So what's the answer?
Insulation!
But it's so expensive!
Not necessarily.
I was reading some of the blogs that I like to read and was captivated by the link to several articles on insulating your windows. And since I'm poorer than the proverbial church mouse, free is my favorite word.
As in free bubble wrap to insulate your windows. Bubble wrap on windows? Insulating windows is such a pain to do. And then, here in the south, some days it's cold enough to freeze water and the next, the door is open to let a little heat OUT.
When I lived in North Florida, I used to put up insulation on the windows. You know, the big, super-size sheets of plastic. You stretch the plastic over the offending window and tack it into place - with small pieces of cardboard between the plastic and the tackhead. Or else you make like McGyver and duct tape it up and hope the residue comes down before you have to pay to have it fixed. Either way was a pain. And once it was up, there was no using that window until you wanted to take it down for the Spring.
Times, they are a changin'. And that brings us to my lead for the day:
http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Conservation/bubblewrap.htm
I just happen to have received a shipment of school books. It happened to have been wrapped in bubble wrap and I just happened to have saved said wrap.
What could be simpler? Spray water on the window and smack on that lovely, fun to pop bubble wrap. Ok, Some of it I did have fun popping. But to help us all resist, here is another link for you:
http://www.duck-bubblewrap.com/fun/intelligence.asp
Click on "Bubble wrap game". I scored 104. What's your score?
Oh, and the site that got this all started:
http://www.motherearthliving.com/issues/motherearthliving/
green_home/Save-Energy-with-Winter-Window-Treatments_733-1.html
(This address should all be on one line, and does appear on the edit page as readable. But when I tried to post it, on the page you see, the address goes off into the night. So I cut the address in half so that the whole address would appear.
The crazy world of a former homeschool mama whose babies are young adults. Come learn about baking bread, Once-a-month/bulk cooking, making soap, sewing, self-sufficiency, what food storage is and how to start your own. What a 72 hr kit is and how to create one. I'm not an expert but I have been doing most of these skills for a long time. I like to be as self-sufficient as I can. I love learning new skills or ways of doing things at home instead of having to buy at the store. Come join me.
Saturday, November 24, 2007
Saturday, November 10, 2007
Letting the young eagle fly
Well, it's finally happened. My 18dd spread her wings and took off. In the only working car. By herself. Just for a couple of nights. At the house of her boyfriend's parents. In ATLANTA.
She planned it out with me ahead of time, but wasn't sure if she was going to return late Fri. evening or early Sat morning.
I IMed her late Fri to find out if she was going go ahead and drive back late, but she didn't answer me back.
So I go to bed - at 5:30am and I'm tossing and turning. The fact that HER dog was in MY bed may have had something to do with the tossing! (Chihauhau, but still, I don't sleep with animals in my bed!) Anyway, I'm waiting for her to get in this morning. I look at the clock and it's 9:30.!?! She's supposed to be to work at 8:30!?!?! I call work. Her manager answers and I ask for her. He tells me she's not there yet. Oh, now I'm frantic! "She's NOT THERE?????" "no. She was supposed to be here at 8:30." "Well I'll try and find out why she's not there yet." (did I mention she has the only working car with her?)
So the next call goes to her cell phone. Rings once, then no answer, no busy signal, nothing. (Visions of her car breaking down on the interstate and someone kidnapping her flash before my eyes.)
Next call, (with panic in my voice) is to BF's mom. She says she doesn't know what time, dd left, but it was early. (Former paramedic is now trying to keep from having a heart attack on the spot. Atlanta is only an hour and 15 mins from here.)
At this point I just happened to look at the clock on the computer. I looked again. I looked at my watch, I looked at the clock on the wall. They all agree it's only 8:20. Then BF mom says BF just got off the phone with her, she just got home. (ok, not at the house. But at work)
Mom feels stupid. And I'd swear on a stack of Bibles that my bedroom clock read 9:30! So I go check it and it too reads 8:30.
Please understand this is a responsible young person. And I'm really NOT a clingy mom-type. And I have no earthly reason WHY I read the clock as 9:30, when it was only 8:20 (the alarm is deliberately set 10 mins ahead.)
All I know is this. I'm just not cut out to be the mom of teens. lol I just don't seem to have the stamina for it. I'm fine with pukey, poopy babies. I'm fine with tantrums (hey, Thang#1 was down on the floor from the time she was 13 months old until she was 3 1/2. One day I tried to count how many tantrums she had had. I lost count at noon and the count was 36 times to that point. She was 3 at the time.) I just stepped over her and let her rip. I was fine with cuts, and an 15 month old who followed big sister up a tree some 10'. (Remember the old Kodak Moment commercials. Well, Thang #1 came in shouting "Mom, come quick and bring your camera! It's a cardiac moment! Yup, it was at that.) I'm good at teaching them things - we homeschool. They can all cook and sew - yep, even ds. They all know the "facts of life." They can clean and do dishes. They can all take care of kids from newborns to school-age. They know how to make a flint and steel fire, set up a tent and camp. They know how to check the oil and fluids in a car, mow the lawn and paint. Not a problem.
I never thought I'd have any trouble teaching my kids anything. But this teenage stuff is killing me. Driver's Ed was the first clue I was in trouble. As I mentioned, I used to be a paramedic. I KNOW what can happen in a car. I know this kid. And the combination of the two scared the daylights out of me. I was a nervous wreck and made her one. Now mind you, she's a good kid. Except when she's being a brat. But cars are big and unforgiving things. At 65 miles an hour, you're toast if you hit anything. Like a deer, or a cow, or another car. Thang #1 just got her regular driver's license 2 weeks ago. Yes, she's 18, not 16. But between the two of us, it was just better for her to wait. Plus, now she's paying $104 a month for her insurance instead of the $45 she was paying with me being the only licensed driver. We just didn't have the money to pay the extra.
Now I've got to start teaching Thang#2 to drive. He wants to argue with everything I say. I'm just not ready to have him get behind the wheel and argue with me over how he's driving. sigh.
Can't I just go "poof" with a magic wand and make 'em little again. Just for a while longer. Until I'm ready for them to grow up and deal with them being teens. kwim? lol
She planned it out with me ahead of time, but wasn't sure if she was going to return late Fri. evening or early Sat morning.
I IMed her late Fri to find out if she was going go ahead and drive back late, but she didn't answer me back.
So I go to bed - at 5:30am and I'm tossing and turning. The fact that HER dog was in MY bed may have had something to do with the tossing! (Chihauhau, but still, I don't sleep with animals in my bed!) Anyway, I'm waiting for her to get in this morning. I look at the clock and it's 9:30.!?! She's supposed to be to work at 8:30!?!?! I call work. Her manager answers and I ask for her. He tells me she's not there yet. Oh, now I'm frantic! "She's NOT THERE?????" "no. She was supposed to be here at 8:30." "Well I'll try and find out why she's not there yet." (did I mention she has the only working car with her?)
So the next call goes to her cell phone. Rings once, then no answer, no busy signal, nothing. (Visions of her car breaking down on the interstate and someone kidnapping her flash before my eyes.)
Next call, (with panic in my voice) is to BF's mom. She says she doesn't know what time, dd left, but it was early. (Former paramedic is now trying to keep from having a heart attack on the spot. Atlanta is only an hour and 15 mins from here.)
At this point I just happened to look at the clock on the computer. I looked again. I looked at my watch, I looked at the clock on the wall. They all agree it's only 8:20. Then BF mom says BF just got off the phone with her, she just got home. (ok, not at the house. But at work)
Mom feels stupid. And I'd swear on a stack of Bibles that my bedroom clock read 9:30! So I go check it and it too reads 8:30.
Please understand this is a responsible young person. And I'm really NOT a clingy mom-type. And I have no earthly reason WHY I read the clock as 9:30, when it was only 8:20 (the alarm is deliberately set 10 mins ahead.)
All I know is this. I'm just not cut out to be the mom of teens. lol I just don't seem to have the stamina for it. I'm fine with pukey, poopy babies. I'm fine with tantrums (hey, Thang#1 was down on the floor from the time she was 13 months old until she was 3 1/2. One day I tried to count how many tantrums she had had. I lost count at noon and the count was 36 times to that point. She was 3 at the time.) I just stepped over her and let her rip. I was fine with cuts, and an 15 month old who followed big sister up a tree some 10'. (Remember the old Kodak Moment commercials. Well, Thang #1 came in shouting "Mom, come quick and bring your camera! It's a cardiac moment! Yup, it was at that.) I'm good at teaching them things - we homeschool. They can all cook and sew - yep, even ds. They all know the "facts of life." They can clean and do dishes. They can all take care of kids from newborns to school-age. They know how to make a flint and steel fire, set up a tent and camp. They know how to check the oil and fluids in a car, mow the lawn and paint. Not a problem.
