Joy in the Kitchen!

These little graham cracker sandwich cookies are quick and easy to assemble, even for little hands.  Kids of any age love them, at least at our house.  We make these mostly when we have leftover frosting from another project, sugar cookies, birthday cakes, etc.  A little tub of frosting from the store would be a fine substitute. Graham Cracker Sandwich Cookies frosting graham crackers hungry kids Let each hungry kid spread a nice, thick layer of frosting on one graham crackers half.  Top with the other half of the graham cracker and carefully squish it down into the frosting.  Eat right away OR if you're able to wait a bit, make several cookies, put in container with a lid, and let sit a few hours....( this allows the graham crackers to soften) Today for our after school snack, the girls made up several of these to enjoy...  making them and licking the spreading knife is half the fun!  I would love to know if anyone else grew up with these tasty t...

Just take a look at that beautiful sunshiny Plum Jelly!  I love the translucent plum color.  You wouldn't even have to eat this - just use it as decoration!  :o)  The flavor is fabulous too though, so it wouldn't last long as a decoration at our house... it would be slathered on toast and piled on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches! This batch of jelly is nostalgic.  Dave's Grandpa and Grandma were always so resourceful and frugal.  They rarely let things go to waste.  Their yard, years ago, had a huge Damson plum tree .   In 1994 there was a bumper crop of plums!  I remember picking quite a few and making jelly.  Grandpa couldn't bear to see that fruit fall and go to waste so he spent hours juicing those plums.  I don't know for sure how many gallons of juice he got, but I would guess between 10-15 gallons.  They put the juice in containers in the freezer.  A year later, Grandpa passed away.  He was in the hos...

This weeks menu was pretty easy!   We decided to cut down from three freezers to two.  One of those freezers is pretty old... I'd say early 60's.  I'm sure it's using a ton of power.  Just not built as efficient as the newer models.  I feel sort of sad though, it was Dave's Grandma's freezer, and it has just worked it's little heart out over the years.  Seems like it deserves better than just being unplugged.  :o)   Back to the menu!  I am too ashamed to tell you how old a few of the food items I found in those freezers are.  Most of it though, is still in great shape, just need to use up a little to reduce to the two freezers.  This weeks menu's are based around using up some of those items. Menu February 22-28 Monday - Enchilada Casserole, corn, peaches (using taco filling I found in the freezer) Tuesday - Ham & Bean Soup, cornbread (using ham bone and broth from the freezer) Wednesday - Pork Cutlets, corn, garlic...

Granola bars are an easy eat-on-the-go snack!  I realize that most granola bars are just glorified cookies, but there are additions to them that make them more nutritious than many empty calorie treats.  In this recipe, the oats add fiber, protein, and iron.  The crispy rice cereal adds a nice crunch, but is also fortified with vitamins.  The nuts (assuming you use walnuts) add iron, fiber, calcium. Raisins are going to add even more iron, fiber & calcium.  Who knew these tasty bars could actually be fairly good for you!  (Watch the fat and sugar though, they're not calorie free!) My 14 year old son needed a nutritious snack to take snow shoeing tonight, these were his choice.  He loves them!  I think I got this recipe from Frugal Families .  I have no name attached to it though and I've been making it several years now...  I really need to document better!  Any suggestions on who's recipe this is, my Frugal Family friends... ...

Grrr!  This weeks menu was really hard to make myself plan!  There are a few things I have on hand that I need to use; fresh mushrooms, potatoes, whole wheat tortilla's.  It did help to know Tuesday was soup night and Friday or Saturday could be pizza.  Monday of this week was a holiday & we had leftovers from Sunday.  YUMMY Sweet & Sour Chicken & eggrolls.  I think I have a workable menu.  Lots of chicken dishes though.  But that's what I have a lot of on hand right now.  :)   Here's the plan: Menu February 15-21 Monday -  leftover's from Sunday; sweet & sour chicken, fried rice, home made eggrolls Tuesday - Chicken & Homemade Noodles over mashed potatoes, fresh fruit salad Wednesday - Yaki don Buri (a Japanese dish using egg, chicken, mushroom, green onion) served over rice Thursday - Chicken Enchilada's (using half of the whole chicken cooked for dinner Tuesday) Friday - Homemade Pizza.  ...

I think we celebrate every holiday here with food!  We chose to stay home and fix our own special Valentines Dinner this year.  We put a tv in our sons room so he and the girls could watch a movie and eat their pizza. (quite a treat here - frozen pizza and pop. lol!)  Put the baby to bed, and then fixed dinner together.   I was in charge of setting the table, Dave found a great station on Pandora (Harry Connick Jr.!) and even the gas fireplace cooperated and came on just as our main course was ready!  It was a relaxing evening...  quiet, no waiting, easy cleanup.  Wonderful! Our Menu: Tossed green salad with avocado  Country Mushroom Soup Broiled Steak Shrimp Scampi Baked Potato w/ sour cream & butter Cherry Cream Soda Dessert would have been Chocolate Peanut Butter Ice Cream, but we were too full to enjoy it, so we saved it for the next day! Here are a few pictures of our evening. :)      Table for Two   ...

