Crockpots and Crackpots

 My 4am, sleepless mind is thinking about crockpots.

I thrift most things because not only do I find interesting things this way, but I don't necessarily need something brand new. This may be hard to believe for some of you, but I have downsized to the amount of crockpots I have. I had two six quart, an avocado & brown one that was my Mom's, one of those buffet ones with three crocks, and a small one quart that I used to melt chocolate. I was down to two six quarts when I moved north. Last week I wanted to put cocktail sausages in the crockpot with some BBQ sauce and I felt so weird putting one package in a six quart. So I donated a six quart and got a four quart at $2 Tuesday last week.

Other interesting crockpot tidbits:

The Farm (Kathy, Dan, Kim & Regina) used to host an annual Christmas party. My sister had a habit of keeping the box something came in. I was over the house after the party but right before Christmas and I saw the box on the table. My twenty something, grad school self thought it would be funny if I changed the "o" in çrock to an "a" to see if she noticed. I was just finishing up the last "a" when Regina came in and asked what I was doing because it was for her mother for Christmas. Mind you, my brother watched me do this and said nothing. I don't think Mrs. Murphy ever noticed it, though.

I would often make something in the crockpot on Sundays to eat off of for the rest of the week.

When it's too hot to cook in the summer, I use the crockpot. It doesn't heat my kitchen like an oven.

I often made sausage & peppers for my Dad, in the crockpot. My brother does this now, except he uses frozen peppers and onions, overestimating how much can fit in the pot. This was also during the 1.5 years he didn't have a working oven and was trying to use other kitchen appliances in its place. I also very recently found out he had taken the yellow and brown crockpot from the 70's that my sister had. He tried to make bean soup in it, but it never cooked all the way through.

In the early days of Marilyn's dementia, she brought her brown and avocado crockpot over to my house one day. She usually just showed up, and this was one of those occasions. I had just gotten out of the shower and she was sitting at my dining room table, and startled me (this was also a common occurrence.) She told me she had thought I had left it at her house. I had never even seen my Mom use a crockpot growing up and my brother hasn't either after I recently asked him, so I have no idea where she dug it up. I just thanked her and off she went on her merry way. It had a habit of burning things, so it slowly made its way to the garbage can. During a more lucid moment, she asked if I had fixed the crockpot she brought over. That's when she told me it burned things and she thought if I used crockpots, I must know how to fix them, too! So Dan got the one that didn't completely cook things, and I had the one that burned everything...

I won my first crockpot at the annual basket raffle in Staten Island.

My crockpot board on Pinterest is one of the most utilized. If you've made it this far through the post, your reward is a link to one of my favorite recipes for chicken & gravy. It's super easy and 100% comfort food! I have eaten it with mashed potatoes and over rice, but you could also serve it over noodles or anything that makes you happy! More recently, I can't be bothered to peel, cook and mash the potatoes, so I buy the premade ones in the microwavable container. This recipe makes enough chicken & gray for two individual containers.

After the chicken cooks, I shred, and put it back in the gravy.

Then I mix the chicken back with the gravy.

Chicken & gravy served over mashed potatoes. Yum!