I never thought I'd have any trouble teaching my kids anything. But this teenage stuff is killing me. Driver's Ed was the first clue I was in trouble. As I mentioned, I used to be a paramedic. I KNOW what can happen in a car. I know this kid. And the combination of the two scared the daylights out of me. I was a nervous wreck and made her one. Now mind you, she's a good kid. Except when she's being a brat. But cars are big and unforgiving things. At 65 miles an hour, you're toast if you hit anything. Like a deer, or a cow, or another car. Thang #1 just got her regular driver's license 2 weeks ago. Yes, she's 18, not 16. But between the two of us, it was just better for her to wait. Plus, now she's paying $104 a month for her insurance instead of the $45 she was paying with me being the only licensed driver. We just didn't have the money to pay the extra.
Now I've got to start teaching Thang#2 to drive. He wants to argue with everything I say. I'm just not ready to have him get behind the wheel and argue with me over how he's driving. sigh.
Can't I just go "poof" with a magic wand and make 'em little again. Just for a while longer. Until I'm ready for them to grow up and deal with them being teens. kwim? lol
Friday, November 9, 2007
Colds, rice bags and bedtime routines
Just gotta love getting sick. NOT.
I caught a cold a couple of weeks ago and it's still lingering on. Mostly in the guise of some serious coughing. I'm not running a temperature, so it's viral - no good to take antibiotics for it. I just have to let it run it's course.
In the meantime, I've not done any blogging. I thought I'd better check back in with everyone.
It's finally gotten cold here in the North Georgia mountains. The temp has been down into the low 30's at night, 45 during the day.
I've been very thankful for my rice bag and shrug that I made a while back. It was so easy to make these two items. During the day, when I'm up running around, I overheat and I don't wear/own many long-sleeve shirts. Once it gets dark and I sit in my chair typing, my arms get cold, especially my right hand that I'm mousing with. Then new shrug keeps my arms warm without adding extra covering to the rest of me.
While looking at some of my favorite blogs, Chrunchy Chicken had a bit on her blog about using Field corn to make the bags. The deer corn lady has a website that gives pictures as well as written instructions for making these. They are used the same way as rice is used.
I have trouble falling asleep if my feet are cold, so I've developed a new bedtime ritual. First, I take a warm bath. I like to use scented salts instead of bubble bath. Too much of an opportunity to develop a yeast infections with bubble baths. You can buy scented salts at Wallyworld for under $3. Or you can make your own.
To make your own scented salts all you need are Epsom's salt and some essential oil or fragrance that you like. You can buy the small boxes or bags of salts in the pharmacy area of any drug store or Wallyworld-type place for about $2. OR you can go to the plumbing section and buy a 50lb bag of water-softener for about $5-8. The water-softener crystals will need to be broken up a bit - they're too big to work well in the tub. Just put some of the crystals in a bag and whack it with a hammer or drive your car over it. I'd double bag it to drive the car over it!
When you've gotten the crystals smaller, bring them in, place them in a jar - a mason jar works well, and add your scent. It doesn't take a lot of scent. Several drops will do it. Then stir the salts around and close the jar up. Let it sit for a bit so that the scent will be absorbed by the crystals - several hours to a couple of days should do it. If you want it to fizz, add 1 tbs of baking soda to the crystals and stir that into them. A couple of tablespoons to 1/4 cup will make a nice relaxing bath.
After my bath, I heat the rice pack and place it at the end of my bed. If my room is extra cool, I'll also plop another heated bag above my head. This warms me up enough that I fall right to sleep. In the past, I've found that if I put on socks, I'll end up waking up in a couple of hours to take them off - I'm then too hot. But by then I've had enough sleep, that I can't get back to sleep. The heated rice packs seem to take care of the short-term cold feet without causing me to awaken later.
I caught a cold a couple of weeks ago and it's still lingering on. Mostly in the guise of some serious coughing. I'm not running a temperature, so it's viral - no good to take antibiotics for it. I just have to let it run it's course.
In the meantime, I've not done any blogging. I thought I'd better check back in with everyone.
It's finally gotten cold here in the North Georgia mountains. The temp has been down into the low 30's at night, 45 during the day.
I've been very thankful for my rice bag and shrug that I made a while back. It was so easy to make these two items. During the day, when I'm up running around, I overheat and I don't wear/own many long-sleeve shirts. Once it gets dark and I sit in my chair typing, my arms get cold, especially my right hand that I'm mousing with. Then new shrug keeps my arms warm without adding extra covering to the rest of me.
While looking at some of my favorite blogs, Chrunchy Chicken had a bit on her blog about using Field corn to make the bags. The deer corn lady has a website that gives pictures as well as written instructions for making these. They are used the same way as rice is used.
I have trouble falling asleep if my feet are cold, so I've developed a new bedtime ritual. First, I take a warm bath. I like to use scented salts instead of bubble bath. Too much of an opportunity to develop a yeast infections with bubble baths. You can buy scented salts at Wallyworld for under $3. Or you can make your own.
To make your own scented salts all you need are Epsom's salt and some essential oil or fragrance that you like. You can buy the small boxes or bags of salts in the pharmacy area of any drug store or Wallyworld-type place for about $2. OR you can go to the plumbing section and buy a 50lb bag of water-softener for about $5-8. The water-softener crystals will need to be broken up a bit - they're too big to work well in the tub. Just put some of the crystals in a bag and whack it with a hammer or drive your car over it. I'd double bag it to drive the car over it!
When you've gotten the crystals smaller, bring them in, place them in a jar - a mason jar works well, and add your scent. It doesn't take a lot of scent. Several drops will do it. Then stir the salts around and close the jar up. Let it sit for a bit so that the scent will be absorbed by the crystals - several hours to a couple of days should do it. If you want it to fizz, add 1 tbs of baking soda to the crystals and stir that into them. A couple of tablespoons to 1/4 cup will make a nice relaxing bath.
After my bath, I heat the rice pack and place it at the end of my bed. If my room is extra cool, I'll also plop another heated bag above my head. This warms me up enough that I fall right to sleep. In the past, I've found that if I put on socks, I'll end up waking up in a couple of hours to take them off - I'm then too hot. But by then I've had enough sleep, that I can't get back to sleep. The heated rice packs seem to take care of the short-term cold feet without causing me to awaken later.
Friday, November 2, 2007
Things you don't hear any more
My laugh file is subbing for me while I get over my cold.
Thing you don't hear any more.
Be sure and refill the ice trays, we are going to have company after while.
Watch for the mailman, I want to get this letter in the mail today.
Quit slamming that screen door!
Stay in or stay out! If you keep running in and out,I'm gonna set your fields on fire!!
Be sure to pull the windows down when you leave, it looks like it might rain -- and bring in the clothes off the line, too.
Don't forget to wind the clock before you go to bed.
Wash your feet before you go to bed, (you've been playing barefooted outside all day).
Why can't you remember to roll up your pants legs? Getting them caught in the bicycle chain is tearing them up and I ain't made outta money.
You have torn the knees out of that pair of pants so many times there ain't nothing left to put a patch on.
Don't you go outside with your school clothes on!
Hang up your Sunday School clothes, you know you need to pass them down to your brother in good condition.
Go comb your hair. It looks like the rats have nested in it
Be sure and pour the cream off the top of the milk when you open the new bottle. I need it for baking and Pa's coffee.
Take that empty bottle to the store with you so you won't have to pay a deposit on another one.
Put a dish towel over the cake so the flies won't get on it.
Quit jumping on the floor! I have a cake in the oven and you are going to make it fall if you don't quit!
Let me know when the Fuller Brush man comes by, I need to get a few things from him.
You boys stay close by, the car may not start and I will need you to help push it off.
There is a dollar in my purse, go by the service station and get five gallons of gas when you start to town.
Open the back door and see if we can get a breeze through here, it is getting hot.
You can walk to the store; it won't hurt you to get some exercise. Maybe you will learn to be more careful with your bicycle.
Don't sit so close to the TV it will ruin your eyes.
Don't lose that button, I will sew it back on after while.
Get out from under that sewing machine, pumping it messes up the thread!
Do you want to go get me a switch?
Be sure and fill the lamps this morning so we don't have to do that tonight in the dark.
Here, take this old magazine to the outhouse when you go, we are almost out of paper out there.
Go out to the well and draw a bucket of water for me to do dishes
Don't turn the radio on now, I want the battery to be up when the Grand Ole Opry comes on.
No! I don't have nine cents for you to go to the show, do you think money grows on trees?
Eat those vegetables; they will make you big and strong like your daddy.
That dog is NOT coming in this house! I don't care how cold it is out there, dogs just don't belong in the house.
Sit still! I can't cut your hair with you being a wiggle-worm.
