Making Do Without Missing A Thing--6 weekly meal plans in six posts---week five

   I have a confession to make.

   Girlscouts are just too darn cute. And they come to me, their doting, friendly piano teacher, 

and ask me to buy cookies. 

Every. single. year.

   My confession is that I just cant say no.

   SO....right now I am sitting here, writing my blog, drinking a Cherry Coke and eating a Samoa cookie.

   (was that thump I just heard you falling off your chair? Are you all right?)  

 ( Let's see, where was I?)

 Oh yes, I dream in chocolate. And when there is a possible chance I might actually get some, especially in the form of a Samoa Girlscout cookie, all resolve melts away and I can barely usher the adorable urchin out the door before ripping the top off the box in an effort to get to the cookies. And that plastic they wrap around it---seriously, is that stuff made of NASA material or what? Even a strong set of teeth can barely get it open when a person is in a hurry.
   Sad, isnt it? *sigh* Truth be told, I am incredibly thankful that you can not get those darn cookies other than once a year.
   I started berating myself about spending money on cookies while writing a six week series on spending less and feeding your family for under $200 a month.

And then......it hit me.

   It really is okay.

   Did you know the main reason most diets fail is because people reach a certain point that they just can no longer say no to the things that tempt them? They deny themselves SO much, that eventually that self-control just wears thin, and they give in. And THEN they reason that they have already fallen off the bandwagon, why not just go all out?
   Either that or when presented with the reality of all the things they would have to give up, they are completely unwilling to embrace a "full-tilt" plunge into dieting, and avoid it all together.
   Everything I have been sharing with you the last couple of months talk about gradual change leading to radical change. It is about changing your mindset, your approach, how you think of food, how you shop....all of it. And kudos to the many of you who have stepped out of those comfort zones and are starting on your own journey of "making do without missing a thing". But I want you to listen to something I have to say to you.
   There is nothing wrong with going out to eat once in a while, with getting a frozen pizza, or even ordering one in. Nothing wrong with budgeting a couple bags of chips and dip into the groceries for the week. NOTHING wrong with picking up the occasional soda, or candy, or any of that. Honestly, those things will keep you in the game, and make it so much easier to do what I am showing you.
   One dear crunchy friend, who has been a positive and encouraging influence in my life, said to me: "I admire all that you do, Heather, but I don't think you should bake that much sweet stuff. I mean, do you think it is that healthy for your kids to have all those cookies, and cobblers, and hand pies and etc? And surely you could probably make your grocery bill even lower if you cut some of that stuff out! I am just saying you want your kids to be healthy as well as satisfied". Now, Lord bless her little heart, she is right on only one thing. I COULD cut our grocery bill by more, a little, by cutting those things out. But to what end? We eat simply, healthily, and my kids (and husband) love their treats. It makes the beauty of cooking so much from scratch and/or basic ingredients seem like not such a huge endeavor when my kids' eyes light up at a batch of chocolate chip cookies. And I would rather they learn from a young age that ALL things should be done in moderation, including eating sweet snacks. I want them to learn to be able to say no to temptation because they have something else that replaces it in a healthy way. Isn't that what we all strive for in raising our families?
   So dont cut out the special things from your meal plans in an attempt to skimp by on the very least amount you can spend on groceries. Save a little wiggle room for those things...

                           and answer the door when the adorable Girlscout starts knocking.

just look at that face-could YOU say no?--this is the top selling cookie scout for three years!

   ***just as a sidenote, for those of you who love new recipes for baking, I happened to come across this recipe on Pinterest about making your OWN samoas and thin mints. I have not had the time lately to try them, and would be interested to hear if any of my readers have made these yet. click here for the recipe that will make you drool just looking at it. And if you like Thin Mints, here is the other recipe I am dying to try...
   Shall we get started on this week's meal plan? :)

 Meal Plan Number Five


Monday
   breakfast: Campfire toast with fried potatoes, onion and apples
   lunch: ground beef stroganoff over homemade noodles
   snack: apples and peanut butter, Oatmeal chocolate chunk cookies
   dinner: Open faced Turkey sandwiches over mashed potatoes and stuffing bread, green beans,
apple dumplings
Tuesday
   breakfast: Mulberry muffins
   lunch: cheesy potato soup with bread and salad
   snack: cottage cheese with pineapple, cookies
   dinner: Sesame noodles with stir fry veggies
Wednesday
   breakfast: wheat berry cereal with apples and cinnamon
   lunch: hummus and pita chips
   snack: carrot sticks with yogurt cheese dip, english muffins with cheese and chive topping
   dinner: Chicken Tortilla soup
Thursday
   breakfast: homemade pop tarts with Warm Chocolate Soother
   lunch: Leftover Chicken Tortilla Soup with toast points and canned pears
   snack: orange slices, and banana bread
   dinner: porkchop stuffing bake with roasted winter veggies
Friday
   breakfast: homemade breakfast sandwiches with eggs, sausage and cheese
   lunch: baked potatoes with broccoli, onion and cheese topping
   snack: banana Peanut butter bites, banana bread
   dinner: Green coconut chicken curry
Saturday
   breakfast: french toast from banana bread covered with a maple butter glaze for topping
   lunch: calzones with turkey, broccoli and cheese
   snack: whatever fresh fruit and baked goods we have on hand
   dinner: Individual pizzas with choice of toppings, meats, veggies and olives or mushrooms
Sunday
   breakfast: cinnamon rolls
   lunch: steaks, salad and hot cross buns
   snack: apples or oranges, any baked good we have on hand
   dinner: leftovers or waffles

  Really looking forward to sesame noodles and the green coconut chicken curry. I hope you have a wonderful week, and tell me, what are the items that you are going to splurge on once in a while to keep from feeling "deprived" in any way? Oh...and did you get them on sale? :)

Many Blessings to you and yours,

Heather

MOnday: Campfire toast is known by many different names. We always made it while camping, so in our household, that is what it is called. It is simply texas toast with a hole torn in the bread, and an egg cracked and cooked in the bread while toasting. The compliment to that is another thing we love to fry up while camping: potatoes, onions and apples all together. :) Seriously, dont knock it 'til you have tried it. A little butter and salt and you're good to go for breakfast. Beef Stroganoff is simply 3/4 lb ground beef fried up with onions and mushrooms, seasoned with garlic and Lawry's seasoning, then a cream sauce made from the  magic mix, and after adding about 1/2 cup plain yogurt, or sour cream, served over noodles. I often toss in dried spinach into the noodle mix while it is kneading in the mixer so that I know the kids are getting more veggies in this meal. Open Faced Sandwiches are pieces of toasted bread on a plate, with mashed potatoes, a meat and a gravy over the top. I am sure you still have a ton of turkey left over from the meal plan from last week, so this is one of those meals you can use it up. To make stuffing bread, I make a batch of bread and include the following spices: sage, rosemary, thyme, basil, and oregano, plus garlic powder, and salt. Let it bake like normal and then when done, you can use it for this meal AND cut it up and dry it for homemade stuffing, or even croutons. Smart, right? :) Apple Dumplings are peeled, cored apples that you wrap in homemade pie dough, set into a greased 9X9 pan, and fill the middle open space with brown sugar, apple pie spice, and butter. Bake at 350* for one hour and let them sit for a while before eating because that filling is HOT. I know a lot of people in the fall who actually stuff the inside cavity with red hots. I havent tried it yet, but am sure for red hot fans it would be amazing. :)

Tuesday: Using my master muffin mix throw in 1/2 cup dried mulberries and be sure to either add in 1 tsp of vanilla or almond flavoring if you have it. They bake for around 15 minutes at 350*. Cheesy Potato Soup is great stuff, and wonderful for cold winter days. In a stock pan bring 3 cups of chicken stock or one quart of canned chicken stock to a boil, and add 1 cup dried, crushed potatoes. (otherwise, just add 3 cups uncooked or homecanned potatoes). Let simmer for about 20 minutes, and then add 1 1/2 cups fresh or canned potatoes to the stock pot, one more quart of water, and mix in enough Magic Mix to thicken it up into a creamy sauce. To the pot add one cup diced onion, 2 stalks diced celery, 1 tsp of sea salt, and about 1 tsp garlic powder. Once all the potatoes are cooked thoroughly, as is the other veggies, take out your potato masher and mash most of the potatoes so the soup becomes like thin mashed potatoes (with some chunks). To this add one full cup of sour cream or plain yogurt, and one cup of shredded cheese. Sprinkle the top of the soup with real bacon pieces and chives, and serve with fresh bread. Sesame Noodle Stir Fry was based off this link from Pinterest. I use all my own noodles, use apple cider vinegar, skip the chicken, and toast my sesame seeds, as well as throw in a bag of stir fry veggies instead of buying everything separate and chopping it up. To make a garlic-asian sauce, use garlic powder, soy sauce and teriyaki sauce instead with a touch of brown sugar. Easy to do, and very good tasting.

