EIGHT Years???

I cannot believe I started (and abandoned) this blog EIGHT years ago.  Wow has life changed since then! We are living in a brand new world (oh yeah, and there is that pesky pandemic to deal with.)

My husband and I are now officially empty nesters.  We unfortunately lost our oldest son Justin last year.  Our middle son Matt graduated from college and we are gaining a daughter, Emily, on December 5th.  Our youngest, Reed, is living on his own and attending USC (the REAL one, in South Carolina.)  We lost our fur baby Baxter but now have a new one, Jaxon.  He is a 10-month old beagle and it's like having a toddler in the house!

It took me awhile to get used to cooking for two.  If you ask my husband he'll say I still haven't gotten used to it!  Cooking is my passion and my therapy.  Give me a glass of wine and let me loose in the kitchen and I'm a happy girl.

I've decided to start this blog back up.  I am on my 1,000 quest to get healthy, so a lot of my recipes will be on the healthy side.  If you know me at all you know I can't abandon my pasta or sweets completely, so there will be some "good" stuff too!

If you stumble back across this blog, please leave me a comment.  Just say hi, let me know what's going on in your life, tell me to kick rocks, whatever!  Stay tuned....

Sunday Fall Roast Dinner

I returned to my blog to find this post still in draft status.  It's from 2012!  This roaster has been replaced by my new favorite appliance, the Instant Pot.  I still wanted to post for nostalgia's sake.


My favorite cooking appliance to use during the cooler months is my roaster/slow cooker.  It was a Christmas present from my mother-in-law years ago.  As you can see by the picture below, it gets plenty of use!  I use it to cook so many things:  roasts, soups, chili, stews, etc....



One of my favorite Sunday meals is a roast and veggies cooked in my roaster.  Such an easy meal to prepare, just a little prep work, throw everything in the roaster and you have a hearty meal that looks like you slaved for hours.

This past Sunday I made a pork loin with veggies.  I don't really have a recipe for this.  I browned the loin on both sides and put it in the roaster.  I preheat the roaster first on 375 degrees and then set it on 300 degrees.  I added water to cover the bottom third of the pork loin and then added worchestershire sauce, garlic salt and black pepper.  I also added a diced onion and some sliced carrots.  After a hour of cooking, I added sliced baby bella mushrooms.  You can add potatoes, celery, tomatoes or any other kind of veggies that you like.  My 4 pound roast took about 2 hours to cook, then I just set the roaster on low until ready to serve.  I served it with some corn muffins.  It was a great meal for a cool fall evening!