Hush your mouth! I don't want to hear anymore words like that. I will wash your mouth out with soap!
It is time for your system to be cleaned out, I'm going to give you a dose of Castor Oil in the morning.
If you get a spanking in school and I find out about it, you will get a worse whupping when you get home.
Quit crossing your eyes! They will get stuck that way!
Soak your foot in this pan of coal oil so that cut won't get infected.
When you take your driving test don't forget your hand signals each turn. Left arm straight out the window for a left turn, and left arm bent up to the sky at the elbow for a right turn and straight down to the side of the door when you are going to slow down or stop.
It is "Yes, sir!" and "No, sir" to me and your elders young man, and don't you forget it!
While we are at Aunt Mary's and Uncle John's you kids eat when the adults get through and I don't want to hear "I don't like this stuff". You better keep your mouth shut and eat everything on your plate.
If I hear you repeat one word of this I will beat the daylights out of you, do you understand that?!!
Monday, October 29, 2007
Biscuits, Egg McMuffins and dumplings(Edited)
I didn't realize that when I cut and pasted this recipe, it overfilled the area allowed and that the instructions weren't readable. Sorry. I usually check and try to be very careful with my posts. But I don't usually go to the page itself to check it. If ever you find another non-readable page, please let me know so I can go correct it.
I've had a request for my biscuit recipe. The Mom's angel biscuits is my favorite one.
Oh, for all the Yankees (can ya'll tell I'm from the South? hehe) and my foreign friends I will explain what a "cat head" biscuit is. It's a biscuit that's the size of a cat's head. True, I swear it.
Without all the fur - fur's nasty, we don't eat that. Of course, cat is probably nasty too and we don't eat them either - unless you're from a different culture. I've heard that there are some cultures that do eat cat!
Most American's roll out their biscuit dough to about 1/2" thick and use a 2" cutter (or a kitchen glass like you'd drink water out of if you have company - no, honey, NOT the Mason jar, we only drink from one of those if we're by ourselves or on a picnic!) . Then they transfer the dough to a cookie sheet, mush the left-over, cut up dough together and reroll it until the dough is used up. That method is supposed to give you 5 dozen (That's right FIVE DOZEN) hockey pucks, I mean biscuits. And they measure 2.25" x 3/4" Just about right to play hockey, but no size to make a meal out of it. Plus, by the time it's been rolled out a couple of time, the resulting biscuits have some real chewiness to them. Makes 'em REALLY good for hockey then! If you insist on rolling and cutting, at least use an empty tuna can for the cutter (yes, you clean it first. Tuna biscuits - ewwweeeee. I don't like fish. Not much anyway. Fried catfish and smoked mullet are about my only fish eating forays. Shrimp and lobster don't count!) And for pity sakes, roll the dough out THICKLY I'm talking 1 1/2" worth of thickness. 1/2" thick biscuits - shudder!
Cat head biscuits are good size biscuits. The kind you can open up and put stuff on - like fried egg and a sausage patty, scrambled egg and bacon or sausage gravy. Substantial enough to make it a meal by itself. Who needs Micky D's? By the way, you do know that all an Egg McMuffin is is a buttered, toasted English muffin with a piece of Canadian bacon on the bottom, a fried egg on top of that and an piece of cheese topped with the other side of the muffin? So break your eggs in muffin tin sections, and bake at 350 until the yolk is just set. While the eggs cook, butter and toast your muffins and then make a batch of these all at once, wrap well, put in a zipper bag and freeze. Take one out, unwrap it from any plastic, wrap in a paper towel or cloth napkin and nuke it for 1-2 mins. Now you just saved $$$. And you know what's in it. I got one at Micky D's once and it had the root bottom slice of an onion on it. Talk about YUCK! And I took it to go, so there was no returning it. (I discovered it quite a few miles down the road!)
When I make my biscuits, I use my large serving spoon - this is larger than the regular spoons that you'd eat soup with, but smaller than the 1/2 cup size, slotted buffet-type spoons. I use this to just plop the mixed, unkneaded dough into my flour container. (This practice may be why the old recipes tell you to sift the flour. lol)
You can just scoop some flour into a mixing bowl and use that instead of getting dough particles in your flour canister. Anyway, you're wanting to take a big spoonful of dough and put it into the flour. Coat the dough with flour and shape into a round shape, with a flat bottom, tucking in the edges and making it smooth as you shape it. After doing a few, you'll get the hang of what you're doing. My biscuits start out about 3" in diameter and about 1 1/2" high. They rise and spread some as they cook so they end up larger, about 4" in diameter and about 2 1/2" high.
There's another way to make these. Take all the dough, knead it for a couple of seconds with some more flour - just enough to get it to a smooth dough instead of rough pieces of dough. Then pat it out onto your lightly greased cookie sheet and lightly score it with a knife into biscuit size portions. I'd make 5 scores the long way (6 pieces) and 3 scores the short way. (4 pieces) That would give you 24 biscuits. Don't cut all the way through the dough. Let it rise a little while the oven preheats.
Now there's one last way to make biscuits. My exMIL used to keep self-rising flour in a container. She'd pop the top, add her mayo to the top of the flour and stir it about. Then she'd add milk - yup right in the canister. She'd use her fingers to stir the milk in, then pull out some dough, shape and plop on the cookie sheet. That's a woman that's been making biscuits for 60+ YEARS. Personally, I'm not that brave. I'd have the whole canister oozing milk.
Here's my dumpling recipe:
Dumplings x1
Dumplings x3
My servings are based upon hungry teenagers. I'm sure regular people would eat less. I'm about sure that each large dumpling would be one serving of bread in an exchange diet.
Also, I use the same spoon to make dumplings as I do to make the angel biscuits. I cut WAY back on the SALT! We eat a lot, but don't use much salt. I don't like salty dumplings.
I haven't tried this recipe yet, but I know you can do much the same with the angle biscuit recipe.
I've had a request for my biscuit recipe. The Mom's angel biscuits is my favorite one.
| Mom's Angel biscuits | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
NOTE: When using Mayonnaise for baking (to keep the cooked baked good soft when it's cold) you must be sure to use REAL Mayo. Not "Miracle Whip", not salad dressing, not "lite" or "reduced fat" mayo, but the real stuff. Otherwise it won't work properly. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Without all the fur - fur's nasty, we don't eat that. Of course, cat is probably nasty too and we don't eat them either - unless you're from a different culture. I've heard that there are some cultures that do eat cat!
Most American's roll out their biscuit dough to about 1/2" thick and use a 2" cutter (or a kitchen glass like you'd drink water out of if you have company - no, honey, NOT the Mason jar, we only drink from one of those if we're by ourselves or on a picnic!) . Then they transfer the dough to a cookie sheet, mush the left-over, cut up dough together and reroll it until the dough is used up. That method is supposed to give you 5 dozen (That's right FIVE DOZEN) hockey pucks, I mean biscuits. And they measure 2.25" x 3/4" Just about right to play hockey, but no size to make a meal out of it. Plus, by the time it's been rolled out a couple of time, the resulting biscuits have some real chewiness to them. Makes 'em REALLY good for hockey then! If you insist on rolling and cutting, at least use an empty tuna can for the cutter (yes, you clean it first. Tuna biscuits - ewwweeeee. I don't like fish. Not much anyway. Fried catfish and smoked mullet are about my only fish eating forays. Shrimp and lobster don't count!) And for pity sakes, roll the dough out THICKLY I'm talking 1 1/2" worth of thickness. 1/2" thick biscuits - shudder!
Cat head biscuits are good size biscuits. The kind you can open up and put stuff on - like fried egg and a sausage patty, scrambled egg and bacon or sausage gravy. Substantial enough to make it a meal by itself. Who needs Micky D's? By the way, you do know that all an Egg McMuffin is is a buttered, toasted English muffin with a piece of Canadian bacon on the bottom, a fried egg on top of that and an piece of cheese topped with the other side of the muffin? So break your eggs in muffin tin sections, and bake at 350 until the yolk is just set. While the eggs cook, butter and toast your muffins and then make a batch of these all at once, wrap well, put in a zipper bag and freeze. Take one out, unwrap it from any plastic, wrap in a paper towel or cloth napkin and nuke it for 1-2 mins. Now you just saved $$$. And you know what's in it. I got one at Micky D's once and it had the root bottom slice of an onion on it. Talk about YUCK! And I took it to go, so there was no returning it. (I discovered it quite a few miles down the road!)
