Stay Connected

Thursday, April 30, 2015

Oven-roasted canned tomatoes

We are nowhere near fresh tomato season, here. My plants in the garden have only recently been set out. But, oven-roasted tomatoes are still a possibility, at this time of year.

Remember all of those canned tomatoes that I bought in the fall? Okay, so you don't remember. But I do. They stare me in the face every time I step into the pantry.

Here is a delicious way to use those canned, whole tomatoes. Yes, I did say CANNED tomatoes!


Oven-roasted Canned Tomatoes

4 to 5 cups of canned, whole, peeled tomatoes
2 to 3 tablespoons of oil (olive or vegetable, but olive will taste even better)
pinch of black pepper
pinch of sea salt

Preheat oven to 375 F

Fill a sieve or strainer with canned tomatoes, over a dish (I use a glass pie plate).


Cut tomatoes in half, lengthwise. Gently squeeze out juice and seeds over the bowl or plate. Save those juices!

Place tomato halves, cut side up, single layer, in a jelly roll pan (baking sheet with rim) or shallow roasting pan. Place the largest tomato halves in the corners and around the edges of the pan (for more even roasting).


Drizzle with oil, sprinkle with pepper and salt.


Roast for 40-45 minutes. Remove from the oven. Turn tomatoes over.
Remove any very caramelized tomatoes from the baking sheet.

Reduce oven temp to 325 F. Bake for 15 minutes. Remove very caramelized tomatoes.


Bake another 15 minutes. Adjust time, as needed, for your oven and pan. If your oven has a "hot spot", or if your pan is warped, you may need to turn pan around, and/or redistribute the juices by tilting pan for a few seconds.

Scoop tomatoes and juices into a glass bowl. Sprinkle with herbs, as desired (minced basil, parsley, fresh thyme, oregano, fresh rosemary, garlic powder).

Serve immediately as a warm side dish. Or cool, to serve at room temperature.



I love these, sliced and added to sandwiches. Really delish! Feast your mind on this -- pocket bread, filled with avocado, roasted canned tomatoes, sprouts, grated mozzarella. Or, turkey breast, on wheat bread smeared with roasted garlic, roasted canned tomatoes and fresh baby spinach. I'm getting hungry for lunch already!

These roasted tomatoes also make a wonderful, rich addition to pasta dishes and salads, and cooked rice dishes, chopped and tossed in.

Puree with an immersion blender, for a rich sauce for pasta (add back some of the reserved straining liquid), or, to make roasted tomato soup (add some chicken or veggie stock).

Chilled and sliced into long strips, these oven-roasted tomatoes are a family favorite for topping Italian salads. Some Romaine lettuce, olives, garbanzo beans, crusty homemade croutons, mozzarella/provolone cheese and these tomatoes.

Save the liquid from straining and juicing the tomatoes to add to marinara sauce, soup or for part of the liquid in cooking rice.

Do not discard the oil from the roasted tomatoes! It is infused with tomato-ey goodness. Use as the oil in dressing cold or hot pasta, or for drizzling over toasted French bread, before adding any other toppings.

If you have any left, store the roasted tomatoes in a glass bowl in the fridge, for up to 5 days.

Buon appetito!

____________________________________________________________

Wednesday, April 29, 2015

A very odds and ends sort of dinner last night

We had Crazy Soup, multi-fruity pie, and another scavenged salad (this time -- watercress and kale florets, with leftover rhubarb dressing).


Crazy Soup is leftover bits of savories from our dinners. Some onions browned in bacon fat, bits of ground beef and onion from forming hamburgers, liquid and trimmings from "juicing" canned tomatoes, canned vegetable liquid, liquid from thawed spinach, broken pieces of dried-out tortilla, a spoonful or two of different cooked veggies, and an extra container of some sort of "meat" gravy.

After each night's dinner, if there's not really enough of anything leftover for a portion, I scoop whatever remains of dinner into a quart-sized container that I keep in the freezer. When I have 2 of these containers, I thaw them, dump into a stock-pot and add some cooked beans. Sometimes I need to amend the seasonings. This time, it was flavorful enough to simmer it until thickened, and add a pinch of salt. And that's our Crazy Soup!


The multi-fruity pie began as a plum pie, with frozen plums. I found some over-candied orange peel, the liquid from thawed, frozen strawberries (from last weekends brunch), and about a cup of leftover rhubarb sauce that no one seemed interested in. I added all of these found ingredients to the plums. Then sprinkled with a mixture of sugar, flour and pinch of baking soda, and tossed it all together right in the pie shell. The pie was absolutely delicious -- however kinda soupy. It could have used more flour in the mixture.


Much of what went into last night's dinner were scraps that might have otherwise been tossed. So, it feels like the dinner was almost "free". (And I could tell the dinner impressed my family. One member had a smile on his face when talking about what might have just been tossed, but was turned into a full meal for our family.)

I was very tired from a busy weekend, and this was just the sort of dinner I felt up to pulling together. True, not gourmet, but still good enough. And sometimes, good enough, is "good enough".

Maybe tonight I'll have more energy to make a "real" meal.

(The bonus with a dinner like last night's -- I was able to empty a bunch of containers from the fridge and freezer!)

_______________________________________________________________

Tuesday, April 28, 2015

The birthday Ice Cream Bar

For a recent family birthday, we chose to forgo the traditional birthday cake and do an Ice Cream Bar, instead.


I had vanilla ice cream in the freezer, leftover from Easter (see tip below for keeping your ice cream from developing ice crystals after opening). So, that was the initiator of the Ice Cream Bar idea.

I made caramel syrup and hot fudge sauce. I brought out the mint syrup and cherry preserves (both made last summer). I chopped some peanuts. And one daughter contributed some Oreo cookies that were given to her for her birthday (she could never in her life eat a whole package of Oreos by herself!). And that was the Ice Cream Bar.

  • Vanilla Bean Ice cream
  • Hot Fudge Topping
  • Caramel Sauce,
  • Cherry Preserves
  • Mint Syrup
  • Chopped Nuts
  • Oreo Cookies

We all made our own sundaes, customizing to our individual preference. I think mine was more hot fudge than anything else! But I always find it interesting how each of us will customize our items so uniquely.



