My first ever crockpot banana bread
When we first moved to Busan, Patrick and I bought lots of little appliances and things for the apartment. But, by far the best purchase we made was our crockpot. On average, I’d say we use the crockpot two or maybe three times a week. How I survived this much of my life without one, I don’t know. When I first started using a crockpot, I figured it would be great for making stews, which I did at home with my mom’s. But since buying this crockpot I haven’t made a single stew. I have made plenty of other yummy food though.
Some of the great things we’ve made:
- Huge pots of spaghetti sauce
- Sweet and Sour Pork (This one was awesome.) Here’s the recipe we used:
http://busycooks.about.com/od/porkentreerecipes/r/sweetsrcppork.htm
- Curry
- Sour Cream Salsa Chicken
And most recently BANANA BREAD! I really wasn’t sure if this would work but it did and I’m super excited since I have no regular oven. Next week Zucchini bread.
This is the banana bread recipe I used:
http://baking.about.com/od/crockpotbaking/r/bananabread.htm
My favorite crockpot item though, has to be yogurt. Making yogurt in the crockpot is so easy, and it’s delicious. Plus it’s way cheaper than buying yogurt, it’s not full of sugar, and it cuts down on plastic wasted. Here’s how to do it:
Crockpot Yogurt
Ingredients: 1 carton of milk and 1/2 cup of plain, live-culture yogurt
Step 1: Dump a carton of milk (I usually make 2 or 3 liters at a time) into the crockpot and cook it on LOW for about 2 hours. Make sure it’s on low – you don’t want to boil the milk.
Step 2: After about 2 hours unplug the crockpot and let the milk sit for 2-3 hours. While the milk is cooling take 1/4 to 1/2 a cup of plain, live culture yogurt out of the fridge and let it sit on the counter and warm up to room temperature.
Step 3: Check the temperature of the milk after 2-3 hours (depending on how cold your apartment is). You want the milk to reach the point where you can stick the tip of your pinkie finger in and keep it there for 15 seconds without it hurting.
Step 4: Now that the milk has cooled scoop out a cup or two, and mix it with the room temperature yogurt.
Step 5: Pour the milk and yogurt mixture back into the rest of the milk and whisk it, so it’s well-mixed.
Step 6: Wrap the whole crockpot in a couple of heavy towels or a blanket and let it sit for 6-8 hours. (I usually do all this after work and then let it sit while I sleep.
Step 7: When you wake up in the morning you will have nice thick yogurt. Whisk it all well, put it into containers and into the fridge. After a few hours your yogurt will be cold and ready to eat. I like mine over granola and frozen blueberries.
