Sunday, September 6, 2009

Red Beans and Rice

Its been a while since I posted here. Life has been hectic just trying to live it lately. With the overtime pretty much over for a while for my husband, we are now living on 100 dollars less a week than we did when we were working for Jerry. When the overtime is there its great we have more money than we have ever had before but when its not things get very tricky.

I have been having to cook on an even smaller food budget than before and that lead me to recipes my grandmother considered old standards that I had never made before. Mainly redbeans and rice.

One of the problems I have always had is that my When I cook my recipes for 8 are usually more like for 16. So there was plenty to go around. I made this recipe on Wensday and I still have leftovers after eating it nearly everyday since then for lunch. The cost is almost non existant.

2 bags dry red beans - 1.39 each at my local walmart
8 servings of long grain white rice (basicly half the box) Box price 3.25 for the largest generic brand box using half of it that makes the price of the rice used around 1.73 or so.
1 ham bone - if you can find the ham for .99 then the bone could count for as much as a half lb to two lbs of the ham itself so between 54 cents and 1.98 mine was about 60 cents worth
2lbs of Smoked sausage - buy whats on sale and you can usually get this for about 3 to 4 dollars I got lucky and got it for a dollar a lb so my cost was -2.00
1 onion - I got a bag of ten medium size yellow onions for 1.99 and used one for around .20

The rest of the ingredients consisted of dry seasoning like salt, black pepper, red pepper (I just used chilli powder) Buy the cheap kind at walmart for .50 a container and your price for all of your spices will probably be around a penny but Ill call it 5 cents to be on the safe side.

Total cost for the entire meal - $7.36 Price per serving - $0.45 Even my grandmother who went through the depression would be impressed by that.

I have included the link to the recipe since it isn't my own. Give it a try, it sure beats soup night.

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Paula Deen and Friends Living it up Southern Style Cookbook

The kids got this for me for mothers day and I really like the looks of it. I haven't gotten to try any of the recipes yet but several of them have caught my eye. For instance, her camp out menu is very interesting. She has a recipe she calls Hamburger pie. Well, its not a pie, but it is a recipe I am very familiar with. My grandmother and mother both called them picnic meals. Its one of my favorite things to take on a camp out. What I never considered was that you could do a twist on it with chicken or pork chops. I can't wait to try those.

She also has a menu made up just of drinks. Some are leaded as in don't give them to anyone under the age of 21. Most of them however aren't. It was nice to see good old fashioned recipes for summer drinks that wouldn't leave you wondering if you could walk to your car much less drive it.

She also talks a bit in the introduction about getting a part in the movie Elizabeth town. I love that movie. In fact, I didn't know much about Paula until that movie came out. I loved her character so much I had to get start watching her on the Food Network. Now her cookbook has proven to be a wonderful addition to my library as well. If you haven't gotten a copy yet, check it out. You may find something you really like.

I can say this much for the recipe's. Ive never seen a grits recipe that looked more like flat bread or a hoe cake than it did rice or cornmeal mush. I may actually have to try it. I might be southern but so far in my life I haven't been that southern. :)

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Chicken Pasta Mexicana


Edit note: added picture





I finally had time to stop and work on one of my recipes for the blog. Life has been a bit hectic. I have a picture of this recipe but everyone will have to be patient while I locate the cord to my camera so I can upload it.


Chicken Pasta Mexicana


2 lbs cooked shredded boneless chicken

1lb dried elbow macaroni noodles (substitute your favorite noodle if you like Penna Pasta would be good too.)

2quarts Chicken Broth

12 oz of your favorite Chunky Salsa

8oz cooked black beans

2 cups frozen corn

8 oz sour cream

2 8oz cans tomato sauce

8 oz Mozzarella Cheese

8oz Colby and Jack shredded cheese

Diced Tomatoes as Garnish



  1. bring chicken broth to boil then cook pasta in the broth until cooked to the texture you like.


  2. In large skillet heat chicken, corn, black beans, salsa, and tomato sauce thoroughly


  3. Drain cooked noodles mix in the chicken mixture, sour cream and Mozzarella Cheese


  4. Once the cheese is melted, place a layer of Colby and jack cheese on the bottom of the plate, using a measuring cup center 1 cup of the pasta onto the Colby and jack


  5. Top with the fresh diced tomatoes


  6. Serve

Serves 10


Note: I use homemade chicken broth I get from boiling the chicken off the bone.







Friday, April 3, 2009

Update

I broke my toe and cracked the bones in my foot behind it. So the Ciabatta bread was put on hold. Im hoping to be able to stand long enough to make it sometime next week.