*to keep your ice cream from developing ice crystals, after opening the carton -- place a sheet of plastic wrap directly on the ice cream, inside the container. Press out any air pockets under the wrap. Put the lid on, as usual. The ice cream will keep for many months without change to the surface texture or flavor.

__________________________________________________________________

Monday, April 27, 2015

I'd love to have a "real" greenhouse . . .

. . . but for now, I work with what I've got.

We still have a few more weeks of cool, overnight temperatures, here in the PNW. Too cool for plants like tomato to be out in the garden without a cover.


On the deck and in the garden, I use gallon milk jugs, with the bottoms cut out, over single tomato plants.


For my basil starts, I use plastic clamshells that lettuce came in this past winter.


And in the garden, I use these row covers over a long stretch of small plants.

I planted out my tomato seedlings on the deck, around the first of April, which is about a month earlier than is recommended for our area. They're doing well, under their covers. And I hope to be slicing into a fresh tomato in July this year, which would be about 6 weeks earlier than planting into the bare ground in the garden, around the 6th of May.

____________________________________________________________

Friday, April 24, 2015

Last week's lunch round-up: my grab-and-go lunch fixings


left: garbanzo, celery, barley salad    right: chunky tomato soup

I haven't done one of these lunch posts in several weeks. For one thing, I was struggling just to keep a few things made each week. Life flows in spurts. Some months, there seems to be a spring melt and runoff of activity. Other months, just a trickle of activity to add to daily living.

And then there's my quest to get this grocery spending back in line with the budget. I've had a lot of things to talk about.

Anyways, I did keep track of what I made for last week's lunches. Here is/was last week's lunch round-up. Between Sunday, Monday and Wednesday, I prepared these grab-and-go items for our lunches:

  • leftover hummus and fry bread (I intentionally made a huge batch of hummus, some for lunches and some for a meal later next week)
  • garbanzo bean, celery, barley salad -- all marinated in a dressing of oil, rosemary-thyme vinegar and garlic (when I use celery in a salad, I use the entire rib, leaves and all, hence the "leafy" look, plus I think the leaves have a brighter flavor)
  • homemade chunky tomato soup (I had to make 2 batches of this soup, as it was devoured quickly)
  • another batch of pickle juice muffins. I added a bit more cinnamon this time. I kept thinking I was eating apple-cinnamon muffins. Just trying to use up the pickle juice before the next pickle-making season begins!
  • and then later in the week some pumpkin-chocolate chip muffins. I actually made these for a little boy that I babysit on Thursdays. He loves pumpkin-chocolate chip muffins. So, sometimes I bake a batch to bring one to him. And my lucky family gets to eat the leftovers!
  • home-dried prunes
  • carrot sticks (I prepared a large container of carrot sticks on Monday and they were gone by Thursday)
  • oranges
  • pbj sandwiches
  • hard boiled eggs
We are going through more food than usual, with our packed lunches. So, I did make extra for grab-and-go this past week.


I know a few of you work at home, and some of you work in education and so have summers at home. What sort of items do those of you who eat at home, prepare for your lunches? I'm looking for new ideas for things to fix, using fairly basic ingredients.

_______________________________________________________

Thursday, April 23, 2015

So, you know I use tablecloths . . .

Organizing my linen closet



I inherited a large box of tablecloths when my parents passed away. These are cloths from my great grandparents, both sides of my family, as well as some of my grandmother's and mother's table linens.

There's everything from cloths large enough for a table set for 10 (our table only seats 8 at the max), down to tiny cocktail/beverage napkins (from the days of cocktail parties and bridge nights, I presume). There are doilies, lace placemats, and card-table toppers.

The other day I found myself motivated to organize the closet where all of these are stored. I pulled everything out and set myself to the task.

I sorted the linens according to size and item. Then I bagged them up, using those zippered, plastic bags that sheet sets and blankets come packaged in. I have just one shelf in a closet under the stairs to dedicate to linens. So, if I do this right, it all fits.


The extra large table cloths now have their own bag, and sit on the bottom of the stack, rarely used. The napkins are sorted into 3 smaller bags, the white monogrammed ones (both sides of the family had last names beginning with "M",  lucky me), the ecru machine-embroidered ones (wedding gifts when my husband and I got married), and the assorted patterned and odd ones.  Then there's the bag of medium sized table cloths, the bag of placemats, the bag of kitchen table cloths, and the bag of table toppers, squares, runners and dinner roll basket liners.

On the end of each bag is a list of the bag's contents. I include the number of the various types of napkins on these lists. As the trend seems to be to mix and match linens, I can quickly see if I have enough of any given color, pattern or design on the napkins for whatever holiday or event, to go with whatever cloth, runner, table topper combo that works on the table.

I didn't bother precisely measuring each table cloth, but simply stated on the label how many people could be accommodated at the table with that table cloth. For example, "seats 10", or "seats 6". In my own head, I know how many leaves/additions to make to the table for each cloth, with that notation.

I try to use these linens throughout the year, in place of buying any new linens, or paper napkins. When we've hosted large soup/bread gatherings, I've been able to dig into this stash of napkins for our guests, instead of buying paper napkins. I even have enough of those smaller beverage napkins to fill my small square napkin container, in place of buying paper beverage napkins for when a few friends are over. They don't all match, but that can be some of the charm of using heirloom linens.

I try to be careful with the oldest of these linens. But I've been known to take them outside for dinner al fresco. It's just such a nice touch, with no extra cost, to spread a tablecloth on the patio table and add a vase of flowers, for a dinner in the glow of the setting sun.

______________________________________________________________

Wednesday, April 22, 2015

A scavenged salad



Working in the garden the other day, I came across a patch of watercress coming up in the cracks of the walkway. I also found several wayward violets in bloom. Some people I know would have declared these "weeds". But my thought was, "oooh, salad!"


There was enough for all five of us. I drizzled individual plates with this rhubarb salad dressing.