Wednesday: Hummus around here is chock full of veggies covered by smooth chickpea paste. In a bowl (or if you dont have an immersion blender, do all this in your blender) I put two cans (or one pint) of chickpeas, reserving some of the liquid in case I need to thin the hummus. I then add one tomato, one cucumber, two carrots, 1/2 onion, one garlic clove, 1/2 cup mayo or plain yogurt, 1 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp cumin and curry powder, 3 dashes tabasco sauce, two dashes soy sauce, and blend away. When it is pureed, I serve in bowls with powdered green onion over the top, although in the summer we often serve with chopped green onion and cucumber slices as well as pita chips for dipping. To be honest, there are an awful lot of veggies you could throw into this mix and your kids will still eat it. I have found that you have to be careful how many cukes you throw in because it will water your hummus down. And it is still good the next day.  Chicken Tortilla Soup is one of my very favorites, and is often so good you just keep going back for more. I got the basic recipe from my Fix it and Forget it cookbook, but of course tweaked it to fit our tastes in this family. You need: one cup chicken (cubed, shredded, frozen fresh or dehydrated)/ 2 cans or one quart black beans, undrained (just dump in crockpot)/ 2 cups (or one pint) sweet and spicy salsa/ 2 cans Rotel tomatoes or one quart home canned chili tomatoes)/ 1 small can chopped green chilies/ 1 large can tomato sauce or spaghetti sauce/ one bag (or two cups dried corn)/ two quarts chicken stock (7 cups worth)/ and 1/2 block Veleveeta cheese. (yes, I know, SO BAD for you.....but it really isnt going to kill you if you eat it ONCE in a while...or atleast, I dont think so.....). Throw everything but the Velveeta into the crockpot and cook on low for 6 -8 hours. If you are using dried chicken, make sure to test the chicken before serving--it may need a little longer to cook without being stringy tasting. Put the cheese-ish stuff in about an hour before serving and let it cook down. I serve with tortilla strips sprinkled across the top. To make those, cut a tortilla in thin strips, shake in a bag with oil and salt, and then bake in an oven for a couple of minutes until crisp. Watch carefully as they burn fast. :) This recipe normally makes enough for us to eat one night, and then we bag the other half and freeze it--two bags, one for another night of soup sometimes, and another I add more Velveeta to and we turn into a dip with homemade tortilla chips. :) You just add more Velveeta to get it there.
Thursday: Homemade Pop Tarts came from another one of my favorite sites (Heavenly Homemakers)and the kids LOVE them. I have yet to figure out how to make chocolate ones (*sigh*) but have gotten pretty good at making the Maple Brown Sugar filling that is similar to the store ones. It is simply pie crust, rolled out in a 50/50 sugar and flour combination, the filling is either your favorite jam or shortening, butter, brown sugar and cinnamon with a touch of maple flavoring. Cut the pie crust into typical "pop-tart" shapes, spread the filling, and lay another layer on top, pinching the edges with your fork, and pricking the top. We have never put these in the toaster, but you can bake in the oven in about 8-10 minutes, or in the toaster oven for less. Warm Chocolate soother is the same as last week's vanilla soother drink, but with 1 TBS of baking cocoa mixed in. Very rich and satisfying. Again, from Heavenly Homemakers site. Porkchop Stuffing Bake is this: in a 9X13 greased pan layer the following: 4 cups stuffing with herbs (homemade or boxed) not made, six porkchops, thin ones. In a separate bowl combine 2 cups of water (hot) and 2 batches of magic mix made with chicken stock and crumbled dried mushrooms (or 2 cans cream of mushroom soup). Pour this over the porkchops and stuffing, cover with foil and bake one hour at 350*. Test meat to be sure it is no longer pink inside.
Friday: I got the great idea on breakfast sandwiches from this great website: skinnymomskitchen. com Your imagination is all that limits your breakfast sandwich making. The best part is being able to freeze them and have them available for your family to pull out when they want one (such as hungry hubbies who are on the prowl for something after working hard outside, etc). Convenient to pull out for a quick breakfast as well. Banana Peanut Butter Bites are sliced bananas that you freeze on a cookie sheet for a couple hours, heat up one cup of peanut butter and mix with a handful of chocolate chips, and drop the banana slices into until they are coated. Then lay them on a cookie sheet and put back in the freezer until set. We have tried this with using Nutella as well, and man, just way too good. I have also used SunButter, and it has worked just as well. Coconut Chicken Curry uses green curry paste, which might be a little much for those of you who are feeding kids, so be sure to add it after you take out portions for kids who arent going to react to spice very well. This is the recipe I printed and keep in my cooking binder. I use canned cubed chicken, my own tomatoes and skip the tomato sauce, going for more of the coconut yumminess by stretching the sauce with either milk, or almond milk, depending on what we have on hand. I also add the green curry paste right at the end after dishing out the kids' plates. When we have it, I put large chunks of pineapple, and bell pepper in the pan only a few minutes before serving.
Saturday: all your links are above. For the Maple Butter sauce for the french toast just melt butter in a pan, stir in 1/2 cup dark brown sugar, 1 tsp of vanilla, and 1/4 tsp maple flavoring. Simmer until thick, and then drizzle over french toast.
Sunday: for the hot cross buns make them ahead of time when you bake bread and put them in the freezer. Just mix one Tbs caraway seeds into the bread dough before rising the first time, and add an extra 1/4 cup sugar into the mix. Taking a muffin tin that has been well greased, split your bread dough into 12 pieces from one portion you would have put into a loaf of bread. Roll each portion into a ball and place in the muffin cups, then score the top with a cross or plus mark. Let rise until double, and then bake at 350* for 15 minutes or so until golden brown. When cooled, drizzle a simple frosting over the top that is made with powdered sugar, lemon juice and a touch of vanilla.

Making Do Without Missing A Thing---6 weeks of meal plans in 6 posts!!--week five

   

 I am troubled.

   I am watching the price of gas going up and it makes my mind travel back to a couple years ago when gas spiked before--leaving many families making some really tough choices between hitting the grocery store or filling up the gas tank to get to work. I wish I could communicate to you the urgency that is behind this series that I am posting online. While in another six months you may not be able to feed a family of five for under $200 a month, you will be well on the way there if you start NOW. :)


   I am thinking about doing a couple more posts when this series is done about how to take some basic meals and ingredients and make them stretch for your family. I will also be blogging on how to save money on homemade cleaners, gardening, and as always, interspersing all of those with my heart to heart chats I have with you of what is weighing on my mind at the time.

   If you have any space: a balcony, a window seat, as well as the standard yard, I would encourage you to step out and start gardening this year. If you have lawn and the ability to plant some veggies or even a fruit tree or two, I would encourage you to do it. If you have a relative or good friend nearby that owns their home who would be open to sharing some of their space outside with you, I want to encourage you to take the step now and call them. I really think we are heading into some hard-er times than we have seen in a while. My husband and I have discussed many different ways we can make ourselves as "self-sustainable" as possible while living in a small rural town. Each demographic has its own challenges, and frankly, you will never be entirely self-sufficient if you live where there is electricity, and city water and sewer, trash pickup, etc.

But you can do the best you can with what you have been given.

   We have transferred our majority of our heat to wood-burning. We have purchased in bulk, and learned all sorts of ways to put food aside as we grow it or see it on sale. We will soon be investing in rabbits again and starting to raise them for meat like we have in the past. We are purchasing smaller fruit trees to add some fresh fruit into our yard as well as the black walnut trees that grow here already. Dont get me wrong, we are not hoarders, or anything else that the media right now would like to portray us. Just simple folks who have had to learn the hard way that sometimes making sure your family is fed, safe, and warm can take a lot of creativity if you want to do it without a lot of help.

   I don't know where you are tonight. If you are just here looking for some great recipes, then wonderful and welcome to the Welcoming House! I have plenty to share! If you are here looking for some encouragement to find a way to save and keep your grocery bill down, then you are at the right place. Welcome! And finally, if you are here because you are down on your luck and looking for a way to make all the crazy pieces work, welcome. I have walked in those shoes a time or two, and always ended up the better for it, albeit with a few more grey hairs. :)
   In light of what we have been talking about, this meal plan will be the most simple, and the cheapest for ingredients I have posted so far. We are talking minimal meat, doing things from scratch, and using what you can to feed your family. I hope you find this week entertaining, delicious, and relaxing when you realize how inexpensive it is.

   

Monday

   Breakfast: breakfast burritos using refried beans, scrambled eggs, canned potatoes, and dried peppers

   Lunch: mini-cheese pizzas

   Snack: apples and smoothies

   Dinner :Best Turkey Soup, bread, and peach cobbler

Tuesday

   Breakfast: Brown Sugar Pancakes with peach syrup

   Lunch: Cheesy Taco Shell Bake

   Snack: oranges and dough faces

   Dinner: pita pockets with creamy bean filling, salad, and cookies

Wednesday

   Breakfast Chocolate Cream of wheat, and cocoa
   Lunch: Broiled Tuna Melts

   Snack: celery and carrots with Ranch, cookies

   Dinner: Homemade Pasta with pumpkin Bisque, 

Thursday

   Breakfast: Hard Boiled Deviled Eggs with Toast and cocoa

   Lunch: Grilled Turkey, Tomato and Cheese Sandwiches with fruit

   Snack apples with peanut butter, cheese quesadilla rollups

   Dinner: Spinach Sausage Quiche with Jam Bars

Friday

   Breakfast: waffles, strawberry jam, and Warm Vanilla Soothers

   Lunch: individual bean burritos with Sweet and Spicy Salsa

   Snack: mandarin oranges, and jam bars

   Dinner: Porcupine Meatballs with orange rice, fruit salad

Saturday

   Breakfast: cold cereal, bananas, and milk

   Lunch: Beef and Barley Stew with fresh bread

   Snack: pretzels and mini hand pies

   Dinner: Veggie Delight Pizza

Sunday

   Breakfast: Apricot Almond Breakfast Bars, cocoa or coffee

   Lunch: 15 bean and ham soup, farmer's rolls, and custard pie

   Snack: canned pears and pie

   Dinner: leftovers

Bless you, dear reader. 

Many Blessings to you and yours,

Heather

Monday:  

use homemade corn tortillas for wrapping the mix in. I scramble eggs, a pint of home-canned potatoes, and a can of refried beans all together, as well as a handful of dried sweet peppers that I have started to rehydrate in hot water while making the tortillas. Did you know you can make your own refried beans for a fraction of what a can costs you? All they are is cooked pinto beans that have been pureed and then heated with seasonings and lard. Seriously. But This recipe shows you how to do it all in one step and make fat free nummy refried beans in a crockpot. Beans freeze well, so if you make up a batch, put the extra in the freezer for the next meal. Anyhow...fry everything up and serve your family with warm tortillas and hearty filling to give them a good start on the day. Our smoothies use milk (either fresh or powdered that we mix up), any fruit we have available, and Kale if we have it around. Throw in a banana or two and you are ready to go for a smoothie that is filling and satisfying. Turkey, hands down, is one of the cheapest meats you can purchase on sale that will give you a spectacular yield for one purchase. Last year around Thanksgiving when turkey went on sale for .40 a pound we picked up a few. One provided us with almost 10 meals, and finished off with over 14 quarts of turkey stock for canning (not to mention when we used before that). Best Turkey Soup uses some of that meat. Take two quarts of turkey stock/ one pint of cubed canned or 2 cups frozen turkey/, 1/2 cup red lentils/ one onion, diced or 1/2 cup dried/ one clove of garlic, minced/ 1/2 cup brown rice/ 3 carrots cubed (or 1/2 cup dried)/ tarragon, basil and oregano, plus one bay leaf. Put all into a large stock pot and add 2 cups water, and 1 tsp onion or garlic salt. Cover and let simmer for an hour or so, then serve. Peach Cobbler is also easy to throw together. Take one large can of sliced peaches (or one quart home canned), drained/ Pour into greased 8X8 pan. Take your Master Cookie Mix, and use one cup added to one cup oatmeal, plus 4 Tbs of butter or margarine, as well as 2 Tbs of Brown sugar. Put this topping over the peaches, drizzle a couple Tbs of the peach juice from the can over the pan, and bake at 350* for about 30 minutes until browned on the top. Reserve the juice for peach syrup tomorrow.