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Torpedo Subs by Quiznos

We tried the new Torpedo Subs from Quiznos last night for supper. Having a broken toe, makes cooking a bit difficult.

These things were awesome. Bear pointed out that they were small and for a dollar more you could get a foot long sub with everything on it at Subway, but nothing Ive ever gotten from Subway was this good.

It was so good it has inspired me to try my hand at making Ciabatta bread and my own sandwiches. Ive found a few recipes I'm going to play with. When I'm done, Ill post the best of them here.

In the mean time, Supper tonight is coming out of thin air. I'm making some of the loaves of Artisan Bread, Bear has gotten tired of pasta in a tomato sauce, but he will eat it with a cream based sauce. So I'm probably going to make a homemade Mushroom Cream sauce with ground turkey and serve it over noodles or rice. That will go nice with the Bread and then this weekend Ill try the Ciapatta bread and post how well it turns out.

Monday, March 16, 2009

Great Bread Recipes

Ive been focusing on finding cheep healthy and quick bread recipes.

The first one I found was in Mother Earth News. Five minutes a Day for Fresh Baked Bread. Its a bit on the salty side if you cook it right away but when served with cheese or along side a good pasta dish, you don't notice it. It has a sour dough taste if you leave it for a few days. It does really only take five minutes after the initial creation of the dough and you don't have kneed it.

If your looking for Sandwich bread, then this is the prefect recipe. It has to do the whole rise and re-rise thing but ultimately, it turns out wonderfully.

If you want great homemade hot dog or hamburger buns then try these. Just be careful because if you don't get the liquid cool enough before you add it to the flour mixture you will kill the yeast. Unless you have a thermometer, leave it until you think its cool enough then leave it a bit more.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Enchalada Cassarole

I also wanted to try my hand at making healthier homemade refried beans I got the recipe from here. They turned out quite well though I could have let the beans cook for a half hour longer than I did before trying the recipe.



So I put it all together to make an enchilada recipe. I adapted my own recipe from an idea I found in one of the Taste of Home Magazines. But, because I didn't have all the items it asked for and some of them I did have many of my family members wouldn't eat, I recreated it to get something I think is just as good.



2 lbs Ground Turkey, Beef, or Pork (I used the Taco Seasoned Ground Turkey that walmart has been selling for a dollar a lb.)

2 lbs Mexican fancy cheese

3/4 cups sour cream

6 tortillas (Homemade or store bought, mine was home made)

1 cup frozen corn, cooked to the point of no longer being frozen

1 red onion, chopped

16 oz tomato sauce

Refried beans (how ever much the refried bean recipe makes for you.)

Head of Lettuce

1 Tomato



Cook the ground meat and onions together, mix in the corn, tomato sauce and refried beans

put a layer of tortillas in the bottom of a 13x9 inch casserole dish cover with the meat mixture. Top with a layer of sour cream and cheese then repeat.



Bake at 425 until the cheese is melted. Top with shredded lettuce and chopped tomatoes



If you have meat filling left over that won't fit into your casserole dish then make another in a different dish until its all gone. I made 1 large one and 1 smaller one.









Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Brownies

For my birthday or Christmas, I can't remember which, when I was 11 or 12 (so 25 or 26 years ago), my mother bought me a cookbook of my own. I don't remember the name. I'm holding the book in my lap right now but its a 25 year old paperback. The front cover is gone. The copyright page is gone. What is left are the recipes. If anyone recognizes the recipe and can give me the name of the book, I would be greatly appreciated.

This brownie recipe was raved over my entire life. I have had people beg me to make it. The problem is that every time I go to make it the recipe book has disappeared. So I'm going to put the recipe here. I hope someone finds it useful.

4 oz Unsweetened Chocolate
2/3 cup shortening
2 cups granulated sugar
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 cup chopped nuts (optional)
Powdered Sugar

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease baking pan
Heat the chocolate and shortening over low heat until the chocolate melts. Remove from heat mix in the sugar eggs and vanilla. Stir in the flour, baking powder, and salt. Add in the nuts if you are using them and then spread into the pan evenly.

Bake for 30 min or until the brownies start to pull away from the sides

Cool cut then sprinkle with powder sugar and serve.

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Im addicted

I'm addicted but I don't know to what exactly and that scares me. I'm addicted to Mt. Dew. But, can you really become addicted to a soda? Everyone says oh its the sugar or oh its the Caffeine but if that was true then why is it so easy to do without cake, candy,pies? I like them, I like to eat them, but I can stay away from them without a problem.