Yum!

Do you forage? In our area, fiddlehead ferns are somewhat popular for scavenging. And I know of one lady who eats the dandelion greens from her yard. 

It wasn't all that long ago in history, that people foraged for food on a regular basis. While we need to be careful not to ingest anything poisonous, I do think it's silly to think that all of our food has to come from a store.

________________________________________________________

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Microwaving bars of soap, part 2: making liquid soaps for laundry and hand soap


(For part 1 on how to microwave a bar of soap, see yesterday's post )

For liquid soap

Liquid is my preferred form of soap for laundry and hand soap. It rapidly dissolves in cold water, hopefully getting down to the business of cleaning, faster. Plus there's no chance of any undissolved soap bits remaining on clothing, ever, even in cold water washes.


To make liquid soap:

After the inflated soap lump has cooled for 5 minutes, I break it apart by hand into small pieces, about the size of shooter marbles, into a stainless steel saucepan.

I cover with hot tap water, and bring to a boil on the stove. I stir constantly, breaking up any soap lumps as it comes to a boil. Once boiling, I reduce heat, and continue to stir until melted.


This takes about 5 minutes, total, compared to hours of stove-time to melt whole bars.

Once all is melted, I partially fill a 1-gallon, wide-mouthed container with cold water, about half full. I then pour the hot, melted soap into this cold water. Wide-mouthed container is key, as this is a scoopable, not pourable, soap.


I stir, and add more water to fill to the top, and stir again. Adding this extra water makes the soap more manageable for scooping into the washing machine. As the liquid soap cools, it will thicken substantially.

Using liquid laundry soap:
I use about 2 cups (or about 1/8th of the 1-gallon container) of this liquid soap per load. It's pretty gelatinous, so a sturdy scoop works well for me. After I add the laundry to the washing machine, I scoop this soap just under where the wash water comes into the machine. It dissolves in the first minute of agitation.

**slight derail -- Some folks don't like the gloppiness of this soap. You can microwave your soap before each load. It becomes pourable with heating. But that's too much work for me. I've got better things to do with my time, so I tolerate the gloppiness. I have read of some people using a mixer to "whip" the liquid soap. I haven't tried this, but reportedly, whipped, cooled liquid soap is easier to handle/measure for laundry. Again, I just don't have that much time. Maybe some day I'll give it a try.

Alternatively, a large pump dispenser (like what hair salons use for the large containers of conditioner and shampoo, or what a restaurant uses for condiments -- we're talking 1-gallon pump dispensers) would also make adding/measuring the liquid soap more manageable. A pump dispenser works well for my liquid hand soap.--  end derail**

I buy 3-packs of Dial "Basics" at Dollar Tree for $1, or often find it on sale at the supermarket for 88 cents/3-pack. So, my cost per load is about 4 cents, for just plain soap.

Adding vinegar makes a great rinse aid in laundry

With sensitive skin, in the process of healing from eczema, I find adding vinegar to the rinse compartment to be very helpful in removing any final traces of soap from laundry. Vinegar also keeps colors brighter, softens towels and reduces mildew smell (a bonus with bath towels). I use 3 to 4 tablespoons of vinegar per load, put in the rinse dispenser, to be released during the rinse cycle. 3 tablespoons of vinegar costs me about 3-4 cents per load.

Sensitive skin laundry products vs. my homemade soap/vinegar rinse

My total cost for sensitive skin laundry care is about 7 to 8 cents per load. Compare that to Dreft Baby Liquid detergent at over 30 cents per load, or Ivory Snow Gentle Care Laundry Detergent at about 50 cents per load.

Making hand soap for pump dispensers

I use the liquid form of this soap to make my own hand soap. I add enough water to give the liquid the right viscosity to pump from the dispenser. This is a trial and error process.

After the water has be mixed in, I add about 1 part of liquid dishwashing detergent (the kind for hand washing dishes) for 6 parts of liquid soap. This added detergent helps with cutting grease and oils, especially helpful in the kitchen.


Coloring and fragrance

I add liquid soap colorant (or food coloring) until the desired color, and essential oils for fragrance. This particular batch is lemon-mint leaf, starting with lemon dish detergent, and adding lemon essential oil and spearmint essential oil. It's a fresh fragrance that just smells clean.

Including the extra ingredients, 16 ounces of my own hand soap costs about 30 cents (compared to $1 for 7.5 ounces of commercial product). There's no additional plastic waste. And even with the dish detergent added, it's better for my skin than liquid hand soaps sold in stores. I can feel the difference.


The bonus to making my own liquid laundry soap is any time I run out of hand soap for the pumps, I have the soap in liquid form already, and can make up a batch of hand soap for refills, in just 3 minutes.

______________________________________________________



Monday, April 20, 2015

Microwaving bar soap -- what in the world?

Microwaving a bar of soap for making laundry soap in minutes, with no grating 


Do you make your own laundry soap? If you do, do you grate bar soap for this?

"Why would anyone make laundry soap?" you wonder.

For me, making my own hypo-allergenic laundry soap has drastically reduced my eczema flare-ups. But the primary motivation for most folks is saving money.

For years, I'd grated my hypo-allergenic bar soap on a small handheld grater. The fear of losing the skin on my knuckles caused me to change from grating bars of soap to melting whole bars of soap in a large pot of water.

Well . . .

I tried something fun and new a couple of weeks ago. Yes, this part was the fun part. How do you feel about kitchen experiments?

From bar to puffy blob: you gotta try this!!


Use your microwave for an easy way to get your bars of soap ready for pulverizing or melting. 
Then, you can use, as is, or blended with other ingredients, for making powdered or liquid soap for laundry and/or filling all of those hand soap dispensers, for pennies.

How I go about this

(Just an FYI -- This isn't about a particular recipe for laundry detergent. There are loads of recipes online. This is about how I get the bar soap into a form that is very user-friendly, without hand-grating.)

