LESSONS LEARNED

Here's a few things I've learned in cooking for one month with the SLOW COOKER.

**  Arranging your meal plan in the morning and getting the work out of the way, makes for a wonderful and peaceful afternoon, just enough time to watch Oprah !!
**  It's tough to do a slow cooker meal everyday, the leftovers were at times overwhelming.  I wasn't always serving all 5 in my family so we had a good amount of leftovers.
**  My slow cooker cooks fast, I need to keep that in mind in the future.
**  Not having to clean an entire meals dishes in the evening is a God send........I was able to keep my kitchen much cleaner throughout the week.
**  The recipes other people give you almost always turn out to be GREAT.  Never turn down a suggested recipe.  Cooking out of a cookbook is such a hit or miss.  Believe me, I had 21 of them.
**  Coming in the house at 4pm and knowing dinner is almost done, is heavenly.  
**  It's fairly easy to shop for the ingredients for these recipes.  Most are either pantry items or meat that is fine in the freezer till the night before you need to use it.
**  Slow Cooking, simply put, makes a busy life MUCH less hectic and it can significantly reduce the amount of times you feel "forced" to eat out since nothing is planned nor shopped for.
**  This was FUN, fun enough where I am going to continue to slow cooker and I'll post my favorites on this blog.   Thanks for everyones encouragment, recipe sharing and enthusiasm.

I DID IT  !!  Julie & Julia would be proud, I think..........