Tuesday: 

 Brown Sugar Pancakes are just plain pancakes made with dark brown sugar to give them a darker color. Taking the juice from the peach can, heat it on the stove, add a Tbs of Cornstarch, and serve with your pancakes. If you need to thin it out to make more (from my home canned peaches I get about 1 1/2 cups) add up to 1/3 cup water and 1 Tbs sugar to it. Cheesy Taco Shell Bake is the same as my mac and cheese but you do a couple things a touch differently. First, use shells instead of macaroni. Second, add taco seasoning (or make your own) to the sauce while you are making it, and serve it with a touch of paprika on the top for prettiness. Remember, Tuesday is my bread baking day, so for dough faces I have the kids each take their own pat of dough and roll it out (help is obviously required for my twins so none gets beaned with the rolling pin). Bake as you would a roll or pizza dough. When still warm, cover with peanut butter or cream cheese and give the kids an assortment of items to put on such as raisins, carrots, olives, etc. They have so much fun that they never know what they are eating is good for them! Pita bread is stuffed with a combination that is to die for in my next recipe. Take a couple cans of garbanzo beans (chickpeas), drain and rinse, then put in bowl. Take a potato masher and smash some of them, but leave some whole. To this add the following: 2 Tbs olive oil/ 1 tsp salt/one cup plain yogurt/ soy sauce/ one can (or pint) diced tomatoes, drained/ one red onion, diced really small/ and one can of sliced olives/ to this add a tsp of cumin powder and cilantro if you have it. Serve in the pita breads alongside sliced cucumbers and spinach, or even bean sprouts (SO easy to grow at home in a Quart jar with a little water and a coffee filter) to add to the pitas. Sugar cookies make a nice finish to the meal, and are a simple, inexpensive dessert everyone loves. Make sure to have enough for the next couple snacks (if you can keep everyone out of them!)

Wednesday: 

Homemade Pasta recipe can be found by clicking here and scrolling down to the recipes at the bottom. For the topping, I heat pumpkin (2 cups worth), crumbled spinach, diced onion, and tarragon in a pan, adding about one cup of cream sauce to it that gets whisked in. Salt and pepper. I make my cream sauce with chicken bullion or stock so it gives the pumpkin an even warmer flavor. Be sure to season it right before serving with cinnamon. Even guests ask for the recipe because it is so unusual and flavorful. With a lb of sausage, it makes a killer filling for ravioli. :) Especially with a creamy sage sauce.

Thursday:

You have a lot of turkey left over right? So today you take some of that shredded turkey, a handful of re-hydrated dried cherry tomatoes, and a slice of cheese and you grill a sandwich for each person in your family. Cheese Quesadilla roll-ups are tortillas spread with cream cheese and sprinkled with cheese shreds, then rolled up and cut in half for each person. Spinach Sausage Quiche is a simple and satisfying meal. I often make up this filling in larger batches and freeze it so all I have to do is pull out a bag and thaw. Same with my pie crust--I always have two or three double pie crust doughs frozen in large "pucks" so it is easy prep and that less demand on my time. After all, what is to making a triple size batch of pie dough vs a single? Takes the same amount of time but yield more meals, that's what. :) You need a single pie dough for this recipe. Then in a frying pan, combine the following: 1/2 lb sausage/ 1/2 onion/ one can or 1/4 cup dried spinach with 2 Tbs water/ salt and pepper to taste. When this is all browned and cooked, place in the bottom of the pie shell. Whip 6 eggs with one cup milk, add a touch of mustard, and garlic salt, pour over the filling, and bake for one hour at 350* or until lightly brown and no longer jiggly in the center.  

Jam Bars:  1 ½ cups flour/ 1 teaspoon baking powder/ ¼ teaspoon salt/1 ½ cups quick oats/1 cup sugar/ ¾ cup margarine/ 1 1/2 cups jam (depends on how much you like) (we love love love this with blueberry or strawberry jam around the Welcoming House)

• reserve 2/3 of the mix when you combine everything but the jam. Press the other 2/3 into the bottom of a 9X13 pan, cover with jam, sprinkle the rest on top, and bake for 30-45 minutes at 350*. let cool and then serve slightly warm.

Friday:

Porcupine Meatballs are the same recipe as my other meatballs, but when you make them, you take 1/4 of the mixture and add 3/4 cup of long grain rice, that is uncooked. Freeze as they are without cooking them, or make meatballs today for the freezer! Place in a greased 9X9 dish, cover with one large can tomato sauce mixed with one cup of water and cook for 45 minutes covered with foil. Take off foil and cook another 15 minutes. Orange rice is brown rice with the following ingredients: 2 Tbs Orange Juice concentrate, 1 tsp orange zest, one Tbs dried minced onion that all cooks together while you are waiting for the meatballs. Fruit salad is either two bananas, two apples, and two oranges (or a can of fruit cocktail) cut up into pieces and stirred with a couple Tbs of orange juice concentrate, and shredded coconut. If I have them, I will throw in a handful of mini-marshmallows.

Saturday: 

In the crockpot (since you will be baking today--bread, pretzels and mini-hand pies) combine the following for Beef Barley Stew: 3/4 lb ground beef or venison stew meat/ 3/4 cup barley/ 1 onion diced (or 1/2 cup dried)/ 2 potatoes diced (or one pint canned potatoes/ 2 carrots diced (1/3 cup dried--all of these can be from your dried stores, folks)/ two Tbs Worchestershire sauce/ two quarts of beef stock or the equivalent of 7 cups worth in beef stock/ one bay leaf/ 1 tsp thyme/ one tsp sage/ 1 tsp garlic salt. Let cook on low for about 4-6 hours, then thicken with a slurry of flour and stock from the soup. Pretzels: this is the recipe we use to make these, and I like that they are baked, not boiled in hot water. We dip ours in cinnamon sugar or brown sugar and browned sesame seeds. It is so easy to do! Mini hand pies are pie dough rolled out into a rectangle, split into strips lengthwise, and then the filling put on one side of the dough. Make sure you leave enough around the edges to fold the dough over and pinch with a fork to seal. Be sure to cut slits in the top so your pies don't explode. We bake ours on cookie sheets, often with parchment paper, for 15-20 minutes at 350*. When you take them out, rub a stick of butter quickly over the top and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar or just plain sugar. Veggie Delight Pizza uses any leftover veggies from the week, based on a cheesy cream sauce that has pureed carrots in it, giving it a orange/ reddish color. I also routinely re-hydrate various dried veggies from my cupboard, such as corn, carrots, yellow squash and red peppers. Top with mozzarella and sliced olives in a smiley face and your kids will eat it. :) Great way to use up leftover veggies, but so is my post on using your freezer to make stone soup.

Sunday:

Apricot Almond breakfast bars use a simple shortbread as the crust, canned ginger apricot puree as the filling,with a heavy streusel over the top. If your kids object the first time to the strongness of the apricot, puree up one steamed carrot into it which sweetens and mutes the apricot taste. Shortbread recipe is easy: 3/4 cup flour/ 1/4 tsp almond flavoring/ 1/4 cup sugar/ 1/2 tsp of salt/1/2 cup room temperature butter. oven to 350* Combine the flour, sugar and salt in a mixing bowl. Work in the butter with a fork or pastry cutter until the dough has the consistency of short crust. (reserve  about 1/8 cup for the topping) Turn out onto the floured counter and knead until smooth, press into the bottom of  9X13 pan and prick with a fork. Pour one pint of canned apricot ginger puree over the top (or make your own from one large can of apricots, drained and pureed with 1 tsp of ginger and 1/2 cup brown sugar.) Combine the reserved crust with sliced almonds, 1/2 cup brown sugar, and 1/2 cup cookie mix with a pinch of salt. Sprinkle over top of bars and bake at 350* for 30 minutes until topping is lightly browned. These need to sit about 10 minutes to firm up when bake before eating. !5 bean and Ham Soup is the bagged meal you buy in the store. We soak overnight, then drain, put in the crockpot with either ham stock we have canned, or a ham bone we have saved from a previous meal, and cook on low for about 6 hours. We also put in celery, carrots and onions the last hour or so. Banana Custard Pie is found right here on one of my favorite sites. I make my pudding from home using my Magic Mix flavored with vanilla extract and cinnamon and nutmeg. Graham Cracker crust is easy using store bought graham crackers and a little butter, pressed into a pie dish and refrigerated for an hour or so.

   Remember, making things from home is inexpensive and  saves you money in the end. Save your time by making things ahead of time, by thinking ahead, and by planning your meals. When you grocery shop, decide which meals you are going to buy double of to build your pantry up. And make up those master Mixes so it doesn't take any more time to make up a batch of cream sauce, muffins, cookies, cornbread, or anything else. Only two more meal plans and then our final week together on this series! :)

Making Do Without Missing a Thing---6 weeks of meal plans in 6 posts--week five

 


*Vrrrrrrrrrrooooooooooooooom Vrrrrrrrooooooooooooommmm!!!!!!!!!!"

   This is what I am thinking about as I am sitting down to write the third meal plan in the fifth week of our series on Making Do Without Missing a Thing? Remember my adorable, and sometimes (oftentimes) overwhelming twins? Yes. I was thinking today that they will be two in just under a month, and the time has flown by so fast with them.
   I waited ten years for God to bring me those two precious little bundles of dark eyes and crazy dark spiral hair. And every time I get a kiss, a hug, a pat, a smile, I want to tear up and cry. God has been so good to me.

   Last week their favorite game was "Choo choo". It was cute. One would hang on to the other, and they would run through the house, chugging away and collapsing with laughter when one would suddenly decide to shout "TOOT TOOOT!!!".
   Very very cute.
   And very entertaining.
   And anyone could join in.


   Not this week. NO, this week the game is very very fast, it is every toddler for herself, and goodness help the cat or the dog if they get in the way of chubby toddler legs careening around corners or through doorways in a race to some imaginary finish line.
   Its cute. I get it.
   But its also borderline-driving this mamma to distraction.
   I cant even think when I hear that "vroooooooom", because all I am waiting for is the wail that will soon follow when someone wrecks their Maserati right into the piano bench, or wall of the living room.