What I use

  • 1 very fresh (new) bar of soap, 3 ounces or thereabouts, Ivory or Dial "Basics" (Ivory is the soap that is well-known for working the best in this experiment/transformation, but Dial "Basics" also works for me.)
  • waxed paper
  • microwave
  • blender, food processor
  • storage container for powdered soap
  • 1-gallon, wide-mouth container to store liquid soap 


I microwave 3-oz bars of soap, one at a time. (I use Dial "Basics", but Ivory also works. I'm not sure about other brands of soap.)

The soap should be new. A new bar fluffs the best. And Ivory soap is reported to fluff up the most. But the Dial "Basics" gets enough fluffing to make it easy to pulverize in the blender.

On a large sheet of waxed paper, I place 1 unwrapped bar of soap, in the microwave. Yes, I said in the microwave, just dry, unwrapped, as is.

I set the timer for 1 minute. In 1 minute, the bar of soap will look something like this


You can see some hard edges remaining. I continue to "cook" the bar of soap for 15 second intervals.

It takes my 3-oz bar of soap 1 minute and 30 seconds. Your microwave may vary.

You want to watch these 15 second intervals, as leaving the soap in the microwave too long will result in scorched soap. When the hard edges of the bar are gone, it's done. Like this


Open the microwave, and allow to sit for a minute. Peel the lump of inflated soap off of the waxed paper. The lump will still have hot spots, especially in the center, for another 6 or 7 minutes.

Allow it to cool!

With microwaving, the hard bar becomes pliable, breaks apart easily with your hands and is airy, like foam. Now that is something to see.

For powdered soap

Pull the lump into marshmallow-sized pieces and one by one put them in your food processor or blender. I use my blender for this, doing about 1/3 of the large lump at a time. Turn the appliance on for short bursts, until the lump is pulverized. This only takes a few seconds. With a blender, you'll want to empty the soap powder from time to time, into your storage container. 

The entire time spent pulverizing is about 2 minutes. And does not stress my blender in the least. You will have pulverized soap like this


Be careful about breathing in the soap dust.

One 3-oz bar yields 1 cup of soap flakes.

Powders work well for combining with other ingredients, like washing soda, borax or OxyClean. 

Using the powdered soap:
when I do use this in powdered form, I use about 2 to 3 tablespoons of soap flakes per load. This gives me about 6 to 8 loads of soap per bar.

Most folks find there's better cleaning power if soap flakes are blended with borax, washing soda and/or OxyClean. There are many recipes for these homemade laundry soaps online, all very similar.

Some people prefer to use homemade soap flakes to extend their favorite commercial laundry products, like Tide and Gain, mixing a commercial product with the homemade product in up to a 50/50 mix. You would use less of this blend, due to the density of the soap flakes.

I began making my own laundry soap to reduce eczema flare-ups. But the money-saving aspect also appeals to me.

My husband's laundry seems to require a 50/50 blend, like mentioned above. Soap, alone, does not handle the man-smell. I blend a powdered detergent from Dollar Tree with homemade soap flakes, for his own detergent (and for when I'm washing other clothing/linens that won't include my own). When using just the Dollar Tree detergent, our cost is about 11 cents per load. When I extend the DT detergent with pulverized hand soap, (using 3 bars of Dial Basics to one small box of DT powdered detergent), our cost per load is about 6 cents. Good, right?



Playing in the kitchen is a lot of fun. Even my grown kids think microwaving soap is entertaining. But the real value for me is how easily this makes creating my own laundry soap. Grating bars of soap on a hand grater was tedious. This is just simple.

Who knew I could use my microwave for making laundry soap? Funny thing, there isn't a listing in my microwave cookbook for microwaving bars of soap.

(I have broken this post into 2 parts. It was verging on too long for the blog. More tomorrow on how I make liquid soaps, using microwaved bar soap.)

___________________________________________________________________

Friday, April 17, 2015

I love tablecloths

They are a cheap and super easy way to transform something that looks a bit

like this


to this


Our kitchen table is now 28 years old. It was a kit when we bought it. And has never been refinished. The kids did homework, painted, played with playdough, and colored at this table. The table top edges show years of wear.

Every summer, I vow to tackle refinishing this table. Maybe this summer will be the lucky one. But for now, a nice tablecloth conceals the rough edges and transforms the dining end of the kitchen to something civilized.

This tablecloth, by the way, is one that gets double duty. It goes on the table for the month of December, and then again in early spring. I made it, and the coordinating napkins, several years ago, from a piece of heavyweight fabric, the kind you would use for drapery.

It survives washing in the washing machine. And because of it's heavy weight, it comes out neat enough for family use, to not need the iron. (Okay, some might say a little ironing would be beneficial. But this is nice enough for us.)

Anyway, call me old fashioned. I just love the look of a tablecloth. It doesn't have the visual clutter of placemats/table top.

____________________________________________________________

Thursday, April 16, 2015

When you have (and love) a thing long enough . . .

. . . something about it eventually gives out.



Repairing a plastic zipper coil which has come off of the fabric tape


This is my favorite jacket to wear around the house, most of the year. It's fleece, so it really holds in the warmth.

I've had it (and worn it almost daily) since 2004.

Some might say I should just toss it and buy a new jacket. But for me, it's just "perfect". Do you know how hard it is to find another "perfect" jacket?

The zipper pull attachment thingie came off a couple of years ago. No problem, I can still grasp the remaining part of the zipper pull, to get it zipped up snug as a bug.

But a couple of weeks ago, I noticed that the teeth on the plastic coil zipper had come off of the fabric zipper tape. Bummer!! Never had this happen before. So I had no clue what to do to fix this one.

This isn't a "fix" often listed on sites like ehow. The usual zipper breakdowns are things like separating zipper teeth and missing pulls.

So I had to research the various zipper types, how they're made, and then half-guess what to do to fix my little zipping problem.

This particular zipper is a plastic coil variety. The zipper teeth are a part of a continuous, single coil of plastic, sewn to a fabric tape. (Who knew? I thought the teeth were all individually clamped onto the tape.)

Upon extremely close inspection, in the bright light next to a window, it appeared that the stitching had come undone in this 1-inch spot on the zipper coil/tape. I could see some small threads on the backside of the zipper.


