two helpings. I asked …
The fall my youngest started kindergarten, I had this idea that I was going to be one of those mothers who baked on weekends. Real baking — pie crusts from scratch, the whole thing. That lasted about three Saturdays before I remembered I don’t actually enjoy making pie crusts and the kids didn’t care either way as long as dessert showed up. What I did keep doing was these apples. I’d seen some version of the recipe in a church cookbook — the kind with the spiral binding and a casserole on every other page — and I tweaked it …
My husband Gary is not a fancy-restaurant person. Never has been. Early in our marriage I’d get these ideas about Valentine’s Day — reservations somewhere with cloth napkins, the whole thing — and he’d go along with it the way he goes along with most things I suggest, which is to say quietly and without much enthusiasm. One year we waited forty-five minutes past our reservation time at some Italian place downtown and he ate his entire entrée in about eight minutes flat, which is how he eats when he’s anxious, and I spent the drive home genuinely wondering why …
My mother had this battered enamel pan — dark blue with white speckles, chipped along one edge — and every Sunday afternoon she’d pull chicken out of the oven, skin dark and glossy, the kitchen smelling like caramel and soy sauce and something warm I still can’t fully name. I’ve been chasing that dish ever since. What I’ve figured out is that a slow cooker gets you most of the way there. Bone-in thighs go in, a simple brown sugar glaze goes over the top, and a few hours later you’ve got something that made me stand at the counter …
There’s a dish I’ve been making for years — ground beef patties, a couple cans of mushroom soup, a gravy packet, and some water — that my family genuinely thinks I spent hours on. I don’t correct them. It all goes into the slow cooker in about ten minutes and comes out tasting like a Midwestern diner plate: rich brown gravy, fork-tender meat, the kind of thing you want to eat with mashed potatoes on a cold Tuesday when nobody has energy for anything. My neighbor Paulette gave me the idea, I think around 2009 or so. She showed up …
My brother Kenny has asked me to make these ribs at least a dozen times in the past two years. Maybe more. He texted me last Fourth of July — not “happy Fourth of July,” just “are you making the ribs.” That was the whole message. I made the ribs. They’re slow cooker country style ribs with barbecue sauce and brown sugar, and that’s genuinely it. Three ingredients, set it in the morning, and by dinnertime your whole house smells like a backyard cookout even though you haven’t done anything. Try our Dr Pepper Ribs next. Why You’ll Love It …
I discovered Mississippi pot roast about five years ago at a potluck, and like everyone else who’s tried it, I became completely obsessed with that combination of ranch seasoning, au jus, butter, and pepperoncini peppers. It’s one of those “weird but it works” flavor combos that shouldn’t be as good as it is. Last winter, I had some sirloin steak in the freezer that needed to be used, and I thought – why not try the Mississippi treatment on steak bites instead of a whole roast? Best decision ever. These Mississippi Steak Bites have all that tangy, buttery, slightly spicy …
I’m not gonna lie: there are days when dinner feels like the last straw. The laundry’s still in the dryer from two days ago, someone’s asking where their left shoe is (again), and I haven’t had an uninterrupted thought since 7:42 a.m. That’s when I make this.It’s not fancy. It doesn’t involve a garnish.But it always disappears. I call it “The Chicken That Saves Me.” Online, you’ll find it called crack chicken—which, I’ll admit, sounds a bit dramatic. But if you’ve ever watched your whole family devour a meal in total silence (the good kind), then ask for seconds, and …
