Slow Cooker Meat and Tomato Sauce

I’m pretty obsessed with my Crock Pot right now. I love to come home to the smell of a slow-cooked meal and to not have to cook dinner when I come home. It’s win-win. It’s pretty amazing how everything I make in there turns out delicious. I don’t even have to cook meat in it, vegetable stews work great, too. I always tell myself I will use it more often, then go through a slow cooker phase, and then put it away and leave it there for a couple of months. I hope this phase lasts longer!

I’ve been making a lot of stews to eat over rice lately, and I was in a pasta mood, so I decided to cook up a tomato sauce to serve on top of spaghetti, though it would be equally delicious with rice.

Flanken is the perfect meat  for a slow cooker (duh, chulent!), but this would be great with regular short ribs and maybe even chopped meat.

…8 hours later:

Slow Cooker Tomato and Meat Sauce
Serves 4

Ingredients:

  • 1 pound flanken
  • 1/2 large onion, diced
  • 3 gloves garlic, minced
  • 2 carrots, diced
  • 2 celery stalks, diced
  • 2 14-oz. cans chopped tomatoes
  • 3 stems fresh oregano
  • 1 lb pasta
  • salt, pepper and olive oil

Directions:

  1. Generously salt and pepper the meat. Heat a little bit of olive oil in a pan and brown the meat (in batches if necessary). Remove to slow cooker.
  2. Throw the rest of the ingredients (except for the pasta!) into the slow cooker and set to low for 8 hours.
  3. Discard the bones (the meat should slide right off).
  4. Trim the fat off the top. Take out the meat, shred, and add back into the pot.
  5. Cook a box of pasta according to instructions.
  6. Put the sauce into a large bowl. Put the pasta in the bowl, mix and serve!

Tell us, what’s your favorite crock pot recipe? Inspire us to keep ours on the counter!