So I got out a needle and black thread and carefully stitched the zipper coil back onto the tape, making sure to catch the zipper coil each time that I came up from the underside.

It was actually a pretty simple fix. And definitely one of those fixes that you want to do just as soon as you notice the zipper coil coming off of the tape. (Yeah, that's right, I kept wearing mine for a couple of weeks longer, and had to sew more than I would have if I had only listened to my own wisdom and fixed it right away!)


Anyways, my fave-of-all-time jacket is back in service!

_________________________________________________________________

Wednesday, April 15, 2015

this past week's Cheap & Cheerful suppers

Potato-Spinach-Ham Casserole

Wednesday (about $1.60 for 5)
garbanzo bean soup, made with ham stock, garden parsley, carrots, ham, garbanzo beans, onions and celery
cornbread

Thursday (about $1.80 for 5)
Potage à L'oseille (sorrel and potato soup made with garden sorrel, potatoes, thyme, shallots, garlic, bay leaves, milk, stock, nutmeg, butter, dash of rosemary vinegar to replace white wine called for, salt/pepper) followed, but adapted, this recipe -- to suit my own ingredients
rhubarb crisp with a custard sauce (a thin almond blancmange)
French bread, slices of cheese, zucchini bread and butter pickles

Friday (about $2.15 for 5)
cheese, green pepper, onion pizza
carrot and celery sticks
deviled eggs (I looked at each plate and thought we needed one more item, so made some deviled eggs at the last minute)

Saturday (about $1.75 for 5)
bean, rice and cheese burritos with avocado, and food processor salsa
cabbage and herb slaw
brown rice with salsa topping

Sunday (about $2.75 for 5)
turkey in gravy
bread, onion, parsley and sorrel stuffing (garden sorrel and garden parsley)
brown rice (didn't make enough stuffing, so added some leftover brown rice to dinner)
cranberry-orange-celery gelatin salad (made with frozen, homegrown cranberries, 1 small orange and 2 large stalks of celery, along with a bit of sugar, lemon juice and plain gelatin -- pretty yummy, would've been awesome with the addition of chopped walnuts or pecans)
watermelon pickles

Monday (about $1.95 for 5)
hummus on fry bread
ginger-soy carrots
open-face plum pie (garden plums, frozen, 1/4 cup sugar, orange zest, 2 tablespoons flour)

Tuesday (about $3.50 for 5)
ham, potato, spinach, egg casserole (a modified version of a popular casserole, less cheese, no milk, one less egg)
cabbage slaw
watermelon pickles
prunes (from garden)
leftover plum pie for 2 people


Some nights, supper was much more expensive than other nights, about double the cost from least expensive to most expensive. However, we averaged about $2.20 per dinner for 5 people, not including beverages (milk for 3, water for 3). I think that's pretty good for our family. We do eat large lunches, probably equal in cost to our dinners.

On the odd night that I need to add something to one person's meal (usually my husband's), I add a slice of bread and butter, or a scoop of brown rice. We all eat about the same sized portion of protein and fruit/veggie. I adjust the carbs and desserts from one family member to the next.

What was on your menu this past week?

_____________________________________________________________

Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Deconstructing a recipe for Sorrel Soup


I made a sorrel-potato soup last week that called for several ingredients that I didn't have on hand. I made reference to one ingredient, the white wine, in yesterday's post.

Here's the breakdown of the actual recipe's ingredients, and what I wound up using.

The recipe:

1 tablespoon butter, unsalted
2 bay leaves
1 cup shallot, diced
1 tablespoon garlic, minced
1/2 cup white wine
2 cups chicken stock
5 cups Yukon Gold potatoes, diced
1 tablespoon fresh lemon thyme, minced
4 cups heavy cream
3 cups fresh sorrel, chopped
1 pinch ground nutmeg
salt
white pepper


Here's what I used:

1 tablespoon butter, salted
parts of several bay leaves scrounged from a jar of pickling spice
1 cup of shallots, minced (I have shallots from the garden last summer. If I didn't have shallots I would have used minced onion, green onion, onion powder or dried onions)
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 cup rosemary-thyme vinegar, cut with 1/4 cup water
2 cups of turkey stock
5 cups of russet potatoes, peeled and diced
1/2 tablespoon fresh garden thyme (no lemon thyme, and only had 1/2 tablespoon this early in spring)
2  1/2 cups 1% milk, with 1/4 cup of extra butter, and 1  1/2 cups of water (being lactose intolerant, I didn't want to overdo it on the milk part, so used some water in this substitution. Otherwise, I would have used all milk, with extra butter, in place of heavy cream.)
3 cups fresh sorrel (It's spring in the garden with plenty of sorrel. But if I didn't have any sorrel, but had spinach, then I would have made this as a spinach-potato soup.)
1 pinch ground nutmeg (I did have to run a whole nutmeg over a rasper, but in the end had ground nutmeg)
salt
black pepper

(also added a pinch of onion powder and extra garlic powder at the end of cooking, to season)

*in bold type, these are the substitutions that I made to the original recipe ingredients.


Basically, the only ingredients that I had, as stated in the recipe, were the shallots, the sorrel leaves, the nutmeg and the salt. For everything else I found the next best thing to substitute with.


Some notes on substitutions:


when needing cream, milk and extra butter can substitute. If the butter "floats" to the surface at the end of cooking, a binder of flour and water can be heated in the finished soup. But this is not always necessary, for a family meal. No one in my family objected to a little melted butter around the edge of the bowl.

when needing wine in soup, vinegar and water make a good substitution, especially if the amount of wine is less than 10-15% of the liquids called for.

different poultry stocks can be used interchangeably, when the amount of stock is small compared to other liquids and ingredients.

potatoes are potatoes, especially if the soup or sauce is to be blended at the end of cooking.

there are many members of the onion family. Shallots, chives, yellow onions can be used interchangeably, with exception to recipes like French onion soup. Somehow, French onion soup made with chives does not sound visually appealing to me. And onion powder or dried onions can stand in, in a pinch.

at the end of cooking a soup, sauce or gravy, if it tastes "flat" try adding a pinch of onion and/or garlic powder for a boost in flavor. Alternatively, try a tablespoon of soy sauce. (I add soy sauce to many gravies, for that boost of flavor.)


