You’ll never guess this Slow Cooker Pumpkin Spinach Mac & Cheese contains pumpkin. It’s all sorts of creamy, cheesey goodness, and the best part is you just dump it all into your slow cooker and walk away!
I’m pretty sad that Crocktober is coming to an end. I’ve really enjoyed putting together meal plans for you each week. Our budget is also pretty happy with all the cooking in and stocking the freezer with leftovers. Hubby loves that he doesn’t have to ask what’s for dinner each night or help me cook something – it’s already done for us when we get home! In case you’re just tuning in, this month is Crocktober in the Powers household. We’ve been cooking 4 meals a week in our slow cooker and this is the final week. If you’ve enjoyed these meal plans I’d love it if you left me a comment and let me know what you’ve tried and what you’ve liked.
In honor of Halloween on Friday, this week of Crocktober is all about pumpkin! I’ve created a slow cooker pumpkin spinach mac & cheese that you’ll never guess contains pumpkin. It’s all sorts of creamy, cheese goodness, and I can’t believe I didn’t have to make it on the stove then bake in in the oven. (It even got rave reviews by a Wisconsin friend who is a self-proclaimed connoisseur of macaroni and cheese. He doubted me and gave me lots of trouble when he saw me put it together, and then ate his words as he had 3 servings.) I also found you 3 other unique savory pumpkin slow cooker recipes that I’m completely in love with. I can’t wait for you to try them!
I have done 3 things for you here:
- You don’t have to do any work besides dumping ingredients into a slow cooker to get mac and cheese
- It’s got pumpkin! Hello Fall!
- There are 2 different vegetables in here that everyone will be happy to gobble down!
Enjoy!
Slow Cooker Pumpkin Spinach Macaroni and Cheese
- Prep Time: 10
- Cook Time: 180
- Total Time: 190
Description
Who says mac and cheese has to be bad for you? You’ll never guess this mac and cheese contains pumpkin. It’s all sorts of creamy, cheesey goodness, and the best part is you just dump it all into your slow cooker and walk away!
Ingredients
- 2.5 cups milk
- 16 oz dry macaroni or small pasta
- 1.5 cups shredded parmesan and romano cheese
- 1.5 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese
- 1 (15oz) can pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie filling)
- 1 can evaporated milk
- 4 oz cream cheese, cubed
- 1/2 shallot, chopped and browned in butter until translucent
- 1/2 Tablespoon rubbed sage
- 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon pepper
- 2 teaspoons dry mustard powder
- 2 handfuls baby spinach leaves
To Top
- 6 slices of cooked bacon, chopped (optional)
Instructions
- Brown the diced shallot in a bit of butter in a pan on the stove until it’s softened.
- Line your slow cooker with a plastic liner and spray the liner generously with cooking spray. (Trust me, you don’t want to skip this step.)
- Add milk, uncooked macaroni, parmesan, cheddar, pumpkin, evaporated milk, cream cheese, shallot, spinach, and spices to the lined crock-pot.
- Cook on low for 2.5-3.5 hours, gently stirring occasionally. Cook times will vary, so stop cooking when pasta is al dente.
- Top with chopped bacon.
Notes
- Do not allow it to cook any longer, even on warm. It will turn into a mushy, burned mess. (Not that I tried this *cough cough*)
- The pumpkin flavor isn’t really prominent, but if you want more pumpkin taste, just add another half can of puree.
- Meat Lovers: Add in some cooked rotisserie chicken or cooked sausage
- Gluten-Free: Use Gluten-free pasta
- Vegetarian: Leave out the bacon on top.
- Vegan: You can try your favorite substitutes if you really want to, but I bet you could find a better vegan mac and cheese recipe. 🙂
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 8
Coming Soon!
Coming soon: Since my 1 year blogiversary was a few weeks ago, I’ve been working on a special re-design of my logo and my site. It’s going to be live tomorrow (Tuesday) morning and I can not WAIT to share the new logo my friend Jess created for me!!! To celebrate, I’m also bringing you a special recipe for Pumpkin Spice Kettle Corn. (Edit: It’s here!) Yep, I took the most popular recipe on my site and kicked it up a notch into something that you’re going to shovel into your face by the handful share politely with all your friends who will be begging you for the recipe. Be sure to come back tomorrow and check it out!
Crocktober 2014 Week 5
This is the fifth and final week of Crocktober for 2014. Recipes this week revolve around pumpkin: Slow Cooker Pumpkin Spinach Mac & Cheese, Pumpkin Maple Pulled Pork, Pumpkin Lentil Stew, and Spicy Pumpkin Chicken Corn Chowder.
