Adventures in Cookery

My goodness, this is yummy!

So I went to the hardware store the other day, to get some picture hooks; exited with them and a new 1.5-quart slow cooker. Oh, right; like you can go to the hardware store for A and not walk out with B, if not C, D, and E? Then you're a stronger person than I am.

Now, I'm not into cooking; haven't been for years, ever since I discovered the amazing takeout at Ipswich Shellfish Company. But what's not to like about fill it and forget it cooking? So, what the heck.

My first attempt wasn't more then meh. Might have helped if I'd followed the recipe exactly rather than substituting X when I didn't have Y....

But today's effort? Oh, my. I plucked it from Phyllis Good's "Fix-It and Forget-It New Cookbook, 250 New Delicious Slow Cooker Recipes" -- one of several cookbooks I browsed through at the local library, and one of the few that didn't start most meat recipe instructions with "Take a large skillet...." Listen, folks, if I wanted to be messing about with skillets and browning and sauteing and shit I wouldn't be looking at a slow cooker to begin with, ya know?

Anyway. Today's effort I actually started last night with fixing the marinade and putting the chicken into the fridge overnight. Popped it into the Proctor-Silex this morning, turned it on, and....

Well. I didn't have chicken thighs on hand, just drumsticks, and I was using a 1.5-quart machine rather than the 4-quart one listed (but it all fit!), so I started it on high for an hour plus. I did take the lid off and rearrange the drumsticks a couple of times rather than leaving it alone. I sort of guessed at the remaining cooking time after I turned it to low, let it go a bit longer than the instructions. And I left out the parsley.

But! The aroma that filled the house was wonderful. When I took out the drumsticks the meat was falling off the bones tender. I stripped the bones and packed the meat away in the fridge to microwave with a side dish for supper later -- sampling as I worked, and OMG OMG OMG delicious!

The recipe's on page 22, "Simple Chicken Thighs," and calls for 2 pounds of thighs (I had 1.6 of the drumsticks), a marinade of olive oil, red wine vinegar, honey, soy sauce, minced garlic and ground pepper -- oh, and fresh parsley if you've got it. I ladled some of the marinade over the pulled-apart chicken meat and will probably discard the rest (unless it will freeze and be reusable?) but if I had some cornstarch lying around, the recipe says I could whisk some with water and stir it into the marinade to make gravy.

I've already found several other recipes I want to try in this. Imma gonna buy this book.

Fix-It and Forget-It New Cookbook