_____________________________________________________________




Monday, April 13, 2015

Substitutes for wine in recipes

Don't we all make substitutions in recipes when we don't have the needed ingredients?

I made a soup the other night in which the recipe called for white wine. Not a drinker, here, so I didn't have wine on hand. I used some rosemary vinegar and water in a 50/50 mix, to substitute for white wine.


Here's a list of alcohol-free substitutes for various wine flavors/types to use in cooking. Some of these suggestions were passed on to me by a medical professional, while others I have picked up along the way.

With any of the vinegars used as substitutes, you can add a pinch of sugar, for the natural sweetening you'd find in wine. Or not. Taste and see if it needs just a hint of sweetening. This will depend on the nature of the recipe.

white wine

--herb vinegar, such as tarragon, rosemary or thyme, use full strength or in a 50/50 blend with water. These can be easily and cheaply homemade with fresh herbs left to steep in white vinegar. (As a substitute, I use a half and half mixture of vinegar and water as a substitute for white wine in soups, sauces and stews)
--apple juice or apple cider
--chicken stock, won't give a wine flavor but offers nice taste for savory dishes
--clam juice, especially nice in fish or other seafood dishes

red wine

--red wine vinegar in a half and half mixture vinegar and water (pinch of sugar can be added)
--berry vinegars (sweetened or unsweetened), also in a half and half mixture water to vinegar
--red grape juice, cranberry juice or pomegranate juice can be substituted (I like thinned down versions of these juices, to cut the sweetness)
--any of the above blended 50/50 with beef broth
--25/75 blend of red wine vinegar to grape juice (no sugar added variety). This is a good alternative to burgundy wine in a dish like Boeuf Bourguignon. It won't taste exactly like a traditional Bourguignon, but it will be an acceptable version. If possible, add in a bit of mushroom stock or sodium-free beef stock. (I do sometimes have mushroom pieces, ends of stems that sort of thing, that I cook up into stock.)

Port wine

--Concord grape juice with lime zest added
--cranberry juice with lemon juice added
--weak apple or orange juice can be substituted for lighter ports

Gewurztraminer

--white grape juice with lemon juice added

sweet white wine, like a dessert wine

--white grape juice with 1 tablespoon (per cup of grape juice) Karo syrup

Champagne

--the obvious choice --Champagne vinegar
--ginger ale mixed with soda water (for desserts that call for champagne)
--or a blend of either of the above with stock, in savory dishes
--sparkling apple cider

Grappa

--grape juice

for deglazing a pan

--red wine vinegar
--balsamic vinegar

for marinading a piece of meat, poultry or fish

--any of the vinegars mentioned for particular meats/seafood, using half the amount called for of wine, in vinegar, then make up the other half with water, and add a spoonful of sugar. So, if your marinade recipe calls for 1/2 cup of wine, use 1/4 cup vinegar, 1/4 cup water, and teaspoon of sugar.


My choice for most recipes is a vinegar and water blend, sometimes with a pinch of sugar added. I choose my vinegar flavor based on the dish and the overall flavor I want to impart. Right now, I have rosemary-thyme vinegar, which I use to replace white wine in recipes, and unsweetened blackberry vinegar, which I use to replace red wine in recipes. I always have flavored vinegars on hand. So this is sort of a no-brainer choice for me.

________________________________________________________

Friday, April 10, 2015

watermelon pickles

I served these with Easter dinner.


None of our guests had even heard of watermelon pickles and were very eager to find out how I made them.

(Here's the post with how I made them, last summer.)

But I thought you might want to see what they actually look like, once made.

---------------------------------------------


Using the pickle juice

And one more watermelon-y pickle thing this week. As we've been going through the jars of these pickles, I've saved the liquid from each jar, not sure what I'd do with it all. But as it's flavored with just vinegar, sugar, cinnamon and cloves (no savory flavors), we all thought it would go well with baking.


So this week, I made a batch of whole wheat muffins, using watermelon pickle "juice" as most of the liquid. I also added some extra cinnamon to the batter. Not only could we not tell that there was pickle juice in the muffins, but they were gobbled up very quickly!

________________________________________________________

Thursday, April 9, 2015

Cheesy-potato casserole (from our Easter dinner)

When I brought the Cheesy-Potato casserole to the Easter table, my guest sitting to the left of me exclaimed, "oooh, what's in those?!" Big, big hit for Easter dinner. Even with a table full of other dishes, salads, and trays, we went through 2 quarts of this Cheesy-Potato Casserole.


If you'll remember, several weeks ago I wrote a post about using up some wrinkly potatoes and freezing them. I had made mashed potatoes, adding some of the last of the cream cheese and sour cream, plus plenty of butter, some salt and milk. I froze these mashed potatoes in quart-size containers.

--------------------------------------

The day before Easter, I thawed two of those quart-size containers. I put them in my stand mixer and whipped them back together (the liquid separates out from the solids in mashed potatoes when freezing/thawing).

I stirred in 1 & 1/2 cups of shredded cheddar-jack cheese, and a very large handful of freshly cut chives, minced (about a cup of minced chives).

(I took about 1 & 1/2 cups out to test bake that day, adding a handful of cheese as topping. It was a bit soupy going in to the oven, but came out perfectly thick after baking.)

So, with the larger casserole, it too was a bit soupy when first assembled. I buttered a 2-quart, round casserole dish, scooped the potato mixture into this dish, covered and refrigerated overnight, until an hour and a half before Easter dinner. It had substantially thickened overnight.

I topped with another cup of grated cheddar-jack, and baked for about 45 to 50 minutes in a 350 F degree oven, until the cheese was just beginning to brown.