When I make my biscuits, I use my large serving spoon - this is larger than the regular spoons that you'd eat soup with, but smaller than the 1/2 cup size, slotted buffet-type spoons. I use this to just plop the mixed, unkneaded dough into my flour container. (This practice may be why the old recipes tell you to sift the flour. lol)
You can just scoop some flour into a mixing bowl and use that instead of getting dough particles in your flour canister. Anyway, you're wanting to take a big spoonful of dough and put it into the flour. Coat the dough with flour and shape into a round shape, with a flat bottom, tucking in the edges and making it smooth as you shape it. After doing a few, you'll get the hang of what you're doing. My biscuits start out about 3" in diameter and about 1 1/2" high. They rise and spread some as they cook so they end up larger, about 4" in diameter and about 2 1/2" high.
There's another way to make these. Take all the dough, knead it for a couple of seconds with some more flour - just enough to get it to a smooth dough instead of rough pieces of dough. Then pat it out onto your lightly greased cookie sheet and lightly score it with a knife into biscuit size portions. I'd make 5 scores the long way (6 pieces) and 3 scores the short way. (4 pieces) That would give you 24 biscuits. Don't cut all the way through the dough. Let it rise a little while the oven preheats.
Now there's one last way to make biscuits. My exMIL used to keep self-rising flour in a container. She'd pop the top, add her mayo to the top of the flour and stir it about. Then she'd add milk - yup right in the canister. She'd use her fingers to stir the milk in, then pull out some dough, shape and plop on the cookie sheet. That's a woman that's been making biscuits for 60+ YEARS. Personally, I'm not that brave. I'd have the whole canister oozing milk.
Here's my dumpling recipe:
Dumplings x1
| This is good for one or two people | |||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||
| Yield: 8-10 dumplings |
| Dumplings x2 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Dumplings x3
| This is good for 3-4 people. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Yield: 24-30 dumplings |
My servings are based upon hungry teenagers. I'm sure regular people would eat less. I'm about sure that each large dumpling would be one serving of bread in an exchange diet.
Also, I use the same spoon to make dumplings as I do to make the angel biscuits. I cut WAY back on the SALT! We eat a lot, but don't use much salt. I don't like salty dumplings.
I haven't tried this recipe yet, but I know you can do much the same with the angle biscuit recipe.
| Paula's Purty Nearly Instant Biscuits | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Thursday, October 25, 2007
An alternate cistern
I haven't actually made this cistern myself. I live in North Ga, and even though the state is in a "drought", we've had plenty of rain where I live. However, this is one of those ideas that I've kept in my mind - you never know when you'll need something like this.
Most houses have rain gutters with a downspout. The downspouts drain the water away from the house - unless you reroute the water to where you want it.
What I have seen done is to make a small 55-60 gal. cistern with a trash can under a downspout. They took a large, clean trash can and build a small fence around it, about 3 feet high and just a bit wider than the circumference of the can. They placed the can in the middle of it, on top of a couple of bricks and put some large gravel around the can to stabilize the outside of the can - to keep it from tipping over as it fills. They then cut the downspout so that the end was just inside of the trash can. They cut a hole in the lid, just large enough that the downspout could fit through it and let the lid close. They also covered the cut area with small screening - to keep dirt and leaves out. They also fit a small piece of screen at the top of the downspout for the same reason. You will have to make sure that you check for leaves in the gutters/downspout or it will block the downspout from draining.
You can make one of these for each corner of the house. That would be about 240 gals. of extra water. If you can have some other clean trash cans around, you could dip off the water to the other cans and keep letting your spouts funnel water to the fenced cans.
NOTE: If you DO NOT have a fenced yard or have small kids, I would use food grade 55 gal drums to do this and use a siphon to remove the water from it. Any kind of bucket - even a 3 gal bucket with water in it is a drowning hazard to a small child. Being top heavy, they fall forward and can not get back out and are dead before anyone finds them. The food drums have two 3" openings in the top. The lid is one solid piece and no one can fall into it. Also the fence keeps the barrel from being tipped over. 55 gals of water weigh a LOT and a kid pulling on it would be badly hurt if it fell on them.
I have also seen a threaded drain port about 2" from the bottom of the can/barrel. The port lets you attach a hose to it and turn water access off and on.
I have also heard of people getting a new septic tank sunk in their yards and having the flow from their downspouts funneled into that. They used a submersible sump pump (new) to drain the water as needed. Some people also put in a drain field so that when the tank is full, the water has someplace to drain to. It would depend on how much rain you get as to what you will need.
Here are some links I found:
http://www.rainbarrelguide.com/
http://www.geocities.com/rainsystem/howto.html
http://www.lid-stormwater.net/raincist/raincist_specs.htm
This site has a LOT of neat stuff!
http://www.floydcountyinview.com/cistern.html
http://deercreek_63080.tripod.com/theprimitivecabinwebsite/id8.html
http://www.harvestingrainwater.com/suppliers/water-tankscisterns/
http://www.scribd.com/doc/96380/rainwater-harvesting
http://www.plastmo.com/plastmo/rbdivert.html
Most houses have rain gutters with a downspout. The downspouts drain the water away from the house - unless you reroute the water to where you want it.
What I have seen done is to make a small 55-60 gal. cistern with a trash can under a downspout. They took a large, clean trash can and build a small fence around it, about 3 feet high and just a bit wider than the circumference of the can. They placed the can in the middle of it, on top of a couple of bricks and put some large gravel around the can to stabilize the outside of the can - to keep it from tipping over as it fills. They then cut the downspout so that the end was just inside of the trash can. They cut a hole in the lid, just large enough that the downspout could fit through it and let the lid close. They also covered the cut area with small screening - to keep dirt and leaves out. They also fit a small piece of screen at the top of the downspout for the same reason. You will have to make sure that you check for leaves in the gutters/downspout or it will block the downspout from draining.
You can make one of these for each corner of the house. That would be about 240 gals. of extra water. If you can have some other clean trash cans around, you could dip off the water to the other cans and keep letting your spouts funnel water to the fenced cans.
NOTE: If you DO NOT have a fenced yard or have small kids, I would use food grade 55 gal drums to do this and use a siphon to remove the water from it. Any kind of bucket - even a 3 gal bucket with water in it is a drowning hazard to a small child. Being top heavy, they fall forward and can not get back out and are dead before anyone finds them. The food drums have two 3" openings in the top. The lid is one solid piece and no one can fall into it. Also the fence keeps the barrel from being tipped over. 55 gals of water weigh a LOT and a kid pulling on it would be badly hurt if it fell on them.
I have also seen a threaded drain port about 2" from the bottom of the can/barrel. The port lets you attach a hose to it and turn water access off and on.
I have also heard of people getting a new septic tank sunk in their yards and having the flow from their downspouts funneled into that. They used a submersible sump pump (new) to drain the water as needed. Some people also put in a drain field so that when the tank is full, the water has someplace to drain to. It would depend on how much rain you get as to what you will need.
Here are some links I found:
http://www.rainbarrelguide.com/
http://www.geocities.com/rainsystem/howto.html
http://www.lid-stormwater.net/raincist/raincist_specs.htm
This site has a LOT of neat stuff!
http://www.floydcountyinview.com/cistern.html
http://deercreek_63080.tripod.com/theprimitivecabinwebsite/id8.html
http://www.harvestingrainwater.com/suppliers/water-tankscisterns/
http://www.scribd.com/doc/96380/rainwater-harvesting
http://www.plastmo.com/plastmo/rbdivert.html
Everlasting chicken - was Magic chicken
Ok, my 18dd suggested I change the name of this post. I'd forgotten that "magic" has other connotations - pot (and I ain't talkin' 'bout what 'cha cook in!)
I thought I'd include my everlasting chicken recipe. I use this recipe to make several meals from one fryer size (3-4 pounds) chicken. You can make 1 large pot of soup, 1 large pot of either chicken and rice or chicken and dumplings or a smaller pot of each. You will also have breast meat to make another meal out of, plus more chicken meat from wings, back, neck and scraps that didn't come off with the breast and then more broth.
First I thaw my frozen chicken (if it was frozen), then wash it out, pick off any missed pin feathers and remove the giblets. I then take Mr or Ms chicken and put it into my large soup pot, cover it with water - to about 2" from the top of this large pot. I then season it with salt, onion powder, garlic powder, Adobo and poultry seasoning. Bring it all to a boil and reduce heat to low, cover and let simmer for about 20 mins.
I then remove the meat from the pot. I have a partially done chicken and about 6 cups of stock.
Next I remove the legs/thigh quarter from both sides and set that aside. I preheat the oven to 350 degrees, while that's heating I re-season the chicken itself with the above spices, sans salt. I put the chicken and the giblets into a roasting pan and cook the chicken for another 30 mins or until the meat is tender.
While the breast meat is cooking, I remove the meat from the thigh/leg quarters. I put the fat, skin and bones aside, I'm going to use them again later.
