Happenings and What We've Been Eating (With Links to Recipes)

I look at pictures and videos of people growing seeds in preparation of growing season and am looking out the window to snow falling this morning (April 6th...seriously weather, stop it and give us Spring.  Please?!?).

By the way, love my Moomins calendar?  I got it for a birthday gift and I LOVE it!!!!  I'm a huge Moomin fan, so getting a calendar is super exciting for me *laugh*.  We watch the old 90s Moomin cartoons on YouTube (you can even hit the Moomin Official channel on YouTube to watch them, so don't feel guilty watching them there :) and really enjoy them.

It has been a month, again, since I last blogged.  A lot of that has been due to the fact that life has been crazy busy, but some of that is due to other things, like my husband got rear ended while stopped and waiting for someone to turn (so, legally parked basically).  Luckily, the teenager that hit him didn't even try to blame anyone but himself for the accident and even if he had my husband has a dash cam, so the insurance companies have been really nice about everything.  We'll have to wait for parts to replace the back bumper and a few parts like that, but considering how hard the guy hit my husband we were pretty lucky.  So far, my husband has been okay since the accident other than getting a stress headache the day it happened (go figure, right?).  Not sure if this is going to do anything to our insurance premiums considering it was still a claim, even if it wasn't our fault or anything, so we'll see how that goes.  So far, so good, as the saying goes.

I also had all of Alvah's evaluations for his three year check up to get through for school, which was a lot of e-mailing back and forth with his team to get goals and things figured out.  We've been trying to get caught up on homeschool stuff and I've been working on getting the curriculums figured out for the kids for next year as well and both kids are now swimming twice a week (Armina is an intern at the pool where she's working toward her water safety certification, so she's working five hours a week on top of school and her own swimming stuff to become a full time swimming instructor and the son is in Special Olympics as well as regular swimming lessons), so our schedule is really full most days. 

I'll get into more frugal accomplishments on Friday (well, more realistically, Monday as my husband is off on Fridays, so I tend to do stuff with him, but we'll see how it goes), but I did want to bring up something that I'm going to be doing here for a while and see how it works out.  My life is hectic, to say the least, and it can be hard to get blogging done and one of the things that adds more time than you'd think is posting up links to posts on Facebook.  To just save myself a bit of time, I'm going to not post up every single link as I post them to Facebook, but instead I'm going to aim for a weekly recap post with links that I'll post to Facebook on like Fridays or something.  This way if I want to schedule a blog post on something like, say, a recipe, and don't have time to hop to Facebook to link when it goes live, at least those who rely on Facebook for updates can get an update on what is happening on the blog on the recap post.  I know it's not ideal, but honestly guys and gals, I find time to be more and more of a commodity anymore.  With the costs of things and how prices keep going up, I have found myself making everything that I can at home, especially baked goods and bread products.  So, where I did a lot of that in the past, now I'm doing about 99.9% of it at home and eating out is something we've cut out as much as humanly possible as that is getting ridiculously expensive.  I just can't bring myself to shell out the prices they want for bread products at the store that are mostly air when I can make good sourdough products at home that are much easier to digest (I'll get more into the benefits of sourdough in another post, as I'm planning on starting to blog what sourdough recipes I'm making for fun :) and are way more nutritious than the stuff you can get at the the store (not to mention they taste a whole lot better).  

In the meantime, sans sourdough stuff (which will be in separate posts), I thought it would be fun to start sharing what we've been eating around here (been meaning to do this for a while) in a whole "What's for Dinner" type of series (I'll also share any exciting lunch or breakfast items I make, meal preps I do for my husband's work lunches and things like that).  This way I can also start to share how I'm using my food storage/bulk foods from day to day to give you ideas (I hope) on things you might be able to make.  

So, let's get to things we've eaten around here of late.

Well, one thing we've been eating a lot of is chicken as it is one of the few proteins that seems to go on sale relatively cheap of late.  So, let's start there...

Chicken Dishes

Chicken Lyonnaise :  This dish really radiates fancy, but it is really just a braised chicken dish and is is delicious!  I first ran into this when I was studying the Titanic with the kids and I made some dishes that were served on the Titanic.  Of all of the dishes we tried, this one has stuck around in my recipe binder.

