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Your Energy. Your Money. You’ll Devour These Delicious and Energy-Efficient Recipes

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Give your traditional oven a rest and lean on your microwave or slow cooker and save.

By substituting your microwave or slow cooker for your conventional oven, you use significantly less energy. Big on flavor, small on electricity consumption—these cooking options will win over taste buds and energy bills by using smaller appliances that use less electricity than a traditional oven. Pretty tasty, right?

Recipes Below

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Microwave Super-Fast Breakfast Burrito

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Yes, you could go to a high-end breakfast place, wait in line and do your best to charm the waitstaff—and you’d still not hit the culinary sweet spot that this surefire morning hit has. You save energy. You save time. And you only have to spend your charm on the family dog, who can be a surprisingly tough audience.

Ingredients

  • 2 slices of bacon
  • 1 egg
  • 1 tortilla
  • ¼ cup shredded cheese

Serves: 1

Serve with: Salsa or hot sauce

Instructions

  • STEP 1. Place bacon on a plate between a double layer of paper towels and microwave for 2 minutes or until it reaches desired crispiness. It will continue to crisp after cooking. Set aside.
  • STEP 2. Crack the egg into a 4-inch ramekin. Add milk and use a fork to scramble. Cover with a small plate and microwave for 90 seconds. Set aside.
  • STEP 3. Place tortilla on a plate, sprinkle cheese on top and microwave 10–15 seconds until cheese is melted.
  • STEP 4. Top the tortilla with cooked egg, bacon and salsa or hot sauce as desired.
  • Wrap and enjoy.

Recipe Credit: Cookin’ With Kilowatts

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Slow Cooker Crab Dip

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Crab? Good. Cream cheese? Good. More cheese? Also good.

When you start with ingredients like these, you can’t go wrong. So don’t let healthy items like onions get in the way of this killer dip that will get gobbled up without gobbling up your energy. And it’s a crab dish, so as a Marylander, you are morally obligated to try this crowd-pleasing dish.

Ingredients

  • 1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, softened
  • ½ cup finely chopped sweet onion
  • ¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese
  • ¼ cup mayonnaise
  • 2 garlic cloves, minced
  • 2 teaspoons sugar
  • 6 ounces crab meat, flaked and shell removed

Makes: 2 cups

Serve with: Assorted crackers, crab seasoning to taste

Instructions

  • STEP 1. Combine the cream cheese, sweet onion, Parmesan cheese, mayo, garlic and sugar in your slow cooker.
  • STEP 2. Stir in crabmeat.
  • STEP 3. Cover and cook for 2–3 hours.
  • STEP 4. Garnish with green onions and serve with crackers.

Recipe Credit: Taste of Home

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Slow Cooker Balsamic Pork Tenderloin Awesomeness

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If two of your favorite things are eating and doing nothing, then this may be the greatest recipe on the planet—which will also help save the planet via your energy-friendly slow cooker.

If done right, these fall-apart, crazy-tender tenderloins will make you slow cooker royalty.

Ingredients

  • 1 2‐ to 3-pound boneless pork tenderloin
  • 1 cup chicken stock or broth
  • ½ cup balsamic vinegar
  • 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
  • 1 tablespoon soy sauce or coconut aminos
  • 1 tablespoon honey
  • ½ teaspoon red pepper flakes
  • 2 cloves garlic, chopped

Servings: 8

Instructions

  • STEP 1. Place pork tenderloin into the insert of your slow cooker. In a 2-cup measuring cup, mix all remaining ingredients. Pour over pork and set the timer for your slow cooker (6–8 hours on low).
  • STEP 2. Once pork tenderloin has cooked, remove it from the slow cooker with tongs onto a serving dish. Break apart lightly with two forks and then ladle about 1/4–1/2 cup of gravy over pork tenderloin. Be warned—you may need a big, slotted spoon to transfer from pot to plate. It’s that tender—and that delicious. It serves eight adults or four teenage boys. Totally your call.

Recipe Credit: Add a Pinch

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Rice Cooker Chocolate Upside-Down Cake

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Traditionally, a rice cooker was meant for healthy, nutritious, decadence-free fare. Until now. It’s time to transform your rice cooker into a contraption that would make a pastry chef jealous. Just properly clean your rice cooker after this recipe or your rice may taste like chocolate. Wait. Maybe we have two recipes here.

Ingredients

  • 1½ cups all-purpose flour
  • ½ cup white sugar
  • 4 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • ½ teaspoon salt (optional)
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • ⅓ cup vegetable oil
  • ½ teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 tablespoon vinegar
  • ¾–1 cup water

Serves: 12

Serve with: Powdered sugar, berries or any other desired toppings.

Instructions

  • STEP 1. Add flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda, salt (optional) and cinnamon into a bowl. Mix all dry items with a whisk.
  • STEP 2. Add the wet ingredients to the bowl—oil, vanilla, vinegar and water. Mix again. Pour mixture into the rice cooker.
  • STEP 3. Cook in your rice cooker for 30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean to test the cake. Bring the bowl out of the rice cooker and cool for 5 minutes.
  • Flip the cake to top with berries, powdered sugar or other sweet garnish of your choosing.

Recipe Credit: Food.com