When the meat is off the quarters, I then need to make some choices. What do I want to make with this batch of broth. I can make a large pot of soup, or I can wait and make the soup from the later broth I make from the scraps and bones. Normally, I make a batch of either rice or dumplings. I have a ds, Thang #2, that is a bottomless pit, so I make 3 cups of rice to the 6 cups of broth, or split the broth into two pans and make dumplings. I could just make the dumplings in one pot, but we like the fluffy dumplings and found that 2 pots made better dumplings for our taste buds than one pot did.
Chicken and Dumplings
Broth
Chicken cut or shredded into pieces
Biscuit dough (This is Southern U.S. biscuits, made with flour, salt, baking powder, milk and shortening/lard/oil. Biscuits in the rest of the English-speaking world are cookies to us. We DON'T want sweets here lol)
Make your biscuit dough with about 1/2 more milk than the recipe calls for. You don't want a stiff dough that you can knead, but you don't want soup either. It needs to be stiff enough to use a spoon to scoop it out. (if I need to post a recipe, email me and I will. It's late and I don't want to go hunting for it now. lol)
Now put the chicken and broth on and bring it to a boil, then turn it down to simmer.
To make dumplings, you will need a cup or glass of cool water and two kitchen spoons, not measuring spoons, but what we call table spoons. Bigger than what you stir your coffee/tea with, probably a soup spoon elsewhere. Here's what to do: dip one spoon in water, dip it into the dough and come up with a lump of dough on your spoon. Now dip the second spoon in the water and use it to push the dumpling into the now simmering water. Keep dipping the spoons into the water before you go for the dumpling dough and they will slide right off the spoons.
When you have all the dough into the pot, cover the pot and set the timer for 10 mins. Listen to make sure it doesn't boil over - with the lid on, you may need to turn it down just a tad, but you do want it to be simmering. At the end of 10 mins, take the lid off and let it cook for another 10 minutes. Test a top dumpling. It should be light and fluffy. The inside should be cooked. If it's still gummy, let it cook a minute or two longer and it should be done. Also note that the top dumplings will be fluffy, but the dumpling underneath will just be clumps of cooked dough. Some people like the more solid dough a lot. We don't like them as much, so that's why I use two pans - even though I could get all the dough into one pot - even when it's a triple batch of dough.
When I do two pans of broth, I double or triple my recipe to have enough fluffy dumplings. So one batch of biscuit recipe should be enough for one pot of broth for normal people.
Chicken and yellow rice - VERY easy to make
meat from 2 thigh/leg quarters
6 cups broth (add water if you're a little short on the broth. Or water and bullion if there's no broth)
3 cups rice
1 tsp turmeric
2 tsp poultry seasoning
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp Adobo
1 tsp salt
Measure broth and rice carefully! Too much of one affects how the rice will turn out!
Put the ingredients back in the big pot and bring to a boil. Turn heat to low (3 on mine on a scale of low to 9, 9 being the hottest), stir well, put a tight-fitting lid on the pot and set your timer for 14 minutes. DO NOT remove the lid, stir or otherwise mess with it. LEAVE it ALONE! When the timer goes off. STILL DO NOT remove the lid, stir or otherwise mess with it! Just take it off the heat and let it sit for 10 mins.
At the end of this time, you will have perfectly cooked rice, no sticking to the bottom of the pan, no undone rice and no soupy rice - unless you've either not measured carefully, don't have a tight-fitting lid or opened the pot. I've fixed rice like this for 30 years and the only time it has ever failed is when I've gotten lazy with measuring the broth or rice. This means getting to eye level with your measuring pitcher for the liquid and using a knife to scrape the excess rice off the top of the measuring cup instead of scooping and shaking the rice sort of level.
The turmeric will give the rice a nice yellow color.
I serve this with my Aji picante (Colombian salsa)that I posted before. (And if someone will tell me how to link back to that post, I'll gladly link it for everyone.)
Salsa Colombian style (Aji Picante)
6 Roma tomatoes, or 3 regular tomatoes, diced small
1 med onion, diced small
1 jalapeño pepper, minced
1 1/2 tsp salt
red wine vinegar
olive oil
Place in a medium size bowl and mix together tomatoes, onions and peppers. Add vinegar to 1 1/2" to 2" below vegies. Pour a 1/2"-1" layer of oil over all. Add salt and stir well. Use fresh.
Back to our chicken in the oven. When it's done, remove the meat from the bone. You may save the breast meat either in two halves or shred it. You can make another meal or two from this meat. Either chicken sandwiches, chicken salad or baked breast meat with potatoes/rice, vegies and bread or salad. You will also have meat from the wings and back, as well as scraps of meat from other parts. Save these for the next round of broth-making.
More Broth
Save the skin, bones and scraps from the chicken from the oven as well as any goodness on the bottom of the roasting pan. Do NOT add the liver, this will make the broth have too strong a flavor - unless your family is just crazy about the taste of liver. I've been known to add some water to that pan and "deglaze" it, then add that to the broth pot as part of the water. Add the ones from the thigh/leg quarters. Add a couple of carrots, not peeled, just broken into about 3 pieces, 1 onion, not peeled, just cut into quarters, 1 or 2 stalks of celery - again, just broken into 3 pieces. Place into a roasting pan or into your big pot and cover well with water. Add the usual cast of characters: salt, onion powder, garlic powder, Adobo and poultry seasoning. Place in the oven at 350 for a couple of hours, replacing the water as needful or place on stovetop and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for a couple of hours. (Can put this in the crockpot too!) At the end of this time period, you have a nice broth. Strain it (I just pour it into my colendar, with a bowl underneath it to catch the broth). Toss the bones, skin and cooked out vegies. You can either put it into a container overnight, remove the fat and use; or go head and use it. The fat will pool at the top and you can skim it off with a spoon.
Chicken noodle soup
Broth
Egg noodles
Bits of chicken from deboning the chicken
Anything else you'd like to add - shredded carrots, potatoes, cooked rice instead of noodles, diced celery, diced onions, etc.
Seasonings to taste
Put the broth, noodles and bits of chicken into the soup pot along with anything else you'd like to add. Bring to a boil and lower heat. Cook until the noodles are done. If using uncooked rice, make sure you use 1 cup of rice to at least 3 cups of broth, perhaps even 4 cups of broth. You want soup, not a pot of rice.
Chicken gravy
You can also use some of the broth to make gravy and shred some chicken into it. Serve it over rice, potatoes or bread.
For each cup of broth you want to make into gravy, add 3 tablespoons of flour to another bowl. Add just enough water to make a slurry. Pour the slurry into the hot broth and bring it to a boil, stirring constantly. Adjust your seasonings.
Chicken Pot Pie
Gravy from above with some meat (or not)
pie crust, biscuit dough, corn bread dough, tortillas, mashed potatoes, etc. Enough for 1 or 2 crusts (one for top and one for bottom - if you want a bottom crust)
frozen mixed vegies
diced potatoes (see note below)
This is so simple. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Select your pan - pie plate, 9x13, cast iron skillet, casserole, whatever you want to use.
Mix gravy with meat and vegies. If you want a bottom crust, pat it into your chosen vessel, otherwise grease with your choice of stuff so you can get it out of the pan when cooked. Then pour the mixture into the pan. Top with whatever your using for a top crust. If a solid crust, cut a couple of small slits into it. Place your pan on a cookie sheet (to catch any overflows) and put in the oven for 30 minutes or so. You want to heat the food through and brown your crust.
All of these recipes can be frozen - unless you add potatoes to anything. I've heard that other people freeze potatoes, but I've never had good luck with the texture after doing that.
There you have it. One miracle with chicken.
I thought I'd include my everlasting chicken recipe. I use this recipe to make several meals from one fryer size (3-4 pounds) chicken. You can make 1 large pot of soup, 1 large pot of either chicken and rice or chicken and dumplings or a smaller pot of each. You will also have breast meat to make another meal out of, plus more chicken meat from wings, back, neck and scraps that didn't come off with the breast and then more broth.
First I thaw my frozen chicken (if it was frozen), then wash it out, pick off any missed pin feathers and remove the giblets. I then take Mr or Ms chicken and put it into my large soup pot, cover it with water - to about 2" from the top of this large pot. I then season it with salt, onion powder, garlic powder, Adobo and poultry seasoning. Bring it all to a boil and reduce heat to low, cover and let simmer for about 20 mins.
I then remove the meat from the pot. I have a partially done chicken and about 6 cups of stock.
Next I remove the legs/thigh quarter from both sides and set that aside. I preheat the oven to 350 degrees, while that's heating I re-season the chicken itself with the above spices, sans salt. I put the chicken and the giblets into a roasting pan and cook the chicken for another 30 mins or until the meat is tender.
While the breast meat is cooking, I remove the meat from the thigh/leg quarters. I put the fat, skin and bones aside, I'm going to use them again later.