I do a few things different, though.  First, chicken breasts are really expensive, so I use bone in chicken thighs.  Due to the cost of eggs, I dropped the egg dip before coating the chicken in flour.  I then floured and browned the chicken in a cast iron 12" skillet (I just made 5 chicken thighs since it was enough for us for dinner and for my husband to take for lunch the next day for work).  I also couldn't find my minced garlic in the fridge and didn't feel like trying to find my bag of garlic cloves in the freezer (how I'm storing fresh garlic now) to mince one, so I just subbed in about 1/2 tsp of garlic powder and I used 1 TBS of dried thyme instead of fresh.  I used chicken bouillon mixed with water for the stock in the recipe and added extra wine and water (I'll explain why in a second).  I browned the chicken like the recipe stated, but cooked the chicken thighs for about four minutes per side.  I then took the half cooked chicken out and put it aside for a few moments, while I caramelized the onions in the pan and added the liquid and stirred it into a sauce.  I added the chicken back to the pan, spooned some of the onions up and over the chicken and added some extra chicken broth to the pan with a few splashes of wine.  I then just stuck the cast iron skillet in the oven at 350 degrees while I was baking something else (I think it was rolls, but don't hold me to that) and just baked it for about 40 minutes.  I turned the chicken once during the baking when I took the rolls/whatever out of the oven and just let it braise in the cooking liquid until my husband got home from work.  

I know browning the meat beforehand seems like a bit of work, but it really is worth the final product and there really isn't a lot of ingredients to the recipe.  If you don't have wine, I'm sure you could use more chicken stock and just make do, but if you have wine, I say use it (I even had to use a bit of sweet red wine in place of white as I was out of white cooking wine and it worked out fine).

Chicken Curry Udon   I actually cut chicken thighs off the bone to make this recipe and it was fabulous!  I used dried Udon that I keep in the pantry for Japanese cooking and used canned carrots instead of fresh.  I also used green onions that I had frozen in the freezer instead of fresh green onions. 

Right side track here, you'll notice in my cooking that I don't keep celery or carrots in the fridge right now.  ANY vegetable that I found myself throwing away at all due to it going bad in the fridge, I plain stopped buying to cut costs.  So, for carrots I'm doing a lot with canned and dehydrated carrots now (they work great) and with celery I have a small jar of freeze dried celery that I use in salad recipes (like say potato salad or chicken salad) and the rest of the time I'm using dehydrated celery.  I've actually been really happy with the new way of doing things.  I'm going to try and plant some carrots this summer in the planter garden I'm doing, but for the time being this is what I'm doing instead.  It has helped to cut grocery costs a bit and I'm happy with the results as nothing is going to waste.  I also threw in some frozen summer squash I had in the freezer, some cut up potatoes (because I LOVE potatoes in Japanese curry dishes), a small bag of frozen peas from the garden last year and a few other small veggie odds and ends. 

Final verdict on the dish?  My husband said, "It tastes like Japanese curry", while I loved it (but, I love Japanese curry too *laugh*) and ate every single bit of leftovers for lunch over the next few days.  It was a fun change of pace, anyway :).  Just a side note, too.  I got nervous about keeping the Japanese curry blocks in the pantry past their use by dates due to the oils in them, so I gambled and put the blocks (boxes and all) in the freezer for long term storage.  They froze beautifully and I didn't notice any change in taste or texture in the final product after using frozen blocks.  So, just wanted to pass that along.

Korean Fried Chicken:  Guys, this is one of the TASTIEST things I've made in a long while!  It was SO good!  I used boneless skinless chicken thighs instead of chicken wings that I cut into bite sized pieces and then I made the soy garlic sauce to dip it in.  It was SOOOOOO good!  The daughter and husband liked it too and it was definitely added to the recipe binder to make again!

Those were the recipes I still have bookmarked in my phone, so those were obviously the ones that made the biggest impression on me.  Other than that we've been eating a lot of basic chicken dishes.  Chicken pot pie (used the last of my frozen pie crusts in the freezer to make it, so now I'm experimenting with home made again), baked chicken with various sides and things like that.  I do have some other recipes book marked and am hoping to maybe do some freezer cooking at some point if I can get my fridge freezer cleaned and organized, but we'll see how it goes.

