Wingin' It Roast

Monday night I set out a Boneless Chuck Roast to thaw.  I knew exactly what I was going to fix for dinner on Tuesday evening.  I Love You Chuck! Never-Fail Roast Beef Sandwiches that I found over at Tasty Kitchen on The Pioneer Woman's website.  I had it all planned.  Since the roast is slow cooked on the stove top I figured I'd throw it together during my lunch break and have FWB keep an eye on it since he was just hanging out at my house. 

I got home for lunch and started going over the recipe again.  I only get a half hour lunch break and I knew that wouldn't exactly be enough time, so I decided to forget about the recipe.

"Well, babe.  Screw this!  I'm wingin' it!", I said as I pulled my large crockpot from the cabinet.

Instead of looking at me like I was crazy and saying he'd probably eat out for dinner, he shrugged his shoulders and said, "That's usually when food turns out the best." 

Whew!  He is so laid back.  I love it! 

So, I put the roast in the crock pot, added these...

...and some sliced green and red peppers (even one from my garden!), set the crockpot on high, and headed back to work (after eating some leftover pizza of course). 

I don't know exactly how much of each ingredient I used cause I was just dashing and sprinkling, and pouring so here is a rough guesstimate:

•  2 pound boneless chuck roast
• 1 can beef broth 
• 1 beef bullion cube  
• 1/2 to 3/4 cup Worcestershire Sauce 
• 2-3 Tbsp minced onion (I covered much of the top of the roast).  
• Couple dashes of Liquid Smoke 
• 1/4 cup or so of Soy Sauce.  
• Maybe 1/2 Tablespoon of Garlic Salt.  
• 4-5 seeded and sliced peppers (I sliced up a green pepper from my garden and used some frozen pre-sliced peppers) 

The FWB text me around 4:00 to tell me the house smelled amazing!  When I got home after work I checked the roast and it was done.  It had cooked for 4 hours.  I shredded it and let FWB have a taste.  He thought it was fantastic, but he wanted to know what happened to all the peppers.  Once they cooked, they shrunk a bit so it didn't look like there were many.  I got the bag of frozen peppers back out and added maybe the equivalent of 1-2 peppers.  Looking back I think I would wait to add the peppers.  Add them about a half-hour to an hour before eating. 

I shucked some corn and started boiling them, meanwhile stirring the shredded roast and peppers every so often.  When it was time to eat I piled the roast and peppers on some big hamburger buns with a slice of cheese.  We used the broth concoction for dipping.  Picky eater Pacen even thought the sandwich was good!  FWB decided the roast tasted even better with more peppers.  He ate four sandwiches last night! I will definitely be making this recipe again! 

"When Mighty Roast Beef was the Englishman's Food
It ennobl'd our veins and enriched our Blood:
Our Soldiers were Brave and our Courtiers were Good:
Oh! The Roast Beef of Old England,
And Old English Roast Beef." ~ Richard Leveridge

Weekly Photo Challenge: High Angle

Last Thursday's photo challenge over at A Step in the Journey was to shoot from a high angle.  The weekend before, I had numerous chances to shoot from high angles.  You see, I drove to Copper Mountain, CO for the Warrior Dash and this year I decided to avoid the Denver traffic and take another route.  I had plenty of time to travel.  My race heat was to run at 11:00 am on Saturday and I had Friday off from work so I decided to spend all day driving.  I have always wanted to see Estes Park and drive through the Rocky Mountain National Park so that's what I did.  Amazing!  Beautiful!  Breathtaking!  If any of you have a chance to drive through the park, do so! 

I will write more about that road trip later, but for now here are a couple pictures I took in the park that I feel touch on the challenge for last week. 

 

 

 

I'm even above some clouds.  :)

Raining not too far in the distance.