When the meat is off the quarters, I then need to make some choices. What do I want to make with this batch of broth. I can make a large pot of soup, or I can wait and make the soup from the later broth I make from the scraps and bones. Normally, I make a batch of either rice or dumplings. I have a ds, Thang #2, that is a bottomless pit, so I make 3 cups of rice to the 6 cups of broth, or split the broth into two pans and make dumplings. I could just make the dumplings in one pot, but we like the fluffy dumplings and found that 2 pots made better dumplings for our taste buds than one pot did.
Chicken and Dumplings
Broth
Chicken cut or shredded into pieces
Biscuit dough (This is Southern U.S. biscuits, made with flour, salt, baking powder, milk and shortening/lard/oil. Biscuits in the rest of the English-speaking world are cookies to us. We DON'T want sweets here lol)
Make your biscuit dough with about 1/2 more milk than the recipe calls for. You don't want a stiff dough that you can knead, but you don't want soup either. It needs to be stiff enough to use a spoon to scoop it out. (if I need to post a recipe, email me and I will. It's late and I don't want to go hunting for it now. lol)
Now put the chicken and broth on and bring it to a boil, then turn it down to simmer.
To make dumplings, you will need a cup or glass of cool water and two kitchen spoons, not measuring spoons, but what we call table spoons. Bigger than what you stir your coffee/tea with, probably a soup spoon elsewhere. Here's what to do: dip one spoon in water, dip it into the dough and come up with a lump of dough on your spoon. Now dip the second spoon in the water and use it to push the dumpling into the now simmering water. Keep dipping the spoons into the water before you go for the dumpling dough and they will slide right off the spoons.
When you have all the dough into the pot, cover the pot and set the timer for 10 mins. Listen to make sure it doesn't boil over - with the lid on, you may need to turn it down just a tad, but you do want it to be simmering. At the end of 10 mins, take the lid off and let it cook for another 10 minutes. Test a top dumpling. It should be light and fluffy. The inside should be cooked. If it's still gummy, let it cook a minute or two longer and it should be done. Also note that the top dumplings will be fluffy, but the dumpling underneath will just be clumps of cooked dough. Some people like the more solid dough a lot. We don't like them as much, so that's why I use two pans - even though I could get all the dough into one pot - even when it's a triple batch of dough.
When I do two pans of broth, I double or triple my recipe to have enough fluffy dumplings. So one batch of biscuit recipe should be enough for one pot of broth for normal people.
Chicken and yellow rice - VERY easy to make
meat from 2 thigh/leg quarters
6 cups broth (add water if you're a little short on the broth. Or water and bullion if there's no broth)
3 cups rice
1 tsp turmeric
2 tsp poultry seasoning
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp Adobo
1 tsp salt
Measure broth and rice carefully! Too much of one affects how the rice will turn out!
Put the ingredients back in the big pot and bring to a boil. Turn heat to low (3 on mine on a scale of low to 9, 9 being the hottest), stir well, put a tight-fitting lid on the pot and set your timer for 14 minutes. DO NOT remove the lid, stir or otherwise mess with it. LEAVE it ALONE! When the timer goes off. STILL DO NOT remove the lid, stir or otherwise mess with it! Just take it off the heat and let it sit for 10 mins.
At the end of this time, you will have perfectly cooked rice, no sticking to the bottom of the pan, no undone rice and no soupy rice - unless you've either not measured carefully, don't have a tight-fitting lid or opened the pot. I've fixed rice like this for 30 years and the only time it has ever failed is when I've gotten lazy with measuring the broth or rice. This means getting to eye level with your measuring pitcher for the liquid and using a knife to scrape the excess rice off the top of the measuring cup instead of scooping and shaking the rice sort of level.
The turmeric will give the rice a nice yellow color.
I serve this with my Aji picante (Colombian salsa)that I posted before. (And if someone will tell me how to link back to that post, I'll gladly link it for everyone.)
Salsa Colombian style (Aji Picante)
6 Roma tomatoes, or 3 regular tomatoes, diced small
1 med onion, diced small
1 jalapeño pepper, minced
1 1/2 tsp salt
red wine vinegar
olive oil
Place in a medium size bowl and mix together tomatoes, onions and peppers. Add vinegar to 1 1/2" to 2" below vegies. Pour a 1/2"-1" layer of oil over all. Add salt and stir well. Use fresh.
Back to our chicken in the oven. When it's done, remove the meat from the bone. You may save the breast meat either in two halves or shred it. You can make another meal or two from this meat. Either chicken sandwiches, chicken salad or baked breast meat with potatoes/rice, vegies and bread or salad. You will also have meat from the wings and back, as well as scraps of meat from other parts. Save these for the next round of broth-making.
More Broth
Save the skin, bones and scraps from the chicken from the oven as well as any goodness on the bottom of the roasting pan. Do NOT add the liver, this will make the broth have too strong a flavor - unless your family is just crazy about the taste of liver. I've been known to add some water to that pan and "deglaze" it, then add that to the broth pot as part of the water. Add the ones from the thigh/leg quarters. Add a couple of carrots, not peeled, just broken into about 3 pieces, 1 onion, not peeled, just cut into quarters, 1 or 2 stalks of celery - again, just broken into 3 pieces. Place into a roasting pan or into your big pot and cover well with water. Add the usual cast of characters: salt, onion powder, garlic powder, Adobo and poultry seasoning. Place in the oven at 350 for a couple of hours, replacing the water as needful or place on stovetop and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for a couple of hours. (Can put this in the crockpot too!) At the end of this time period, you have a nice broth. Strain it (I just pour it into my colendar, with a bowl underneath it to catch the broth). Toss the bones, skin and cooked out vegies. You can either put it into a container overnight, remove the fat and use; or go head and use it. The fat will pool at the top and you can skim it off with a spoon.
Chicken noodle soup
Broth
Egg noodles
Bits of chicken from deboning the chicken
Anything else you'd like to add - shredded carrots, potatoes, cooked rice instead of noodles, diced celery, diced onions, etc.
Seasonings to taste
Put the broth, noodles and bits of chicken into the soup pot along with anything else you'd like to add. Bring to a boil and lower heat. Cook until the noodles are done. If using uncooked rice, make sure you use 1 cup of rice to at least 3 cups of broth, perhaps even 4 cups of broth. You want soup, not a pot of rice.
Chicken gravy
You can also use some of the broth to make gravy and shred some chicken into it. Serve it over rice, potatoes or bread.
For each cup of broth you want to make into gravy, add 3 tablespoons of flour to another bowl. Add just enough water to make a slurry. Pour the slurry into the hot broth and bring it to a boil, stirring constantly. Adjust your seasonings.
Chicken Pot Pie
Gravy from above with some meat (or not)
pie crust, biscuit dough, corn bread dough, tortillas, mashed potatoes, etc. Enough for 1 or 2 crusts (one for top and one for bottom - if you want a bottom crust)
frozen mixed vegies
diced potatoes (see note below)
This is so simple. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Select your pan - pie plate, 9x13, cast iron skillet, casserole, whatever you want to use.
Mix gravy with meat and vegies. If you want a bottom crust, pat it into your chosen vessel, otherwise grease with your choice of stuff so you can get it out of the pan when cooked. Then pour the mixture into the pan. Top with whatever your using for a top crust. If a solid crust, cut a couple of small slits into it. Place your pan on a cookie sheet (to catch any overflows) and put in the oven for 30 minutes or so. You want to heat the food through and brown your crust.
All of these recipes can be frozen - unless you add potatoes to anything. I've heard that other people freeze potatoes, but I've never had good luck with the texture after doing that.
There you have it. One miracle with chicken.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Newly licensed - Thang #1
Okay. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I can now send the child to the store without me. On the other hand....MY BABY! What if she wrecks? What if she gets lost? Ok, so she won't get lost that easily - she's grown up around these parts. But, uhmmmm, she's not such a good driver yet. She forgets really important things like her blinker. She has a bit of trouble parking. Could all that only be because I'm in the car? Because I make her nervous? I make HER nervous??? I'm the one that used to be a paramedic. I KNOW what can happen with a car!!
And it's raining and she took her brother, Thang #2 ALL the WAY to Walmart - 16 miles from here! Without me.
Okay, breath, mom, breath. Hysterical moment over!
She's very responsible. She bought and paid cash for her own car last year. She's 18 1/2 and holds down a part-time job as a Customer Service Manager for the store where she works. She's still finishing up high school or she would be working full time. She even found a sale on a pair of name brand shoes for her brother. Regular price was $48 and with tax it came to $26 - cheaper than the cheap shoes at Wallyworld. She's been paying her own bills for about 2 years - except for a period when she couldn't find a job. She's never bounced a check on the account she's had since she was 15 1/2.
So why is my stomach in my throat? Could it be the severing of the ties? Now she can go and do without me. Now I'm not her ride any more. She's free to come and go as she wishes. Scary!