Breakfast Items:

Fruit Cobbler  This is my new favorite thing to make for breakfast on the weekends, as it is something that my husband can grab when he gets hungry in the early morning hours.  I found, while talking to my mom, that back in her day, fruit cobbler was actually more of a breakfast item than a dessert item, so I gave it a try and I LOVE it.  I tend to make this on Thursday so we have it all weekend long.  I put one can of fruit pie filling in the bottom of a 9x9 pan (small square baking dish) and then split the recipe for the cobbler in half.  

Our favorite flavor to date is blackberry.  You can get an AWESOME deal on blackberry pie filling from Amazon.  This 12 pack of pie filling is only 16.00 and some change most days (NOTE:  Associate link there.  If you order through it, Amazon shoots me a small commission for pushing the sale their way, but it doesn't cost anything extra.  If you order through my associate links, thank you for supporting my family and the blog!)  and is a really nice flavor for a breakfast cobbler (especially since, if like me you love blackberries but don't have any bushes and might not be able to grow them in your region anyway).  I love the flavor and the price of the pie filling, honestly and the simplicity of the recipe really just sells the entire thing.

2 Ingredient Biscuits.  My main reason for buying self rising flour was to make these for my biscuit loving daughter.  She didn't like them because they didn't taste as good as Bisquick (seriously!?!?), so I'm using my self rising flour in other recipes and trying different home made biscuit recipes on her instead.  I'm determined she's going to eat home made biscuits, preferably sourdough ones, before I'm through, but so far, the search continues!

Fluffy Whole Wheat Waffles:  I used home ground flour for this and it came out pretty good!  I put the majority of them into the freezer and we've been eating them along with other breakfast items.  I got the idea from Becky from "Acre Homestead" on YouTube and it was a good recipe, so I'm glad I checked it out.

Applesauce Loaf:  The recipe for the applesauce loaf is in the description of the video.  I even used her recipe for the glaze to go on top.  This was REALLY tasty and my husband and I really enjoyed it for breakfasts.

Baked Goods:

When it comes to baking things, I'm doing that a ton, it seems.  This week has been especially busy as I completely spaced the fact that Easter is THIS WEEKEND!?!  I thought it was more toward the end of the month, so I was lucky that yesterday I decided I was going to make a ton of cookies for quick desserts around the house.  

By the way, I cannot recommend dissolvable canning labels enough.  I use them for tons of stuff anymore.  You can just run the labels under water when you want to put something else in the container and it comes right off and dissolves.  One of the best inventions of our time, I swear!

So, getting back onto the subject at hand, what did I end up making?

Sugar Cookies:  These are my husband's favorite and I really should make them more often as the kids like them too, but I don't (oops on my account).  So, I made a batch of sugar cookies for him.  I have somehow completely misplaced my Easter cookie cutters (I have an egg shaped one, a rabbit shaped one and a basket shaped one, but darned if I can find them), so I made some circular ones (I tried to shape them into an egg shape with little success, but we made them pretty with sprinkles *laugh*) and we found a chicken shaped one and a butterfly shaped one, so we used those as Spring/Easter-ish themed *laugh*.  

Biscoff Butter Cookies:  I got a super good deal on Amazon for Biscoff Cookie butter a while back (like 8.00 for an 8 pack flat...no joke).  I've been sitting on it so we don't use it too fast, but it's getting past the best by date and while I'm sure it will stay good for quite a while still, I decided to make cookies...with cookie butter.  Weird?  Sure.  Tasty?  Eh, kind of.  The recipe had great ratings and stuff, so I doubled it and used an entire 14 oz container of cookie butter in it (so it wouldn't get lost in the back of the fridge).  I was kind of hoping it would come out tasting like an almost smore with the graham cracker like taste of Biscoff cookies and the chocolate, but after they baked and I tasted one...well they taste like chocolate chip cookies to me.  I love the texture though.  They come out chewy, which I love, but yeah...they taste like chocolate chip cookies.  We're eating them, though *laugh*).

Nestle Tollhouse Original Chocolate Chip Cookies:  My daughter's favorite cookies.  My dad would be proud as they were his favorite too *laugh*.   I made one recipe of them for her and she's definitely enjoying them.

When it comes to the rest of the Easter treats around here, I'm completely skipping store bought candy this year as the kids get plenty of treats around here and will be fine without them.  I am going to make an angel food cake (from a mix to save my eggs) and make strawberry short cake with it for dessert on Easter.  I already got a great price on a spiral sliced ham (of all fancy things) at the beginning of the year, so we'll have that for dinner and I'm hoping the store will have eggs tomorrow so we can color a bunch, but we'll see how it goes (if they don't have eggs, we'll just color a few of the ones we have here, just not as many).  Not smart forgetting a major holiday until it is right on top of you.  Oops.