   *sigh*

   Can someone get me some coffee? :)

   The reason I am thinking about that tonight is because, in some ways, that same sound relates to our whole series the last five weeks.
   I'll be honest. There was a point in time that I was thinking---"Sheesh! What was I thinking setting myself up for a six week series on anything????"  And the struggle was to reconcile myself to exerting personal discipline and setting myself up to write all this down, because I knew there were many others out there who needed it.
   But here we are, halfway through the posts on the next to last week, and we are almost done.

                                                    *Vrrrrroooooom, indeed*

   But what that sound makes me think of even more is how quickly these things I have written about will begin to really, seriously, change your grocery budget as you begin to apply them one by one. Forget the eight years of hard knocks for you. You, reader, are one lucky person, because I already made those mistakes for you! Doesnt that make you happy, even just a little bit?
   I am doing my  best to figure out not only how to pull all this stuff together for the last week, but to make the whole series end with a bang. I am talking pull out the party hats and kazooos, because we are going to party that I made it through in writing this whole thing, and to reward you for being with me through it all! I am thinking a giveaway of one of my favorite books that got me to where I am today, and an opportunity for you to share these posts with those you love. Whadda ya think? Is anybody up for that? :) If there is not enough interest, I will just end on a nice, sweet note and plan on another series very soon. I'd like to hear if there is something you are interested in learning about. :)
   Week three is a great meal week. The fam loves it, and I love it, because there are some seriously good meals, and because some of those meals are really easy for Moi, who does most of the cooking.
   If you have any questions, please ask and I will answer as soon as I can
.
   *in reading through this I realized I wanted to say that we eat a lot of chicken, because for our family a single chicken can make four or five meals. Nothing is wasted. When we are done with all the meat on the carcass, it is boiled with seasonings for chicken stock. Also, it is rare that anything we eat uses over 3/4 of a lb of meat for five people. I just dont think we need to eat a lot of meat, and it is more for the texture of it being there. However, just like anything, I keep my meat-loving husband happy by occasionally adding in a meal that really has meat in it, such as the Meat lovers pizza or Hamburgers.  Our diet as Americans is way too focused on meat, rather than the veggies and fiber from whole grains that we really should be eating more of. :) Just my two cents. Once this series is over I am planning on showing you how to take a chicken and make it into four or five meals for your family. :)

 
Meal Plan---week Three

Monday:
   Breakfast: poached eggs with green onions, hashbrowns (from dehydrated store bought hashbrowns), and maple sausage links
   Lunch: Calzones and canned vanilla pears with nutmeg topping
   Snack orange slices, graham crackers with cream cheese
   Dinner: Stuffed porkchops with green beans, cheesy rice, and apple cake

Tuesday:
   Breakfast: Blueberry waffles with mock whipped topping and blueberry syrup
   Lunch: Cowboy Macaroni with peaches
   Snack: apple slices with fruit dip, apple cake (yep, apple theme day)
   Dinner: Chicken Carbonara, garlic bread and Rich chocolate pudding

Wednesday:
   Breakfast:  Maple Walnut Oatmeal
   Lunch: Baked Potatoes with Creamed Peas and carrots, topped with bacon bits (the real stuff)
   Snack: ants on a log, and dried fruit and granola snack
   Dinner: Chicken and Dumplings with a large salad

Thursday:
   Breakfast: French Toast with bananas and butter/powdered sugar glaze
   Lunch: chicken, tomato and cheese Quesadillas
   Snack: carrot sticks with ranch, Zucchini bread
   Dinner: Pork ginger stir fry with fried rice (uses up leftovers from this week)

Friday:
   Breakfast: Cream of Wheat with fresh fruit
   Lunch: Homemade egg noodles with ground turkey and zucchini cheesy sauce
   Snack: fruit smoothie roll-ups from the dehydrator, Zucchini bread
   Dinner: curried chickpea mash with naan bread, jello salad

Saturday: 
   Breakfast: cold cereal or toast and cocoa,
   Lunch: Michael's Chicken Noodle soup with fresh breadsticks
   Snack: any fresh fruit, or vegetable in house, and orange almond muffins
   Dinner: Meat Lover's pizza: uses pepperoni, sausage, canadian ham,and venison burger on a marinara sauce. I sneak pureed carrots/onions into the red sauce and sprinkle the pizza with basil and spinach flakes.

Sunday:
   Breakfast: Caramel rolls with Caramel sauce
   Lunch: baked chicken with Parmesan couscous, Vegetable medley, and Farmer's rolls
   Snack: orange almond muffins, and fruit salad
   Dinner: leftovers or waffles

   Doesn't that sound good? I am telling you, this week is one of my favorites for a couple of reasons.I use up a lot of leftovers as I go along, which I try to do in other weeks, but kinda get a little lazy about, reasoning my family needs something to eat on Sunday night, right? :) But it also includes some of my favorite things: my brother's soup, caramel roll, anything with ginger, and my mother's farmer's roll recipe. It would be the very best week if it just didn't have jello salad in it. Sorry. Totally not a favorite of mine. But the rest of the family knows when this week comes around they actually get to eat Jello, and Mom wont gag while they do it. :) Small concessions, and everyone is happy on the home front.
    Hope you all enjoy this meal plan, and the recipes that follow.

Many Blessings to you and yours,

Heather                

Monday:
When I  make anything I am always pulling stuff out of my dehydrating cupboard in an effort to get more seasonings or veggies from what I put up each year. It is just a tall cupboard deep enough for one layer of quart jars all the way up the shelf from the floor. Love it. When I said green onions on the poached eggs, that means I take a small handful and crumble it over the top of the cooking eggs. The steam from poaching it rehydrates it and makes it so nummy. Hashbrowns or any other kind of potato from the frozen food section of your grocery are very easy and wonderful things to dehydrate as they put up easily, keep their color, and rehydrate without going to mush. I can put three to four large bags of hashbrowns into a single quart jar when dehydrated. You just have to watch how much you use so you don't make a huge amount by mistake! Put them in a frying pan with a little butter and some water or broth and they will be back to themselves in no time at all. Calzones are essentially sandwich pockets with whatever filling you choose to put in them, then folded over and sealed with water and a fork. I do this a lot with leftover meats and cheese. Vanilla Pears are home-canned pears that I make every year, just adding a touch of vanilla to the bottom of each jar before I put the pears in and add the syrup. It is easy and very good. My husband filets and then stuff his stuffed porkchops with stuffing that he mixes with apples and raisins. The stuffing is either bought on sale, or made from stale slices of home made bread. They bake in a foil covered 9X13 pan for up to one hour. He seasons them with Lawry's salt and rubbed sage from my garden. The Cheesy rice is brown rice cooked with onion salt, dried onions, and chicken stock. Then I shred 1 cup cheddar cheese into four cups brown rice. Be sure to reserve one porkchop and one cup of rice (before you add the cheese) in the fridge for another meal later this week! Apple Cake: 3 medium apples, washed and diced up (I leave skin on), 2 eggs, 1/2 c. oil, 1 1/3 cups dark brown sugar, 2 tsp apple pie spice, 2 cups of flour (I use whole wheat, but you can use all purpose if you need)---in last 1/4 cup of flour put 1/2 tsp salt and 2 tsp baking soda, mix well, then add into the batter. Batter will be really stiff, and you need to scrape the bowl a couple of times while mixing, even with a kitchen aid mixer. Fold into a greased 9X13 pan and top with walnut pieces if desired. Bake for 45 minutes at 350*. Can also top with a caramel sauce if you want to impress company.

Tuesday: 

Blueberry waffles are simply waffle batter with blueberry jam added to it. If I have some extra canned blueberries sitting around from another recipe, I throw those in too. Mock Whipped Topping can be made by clicking on this link. You need unflavored gelatin, but that is really good for your bones, and for your kids as well, keeping their joints healthy. It tastes very similar but not quite as sugary as Cool Whip. You can make this for apple cake as well, and since the recipe makes three cups, just set it aside for the morning. Blueberry syrup is again, saved from canned blueberries, and just boiled on the stove with 1/2 cup white sugar and water, thickened with cornstarch, and then poured over the waffles. Cowboy Macaroni is the same macaroni recipe as the last meal plan's recipe, but I add a can of sweet and spicy salsa, as well as 1/2 lb of ground beef or venison to it after browning the meat and adding onion salt. I know with three girls I should call it Cowgirl Macaroni, but the name just keeps sticking. Chicken Carbonara is such a comfort food indulgence, but making it once every six weeks wont kill you. I dont use heavy cream, but 1 cup of water to two cups of instant full fat milk equals a very similar taste. Click here for the basic recipe, and be sure to save some bacon for a few more meals---we put about half what this recipe calls for. For Rich Chocolate Pudding just use some Magic Mix, powdered baking cocoa and sugar. If I am making enough for 4 cups of pudding, I will add one cup sugar, and 1/2 cup baking cocoa to the pudding that is cooking in the pan. Follow the directions on the link recipe to make up the 3 cups of cream pudding.

Wednesday:

