Thursday, August 22, 2013

Quick Garden Sauce in the Slow Cooker

We joined an organic farm share this year so get tons of fresh vegetables delivered to us each week.

The quality is great and the fun of it is we never know what we'll get.  We have been getting a lot of beets, cucumbers and other veggies that have been great for juicing which my husband has been loving.  

This week we also received eggplant, green peppers, garlic and a bunch of tomatoes (plus I have tomatoes from our garden), so decided to toss everything into the crock and make a sauce.


So at 6:45 AM I was chopping up a storm!

The eggplants get their own special photo since I forgot to put them in the first picture!

I came home and the house smelled great.  I pureed everything until it was smooth and the kids LOVED it.

We don't often do pasta and sauce, but this was darn good!

My husband had some Tiger Woods golf thing so wasn't home for dinner.  I knew I wouldn't need to make a ton of sauce for just the kids and I, but wanted to get rid of the vegetables since we're leaving on vacation Saturday morning., so dumped everything in.

Get it Done Tip: Make big batches of sauce and freeze in individual Ziploc bags to use for quick weeknight meals - toss with pasta, pour over chicken cutlets and sprinkle with mozzarella, or toss with meat/chopped veggies and put on hearty bread for sandwiches.

The extra sauce I had I put in the freezer so I have a delicious and nutritious sauce the next time a recipe calls for it.





Garden Vegetable Sauce in the Slow Cooker

Ingredients
6 tomatoes chopped (I also threw in some cherry tomatoes from my garden)
2 garlic cloves minced
1 green pepper chopped
24 oz tomatoes (I used bionature strained tomatoes)
7 oz tomato paste (I used bionature brand)
1 eggplant peeled and diced
1/4 cup red wine
tablespoon sugar
sprinkle of dried oregano

Spray slow cooker with non-stick spray and mix all ingredients in crock.
Cook on low for 8-9 hours
Cool and puree until smooth
toss with pasta