So okay then it must be the caffeine. So why doesn't drinking tea with caffeine or even coffee make it better? Tea just makes me more thirsty and coffee sends me running for the bathroom but neither do anything to help curb my desire for a Mt. Dew.

I may have stumbled onto something though. We say its the Sugar but truth is very few sodas use real sugar. They pretty much across the board use high fructose corn syrup. Now when I said earlier that I can do without cake candy and pies, I usual make mine from home. There are a few store bought varieties that give me that "Oh God" feeling that Mt. Dew does. If I am eating those I can leave the Mt. Dew alone. If I'm drinking Mt. Dew I can leave the store bought cakes and things alone but never both at the same time. I beginning to believe the true addictions in this world when it comes to food isn't so much to cabs or fat or even caffeine but to High Fructose Corn syrup.

On top of all of that, I saw an article on the Mother Earth News website today suggesting that this stuff is contaminated with Mercury. If that is true then how in the world can the people producing those ads supporting the use of this crap do it with a straight face? Addictive, Yeah I think I have that covered. Capable of poisoning you? Yup got that covered too.

You know we set up legislation to protect ourselves from lead poisoning. We try to control how much mercury ends up in our water supply but then we turn around and put something that contains Mercury into almost every quick food/convenience food/snack food known to man and think that everyone is going to be okay. Mercury doesn't go away. It stays in your system and slowly builds up over time. And here we are killing ourselves slowly.

Now I for one am all for natural selection and letting mother nature take care of our population problems the way she always has instead of trying to drug ourselves into oblivion. For me heath isn't about living longer its just about not being miserable while I'm alive. But, what I have a huge problem with is the idea that its okay for us to be contaminated by things that can kill us created by people who just want to make a quick buck and a government that says well some chemicals are okay. Well there not. Especially not this one.

I don't know what I'm going to do. But, one thing is for sure there has to be something out there that I can keep in easy supply that won't cost an arm and a leg and won't poison anyone. Maybe check into making and bottling my own sodas but then again, to do that, Ill have to find a way to flavor them without using the syrups that usually come with the soda making kits. Its kind of like snow cone machines. They are great to have at home, but when it comes time to flavor the ice our only real options are the syrup ladened with HFCS. I don't know about anyone else but knowing what I know now, I won't be using that stuff anymore anytime soon.

Wish me luck on kicking my 60 Oz's a day mt dew habit.

Edit: having looked over the list of things tested, Mt. Dew was not on the list. Pepsi and Coke Classic both were however and Pepsi tested clean where Coke did not. So it is completely possible that Pepsi's source comes from a better quality plant than Cokes but I'm not sure I'm willing to take that chance. But, even then it still boils down to the HFCS as being what I'm addicted to mercury or not. With the history of heart disease and Diabetes that runs in my family, I'm just asking for trouble. I think if we are going to treat the tobacco companies the way we do because of lung cancer we should treat the HFCS products the same way. But, very few will agree with me because were all addicted to HFCS and blaming it on something else.

Sunday, January 18, 2009

Quick Yeast Bread Rolls

This recipe was a pretty good one. I used a bit more stone ground wheat flour that it called for but it was whole grain so it was good for us. I forgot to get a picture though so Ill have to post that the next time I make it

Thursday, January 15, 2009

Pork Chilli and Cornbread

Supper tonight is Pork Chili and Cornbread.







For the Cornbread, use your favorite recipe. I typically use the one on the side of the corn meal package and add a little extra sugar as that I like my cornbread on the sweet side.

For the Pork Chili

3 to 5 lb Pork Roast
1 lb dry Pinto Beans
1 1/2 cups chopped Red onion
2 stalks celery, Chopped
8 large garlic cloves, chopped
1 teaspoon dried basil
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1 15oz can tomato sauce
1/4 cup Chili Powder
1 tbls Cumin

Soak beans overnight or use the quick soak method and cook on stove top following directions provided on package.

Cook Roast in slow cooker until it falls apart.

When beans are done add to un-drained beans The spices, celery, onion and garlic and tomato sauce continue to cook on medium low until pork is ready. Chunk or shred pork and add it to the bean mixture. Continue to simmer for another 20 minutes until all the flavors are combined. Serve with cheese on top and the cornbread on the side.

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

Been Gone a while

Well, Life got in the way for a while. My daughter lost my camera which is still missing. I'm still intent on finding good recipes and posting them here. Some of them of course will be my own.

Tonight supper is an old standby of Cheese Turkey Meatloaf, Mashed Potato's and creamed corn. I may make some biscuits too. I haven't made up my mind yet.