Maple Walnut Oatmeal is basic oatmeal with 1/2 tsp of maple flavoring and 1/2 cup toasted walnuts added to it as a topping with brown sugar. For the Baked Potato Meal, you just need to make up a batch of the magic mix, season it with garlic and onion salt, and then mix in a bag of frozen peas and carrots (or rehydrate one cup of home dried in boiling water for about an hour--peas take a while). Crumble your reserved bacon from Monday's dinner, and serve to the fam. Dried Fruit Granola Snack is using home made granola with canned fruit that you have dried. Different people have their favorites, but one of ours is now the tropical fruit salad. I drained the jar, rinsed the fruit,and plopped it on the trays. Good good stuff. When you mix it with homemade granola----filling snack that is yummy and good for everyone too! Granola is made around here in large batches. Take 12 cups of oatmeal, 3 cups coconut, 2 cups sunflower seeds, 1 cup hulled sesame seeds, 1 cup wheat germ, and 1 cup ground flax seed and put into a turkey roaster. In a sauce pan combine 1 1/2 cups honey and 1 1/2 cups coconut oil. Heat until very runny and pourable. Pour over the ingredients in the roaster and stir well to combine. Use a spatula to keep scraping sides down. Place roaster in oven at 350*. Bake for a total of 20-25 minutes, but keep stirring about every 5 minutes. place on cookie sheets and let cool, break into small pieces for cereal, or larger pieces to make snacks with for the dried fruit/granola snack. Delicious. Chicken and dumplings is based off of this recipe, but I obviously make my own cream soup using chicken stock, add an extra quart of stock, and make my own biscuts rather than buying the cans in the store. We also add more carrots and corn from my dehydrated stores, about 1/4 cup each. This, combined with the biscuts, makes for very thick and comforting chicken and dumplings.
Thursday:
French Toast: using homemade bread, I make my egg dip with more milk and vanilla so the bread is really custardy. The homemade bread also soaks up more, but it is just so good! Afterwards I top with sliced bananas, butter pats, and then sprinkle with simple powdered sugar. Zucchini Bread uses shredded zucchini from my garden that I freeze in 2 cup portions. I am planning on dehydrating this in the coming garden season, because we eat a lot of zucchini, and have had such good success with the zucchini slices in other things that it would be much better for the freezer space.2 1/2 cups all purpose flour (or half and half with WW flour)/ 1 cup brown sugar/3 1/2 tsp baking powder/ 1 tsp sea salt/ 3 Tbs coconut oil or vegetable oil/ 1/2 cup milk powder/ 1 egg/ 2 cups shredded zucchini, drained but not squeezed dry/ 2 tsp pumpkin pie spice. Oven at 350*, mix dry, then wet, then combine, and  pour into two greased bread pans. Bake for 55-65 minutes until toothpick stuck in middle comes out clean. Let cool for five minutes then turn out of pans to cool completely.   Pork Ginger Stir Fry is one of my favorites. In a large fry pan, place 2 TBS of olive oil. Heat, adding the following seasonings: 1/2 tsp ground ginger, 1/2 tsp cumin, 1/2 tsp tarragon, 1/2 tsp ground coriander, and 1 tsp sea salt, also 1/2 cup onion slices, broken into pieces, not dices. Let this saute for a few minutes, stirring every few seconds. Then add two cups brown rice (already cooked). To this add one (or two if you like more meat) cooked, cubed porkchops, thin strips of peppers, a can of water chesnuts that have been drained, and thin strips of carrots. To this all add a couple Tsp of brown sugar to give it a warm sweet taste. If you like the veggies more cooked, add to the oil and seasonings along with the onion. We like them still crunchy, so add them in at the end. Cook for another couple minutes and then serve. You can also crack an egg into the rice before adding veggies if you like egg in your fried rice.
Friday:
Homemade egg Noodles can be found here on one of the posts from earlier int he series. To make the sauce, using a fry pan, fry one pound of ground turkey with the following spices: 1/2 tsp thyme, and 1/2 oregano, and garlic and onion. Into this same pan, put slices of dried zucchini, snipped into pieces, about 3/4 of a cup. Add 2 cups water, cover pan, and let simmer for about ten minutes. When time is up, remove cover, and add salt, and enough Magic Mix to make a cream sauce. Take off heat and add one cup mozzarella. When serving, place noodles on the plate, and top with sauce, then top with bread crumbs mixed with parmesan or toasted sesame seeds. (great way to use up stale bread). Smoothie rollups are easy and very popular with kids and adults. In a blender combine the following: one cup yogurt, one cup fruit, and two bananas, one Tbs of lemon juice, as well as one tsp of sweetener (honey, sugar, agave syrup). If you use canned fruit be sure to rinse it, drain it, and then you do not need sweetener. We love to make strawberry banana ones, but the lemon juice, which keeps the color bright and adds extra Vit C, can make it tart depending on the strawberries. I freeze or dry huge quantities of strawberries every year from a you-pick farm nearby so we have enough to get through the year and not have to pay outrageous prices here in MN in the winter. Sorry--take that blender full (if you can keep from drinking it) and pour onto nonstick sheets in your dehydrator. Dehydrate until the whole thing is leathery, with no wet spots, at around 135*. I make large squares and then cut into four or six strips for the roll-ups, and roll them into plastic wrap. Stored in a cool dark place, these will last you a while, and are as good as candy for the kids. :) Curried Chickpea mash is easy and a favorite around here. Curried Chickpea mash: 1 Lg Onion, sliced/ 1 can whole tomatoes / 3 garlic cloves, peeled/ 2 TBS ginger, grated/ 2 cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed (would be about 1 1/2 cups with store bought cans--we use one quart homemade)/ 2 Tbs olive oil/ 2-3 bay leaves/ 1 tsp ground cloves/ 1 tsp cardamom seeds/ 5-6 peppercorns/ 1/2 tsp Tumeric/ 2 TBs coriander/ 1 tsp cumin/ 1 cup milk or substitute like almond or coconut milk::::Directions::::*puree onions, tomatoes, garlic and ginger until smooth. Meanwhile, heat olive oil over Med high heat and add bay, cloves, cardamom and peppercorns to oil. Cook for one minute. *add puree and cook 5 minutes. Add remaining spices and cook for another 5 minutes. * add chickpeas. Stir until covered with sauce well. Add pinch of salt to taste and the milk or milk alternative. *simmer for 10 minutes. *Using a potato masher or fork, mash chickpeas until chunky (I like it with pieces of the chickpeas still obvious but I have a friend who completely purees it). Serve warm with either pita bread, pita chips or naan, which is basically fry bread that you cook on a skillet and is served warm with the meal as your utensils. Jello Salad is Orange Jello with a can of drained fruit cocktail, and 1/2 cup coconut shreds added, then topped with the same mock topping as earlier in the week.
Saturday is bread baking day:
Michael's chicken soup recipe can be found here in the comment section under the name Shamus (his "other name"). It is amazing and goes fast. Orange Almond Muffins are made using the basic Master Muffin Mix, and adding the following for ingredients: One small can drained mandarin oranges, 1/2 tsp orange Zest and 1/2 tsp almond flavoring. If you dont have mandarin oranges you can put in 1 TBS orange juice concentrate. If you are able to have picked some up on sale (any nuts are SO expensive), you can top them with sliced or ground almonds before baking. For Pizza that night, for pizza crust recipe click here, then puree up one small jar or can of carrots, and 1/2 onion, then add to the marinara sauce for the pizza (we just use spaghetti sauce). Top with whatever meats you have available in your house--I even use up little bits that are in the fridge waiting for another meal. Either way, your family gets a great dose of veggies and meat in a favorite meal without really knowing it. :)
Sunday:
Caramel rolls: using the same recipe  for dough and concept as in my cinnamon rolls, all you do is switch the ingredients up a little. Mix the filling with a touch of cinnamon, and butter flavoring, but add one cup of dark brown sugar and spread over dough. Roll up and proceed to cut as discussed in the link. While baking, in a sauce pan combine either one cup agave syrup, honey or corn syrup to one stick butter, and one cup brown sugar and bring to a slow boil, stirring constantly. Set aside and let cool a few minutes, then add 1 tsp vanilla for flavoring. Turn rolls out onto a plate, top with the sauce and let sit about ten minutes. If you make too much caramel sauce (is there such a thing??), then pour it into a jar and keep in the fridge for topping for icecream or apple cake. Keeps for a couple weeks with no issues as long as the jar has a lid. (and no-one tries to eat it with a spoon *ahem*)
Baked chicken is a whole chicken cut up, cleaned and patted dry. It is then dipped in an egg wash of one egg to one cup milk, then into a simple flour, cormeal, and Lawry's seasoning mix. (can you tell my husband is the one who does this? Lawry's seasoning always comes in). He bakes it at 350* until the juices run clear when poked, about 40 minutes to an hour for bone in chicken. Parmesan couscous is one of those things I pick up on sale, because I absolutely love it, and with everything I make, it is nice once in a while to have a mix made up that you got for a good deal. However, this year, with the cost of goods going up, and that I can buy couscous in bulk for much cheaper, I will be coming up with a recipe. Dont worry, I will post it for you when I am done. :) Farmer' Rolls are my mother's standard that we ate as kids at all holidays. I decided they are good enough to make them all the time, and my kids love them. Makes a double batch so halve stuff if you dont want a large amount. 5 tsp or 2 pkgs of dry yeast/ 2 1/2 c warm water/ 3/4 c soft or melted shortening (or coconut oil)/ 3/4 cup sugar (I use agave syrup)/ 2 eggs well beaten/ 8-81/2 cups bread flour (or use 6 cups wheat and 1 1/2 cups bread flour)/ 2 1/2 tsp sea salt......soften yeast in water for 5 minutes, add sugar, shortening, and eggs, blend well. Turn off mixer and add 4 cups flour, turn on with dough hook, once that is incorporated, add the remaining flour one cup at a time, then add salt last (it inhibits the rise of  the bread). This will be soft dough. I turn it out on counter, after flouring the surface and cover with a towel. This makes the equivalent of three loaves of bread, so I cut it in three pieces after it doubles in size about an hour and a half later, and then cut the three "loaves" into ten to twelve pieces. If you want beautiful rolls, and easy way is to shape them into balls and then place in a greased muffin tin.Let double, takes about 45 minutes, and bake at 350* for fifteen to twenty minutes. You can also refrigerate this dough in a container with a lid and pull of some as needed. The flavor gets even better over a couple of days. :)
   Hope you enjoy and let me know what you think!!! :)

Making Do Without Missing a Thing--Six Weeks of Inspiration in Meal Planning in Six posts--week Five

 Whew! Did ya get all that yesterday? I was trying to finish up the post while holding a twin away from the computer with one leg, shouting for my husband to come and grab the second who was trying to jump off the changing table, and meanwhile my 12 year old is sitting quietly at the table doing her school work. Just a regular day here in the Welcoming House. :) When I shared with them that Mom was healthy enough to go back to our regular meal plans, I got cheers, so you know it works around here! And with three kids, those recipes had better be kid tested and approved!

   I am writing this late at night while children are in bed and I can concentrate rather than having to leave the computer (and my train of thought) every six seconds. Do you have a crazy house like that too? Our Pastor this weekend was talking about how our blessings are already in our hands, waiting for us to recognize them, even when they don't fit our idea of what a "blessing" is. It really hit home for me, because for years I have wanted to publish my written music and get a CD out...even if it is just for my kids. It's true. I am not just a run-of-the-mill piano teacher. I really lead a secret life. HA.
   Music is my passion, and it regulates my day, soars through my thoughts at night....and comes out on the keyboard when I have a moment to spare during the day. Since having kids I have learned that getting up at 3 am and pounding on the piano is not such a great idea though....
   A few years ago I was blessed to record 10 of my songs onto a CD with a friend. I am busy copyrighting them, and then think they would be a wonderful addition to this blog! Wouldn't that be fun, listening to my music while you read? It would sure be fun for me to listen to it while I write!
  But anyhow, I realized that I have all the blessings in my hands that I really ever asked God for---my children, my husband, and my home. God uses those things every single day, even on the craziest ones, to point me right back to him and say gently to me: "THIS is the plan I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to bring you hope and a future". (Jeremiah 30:31). So rather than get frustrated that things aren't going the way I planned, I can just smile and thank him for the cup in my hands that is filled to overflowing with blessings.

