Crock Pot Red Beans, Andouille, and Rice or My Chaotic Life.

     Welcome back and thank you for checking out my blog. Today's dinner is Crock Pot Red Beans, Andouille, and Rice.



      Normally my week is anything but normal, it's full of chaos and last minute changes. Most of the time I have no discernible schedule or routine and my family and friends have no idea what I do. And then there's Thursday. For me Thursday is my one day each week when I have a sense of normalcy and a regular schedule. Over the last four months I have been using Thursday to train and develop a new audio/video crew. My day is broken into two sections, 12pm-5pm I prep and maintain the equipment and run training sessions with the crew and 7pm-10pm when I do live training where I sit back and supervise the crew as they run a live show. The problem I had at first was that I was having a hard time fitting cooking dinner and wife time into an hour and a half. I quickly worked out that the solution was to use my free time in the morning to set up and cook dinner in the crock pot. If you've read to this point you've probably deduced that Thursdays at my house is crock pot day.
     I feel that I need to make a clarification at this point, I am using the term "crock pot" because that is what I grew up with, another acceptable and interchangeable term is "slow cooker". I don't care to debate semantics, use which ever term you are most comfortable with and enjoy the food you make.

     Cooking in a crock pot is very easy and is handy for dinners or potlucks. 
Crock pots come in a variety of sizes and can be as simple as one-dial heating control or completely programmable The common features that all crock pots have are an outer heating element with heating control and handles, an inner removable ceramic "crock", and a glass lid. I have two crock pots, one that is large with time-programmable controls and one that is medium sized with every bell and whistle available. The large one was a wedding gift from my sister-in-law, Carol, and is great for making large amounts of food to serve several people but it's not very transportable and due to it's size smaller dinners (3-4 People) only fill the bottom 1-2 inches and end up overcooked. The Medium sized crock pot is big enough to serve 6-8 people, has easy grip handles and a locking lid, and can be programmed for time, temperature, time & temperature, or probe temperature. I'm not saying that you need the latest, greatest crock pot on the market, I am saying get your crock pot out and let's make something delicious.
     Today's dinner is Red Beans, Andouille, and Rice. If you are confused by the word Andouille (pronounced- an-du-ee) it is a spicy Cajun sausage that can be found in the meat department with the other sausages and hotdogs. I recommend that you try the Andouille, if you find that it's too spicy for you ask your butcher to recommend a less spicy chicken-based sausage. Another thing to concider is what rice should you use. Due to the amount of time required for crock pot cooking most recipes call for "converted" rice, many rices will become very mushy and almost disolve. I've found through trial & error that regardless of the type of rice (white, brown, long grain) the best brand to deliver reliable results is Uncle Ben's.
Also, rice has to reach a high enough temperature before it will cook, if you find that after eight hours your rice is still hard, increase the temperature.
     With all of that under our hats, let's look at today's recipe.


                        Red Beans, Andouille, and Rice


Prep time     20 min.     Cook time    240min.     Serves     8

Ingredients

1 clove garlic, minced

1 medium red onion, chopped

1 rib celery, chopped

1 medium green pepper, chopped

15 oz. canned kidney beans, dark-variety, rinsed and drained

14 1/2 oz. canned diced tomatoes, undrained

9 oz. andouille, cut into bite-sized pieces

1/4 tsp dried thyme

1/4 tsp black pepper

6 cups fat-free chicken broth

1 cup uncooked white rice, converted-variety recommended


Instructions

     Place garlic, onion, celery, bell pepper, beans, tomatoes with its juice and sausage in a 5-quart crock pot. Add thyme and pepper; stir well.

     Pour in broth and rice; stir again. Cover crock pot and set on high power; cook for 4 hours.

     Season to taste with salt and pepper. To turn up the heat, add 1/8 tsp cayenne pepper with the thyme.


     This recipe yields about 1 1/2 cups per serving.


     This is a very easy to make dinner that will fill your house with wonderful smells, if you haven't used a crock pot this is a great place to start. As always if you try this recipe, leave a comment and let me know how it turned out.

     Next week- Beef Crostini or Codename Get Together.