In case you missed them, here’s Crocktober week 1, week 2, week 3, and week 4.
Note: I’m only featuring 4 recipes per week because we have a leftover night once a week, and we tend to make plans with friends on the weekends. If you have a large, hungry family or want to use your slow cooker every single day, feel free to double these recipes or add to these weekly meal plans.
I’ve listed each recipe’s ingredients directly below it and here is the
Crocktober 2014 Week 5 Shopping List
Click the photos to get the recipes.
Recipe 1: Slow Cooker Pumpkin Maple Pulled Pork by Cheeky Kitchen (Serves 8, Gluten-free if using GF Worcestershire)
Recipe 2: Slow Cooker Spicy Pumpkin Chicken Corn Chowder by Boulder Locavore (Serves 6-8, Gluten-free if using GF flour)
Recipe 3: Pumpkin Lentil Stew by LaaLoosh (Serves 6. Vegetarian, Gluten-free if using GF broth, Vegan if using soy or coconut yogurt)
Recipe 4: Slow Cooker Pumpkin Mac & Cheese (Serves 6-8, Vegetarian, Gluten-free if using GF pasta)
This post is linked up with Menu Plan Monday over at Org Junkie.com
Your pumpkin mac & cheese sounds great and I am so drooling 🙂 I love the bacon crumbles, that I think is brilliant! I am going to have to taste test and sneak it onto the grandkids too! Love the crocktober series, all the recipes you have shared have been awesome and delish!
Thank you! I’m eating the bowl that’s in the photograph as we speak. (The best part of food blogging – lunch is beautiful and you’re rewarded when you finish a shoot!) For grandkids, you may want to omit the spinach and just add it to your bowl (or add it at the very beginning so it cooks in and almost hides completely.) Average kiddos seem to run from anything green.
hmmm that’s true, Bob was doing the “I can’t eat green” thing for awhile. So to hide it from all the wimps, sounds like I throw it in at the beginning and just watch them gobble lol. Thanks for the tip!
Slow Cooker mac and cheese! Be still my heart!! This looks delicious!!
Thanks Judith! I’m pretty sure I’ll never make it in an oven again.
Slow cooker mac & cheese?!! Sounds great to me! It looks fantastic! Thanks for sharing it with us at Foodie Fridays!
I’d made it a few times in the oven, but wanted to adapt it to make it Crocktober official. Turns out it’s even easier, and if you use a crockpot liner you don’t have to do any dishes! (My favorite part.) Thanks for hosting the party!
Crocktober! ha, that made me laugh out loud. Um pumpkin mac and cheese sounds like something they serve in heaven, so i’ll definitely be trying some of that. i’m always looking for great crock pot recipes so thanks for posting!
haha…crocktober 😉
Crocktober is pretty much my favorite month ever. Probably because I don’t have many dishes to wash and I get to just throw everything in the crockpot in the morning and walk away. I hope you enjoy the mac and cheese!
Hi Stephanie! So, I’m both gluten and lactose free (this is apparently a pretty common combo) but this sounded so good and I had some leftover homemade puree I wanted to use, so thought I’d give it a whirl with some modifications. I substituted lactose free milk, raw milk parmesan cheese (so still dairy, but many lactose sensitive people can do raw milk), Manchego cheese (sheep’s milk) for the cheddar, goat milk evap milk, and spreadable goat cheese for the cream cheese and it was wonderful! As goat’s milk can have a strong flavor I wasn’t sure if it would be good, which is why I used a variety, but came out great!
Vanessa,
That sounds awesome! I’m so glad it worked for you. I have a lot of friends/readers who are gluten free and either dairy-free or vegan, so I usually try to include a vegan option and a GF option for my recipes to accommodate them whenever possible, but I realized I’d likely have to re-do the whole recipe to make this one work. The evaporated milk was the especially tricky part. I didn’t realize evaporated goats milk existed. (Not vegan, but a great dairy-free sub.) Now I want to try it with added goat cheese. I imagine that makes it super-rich and creamy.
I am so excited about all of these recipes! I’m now following you to keep up with the yummies!
Thanks Andrea!
Crock pot recipes are perfect for me since I work all day. It makes dinner time so much easier and convenient. These recipes are going on my meal plans this month.
Crocktober is over, but I’m still pulling out my crockpot at least once a week. There’s 5 whole weeks of crockpot meal plans here to choose from, so I’ve got you covered if you need more ideas! I’d love to hear about the ones you try. 🙂
For the pumpkin spinach mac, if I were doubling the recipe, how long would you estimate on cooking time? Or should I just monitor for al dente?