   I feel the same way as we near the end of this series.

   I am blessed to be able to sit here and write this, to share with you all that I have learned, and pass on some tried and true things have made my family blessed in so many ways. My hands are full....and so is my heart. :)

   Without further prattling, here is the next Menu Plan for my family (we will start this next week)

Menu Planning--Week TWO

Monday
   Breakfast: breakfast burritos
   Lunch: French onion soup with toasted bread and mozzarella sandwiches, fruit
   Snack: Apples with fruit dip, toffee bars
   Dinner: kielbasa with mashed potatoes and sauerkraut, mixed veggies

Tuesday
   Breakfast: chocolate chip pancakes with strawberry chunk syrup
   Lunch: home made mac and cheese, salad and mandarin oranges
   Snack: Carrot sticks with ranch, bread with jam
   Dinner: Tacos with ground beef and black bean filling, spanish rice, and toppings. Rice pudding with Cinnamon for dessert

Wednesday
   Breakfast: wheat berry cereal with peaches and cream
   Lunch: mini pizzas, topped with whatever veggies kids want on them.
   Snack: granola with dried fruit, toffee bars
   Dinner: venison stew, dinner rolls, and pineapple upside down mini-cakes

Thursday
   Breakfast: scrambled eggs, hashbrowns and toast
   Lunch: chicken and cheese quesadillas,
   Snack: celery and cream cheese, chocolate chip cookies
   Dinner: veggie lasagna, garlic breadsticks

Friday
   Breakfast: dried cherry scones with cream
   Lunch: Lydia's green bean soup, and cornbread
   Snack: oranges, and cookies
   Dinner: Meatloaf, buttered corn, salad.

Saturday
   Breakfast: caramel french toast bake
   Lunch: tomato soup with tarragon, grilled cheese sandwiches and canned peaches
   Snack: apples with peanut butter, and popcorn
   Dinner: Chicken Zucchini Alfredo pizza

Sunday
   Breakfast: Egg bake
   Lunch: Split pea Soup, loaf of fresh bread, Toffee bars
   Snack:  any fruit or veggie available, and any baked good left
   Dinner: leftovers or waffles

   Hope this makes you hungry and ready to try it! Have fun trying all the new recipes. I was just thinking tonight that it sure would be fun to have a tab up top that just says recipes, and you can click on it to find all these! But, time will tell if that is something that will happen!

   Many blessings to you and yours!

Heather

recipes for each day:
Monday:
   Breakfast burritos are scrambled eggs, chorizo or sausage, peppers and onions (I often use dried in this recipe)with a touch of taco seasoning placed into warmed tortillas and served with shredded cheese and salsa.
   French Onion soup is made of one pint of carmelized onions (onions that are left in the crockpot on low for up to ten hours after being topped with butter and a little brown sugar, then canned) mixed with two quarts of beef stock (same as six cups of beef stock), and let to cook down. I have a friend who puts steak sauce in his for more flavoring, but we tend to do things simply around our house. Once heated, serve with rounds of french bread made into open sandwiches by being topped with garlic butter and mozzarella, then heated under the broiler. My kids will eat some of the soup, but love the sandwiches, so we just let them dip away.
Tuesday: for the pancake syrup I powder/chunk up dried strawberries in a coffee grinder and then add to a simple syrup of sugar and water in a saucepan. Heat to boiling, then turn off heat to let cool some. If you want it thicker, you can add a couple TBS of strawberry jam to the syrup. The kids love this over chocolate chip pancakes, and while it isn't totally healthy, I know they are getting a dose of fruit along with the whole wheat fiber in the pancakes.
For the magic mix recipe to make home made Mac and Cheese click here. This is the same recipe I use to make any cream soups or pudding bases. I shred sharp cheddar into my sauce for mac and cheese, as well as one TBS of mustard, and onion salt. I always make two pans at a time so I have one for unexpected guests or to take along with us on a trip for home school co-op or something. I top it with more shredded cheese, and paprika.
Spanish rice is rice cooked with tomato and chicken broth, combined with garlic, onion, and chili powder. The beef and bean seasoning is made with 3/4 lb ground beef, and one pint home-canned black beans, drained. I season with my mexican store seasoning. I mash up some of the beans in the pan with an old fashioned potato masher.
 HERE  is the basic recipe we use for rice pudding. I often use my home-dried "minute rice" made in my dehydrator for this as it takes much less time for the pudding to thicken and become creamy. We do not, however, add raisins, as my kids dont like that as much. We do top it with cinnamon or nutmeg.
Wednesday:
Wheat Berry Cereal is something new-er around here, and you need a lot of patience or a pressure cooker to make it (or pressure canner). I put 2 cups of wheat berries into my pressure cooker with  cups of water and a pat of butter. I cook it on high pressure for one hour. If you were doing this without a pressure cooker, you need to soak the grain overnight and then cook on the stove for around 5 hours. After it is done I make condensed milk from powdered full fat milk (you just use more of the milk powder to less water), sweeten it, and add in the peaches. If you have had any fruit earlier in the week, you can save the syrup and add that in when the cereal is cooked to add the fruity flavor the kids will love. If this sounds like too much work for you, substitute another cereal. :) But it is wonderful-nutty and creamy, and when you add fruit to it, or maple syrup with cream, it is a great stick-to-your-ribs kind of breakfast. Any leftovers go into the freezer for muffin batter add-ins later. Mini Pizza dough can be found on this post and can be topped with a couple spoonfuls of homecanned spaghetti sauce, mozzarella cheese and whatever topping the kids want to throw on there. If you click on Venison/Beef Stew it will take you directly to the page the recipe is already on. The recipe for Pineapple Upsidedown Minicakes is right here, and while we make our own cake mix from home, this is how we go through the baking process.
Thursday:
I told you that I make up a couple batches of cookie dough and just freeze "cookie pucks" right? Since my surgery my kids have not gotten that unless I just make up a batch. (so GLAD for the Master Cookie Mix)
I would encourage you to try it as it makes homemade treats so much easier. I do this with all sorts of things, but my kids' favorite is the muffins and cookies. Makes my prep time so much shorter in the long run. And less dishes is ALWAYS good around here at The Welcoming House!
Veggie Lasagna: Make up a batch of pasta, and roll into sheets. Grease a 9X13 pan. This is a great recipe for those dried veggies you have from your dehydrator. :) I use cottage cheese or homemade cottage cheese if I have a fresh batch ready (click here if you want to learn just how easy it is to make from home with a gallon of milk and some lemon juice), mix the cheese with two eggs, and seasonings (I use oregano, basil, pasrley and thyme, as well as garlic salt.) The veggies I normally add in that are dried are onions, green onions, zucchini and yellow squash, (these are sliced and look so beautiful when the lasagna is done). Get out a quart of home canned tomatoes with little to no spice to them. I often use my stewed tomatoes because I love the taste and the hint of sweet with them, plus they include celery.
In the pan, layer in this way: pasta sheet, cottage cheese mix, tomatoes, veggies. I sprinkle each layer with mozzarella cheese. Repeat layers until you run out of ingredients, then top with more cheese and bake. I always make two of these up and freeze one so I have an extra casserole if needed for someone in need, or even for company or a Sunday where we are tired and just want to pull something out and eat it. :) This bakes at 325* for 1 1/2 hours. The little lower temps make this develop almost a "crust" with the pasta on the bottom. Awesome.
Friday:
Dried Cherry Scones: before making batter, put 1/2 cup dried yellow cherries into a small bowl and add one cup boiling water, then top bowl with a plate. Let sit for ten minutes. Meanwhile make batter. In  bowl of mixer combine the following ingredients: 2 cups flour, 1/3 cup sugar, 1 tsps baking powder, 1 tsp salt, cut in six TBS butter (it really has to be butter, or your scones will be tough). To this batter add the dried cherries, and taking a 2 cup measuring cup, add the cherry liquid from rehydrating. To this add enough water and 1 full cup full-fat milk powder. Then add 1 TBS of lemon juice and let this sit for about 3 minutes. Add to the batter and stir just until combined. Scrape out of bowl onto a lightly floured surface and knead 8-10 times gently, then pat into a large circle about 1-2 inches thick on a greased cookie sheet. Cut into 8-10 triangles and carefully slide apart on the sheet. With a brush or your fingers wash the tops with a little milk and sprinkle with sugar. Bake at 350* for 12-15 minutes until tops are golden brown. *you can use any dried fruit, and many dehydrating people actually buy canned fruit and run it through their machines to have dried fruit on hand. The store bought fruit is much sweeter, but that is an easy way to build up a shelf stable store to bake with for muffins and things such as this recipe. I also wanted to say these are very filling, and you will most likely have one per child and possibly two per adult. I personally can only eat one because they are so filling and rich, but amazing. You can also make this recipe's dry ingredients up into bags and have it waiting for you so all you have to do is add the wet ingredients to pull it together faster. :)
Lydia's Green Bean Soup: This is a canning recipe, and you can make this on your stove, but once it is pressure canned the flavors are so intense and yummy that you will never make it on the stove again. In each Quart jar layer the following: 3 sprigs of oregano, 1 tsp salt, and 1 leaf basil/ 3 garlic chips or one whole clove/ 3/4 cup chopped cooked ham/ 3/4 cup diced onions/ 3/4 cup green beans and wax beans mixed/ 3/4 chopped potatoes with the skin on. Pour boiling water to the shoulders of the jar (1" head space), wipe rim with rag dipped in vinegar, cap with warmed lid and ring, process for 90 minutes at 12 lbs pressure. I normally make 30 jars or so at a time. The broth becomes really "hamm-ie and potato-ey", and this soup is just plain amazing when you serve it with biscuts or cornbread.
 Meatloaf: in a bowl combine the following ingredients: 3/4 lb ground beef, one cup oatmeal run through a blender/ or one cup bread crumbs, 2 eggs,and one can of black beans pureed with their liquid from the jar. To this add 1 tsp sea salt, 1/4 cup worchestershire sauce, a touch of steak sauce (we use A-1), and basil. I also add dried celery and onion. Bake at 350* for one hour. Top with tomato sauce or ketchup.
Buttered corn: use 1/3 cup per family member. Place dried corn in greased crockpot and top with equal amount of water or chicken stock. Top with 3 TBS of butter, cut into small chunks, and season with oregano and garlic.  Turn on low and cook for 4-5 hours.