Update:
After buying Thang#2 some shoes, they went to their dad's house, ate pizza with dad, step-mom and Thang #3. Despite the hard rain which I had them wait out at dad's, they are now home safe and sound.
whew
I may not be cut out for this phase of life. lol
And we've all grown from the experience.
And it's raining and she took her brother, Thang #2 ALL the WAY to Walmart - 16 miles from here! Without me.
Okay, breath, mom, breath. Hysterical moment over!
She's very responsible. She bought and paid cash for her own car last year. She's 18 1/2 and holds down a part-time job as a Customer Service Manager for the store where she works. She's still finishing up high school or she would be working full time. She even found a sale on a pair of name brand shoes for her brother. Regular price was $48 and with tax it came to $26 - cheaper than the cheap shoes at Wallyworld. She's been paying her own bills for about 2 years - except for a period when she couldn't find a job. She's never bounced a check on the account she's had since she was 15 1/2.
So why is my stomach in my throat? Could it be the severing of the ties? Now she can go and do without me. Now I'm not her ride any more. She's free to come and go as she wishes. Scary!
Update:
After buying Thang#2 some shoes, they went to their dad's house, ate pizza with dad, step-mom and Thang #3. Despite the hard rain which I had them wait out at dad's, they are now home safe and sound.
whew
I may not be cut out for this phase of life. lol
And we've all grown from the experience.
Sunday, October 21, 2007
EASY Fleece shrug (like a shawl, but with arms)
Ok, it's getting cold here in North Ga. The temp was 51 at 9:30pm. I'm not going to running the heater until I can't put it off any longer. We need to put on more clothes to keep warm. So what does that have to do with a shrug and what the heck is a "shrug" anyway?
A shrug is sort of like the sleeves of a shirt/sweater, without the body of it. It goes from one wrist, over the shoulders and down to the other wrist. It's meant to add some warmth to arms and shoulders without overheating the rest of you. Unlike a shawl, it won't slip off with movement. The "sleeves" stop that from happening.
While I'm up and moving, I HATE long sleeves. Normally, I go out in the snow without a jacket, sweater or coat. I overheat very easily and really prefer to be cooler than hotter. Unfortunately, as soon as the sun sets, especially when I sit at the computer or read, my body temp seems to drop and I get COLD. To the point of miserable, cold! My right hand will be icy in no time, my feet freeze (ok, perhaps I should put some shoes/slippers on once in a while. lol) and my arms are goosebumped.
I've knitted slippers for the feet and a fingerless glove for the hand. Tonight, I realized that even with shoes on, my arms were just cold but that the rest of me was fine.
I happened to look over at a pile of material that I've been going through making various napkins, feminine protection, wipes, hankies, etc and saw a piece of scrap fleece. I bought this remnant for about $2.00 at Walmart. It's a piece that's 21" long and 60" wide. All of a sudden I got a really bright idea.
I picked up that scrap, put it over my shoulders with the 60" side going from wrist to wrist. I used a pin to mark where the "sleeve" needed to stop so that I could get in and out of it. I did that for both arms. I then turned the material so that the wrong sides were together (the sides that want to "roll" inward is the "wrong side") and pinned near where I had marked the material for the "sleeve" to stop. I held the two "sleeves" together to make sure they were even. I then zig-zagged from the wrist end to where the pin was, making sure to backstitch both at the start and end of the stitching so that the stitching wouldn't come out. I stitched about 3/8" from the edge and sewed a seam 12" long - before I ended the stitching. I just used the same thread I had been using to sew some light-colored material. (This is a black background with bright dots on it.) I trimmed the threads and turned it right-side out and slipped it on. It's working GREAT! my arms aren't cold anymore. My torso isn't hot and I have freedom of movement. The wrist ends are rather baggy, not fitted at all. When it gets really cold, I may make the wrist end tighter, but I don't think I'm going to need to.
So the mental picture is a piece of material that is a rectangle and then it's sewn up on each side so that there is a sleeve, then an open, unsewn piece of material and then a second sleeve as one continuous piece of material and that's a shrug.
I'm very heavy, so the wider piece of material is needed to cover me. If you're thinner, you could probably get away with a piece of material that was only 16"-18" long and 60" wide. If you're a smaller person and the 60" makes the sleeves too long, trim the sleeves down a bit to fit.
It's taken me longer to type this up than it did to make the shrug. I don't think it took me 15 mins from the time I thought about doing it until I was wearing it. My kind of project!!
A shrug is sort of like the sleeves of a shirt/sweater, without the body of it. It goes from one wrist, over the shoulders and down to the other wrist. It's meant to add some warmth to arms and shoulders without overheating the rest of you. Unlike a shawl, it won't slip off with movement. The "sleeves" stop that from happening.
While I'm up and moving, I HATE long sleeves. Normally, I go out in the snow without a jacket, sweater or coat. I overheat very easily and really prefer to be cooler than hotter. Unfortunately, as soon as the sun sets, especially when I sit at the computer or read, my body temp seems to drop and I get COLD. To the point of miserable, cold! My right hand will be icy in no time, my feet freeze (ok, perhaps I should put some shoes/slippers on once in a while. lol) and my arms are goosebumped.
I've knitted slippers for the feet and a fingerless glove for the hand. Tonight, I realized that even with shoes on, my arms were just cold but that the rest of me was fine.
I happened to look over at a pile of material that I've been going through making various napkins, feminine protection, wipes, hankies, etc and saw a piece of scrap fleece. I bought this remnant for about $2.00 at Walmart. It's a piece that's 21" long and 60" wide. All of a sudden I got a really bright idea.
I picked up that scrap, put it over my shoulders with the 60" side going from wrist to wrist. I used a pin to mark where the "sleeve" needed to stop so that I could get in and out of it. I did that for both arms. I then turned the material so that the wrong sides were together (the sides that want to "roll" inward is the "wrong side") and pinned near where I had marked the material for the "sleeve" to stop. I held the two "sleeves" together to make sure they were even. I then zig-zagged from the wrist end to where the pin was, making sure to backstitch both at the start and end of the stitching so that the stitching wouldn't come out. I stitched about 3/8" from the edge and sewed a seam 12" long - before I ended the stitching. I just used the same thread I had been using to sew some light-colored material. (This is a black background with bright dots on it.) I trimmed the threads and turned it right-side out and slipped it on. It's working GREAT! my arms aren't cold anymore. My torso isn't hot and I have freedom of movement. The wrist ends are rather baggy, not fitted at all. When it gets really cold, I may make the wrist end tighter, but I don't think I'm going to need to.
So the mental picture is a piece of material that is a rectangle and then it's sewn up on each side so that there is a sleeve, then an open, unsewn piece of material and then a second sleeve as one continuous piece of material and that's a shrug.
I'm very heavy, so the wider piece of material is needed to cover me. If you're thinner, you could probably get away with a piece of material that was only 16"-18" long and 60" wide. If you're a smaller person and the 60" makes the sleeves too long, trim the sleeves down a bit to fit.
It's taken me longer to type this up than it did to make the shrug. I don't think it took me 15 mins from the time I thought about doing it until I was wearing it. My kind of project!!
Saturday, October 20, 2007
Beef and chili burritos
I had a college roommate whose family came to visit and made this delicious concoction for dinner. It is SO good. I don't make it much any more, my kids won't eat this either. I think this is another meal I'm going to go ahead and make for me, then freeze.
Beef and chili burritos:
1 lb ground beef, browned and drained
1 onion dice and cooked with the meat - if using store-bought chili
1-2 cloves of garlic, also cooked with the meat - if using store-bought chili
2 regular cans of chili (I make my own and use 2 cups or so of it instead.)
1 can of mushrooms (really doesn't matter if it's the small or large can. One is 4 oz and the other is 8 ozs., so it will depend on how much you like mushrooms.)
1 can of black olives, sliced (Regular size can, not the little one.)
1 med onion, diced
1-2 tomatoes, diced
Shredded cheese - your choice. I usually use cheddar or jack
Sour cream
Splash of red wine vinegar (opt)
Flour tortillas - Burrito size
Brown meat and vegies if using canned chili. Drain, add chili, mushrooms and olives. Heat well on low. Place other ingredients in individual bowls to pass around as people make their own burritos.
Heat tortillas in microwave, covered with damp towel to keep warm.
When ready to make:
Place warm tortilla on plate. put 2 tablespoons of meat/chili mixture down center of tortilla. Add a tablespoon or two each of tomatoes, onion, shredded cheese and sour cream. Sprinkle with a little red wine vinegar. Fold ends up toward middle - about 1/3 each side. Then fold each side over about 1/3 to make an enclosed package. Now it's ready to eat. YUM-YUM!
