slow cooker dips – Ali Does It Herself

For our annual potluck, the Pie and I decided to make three hot dips and have them with crackers and vegetables for people to snack on while they waited for the rest of ~~the food~~ our guests to arrive. As with all slow cooker meals, the prep pictures look prettier than the final shots, so you’ll just have to take my word for it that they’re well worth eating — so worth eating, I’m giving each dip its own post this week. Today we’re making SPINACH AND ARTICHOKE DIP WITH BACON. This dip, adapted from a Better Homes & Gardens recipe, is easy and fantastically tasty, and we halved it to fit in our 1/4qt slow cooker.

First, cook up a couple slices of bacon. Drain those on paper towels and crumble them when they’re cool.

Dice up about 1/2 a sweet onion and a few green onions, and chuck them in the bacon skillet with a little bit of the bacon fat and sauté until the onions are soft and translucent.

Chuck those in your 1.4qt slow cooker when they’re ready to go.

Roughly chop up the contents of a 14oz can of artichoke hearts and huck those in, as well as about half a drained 10oz box frozen spinach.

Chop up a sweet bell pepper finely and chuck that in.

Crumble up about 2oz blue cheese and pitch that in too, as well as 4oz package plain cream cheese (that’s half a block package).

Add in as well as much minced garlic as you like, and 1/2 teaspoon dry mustard and give the whole thing a good stir before covering and cooking, stirring occasionally, for about 2-3 hours, until everything is all melty and lovely.

Stir in your crumbled bacon and you’re good to go.

It’s the one on the right. Stay tuned for the middle dip on Friday!

As a thank you for babysitting Ruby one weekend, Cait gave me these three wee 1.4 qt crock pots as a wee present.

Apparently Ruby is more evil than she looks.

For our annual potluck, the Pie and I decided to make three hot dips and have them with crackers and vegetables for people to snack on while they waited for the rest of ~~the food~~ our guests to arrive. As with all slow cooker meals, the prep pictures look prettier than the final shots, so you’ll just have to take my word for it that they’re well worth eating — so worth eating, I’m giving each dip its own post this week. Today we’re making BACON CHEESEBURGER DIP. This recipe is adapted from Betty Crocker.

Start with 8 slices of your favourite bacon.

Cook those up nice and crispy, then drain them on a paper towel. When they’re cool enough, crumble them up with your fingers. Save a few tablespoons for garnish later on.

Then, with your pan still hot (and redolent of bacon), chuck in 1/2lb lean ground beef and cook that stuff up until it’s no longer pink. Drain that sucker.