I don't have any photos to share, but it did look (and taste) delicious. Not a speck remained at the end of dinner.
----------------------------------------

For your own information, you could easily duplicate my potato dish. Mash about 8 potatoes, with 2-4 ounces of cream cheese, 1/3 cup sour cream, 1/4 cup butter and milk and salt to taste and texture.

Stir in 1 cup of minced chives and 1 cup or more of shredded cheddar or cheddar-jack cheese.

Spoon into a buttered casserole dish. Top with another 1 cup of shredded cheese.

Bake in a 350 F degree oven for 40-45 minutes, or until cheese topping is bubbly and lightly browned.



A real man-pleaser, that's for sure! I think these will become a "regular" on our Easter dinner table.

______________________________________________________________

Wednesday, April 8, 2015

6 Cheap & Cheerful Suppers, 1 not-so-cheap Easter dinner

Wednesday (about $1.80 for 5)
minestrone soup (using lots of leftovers from the fridge and freezer)
scratch cornbread squares topped with melted cheddar
scratch chocolate cake (from freezer) topped with blackberry coulis (frozen blackberries pureed with some blackberry jam, and other fruity liquids from the fridge and freezer, such as leftover cranberry sauce from previous week).

I have to give credit to Kris, here, on the cake. She made mention of serving cake with just a bit of topping, and not full-blown frosting between layers and all around. That inspired me to do a much simpler topping for this cake, for a weekday dinner dessert.

Thursday (about $2.15 for 5)
turkey in gravy over
brown rice
mustard glazed carrots
cabbage slaw

Friday (about $1.85 for 5)
kale frittata
leftover Yorkshire pudding and brown rice (need to use those up)
chunky marinara sauce and cheese over frittata, and Yorkshire pud/rice
sauteed onions and peppers

Saturday (about $1.65 for 5 -- I was cooking all day in preparation for Easter, so dinner was a hodgepodge of stuff)
garbanzo bean salad in a mustard vinaigrette, with chopped carrots, celery, asparagus and shallots
deviled eggs
potato casserole (part of Sunday's casserole, baked up in a small baker)
watermelon pickles
rhubarb sauce (I cut too much rhubarb for Sunday's pies, so made sauce with the extra)

Sunday (about $13.00 for 9)
Savory Spiced Peanuts
ham
cheesy potato casserole
cold marinated asparagus and celery salad
dinner rolls (brought by friends)
tossed salad (brought by friends)
watermelon pickles, carrot sticks and deviled eggs
scratch rhubarb custard pie
bought vanilla ice cream

Monday (about $3.45 for 5)
Denver omelettes (ham, green pepper, onion, cheddar-jack cheese filling)
brown rice, all topped with food processor salsa
leftover rhubarb pie

Tuesday (about $1.50 for 5)
rice and beans (cooked in turkey fat/oil and with spices, onions, garlic and canned tomatoes)
topped with food processor salsa and cheddar-jack cheese
cabbage and celery slaw
slivers of pie drizzled with homemade blackberry syrup

*none of the estimated costs include beverages, usually milk for 3, water for 2. Tack on another 30 to 40 cents per night for the milk. And with Easter dinner, we also drank 2 bottles of Martinelli's sparkling cider, at $1.99 per bottle, making Sunday's Easter dinner cost about $17 including beverages.

____________________________________________________________

Tuesday, April 7, 2015

Savory spiced peanuts

These were a hit as snacks before our Easter dinner. And I didn't have to buy anything special to make them -- Woohoo! They'd be an awesome snack to offer while watching the big game on TV, or at a summer BBQ, or in a jar as a special little treat for Dad on Father's Day. (I'm personally filing that last little idea away for this coming Father's Day!)


Savory Spiced Peanuts


2 teaspoons vegetable oil
2 cups peanuts (I used regular, canned peanuts that have been roasted and salted)
pinch of red pepper flakes
3 teaspoons of chili powder (more or less according to taste)
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 to 1 teaspoon granulated sugar
1/2 to 1 teaspoon garlic powder
popcorn salt, to taste (any salt will do, the popcorn salt is fine, so it adheres better to the nuts)

In a skillet over medium, heat the oil. Add pepper flakes and heat for 30 seconds. Add peanuts, and stir and cook for 1 minute. Add chili powder, cumin, and sugar, stir and cook 1 minute more.

Remove from heat. Add garlic powder and salt, toss well.

Drain and cool on a piece of paper. Store in an airtight container.


The seasonings on these are all to taste, and amounts could vary depending on the freshness of your spices. I like the greater amount of sugar and garlic powder.

____________________________________________________________

Monday, April 6, 2015

Mending, mending and more mending

I've had my portable sewing machine out on the dining room table for a few weeks, and managed to tackle a pretty hefty pile of mending.

It seemed once the word got around the family that I was mending, clothing appeared in the pile on a daily basis.  I mended a seam in a skirt, patched 2 pairs of jeans, hemmed 2 pairs of jeans, zig zagged the edge of 1 bath towel, 2 bath mats, and 2 kitchen washcloths. I repaired the split and fraying edge of the placket on a dress shirt, sewed the two halves of a bra back together (it split right down the front, while being worn :-o ), I sewed closed a hole in the underarm of a sweater, and I fixed my comfy pj bottoms at the waistband.

this one nearly stumped me, but this shirt went from this

to this -- I hope this repair will give this shirt several more wearings


Repairing clothing and household items is satisfying on a couple of levels. It's nice to be good stewards of resources and extend the use of all of these items.


With a zip of the machine, the towels, mats and washcloths can be useful for many more years. No need to send them to a landfill for quite some time. And it's a pleasure to see items in good repair.

these jeans were about to lose their ability to be buttoned


this little fix should make the button hole last as long as the rest of the jeans

Also, mending clothing and household items postpones the need to spend money to replace any of these things. I would guess that all of this mending put off spending a hundred dollars or more on replacing all of these items.


And making minor alterations allowed us to buy items at a significant discount, by being willing to put in a small amount of work to make the item fit right. The two pairs of jeans that I hemmed were both thrift store finds. Both were in very good condition, just too long.