Saturday:

Caramel Baked French Toast: in a greased 9X13 pan, layer eight slices of thick cut homemade bread. You can cut them in half if you have smaller children. in a bowl combine 4 eggs, 1 1/2 cups milk, 1 tsp vanilla, and 1/2 tsp almond flavoring. whisk really well until completely blended. Pour over bread in pan. Sprinkle top of pan with cinnamon, and brown sugar. Melt one stick of butter and slowly drizzle over top of pan. Cover with plastic wrap or a metal lid (if you have one of these 9X13 pans that have one, they are awesome), and refrigerate overnight. Take out about ten minutes before baking in the morning. If you use a glass pan, take out and set on top of stove while oven is heating for up to 30 minutes before baking. You dont want the pan exploding all over the oven because the glass cant handle the heat. Be sure to remove the plastic wrap (hey, we have all been there---it all depends on whether you have had enough coffee or not, right?)
Tomato soup is home-canned around here and is a blend of tomatoes, carrots, and celery, with a touch of onion and sucanat, as well as a dash of chili powder. I make it in huge batches at the end of the summer and can it up with my pressure canner, sometimes 30 quarts at a time. It is a great way to use up my end of summer tomatoes that arent quite perfect for salsa. When I prepare it for a meal, I open a can, add a couple TBS of my magic mix, and some dried tarragon, which has a slight sweet licorice flavor to it. Served with grilled cheese, my kiddos love it. And I know they are getting some good veggies in their tummies.
Pizza is made the same way as last week except we use jarred alfredo sauce from the store (yes I know I can make it, but this is way more simple for Saturdays), I soak our zucchini for about 30 minutes in boiling water to re-hydrate it for the pizza, and open a can of canned chicken from our pantry for the meal. If I have shredded parmesan that goes on the pizza as well as the mozzarella. Layer the alfredo sauce, then a slight layer of cheese, the zucchini, the chicken, do a shake of garlic salt, then top with the rest of the cheese. Big favorite around here, but hey, we love pizza!

Sunday:
Egg Bake: fry up one lb of sausage, add to it one diced onion and one diced green pepper. Cube 1/2 loaf of stale bread (I lay out the slices on the counter overnight so I know it is stale), add everything to a large bowl and toss with sage, thyme and oregano. 1 tsp each, and 1 tsp garlic salt. Put in greased 9X13 pan, and press down until it is well packed together. In same bowl combine six eggs and 2 cups milk, 1 tsp powdered mustard, and pepper. When well whisked, then pour over the bread, trying to make sure all cubes of bread are covered. Cover with plastic wrap and put in fridge overnight. In morning, take out, take off wrap, shred cheese for top, sprinkle with a little celery or onion salt, and stick in oven for an hour at 350*. Cut into 12 pieces and serve for breakfast.
My husband makes the split pea soup with bagged split peas, carrots and onions, and his own special mix of seasonings. I cant even begin to duplicate it, so sorry about that. It is all up to him. :) It is nice having a break from the cooking once in a while, right? You can find the recipe for the Toffee Bars right here.They are another family favorite and are always asked for after chocolate chip cookies.
Have fun trying all the recipes out on this week! I am going to be posting these every other day because of the amount of time it takes to write each one up, and with two almost two year olds, it becomes almost impossible to get them out in time! Blessings to you, dear reader!

Making Do Without Missing a Thing--Six Weeks of Inspiration in Meal Planning in Six Posts--week Five

   In some ways, I have been dreading doing this week only because I know it will take time and effort for me to lay out for you the meals we eat every day. But at the same time, I am excited because I know you will walk away from this week very well equipped to feed your family well for little, and also understanding how all of this pulls together to save you money.

 Before we get started I wanted to remind you of two things.

   The first we talked about in this post: click here.  Here I discussed how I do meal planning and what works for our family each night of the week. Mondays are when my husband is home, so we eat a meat based meal, and something more substantial than soup for lunch. Tuesdays are my busy lesson days, but we like to have stuff made ahead of time, for ethnic meal night. I used to call it Taco Tuesdays, but we have branched way out from that, so the other name works better. :). Wednesday we are gone for homeschool co-op, so it is our crockpot night. Thursdays go late, so I make that our casserole night. Fridays are always something fun that the adults will mostly eat as my oldest goes to Grandma's house for her sleepover, and then Saturday's are homemade pizza night. :) Sundays we have our big meal right after church, and end the week with something like waffles or leftovers.

   The second thing I wanted to remind you of is that with canning, dehydrating, and building a pantry, our meals cost a bunch less than if you went out and purchased this straight out of the store. Not that you cant do that if you are just starting out. Everyone has to start somewhere, and by putting all of these things in line together, you will be able to save more and more money. It will just cost you more to start out with until you have this under your belt. I am trying to share with you a WAY of living, and planning, that has worked wonders for our family in the long run. It has enabled us to feed our children really well, in a healthy way, for much less than most families, and invest the money into other things, such as paying our house off sooner, or building an emergency fund.


   And finally, let me encourage you.

  You absolutely, positively, beyond the shadow of a doubt, can do this.

   If I can do this, a woman who never planned ahead really ever in her life, who loves to live by the seat of her pants and is a spur-of-the-moment-kinda-gal..........then you certainly can do this. It takes initiative, planning, and creativity within a certain limit. And on the flip side of all of that, once you find yourself at the end of the process, you realize just how free you are to make and do whatever you want, and not pay those high prices ever again unless you CHOOSE TO.
   We still have fabulous holiday meals, because we have gotten to the point that we can spend money on something like a whole ham, or prime rib. Those things can feed us for a holiday, but I can always make one or more meals from it afterwards too.

no this is not my grandmother--but it sure could have been!

    I have gotten to the point I am so frugal, knowing that it pays in the end, that what we dont finish goes into another meal. Why should I throw it away unless it is unusable? It is how my grandmother used to do things, and that is something I could have learned a lot about if I had known her. The women of her generation coined the phrase, "use it up, throw it out, make it do or do without". Have you heard of that? I read somewhere, a while ago, that many of the meals made during the Great Depression were passed down as family favorites...with people never realizing their grandparents or great grandparents made it that way because that was all they had! I, instead, grew up in the "throw-away" generation, where if something doesn't get eaten in a week, then it hits the trash. That mentality has passed over into a million subcategories in our lives as well---just drive down the road a couple days after Christmas when the trash bins are out, and you will see what I mean. Think of the amount of trash you had to carry out as a kid, versus how large our trash bins are now. We buy plastic containers that are marketed as "disposable" for our leftovers, and if things look a little fuzzy inside, what do we do? Right. Throw them away. I cant imagine my mother ever just deciding to hoist one of her precious Tupperware containers into the trash can. She would scrape it out, wash it really good, and put it back in the drawer. Me? I used to not think anything of it until the last couple of years....and I am ashamed to say that I don't even KNOW how much waste I personally am responsible for in caring for my family for the last 10 years.

   But I am determined not to be that way anymore.

   So should I put the picture of the Bunny Trail back here again? LOL. Seems like my passion for certain things and a way of life tend to break out once in a while beyond what I can control.
   I am planning on sharing a meal plan a day this week, with the recipes included. Now, if for breakfast we are having oatmeal, folks, I am very sorry, but if you cant figure out how to make oatmeal, you aren't going to learn it here. :) Perhaps you need a cookbook at that point more than you need me! :) But I will give you my recipes for my main meals, or how I tweak certain meals with what we have.
   I hope that you get a lot out of this series, and that you are excited to get started. If there is something you don't like in the meal menu--then put in something that works for you! My husband used to be a meat-and-potatoes kinda guy with little imagination. I was an almost-vegetarian who loved a good dose of chicken and beef once in a while. And now we are all over the board, eating fresh foods, one pot meal foods, every ethinicity of food under the sun within our reach. I hope you too will find some tried and true favorites here that you family will rave over.
   I bake twice a week, both bread and a snack/treat for my family. That normally happens on Tuesdays and Fridays or Saturdays. That, combined with making extras of things each time I cook or bake, gives me a comfortable stocked freezer and keeps me days ahead of my meal planning. Since I have been recovering from surgery the last five weeks, we have been relying on simple meals that are either already canned and waiting on the shelf, or easy ones like spaghetti, etc. So this will be fun to get back into the swing of things with you right alongside me! Here we go!

Week One---Meal Plan ONE
   *any drinks are water, milk, coffee, tea or juice depending on what we have on hand. Our family rarely drinks soda or anything sugary. If the kids want something warm in the morning, they drink hot chocolate from my homemade mix. I will share that here today for you. :) For our morning snack we always have a fruit or vegetable, such as carrot sticks, ants on a log, apple slices with peanut butter, etc. Afternoon snack is normally something baked or available, such as bread and cheese, or a baked good.

Monday:
   Breakfast: potato pancakes with shredded carrot, diced onion, and cheese, served with fresh fruit
   Lunch: Sweet and Sour Asian Meatballs on Brown Rice
   Snack: Carrot sticks with Ranch, Whole Wheat bread with sliced Colby
   Dinner: Roast Chicken, stuffing, salad (with apples, cheese, raisins and peanuts) and Black Bean Brownies

Tuesday:
   Breakfast: blueberry streusel muffins, and hot chocolate
   Lunch: baked Potatoes with broccoli, onion and cheese, seasoned with homemade garlic salt
   Snack: Apples and Peanut Butter, Delicious Pumpkin Bread
   Dinner: Meatless Enchiladas with green chili cornbread, vanilla pudding topped with cinnamon

Wednesday:
   Breakfast: Strawberry and Cream Oatmeal (I use dehydrated strawberries and extra full-fat dry milk added to regular rolled oats while cooking to make this--my kids love it)
   Lunch: Chicken, Cheese and Spinach roll, with homecanned peaches for dessert.
   Snack: Avocados with salt, Black Bean Brownies or Pumpkin Bread (whichever is left over)
   Dinner: Crockpot Hobo Stew with biscuts and Dried Apple Pie Bars

Thursday:
   Breakfast: sausage and gravy with biscuts, bananas, and milk or coffee
   Lunch: Broiled Tuna Melts on homemade bread with fruit cocktail
   Snack: Ants on a log, and Dried Apple Pie Bars
   Dinner: Tatertot Casserole

Friday:
   Breakfast: scrambled eggs with onion, tomato and spinach (dried), toast points, and juice
   Lunch: our version of Turkey Tettrazini, pear halves
   Snack: Apples and Fruit Dip, Bread and sliced cheese
   Dinner: Peanut Chicken Curry, and salad

Saturday:
   Breakfast: cold cereal, fruit such as apples or bananas
   Lunch: Sandwich pockets, and carrot sticks and ranch
   Snack: fruit and Molasses Ginger cookies
   Dinner: Cheeseburger Pizza

Sunday:
   Breakfast: homemade Cinnamon Rolls
   Lunch: Beef Roast, potatoes, carrots, and onions, Cherry Pie
   Dinner: Waffles or leftovers, whichever the family prefers.