Beef and chili burritos:
1 lb ground beef, browned and drained
1 onion dice and cooked with the meat - if using store-bought chili
1-2 cloves of garlic, also cooked with the meat - if using store-bought chili
2 regular cans of chili (I make my own and use 2 cups or so of it instead.)
1 can of mushrooms (really doesn't matter if it's the small or large can. One is 4 oz and the other is 8 ozs., so it will depend on how much you like mushrooms.)
1 can of black olives, sliced (Regular size can, not the little one.)
1 med onion, diced
1-2 tomatoes, diced
Shredded cheese - your choice. I usually use cheddar or jack
Sour cream
Splash of red wine vinegar (opt)
Flour tortillas - Burrito size
Brown meat and vegies if using canned chili. Drain, add chili, mushrooms and olives. Heat well on low. Place other ingredients in individual bowls to pass around as people make their own burritos.
Heat tortillas in microwave, covered with damp towel to keep warm.
When ready to make:
Place warm tortilla on plate. put 2 tablespoons of meat/chili mixture down center of tortilla. Add a tablespoon or two each of tomatoes, onion, shredded cheese and sour cream. Sprinkle with a little red wine vinegar. Fold ends up toward middle - about 1/3 each side. Then fold each side over about 1/3 to make an enclosed package. Now it's ready to eat. YUM-YUM!
My favorite vegetarian recipe
Several times a week I make vegetarian meals. At one point in time, I ate vegetarian all the time and this is the first "recipe" that I learned to make. It's pretty easy to make. I will admit that I don't measure anything with this, I just always "eyeballed" it. So the measurements are an approximation, but they really should be close. Adjust as you need to for your family and their likes (mine won't eat this. They also don't eat "chunks" in the sauce. That's why there's the real deal and then the powders - for the picky amongst us.)
Lentils and rice:
Lentils
Brown Rice
water, stock or bullion
Spaghetti sauce (I make mine homemade, but you could use store-bought sauce)
Grated cheese (whatever kind you like. Cheddar, Mozzarella, Parmesan, etc.)
How much of the ingredients you need depends on how many you're wanting to feed.
I would use 1 cup of lentils to 1/2 cups of brown rice and be eating this forever. Or you could make it and freeze it. (Seems like this was 1/2 a small bag of lentils and about 1/4 - 1/2 small bag of brown rice.) This would make about 3 1/2 cups of lentils/rice - without the spaghetti sauce.
Add liquid to more than cover it. I would add about 4 - 5 cups of water, stock or what have you to the lentils/rice and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and cover it. I simmer it, stirring every 5 mins or so, for 45 mins, until the grains were tender. (Take a bite of both lentils and rice and see if you like how done it is.) If there was any liquid left I used to drain it off. Now I just use less water and watch the fluid level as it cooks.
While the lentils and rice cook, I make my spaghetti sauce, but don't add any ground beef and/or sausage to it.
Spaghetti Sauce:
28 - 36 oz can of tomato sauce, puree, diced tomatoes - whatever floats your boat
1 6 oz can of Tomato paste
1 6 oz can of water (from rinsing out the tomato cans)
1 onion, diced (size of onion depends on how much sauce and how much onion you like) and/or 1 1/2 tsp onion powder
1 -2 cloves of garlic, minced and/or 1 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp salt (we don't use much salt at our house. Up it if you need to)
1 tsp Italian seasoning
1/2 tsp basil
1/2 tsp oregano
1 tsp brown sugar (opt)
1 can black olives, broken into pieces or sliced (opt)
1 can mushrooms (opt)
1 tsp cumin (opt)
Saute the onions, if you're using them until they are soft. Then mix all the rest of the ingredients together. Bring to a soft boil, lower heat to low and COVER - unless you like wiping up tomato splatters from the stove and any surrounding areas! Let simmer until the lentils/rice are done.
Once the lentils/rice are done, drain any water from the pot and mix in spaghetti sauce to make a nice consistency. You want it to be moist, but not soupy - unless you just like a lot of sauce. If there's sauce left over, freeze it in serving size portions or put in ice tray for smaller cubes to add to eggs or burritos.
To serve:
We would just put the mixture in individual bowls and then cover the top with grated/shredded cheese. Personally, I like med. sharp cheddar best. You can also serve this with sour cream.
Add a green salad and perhaps some garlic toast. YUM. Shame my kids won't eat this. sigh. I think I'm just going to make me some and freeze in meal-size portions. My roommates and I sure did like this and it's cheap - if you don't add the olives and mushrooms.
Lentils and rice:
Lentils
Brown Rice
water, stock or bullion
Spaghetti sauce (I make mine homemade, but you could use store-bought sauce)
Grated cheese (whatever kind you like. Cheddar, Mozzarella, Parmesan, etc.)
How much of the ingredients you need depends on how many you're wanting to feed.
I would use 1 cup of lentils to 1/2 cups of brown rice and be eating this forever. Or you could make it and freeze it. (Seems like this was 1/2 a small bag of lentils and about 1/4 - 1/2 small bag of brown rice.) This would make about 3 1/2 cups of lentils/rice - without the spaghetti sauce.
Add liquid to more than cover it. I would add about 4 - 5 cups of water, stock or what have you to the lentils/rice and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and cover it. I simmer it, stirring every 5 mins or so, for 45 mins, until the grains were tender. (Take a bite of both lentils and rice and see if you like how done it is.) If there was any liquid left I used to drain it off. Now I just use less water and watch the fluid level as it cooks.
While the lentils and rice cook, I make my spaghetti sauce, but don't add any ground beef and/or sausage to it.
Spaghetti Sauce:
28 - 36 oz can of tomato sauce, puree, diced tomatoes - whatever floats your boat
1 6 oz can of Tomato paste
1 6 oz can of water (from rinsing out the tomato cans)
1 onion, diced (size of onion depends on how much sauce and how much onion you like) and/or 1 1/2 tsp onion powder
1 -2 cloves of garlic, minced and/or 1 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp salt (we don't use much salt at our house. Up it if you need to)
1 tsp Italian seasoning
1/2 tsp basil
1/2 tsp oregano
1 tsp brown sugar (opt)
1 can black olives, broken into pieces or sliced (opt)
1 can mushrooms (opt)
1 tsp cumin (opt)
Saute the onions, if you're using them until they are soft. Then mix all the rest of the ingredients together. Bring to a soft boil, lower heat to low and COVER - unless you like wiping up tomato splatters from the stove and any surrounding areas! Let simmer until the lentils/rice are done.
Once the lentils/rice are done, drain any water from the pot and mix in spaghetti sauce to make a nice consistency. You want it to be moist, but not soupy - unless you just like a lot of sauce. If there's sauce left over, freeze it in serving size portions or put in ice tray for smaller cubes to add to eggs or burritos.
To serve:
We would just put the mixture in individual bowls and then cover the top with grated/shredded cheese. Personally, I like med. sharp cheddar best. You can also serve this with sour cream.
Add a green salad and perhaps some garlic toast. YUM. Shame my kids won't eat this. sigh. I think I'm just going to make me some and freeze in meal-size portions. My roommates and I sure did like this and it's cheap - if you don't add the olives and mushrooms.
Rice bags for heating
A number of years ago, my then 10dd made us all some rice bags. She's 18 now and those bags have lasted this long and seen a lot of use.
Here's what she did:
Cut some cotton or poly/cotton fabric to a 10"x 10" square (or make a 10" x20" rectangle)
She put the wrong sides together and sewed almost all the way around the bag, left an opening to turn the bag and be able to fill it.
She then filled it with about 2 cups of rice. Just regular, long-grain, uncooked rice.
She then sewed over the opening.
Whenever we need some heat - either on an aching body part or to warm a cold bed, we place the bag in the microwave and nuke if for 1-4 minutes. The amount of time depends on the wattage of your microwave and whether or not you're using this for a heating pad or wanting to warm a bed.
BE VERY CAREFUL using this with small children or elderly person! The bags can get very hot - depending on how long you heat it. They can be heated hot enough to cause a serious burn on a child or elderly person.
Here's what she did:
Cut some cotton or poly/cotton fabric to a 10"x 10" square (or make a 10" x20" rectangle)
She put the wrong sides together and sewed almost all the way around the bag, left an opening to turn the bag and be able to fill it.
She then filled it with about 2 cups of rice. Just regular, long-grain, uncooked rice.
She then sewed over the opening.
Whenever we need some heat - either on an aching body part or to warm a cold bed, we place the bag in the microwave and nuke if for 1-4 minutes. The amount of time depends on the wattage of your microwave and whether or not you're using this for a heating pad or wanting to warm a bed.
BE VERY CAREFUL using this with small children or elderly person! The bags can get very hot - depending on how long you heat it. They can be heated hot enough to cause a serious burn on a child or elderly person.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)