rikibeth

Tonight's big adventure was going with

eternaleponine while she got her hair cut. She's got a half-hour commute each way now, and she was good and tired of driving when she got home. So she bribed me with dinner. Since there's a Panera right next to the Supercuts, this seemed well and good to me.

While I was waiting through her haircut, I looked at the magazines, although I'd brought a book. They had Family Circle and Good Housekeeping. Both, unsurprisingly, featured "Slow Cooker Recipes" on their covers. I decided to have a look.

Now, bear in mind, although you might not think I'm the type to read the service magazines, I'm actually very familiar with them. My mother had subscriptions to those AND Woman's Day from the time I was very small, and I think still does. She also subscribed to Better Homes & Gardens for a time, but dropped that one by the time I was about ten.

And even then, I had the habit of reading ANY print that came close enough to grab. So I read the service magazines faithfully.

I didn't much read them after I left home. Yes, that's sort of backwards. But they do tend to repeat themselves.

So when I saw "slow cooker recipes" on the front, I said "Bet none of them are vegetarian." Because I remembered the tremendously middle-American style of recipe the magazines used to print.

Family Circle was, in fact, all meat-based. Including very old-school sauerbraten with gingersnaps in it that could have come out of the I Hate To Cook Book, but also ropa vieja (Cuban brisket), which I found sort of impressive.

Good Housekeeping surprised me, though! I didn't see all the recipes, because SOMEONE had torn out some of the pages, but in addition to a vegetarian-looking crockpot lasagna (that nobody but me would have eaten, because of the spinach), there was also at least one other: African Peanut Stew. With sweet potatoes, and chickpeas, and green beans.

These are all things

melovechocolate EATS. Willingly.

Because I am not rude enough to tear pages out of public magazines, I copied the recipe down on the little notepad I keep in my purse. And we stopped at Wild Oats to pick up the ingredients I didn't have on hand. (I also got Quorn "naked cutlets" and some "No-Chicken Broth" to see if I can do Not-Chicken Piccata, because I love chicken piccata,

eternaleponine liked it when I made it recently, and

melovechocolate ate it with reasonable good grace before she went vegetarian, as long as I didn't pepper her cutlets, and having things we can eat besides Bean Burritos, Spaghetti and Meatless Balls, Veggie Stir Fry, and Homemade Pizza is always good.)

It's in the crockpot now.

We'll see if it's a hit.