SPOONS wrote:

> What are some good summer crock pot recipes?

Well, this isn't particularly summery, but since it's hot here and I made
dinner in the crock pot yesterday, maybe it'll suffice.

I got a package of beef short ribs and put them in the crock pot. Added red
wine, dark soy sauce, molasses, and Chinese five-spice powder. I didn't
measure, but I'd estimate that I used a cup-and-a-half of the wine (which
was an Australian Shiraz), somewhere between a quarter-cup and a half-cup of
soy sauce, a couple tablespoons of molasses and somewhere between a teaspoon
and a tablespoon of five-spice. (I'd been under the impression that this
was the classic red-cooked recipe, but it isn't. I guess I invented this.)

Cooked on low for fourteen hours.

Served it with rice and had steamed sugar snap peas and baby corn on the
side. It was good; I had the leftovers for lunch today.

Reading over, I realized that this sounds a lot more planned and organized
than it actually was. Here's the sequence in more realistic form: I get out
of bed 90 minutes before I have to be at work. When I got up, I put that
stuff in the crockpot and stirred it briefly. I thought it sounded like a
good combination (and I mistakenly thought I was following a well-known
recipe). I started the crockpot, finished getting ready for work, and
sallied forth in service to my company and my country. My work shift is
twelve hours long, and it takes just over half an hour to get home. To
stretch it out further, I stopped at the grocery store on the way home to
buy SOMETHING to go along with the meat I was cooking. Sugar snap peas were
the first thing I saw, so I grabbed a couple of handfuls. I got home, turned
on the air conditioner, and took my steamer and crockpot out onto the patio.
Put some rice into the steamer (it's one of those two-level electric
jobbies; I love it), made some tea using the microwave oven, then cleaned
the peas and put them on the second level of the steamer. Greeted my
girlfriend as she arrived, and we spoke for about five minutes. I broke
away from our conversation briefly to add a can of baby corn to the steaming
peas. Put the meat into a serving bowl just in time for the rice and the
peas to get finished. Dished up the peas and corn, then dished up the rice,
by which time the tea had cooled to near-room temperature, which was good,
because I was serving it iced. By the way, the tea was quite a nice
complement to the meal; it was a Republic of Tea Cinnamon Plum "Tea of
Conviviality".

Bob