I LOVE my slow cooker

As all busy working mommies know, the key to getting dinner on the table after a long day at work is planning ahead. I am no different than the average mommy, I'm exhausted at the end of the day, and is often tempted to open a can of soup and call it dinner. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, but from time to time, I don't mind putting in some extra prep time, if the outcome is a delicious dinner that is oh so rewarding!  And this recipe is exactly that, it requires a little bit of prep time the night before, but the finished product is well worth the time!

Hubby and I are both meat lovers and I'm always looking for different cut of meat to experience with! And beef short ribs is definitely my new love, I have been seeing tons of food network shows featuring this cut and have been seeing it on tons of restaurant menus as well. The key to making this recipe is the slow cooker, it's a true time saver and I try to use it at least one a week!

This recipe is actually a mishmash of a few short ribs recipes, I've made some tweaking over the years, hope you will enjoy it: 

Slow cooker Beef Short Ribs
3 tbsp olive oil
2 package of beef short ribs
1/4 cup flour
1 chopped onion
3 chopped carrot
1 package of white button mushroom
2 1/2 cup beef broth
2 garlic cloves
1 bottle of strained tomatoes sauce
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 tsp thyme
1 bay leave
3/4 cup red wine

The recipe is pretty simple, all I did the night before was tie each piece of beef ribs with kitchen string (this is to prevent the beef ribs from falling apart because I intended to serve it with the bone. But this step is optional)

 Beef short ribs from my favorite Foody Mart!

Optional step











Cover each piece of beef rib with a flour, salt and pepper mixture, and brown each piece in pan, once browned, they can be placed in the slow cooker. 

The next step is to put the carrots, onions and garlic in the food processor, pour the chopped mixture along with the tomato sauce, mushrooms, tomato paste, beef broth, thyme and bay leave back in the pan to get heated through.  Pour the heated mixture on top of the beef ribs in the slow cooker. And viola! All done! Turn it on low for 8 hrs. I usually do this the night before, so we can wake up to the aroma of beef in the morning! hahah...no actually, the reason I do it the night before is because the ribs release a lot of fat, I separate the ribs (which is fall off the bone tender after a night of cooking) and the sauce, put both containers in the fridge and scoop out all the harden fat before serving.

Ta-da! This is a very easy weeknight meal, and very satisfying.  All I had to do when I got home was to heat everything up and make a quick mash potatoes to go with it.  Another way to serve this is shred the meat and serve it over pasta with the sauce.  The sauce is really really good, very flavorful.

For another night, I used the leftover meat for a yummy beef rib grilled cheese! This was inspired by the pot roast grilled cheese at Turtle Jack restaurant. It was the perfect Friday night dinner, quick and simple, for those Friday nights where I don't feel like cooking but was also too tired to go out for dinner!

So with the $10 I spent on the ingredients, and an extra 30 min prep time, I ended up with dinner for 2 on Tuesday night, packed lunch for 2 the next day, and dinner for 3 (My son loved the grilled cheese sandwich too!) another night! Not too shabby!!!! =)