Scroll down for recipes listed under each daily title. :) I will be posting the costs for each meal later the last week so you can see how much we save.

Many Blessing to You and Yours,

Heather

Monday:

Potato Pancakes: 2 cups leftover mashed potatoes or one quart canned potatoes, drained and smashed. 2 large shredded carrots, one diced onion, 2 cups flour, 1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese, 2 eggs, basil and garlic salt to taste. Mix batter well, then taking a large spoon, drop large spoonfuls into heated oil (we use olive oil or coconut oil). When one side is crispy and brown, flip over and press with your turner until it becomes flat and more pancake like. Serve warm. * just a tip: if you have a kid who has a hard time with veggies, you can add in up to one cup of pureed cauliflower into this recipe and they will not be able to taste the difference. Instead of or with the parmesan throw in some shredded cheese and let them see you do it, and it will color the batter so the carrots arent as noticeable as well. :) I know, sneaky sneaky.

Meatballs: I make these up in a huge batch for the freezer so we can pull from them in a short time for meals. Take a family pack of burger, around 3 lbs. Put in a large bowl and add: 2 cups instant oatmeal, one cup WW flour, four eggs, one diced onion, oregano, sage and thyme, about 1/8 cup of worchestershire sauce, 5 shakes of tabasco, one tsp of sea salt and one tsp of garlic powder. Mix really well and form into balls about the size of a walnut. Put on baking sheet. Bake at 350* for 20 minutes, let cool and place in gallon freezer bag. For a family of five I get three meals out of the 80 meatballs or so that this recipe makes.

Sweet and Sour Meatballs:  in a pan with a little olive oil, add the following: chunked onion, frozen and diced peppers, one large can diced and then drained pineapple (reserve the liquid), 2 TBS soy sauce, 1/4 cup brown sugar, 1 tsp ground ginger and 1 tsp cinnamon. Let saute and cook until the onion is getting clearer, a couple minutes. Add juice from can, and whisk in one TBS of cornstarch. This will make the sauce. Add the meatballs and cook until heated through (I set them out a little earlier as they dont take long to thaw). Meanwhile, in another pan cook two cups of brown rice in beef stock with a little oregano. I use my new pressure cooker and it is such a time saver--rather than 45 minutes, it takes me 12 to make great brown rice. I always make extra and then dehydrate it so I have "minute rice" that can be re-hydrated in a matter of three to five minutes in standing boiling water or stock. :) So plan ahead,make a big pot of brown rice once every couple weeks and dehydrate it, then have it waiting for you to pull off the shelf and use! :)

Black Bean Brownies: seriously folks, these are so good, so incredibly fudgy and chocolatey, that once you try them you will never go back to a regular brownie recipe. And they are so easy to make, a little goes a long way, and you would never know there are beans of any kind in them. Here is the link to the recipe I use, just click your way to brownie heaven. I use home-canned black beans from my garden, one pint's worth.

Tuesday:

Muffins: I just use my muffin mix from week one of this series, and add in the following: one cup frozen or canned blueberries, one Tbs lemon juice, and top with a streusel made with 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1/4 cup WW flour, 1/4 cup oatmeal and 4 Tbs Butter. 

Enchiladas: I  make up to three pans of this at a time. Make four cups of rice using a tomato and chicken based stock, or bullion. Be sure to add in chili powder to the liquid while the rice is cooking. Meanwhile, dice up onion, and open a can of chili tomatoes. When rice is done, empty two cans of drained beans (I use black beans as they have the highest protein count of any bean), the onion, chili tomatoes with juice, all into a large bowl with the rice. I actually buy my seasoning from a little mexican grocery, but you can season the mix with cumin, chili powder, and garlic for a similar effect. I take a ice cream scoop and put one scoop in each tortilla, tuck the ends and roll, then place in a greased 9X13 pan. I cover each pan with about 1 cup shredded pepper jack cheese, then pour over one can of enchilada sauce (the large cans). I buy the cans when I run out of my own sauce about halfway through the year. Each pan makes about 10 large enchiladas. If you like beef or chicken, just add one cup of meat and cut the beans down by one can. We will alternate each month, using regular enchiladas one month, then beef ones the next. You can cover these with foil and store for a couple months as needed, just write what they are on the top, and bake without the foil when it comes time to eat. The cornbread recipe is on this page  just add one can of green chilies to it. :)
Delicious Pumpkin Bread: 2 cups sugar, 2 1/2 cups flour, 1 tsp salt, 1 tsp Baking powder, 2 tsp baking soda, 1 tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp ground cloves, 1 tsp nutmeg, 4 eggs, 2 cups canned pumpkin, 1/2 cup oil, 1/2 cup melted butter. Whisk the dry ingredients, then blend into the wet. Pour into two greased bread pans and bake at 350* for 45 minutes to one hour. It will take quite a while to set, so don't get discouraged. Makes amazing muffins as well.

Wednesday:
Chicken Cheese and Spinach Bread Roll: Take one loaf of bread dough from this post. Roll out into a 9X13 rectangle or as close as possible. In a small bowl, mix one cup mayo with one TBS mustard, 1 tsp oregano and basil, and 3 TBS paremesan cheese. Spread this thinly over the rolled out bread dough. Spread shredded chicken, diced spinach, and then 1 cup shredded cheese over the bread dough. Starting with the short end, roll up into one big log. Smooth water over the end and pinch seam together very well. Place on baking sheet and bake for one hour at 350*. We let it cool some and then cut into slices with a bread knife.
Crockpot Hobo Stew   
biscuts--make extra for tomorrow's breakfast
Dried Apple Pie bars: Using my Master Cookie Mix, add one cup instant oatmeal, and apple pie spice to make a basic oatmeal cookie crust. Press into a greased 9X9 pan and bake in a 350 * oven for about 4 minutes. In a sauce pan, place one cup dried apples that you have snipped into pieces, one cup water, 1 TBS apple pie spice, 1/2 Cup brown sugar, and a dash of vanilla flavoring. Cook about 15 minutes until apples are soft and spreadable. (using a lid makes this process go faster). Spread this over the cookie crust, and top with the same streusel I shared with you  on Tuesday's plans for muffins. Bake again for about 10 minutes, and then sit on counter for ten minutes before serving. Can serve warm with ice cream or cold like a cookie bar.

Thursday:
Sausage and Gravy: use my Master Mix to make the gravy after frying up the sausage. We like it heavy on the pepper. You already have extra biscuts from yesterday, so heat in oven in a pie pan with a nice damp towel over them.
Broiled Tuna Melts: in a medium bowl combine the following: one large can tuna, three shredded carrots, one shredded onion, one shredded zucchini or cucumber. To this add 3/4 cup mayo, 3 dashes of hot sauce, 1/2 cup of shredded cheese, 1 tsp of mustard, and dash of salt and pepper. Turn broiler on in oven. On slices of homemade bread, heap spoonfuls of the filling until covered, makes about 7. Put under broiler for about 5 minutes while watching carefully. You will see filling bubble, and cheese melt, as well as some of the carrots blacken on the ends. If it looks like it could use a little more time, I move it to the bottom of the oven and let it sit in the heat but away from the intense heat for a few more minutes. This crisps the bread. I worked my kids and my husband up to this recipe, and they would not go back to boring tuna melts ever again!
TaterTot Casserole

Friday:
Turkey Tettrazini the Estey Way: using ground turkey, fry this up in a little olive oil, seasoned with tarragon, and basil. remove from pan and make a basic white sauce using the same master mix as the sausage gravy above. Add back in the meat, and one bag frozen peas and carrots or one cup dried peas and carrots rehydrated. Serve over homemade Whole wheat egg noodles.
Peanut Chicken Curry: basic recipe we use: however, we omit the tomatoes, we use green curry paste because we like the taste better, and right before serving we add 3 TBS of chunky PB to the sauce. Serve over sticky rice (which in our house is just plain white rice made in the pressure cooker). I like to add water chestnuts to mine. If the kids are eating with us, I pull some of the curry out before adding the spicy paste, and stir some PB into theirs. Even our toddlers love this stuff.

Saturday:
 Sandwich pockets: take small rounds of bread dough that you have pinched off the dough from earlier, and rolled out. fill with whatever filling kid want: Pb and Jelly, Cheese, Pepperoni, Ham and cheese, spinach and cheese, whatever. Put the ingredients on half of the round, leaving space around the edge. smooth a good amount of water on edge with your finger and fold top half round of dough over to make a half circle with the filling in the middle. using a fork, seal the edges well, then prick a couple times on top for steam to release while cooking. Let these pockets sit for about ten minutes before baking them. Bake at 350* for 12-15 minutes.
Cheeseburger Pizza: Take this pizza crust, and top with the following: one cup spaghetti sauce mixed with 3 TBS of ketchup, one Tbs of mustard and 3 TBS of sweet relish. Spread over the crust and cover all but the very edges. Onto this place one cup of mozzarella, sprinkled to cover. Top now with 1/2 lb browned ground beef that has been cooked in garlic salt and with minced onion. Sprinkle with 4 slices of bacon, crisped and broken into very small pieces. Top with more shredded cheese, and pickle slices. Bake at 350* for 15-20 minutes.

Sunday:
Homemade cinnamon rolls are made with the same concept as the Chicken and Cheese roll. Take one loaf of bread dough, roll out into a rectangle. In a bowl combine one cup shortening, one stick butter, 1/4 cup cinnamon, and 1/4 cup white or brown sugar. Spread this paste thinly over the dough, and starting this time from the long side, roll up into a log and seal the seam with water and your fingers pinching it closed. Cut the log into 12-14 pieces, and press into a 9 X13 pan that has been greased. I make these the day before while baking bread, and put them in the fridge overnight covered with plastic wrap. Take out about 30 minutes before baking to let them warm up a little. Bake for 20-25 minutes at 350*. Serve warm with a simple powdered sugar glaze (powdered sugar, lemon juice, vanilla flavoring and water mixed until smooth)