Country Mushroom soup is simple to make, yet fits into a special occasion wonderfully.  We started making this several years ago for Christmas Eve and it has been a favorite ever since.  In fact, it is Dave's favorite soup ever.  The base is so smooth and rich, the mushrooms make it hearty.  Delicious!   Last night we had this as one of the courses for our Valentines Dinner and just made a single batch.  When I'm feeding the whole family and use it as the main dish, I triple this. Country Mushroom Soup 1/4 C. butter 1/3 C. flour 2 C. chicken broth 1/2 tsp. salt 1/4 tsp. pepper 1 bay leaf 2/3 C. celery, chopped 1/3 C. onion, chopped 1/4 C. butter 4-5 C.  fresh mushrooms, sliced 3/4 C. cream or half & half (or a combination of the two) In a 2 quart saucepan, melt 1/4 C. butter, stir in flour until smooth.  Gradually stir in broth until smooth.  Add salt, pepper, and bay leaf.  Simmer uncovered for 15 minutes, stirring occasio...

Sugar cookies add so much fun to bake during the holidays!  Colorful icing, pretty sprinkles, fun shapes!  With Valentines Day coming up, I thought I'd mix up a batch of these soft, tender cookies.  This recipe mixes up and tastes different than many other sugar cookie recipes.  It has a cakier texture and not quite as sweet, which is a nice complement to a sweet frosting.  The cookies puff up beautifully and stay so soft!  These are not an easy cookie for doing fancy decorating.  If I'm in the mood to add borders and designs, I use a cookie recipe that stays flat and more crisp.  You can use any frosting you like for these, but frosting is a breeze to make.  I'll post my recipe below if you'd like to try it. Sour Cream Sugar Cookies 1 C. sugar 2 eggs 1 C. soured cream (cream that has gone sour - not sour cream like you'd put on a baked potato) 1/2 tsp. salt 1 tsp. baking soda 1 1/2 tsp. vanilla 3-3 1/2 C. fl...

I've got several boxes of apples picked from our trees last fall sitting in my garage.  They're starting to soften, so I don't care to eat a whole one, but they're still great for cooking.  I used several making filling for these little treats for Family Home Evening.  I used a purchased crust, that had been in the fridge since Christmas (Date's still good for another week - I checked!).   The kids really liked these.  I served them with ice cream on the side, but I thought they'd be great with just a glass of milk.  They are easy to serve as an "on the go" snack.  I can see making several of these to put in the freezer for a quick and easy dessert anytime! Little Apple Pie Bites 1 can of apple pie filling or make your own (directions below) 1 batch of pie crust or 1 box of pre-rolled pie crust dough Roll out crust and using a biscuit cutter, cut out as many rounds as you can get. (out of 1 box of crust I got 24 rounds)  Spray a cookie sheet...

Last weeks menu worked out really well until Wednesday.  We ended up with our little guy in the hospital with RSV until late Saturday. My sweet Mom called before I was even home from the hospital with Wesley to say she was bringing dinner.  I had in mind something I could fix, but it was 6:30pm and I was exhausted from (not)sleeping sitting in a chair in the hospital for 3 nights.  Dave and the other kids at home were sick, I was finally getting a sore throat and coughing...   That meal meant more to me than filling our tummies.  It was just like a big hug from my Mama.  You know the kind?  She brought Chicken Pot Pie with biscuits on top instead of a crust.  One of my favorite comfort foods.  She's a great example to me of serving others... I hope I can emulate her better as I grow up.  Thanks for the food and the hug Mom! (and thanks Peggy for offering!) The menu DID work terrific in one way though ...  because it was all p...

Super Nacho's have been the traditional meal on Super Bowl Sunday at our house for years!  We've had them that day for so long our older kids think it's an unbreakable tradition.  I don't love watching football, but I do love fixing dinner and hanging out with the family while they watch.  I first started making this dish layered in a 9x13 pan.  Now we just set all the ingredients out buffet style and everyone builds their own.  The pre-assembled dish works really well for taking to a potluck but the build-it-yourself style is nice here because I LOVE all the toppings, and my little girls prefer just the basics.  I don't see any reason to waste perfectly good onions, tomatoes, and sour cream by making them pick it off. :o)    This year I thought I'd change it up a little and serve Hawaiian Haystacks for Super Bowl Sunday.  Similar build-it-yourself meal.  The idea did not go over well.  Only 2 of us voted for haystacks - and ...

I have a love/hate relationship with menu planning.  I'm often a Fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants sort of girl. Especially concerning cooking.  I cook what I FEEL like cooking most days.  Makes for difficult decisions on days I DON'T feel like cooking.  Know what I mean?  I've planned menu's several different ways....  monthly, weekly (possibly weakly? lol ), a list of 20 meals to pick from for a month, etc.  They all work as long as I stick to them.   Menu planning is good for my budget.  Allows me to easily work with what I have in my freezer and pantry.  Let's me know ahead what I need from the grocery store, so as to avoid aimless wandering.  Gives more opportunity for family input on what we eat.  Just this morning we came to a compromise on soups... the little girls agreed if I made one of their favorites this week, they'd try to eat one of my favorites next week! On days I don't feel like cooking, I don't have to think....