Quick and Easy Hot Dog Buns:  I made these one night as the daughter wanted hot dogs and I didn't have a lot of time to make sourdough anything.  So, I made these.  The shaping and egg wash phase on these failed horribly.  They ended up looking like misshapen mini loaves of bread and putting on the egg wash before the final rise seemed like a bad idea to me and I should have waited until they had risen (spray your plastic wrap with non-stick spray before placing over the rolls to rise as they are a soft and sticky dough) as the plastic wrap stuck terribly to the egg when they were done rising.  But, the flavor was good and we were able to split them and put hot dogs in them without issue, so it turned out okay.  Next time I think I'll use the same recipe, but pull out my New England hot dog pan and try making them in that to shape them better.  We'll see how that goes.

French Toast Casserole:  This is one of those recipes that I regretted making and just wished I had made French Toast instead.  I split the recipe in half, but still it used a bunch of milk products and eggs, but I had a bunch of home made bread that had gone stale and needed to be used up, so I made it.  And well, it was okay, I guess, but the biggest problem I had was that it was BLAND tasting, which was sad with the nutmeg it had in it and stuff (I love nutmeg, so it was VERY sad to me).  We ate it all, but I have to say it was not a favorite of mine.  I included it in this section, because really it came out tasting like a bland bread pudding.

Next time I'll make croutons or French toast.

Hershey's "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Cake:  This was for my daughter's birthday as she loves chocolate cake and really wanted some for her birthday.  So, I figured you couldn't go wrong with Hershey's.  It was easy, it came out nice and chocolatey and the daughter was happy.  I'm not a huge fan of chocolate cake (too rich for my blood) and neither is my husband, but we tried our best to eat it all before it went stale on us and my daughter loved it.

Honorable Mentions/Miscellaneous:

Sausage Alfredo:  I got this idea from That 1870's Homestead on YouTube, in their "What's for Dinner" series last year sometime where Todd was trying something different for dinner.  Darned if I can find the exact video, which I spent way too much time working on finding.  The idea is simple.  Make alfredo but instead of chicken used ground Italian sausage, add some minced garlic while you are cooking it to get that flavor in there, add cream and some Italian seasoning, or other seasonings of choice, cook down until thickened a bit and then add some fresh Parmesan cheese to thicken the sauce up to the texture you want.  

Guys, the concept is simple, but it is SOOOOOOO good!  I actually make this every couple of months and it is now a meal I put into rotation.  It comes together super fast too.  In the time it takes you to make your fettucine pasta, the sauce is ready to go and you are ready to eat.  The leftovers even heat up pretty darned well overall and the nice thing about the sausage, versus chicken, is the sausage doesn't get dried out :).

No Knead Bread:  This is the best, and tastiest, quick sourdough bread to make (since it sits overnight before baking it, I call it a sourdough).  It calls for few ingredients and really your biggest investment is a cast iron Dutch oven to bake it in.  I find that a 3 qt one works great.  I got this one (affiliate link) for a lot less money (I only spent 21.00 on mine) and use it all the time to make a loaf of this bread (if I don't have time to make two loaves of sourdough during the day with the rise times involved).  The best deal I could find when I looked today for a Dutch oven was this one in red, but I've found them for less than 30.00 from time to time if you just search for a 3 qt cast iron Dutch oven and wait a bit (and I don't guarantee how long prices will last, as the one I linked to is 32.00 right now, but could change at a moment's notice).  I also use my big Lodge Dutch oven that my mother-in-law gave me years ago to bake bread in too, but I've found the 3 qt gives me a better rise (since it's smaller) and fits the loaf perfectly.   If you don't have the money to buy a Dutch oven (I get it, trust me) there are recipes that don't call for a Dutch oven to bake sourdough bread (I'll share one in another post), but if you have the money a Dutch oven really is a worthwhile investment.

I could go on, but I need to get off the computer and concentrate on house cleaning and getting a load of laundry done, so I'm going to end it here.  I hope you all are doing well and yes, this time I'm hoping to finally get back to regular blogging here!  Here's hoping :).