Have you ever had the feeling that someone or something is looking at you while you’re in the kitchen? Creepy eyes following you around as you do the dishes or while you’re cooking up something delicious? Well, you might want to check your potatoes because they may have grown eyes! Before they grow arms and drag themselves to plant themselves in your house plants’ soil, let’s cook em up.

I personally don’t like to eat potatoes that have sit so long that their bodies don’t even touch the counter anymore without drowning out that eyeball flavor in a nice soup or stew. I found this recipe for “Old fashioned vegetable beef stew” and decided to give it a whirl. I already had potatoes, mushrooms, and old-ass red wine (the 2-buck chuck variety). The rest of the ingredients, including all-natural Oregon Country Beef came out to $15 more.

Also, I think crock-pot recipes are great because you chop up some stuff and throw it in the crock-pot in the morning and by dinner time you’ve got enough food for a couple days. Perfect for lazy people! Unfortunately, I had 7 hungry guys come over to my house and they polished it off before I could tupperware any of it.

I also love making black beans with the crock-pot. I’ll probably post another recipe for awesome black beans soon. Fartalicious!

Verdict
Do it!

I really liked this recipe. The prep-time was pretty short. All the chopping took maybe 10 minutes. If you can remember to start the crock-pot early enough, you’ll have a ton of food for dinner with very little work. The cleanup is a breeze: wash your cutting board and knife and then the crock-pot when you’re done. This is also a great way to get rid of that old red wine that’s been sitting corked in your fridge or on your counter for a while.

I give it 4 toilet seats up. (Our rating system explained)

What do you get when you have a couple of Tupperware containers in the fridge with some roasted beet mix and corn-quinoa elbow macaroni?

OUR FIRST RECIPE!

We call it Macabeet Chickakale.
Preparation time: ~25 min
Difficulty: Medium

Here’s what we started with:

Leftovers:

• Roasted beet stuff (beets, tomatoes, spices)
• Corn-quinoa elbow pasta

Fresh ingredients:

• Kale
• Carrots (sliced)
• Green Onions (chopped into 1/4″ pieces, including the white part)
• Yellow onion (diced)
• Chicken breast

You can feel free to substitute any or all of the ingredients in this or any recipe on this site. While I know everyone should have roasted root veggie mix in their fridge, sometimes it’s not possible.

Preparation

1. Slice the carrots and the green onions and rip apart the kale into bite-sized chunks. Set aside.
2. Optional: If you’ve got a pretty thick piece of chicken, pound it flat first to speed cooking time. You can also cut it into chunks if you like. Doesn’t matter to me.
   Tip: lay the chicken between two pieces of saran wrap before you pound the crap out of it to save time on cleanup and to prevent the spread of nasties.
3. Get a saute pan going over medium heat and let it warm up. Get some butter or oil or both (I like to do half butter, half olive oil and medium-low heat so the butter don’t burn. Warning: this will increase your cooking time, but make it more delish.) going in the pan and add the chicken. Brown on both sides and then add the onion and some basil. Salt and pepper to taste.
4. Start another pan with high heat and add about a teaspoon of oil. Add the kale, green onions, and carrots and cook until the kale is just tender. (I like my veggies al dente, but you can cook them to whatever consistency you want.)
5. Back to the chicken pan, when the onions are translucent and the chicken is cooked through, add the beet mix (or whatever you substitute for it) and the macaroni and toss it up so that everything is well coated in that delicious onion/oil/butter stuff.
6. When the beet mix and macaroni is heated thoroughly, remove from heat and serve with the greens.

Verdict
Edible

To be honest, I probably wouldn’t make this again, but it was much more edible than some other things I’ve made in the past like Annie’s cheddar bunny pasta with cut up turkey dogs. This one’s at least got some nutrition and greens. Since it relies on some fresh ingredients which aren’t always available in a bachelor fridge, it may not be for everyone. The cleanup time also made it not worth it.

I give it 2 toilet seats up, mostly for the fresh greens. (Our rating system explained)