My sewing machine was put away late Friday afternoon, as I readied the dining room for Easter dinner. But I know it won't be long before that mending pile starts to grow again.

_________________________________________________________________

Friday, April 3, 2015

My egg-citing inventory plan (sorry, had to use that play on words)

I didn't like the feeling of running short on eggs the past couple of weeks. I managed, but didn't like not knowing if and when I'd find more at my price point.

You know that I freeze eggs whenever I have a surplus. I've decided that I'm going to keep a fill-to amount of frozen eggs of about 8-10 dozen. 8 dozen eggs will carry me through 2 months of baking/cooking. So, if I don't find eggs on sale for a period of time, I'll have some back-up eggs in the freezer. As soon as I start to dip into those frozen eggs, I'll watch for a sale again, and buy enough for fresh use as well as keeping that 8 dozen amount in the freezer. 2 to 3 months appears to be the typical cycle for egg sales around here

Did anyone here ever work in a restaurant? In a previous life, I worked as a restaurant manager. When doing inventory and ordering stock, we had a "fill-to" amount. It was a preset amount, thoroughly thought out by the owner, of how much we should always strive to maintain of any given item. That's what I intend to do with buying and storing eggs.

The other thing that occurred to me was this -- in November, when turkeys go on sale for about the lowest price of the year, I always buy my year's supply of whole turkey. Well, the Easter egg sales may very well be the lowest price I'll see on eggs for this year. Other sale prices have been around the $1.25 to $1.29 per dozen point. 99 cents per dozen may be rock-bottom for this year. (A new California law regulating hen house size, is driving egg prices up. This law went into effect on Jan 1 of this year. Although the law is a California one, it's net effect will be a moderate rise in egg prices nationwide.)

I'm not to the point of wanting to buy a year's supply of eggs just yet. It is a lot more work to freeze eggs, than to say, freeze a whole turkey. But I'm willing to go to the work to freeze a 2 to 3 month supply.

So, do you want to know just how many eggs I bought this Easter season? You're going to think I've lost a few marbles on this. But, I'm venturing out there into stock-up territory. I bought 22 dozen eggs. Yep! You read that correctly. This should be enough eggs to last our family through July and maybe into August. My fill-to amount, year round, will be about 8-10 dozen. Out of this bunch of eggs, I'll freeze an even greater amount, just to take advantage of such a low price. About 12-14 dozen are earmarked for the freezer. Some will be frozen individually,  to use 1 at a time, while others will be frozen 3-5 in a container for quiches and frittatas, for family meals. (I use these basic guidelines for freezing eggs.)


And now that I'll have dozens of eggs, I'll be using eggs as the animal protein source for 2 meals per week. I typically serve an animal protein (meat, eggs, cheese) with dinner 4 nights per week, and a bean and grain based dinner 3 nights per week. It can vary from one week to the next, but this is how it averages out.

Eggs are not the protein powerhouses that meat is. A 3.5 oz portion of chicken has an average of 24 grams of protein (depending on the part of the chicken). A single large egg has 6 grams of protein. It would take 4 eggs to ingest the same amount of protein in eggs as in chicken. 4 eggs would be way too eggy for me. So, limiting eggs as the animal source of protein to just 2 days per week, for dinners, seems about right for my family.


Some of our favorite egg dishes include souffle, quiche, frittatas and Yorkshire pudding. Do you have a favorite way to prepare eggs as a supper dish?

_____________________________________________________________

Thursday, April 2, 2015

I've gotten back into making flour tortillas



So, you know that I had bought flour tortillas a couple of times this winter. I was just tired of making them myself.

But, with renewed desire to get our budget under control, I got back into making them myself.

We had bean, rice and cheese burritos the other night, and I made whole wheat tortillas, using this recipe, here. I used all whole wheat flour in the dough and white flour for rolling out. And I made a recipe and a half for the dough, but made each one larger than the recipe suggests, for burrito-size. It took me about 10 minutes to make enough tortillas for the 5 of us. I'm not sure what the grocery store charges for whole wheat tortillas. But I estimate that I saved about 80 cents over buying white flour tortillas from Dollar Tree.


I also made a food processor salsa, using canned tomatoes, tomato paste, some diced onions, chili peppers from the freezer, garlic powder, salt, vinegar, oregano, cumin and chili powder -- all the basic items that I use in making large batches of salsa in the fall for canning.

____________________________________________________________________

Wednesday, April 1, 2015

this last week's Cheap & Cheerful Suppers



Wednesday
fry bread (French bread dough, pressed into small patties and pan-fried in a bit of oil),
split and spread with hummus
cole slaw
homemade cake


Thursday
turkey-cheddar-cranberry sauce-watercress sandwiches on homemade French bread
curried carrot soup
blackberry-rhubarb pie

Friday
turkey in gravy over brown rice
sautéed kale, watercress, onion and garlic (kale and watercress from the garden)
blackberry-rhubarb pie

Saturday
bean burgers, topped with quick marinara sauce and mozzarella
herb polenta
cabbage slaw


Sunday
Greek Garbanzo Bean Salad
(cooked garbanzo beans, canned, diced tomatoes, sliced black olives, rice, watercress, chives, minced onions, garlic powder, oil, vinegar, oregano, thyme, parsley, lemon juice and mozzarella cheese). Made ahead on Saturday evening, for a simple Sunday supper.
biscuit wraps (like these but filled with 2 slices of ham luncheon meat, each, instead of hotdogs)
prunes

Monday
teriyaki turkey with cabbage, carrots and onions
over brown rice
rhubarb crisp

Tuesday
bean burritos (homemade flour tortillas, homemade refried beans, rice, cheese, food processor salsa)
sauteed veggies -- onions, garlic, kale
carrot sticks
prunes

____________________________________________________________

FOLLOW CREATIVE SAVV ON BLOGLOVIN'

Follow
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Be a voice that helps someone else on their frugal living journey

Are you interested in writing for creative savv?
What's your frugal story?

Do you have a favorite frugal recipe, special insight, DIY project, or tips that could make frugal living more do-able for someone else?

Creative savv is seeking new voices.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

share this post