"National parks are the best idea we ever had. Absolutely American, absolutely democratic, they reflect us at our best rather than our worst." ~ Wallace Stegner

Weekly Photo Challenge: Dinner

Last week's photo challenge over at A Step in the Journey was "dinner".  Pacen is gone for the Summer so my dinners really don't amount to much, unless I feel like eating leftovers for a week or longer.  Much of my dinners lately have included squash.  Yup, squash.  I planted a garden this year.  Nothing big...a couple tomato plants, a few green bell pepper plants, a few cucumber plants, some asparagus, and a couple squash plants.  Well, holy cow!!  The squash totally took over!  I have gotten a couple cucumbers and the peppers are coming in very nicely, but the squash has done amazing!  I love squash, but I might be sick of it here in the near future.  :)  Next year I think I'll build a couple more garden beds and plant way more things, especially salad veggies!  I think I'll also plant squash and zucchini along the north fence so it can take over as much as it wants.  :)

So, anyway, I have been experimenting with squash.  Last week I made a dinner and used a tried and true method.  I cut a squash in half length-wise, scooped out the seeds, and sprinkled it with cinnamon and brown sugar.  I then baked it until it was soft.  So good! 

Cinnamon/Brown Sugar Squash with Chicken Breast (Squash still looks a little green.  Maybe I should've left it on the vine longer.)

 Last night I decided to create something different.  I had seen some recipes for avocado sticks and zucchini sticks so I thought I'd try something similar with squash.  I cut the squash into sticks (kinda) and sprayed them with olive oil.  I then sprinkled them with Italian bread crumbs, a bit of cayenne pepper, and some dried basil.  I baked them for a while, until I figured they were done.  Mmmmm, they were so delicious! 

Chicken Nuggets and Breaded Seasoned Squash Sticks. 

"My garden is my favorite teacher. " ~ Betsy Canas Garmon

Weekly Photo Challenge: Bold Colors

What a week!  So, I'm a little behind in posting last week's photo challenge to A Step in the Journey, but I still have time!  Nothing like pushing it to almost the last minute!  I've been super busy the past 4-5 days.  Friday night I baked cakes for Quinn and Pacen.  I spent ALL DAY Saturday decorating their cakes and then I drove to Harrison to help Quinn celebrate her birthday, which actually wasn't until Sunday.  Sunday I spent the whole day with Pacen, his friends, and my family celebrating his birthday, which actually wasn't until Monday.  Monday I finally got a workout in for the first time since Friday evening and then I took Pacen and one of his friends to the Wyoming State Fair.  We didn't get home until 10:00 pm.  Ugh!  I'm exhausted!!  Fortunately though, the carnival, although pretty lame this year, was a great place to capture some pictures of bold colors!

Pacen and Teagan are in the car closest to me (the blond and brunette).

I have a couple more pictures of something with bold colors.  Pacen's cake.  The cake that took me, what seems like forever, to decorate.  The time and back ache and not being able to squeeze in a workout/run were worth it.  Pacen loved his cake! 

Pacen loves Phineas and Ferb (and so do I)! 

Let's not forget about Perry the Platypus!  (With this closer view you can see my mistakes...ignore them.)  :)

"The craving for colour is a natural necessity just as for water and fire. Colour is a raw material indispensable to life. At every era of his existence and his history, the human being has associated colour with his joys, his actions and his pleasures." ~Frenand Leger

Weekly Photo Challenge: What Makes You Smile?

This weeks photo challenge over at A Step in the Journey is "What Makes You Smile?".  This was a hard one for me because there are so many things that make me smile.  I'm talking thousands of things!  When I thought about what I would photograph for this topic I thought I would try to get a picture of Mad Morty Kidd, my Cockatiel.  He is a pretty funny bird.  He dances to pretty much one song and one song only.  "Get Up Offa That Thing" by James Brown.  :)  Well, Morty wouldn't cooperate with me so I went with the one thing that usually always manages to make me smile, Pacen. 

I know, I know.  Typical of a mother.  :)  I didn't take just any plain Jane photo of Pacen though.  I captured him in his "element".  At my Dad's cabin, playing in the pond.  He is my Steve Irwin.  He is fearless, especially in the water.  He sees a turtle or a frog and he dives in, under the moss and weeds, to grab it up.  Me, on the other hand, wouldn't jump into the moss for anything.  Okay, maybe to save Pacen, but that is it!  I need clean water.  Clear water.  I wasn't able to capture a picture of him "hunting", but I did get this:

 

He loves jumping off that thing!  I love trying to capture him in mid-air.  Sometime his expressions are hilarious!  

Go on over to A Step in the Journey and join the challenge.  Or just head on over and check out the awesome photos that people have been taking!

"A smile is a curve that sets everything straight." ~ Author Unknown