Leftovers in Disguise

As an addendum to my Planned Leftovers post, I am now adding leftovers from leftovers to my repetoire.

Remember those stuffed peppers? Ours were huge, so I ended up splitting some for the younger children. So I had two and a half leftover.

Tonight I chopped them up and rolled them in tortillas along with small amounts of beans and hamburger I had leftover from another dinner. Adding a bit of pepper jack cheese and enchilada sauce, I had a whole new dinner!

Planned Leftovers

Have you been to your local farmer's market lately? Or, even better, have any bell peppers from your own garden that are ready to be picked?

Try this recipe for dinner one night, double it and make stuffed peppers the next night. Or, even better, triple it and make two batches of stuffed peppers, one for night #2 and one for the freezer - they turn out great this way.

I got the basic recipe on Hillbilly Housewife, which I happen to love. I've added and subtracted and basically throw whatever I have in to it but here's how I do it most of the time:

Taco Rice

(this recipe serves 8)

2 cups long grain brown rice

1 pound of hamburger

1/2 teaspoon chili powder

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon each oregano & cumin & garlic powder

1 chopped onion (I often add sliced celery, carrots and peppers if I have them)

16 oz can chopped tomatoes

4 cups water

Using a dutch oven, brown the hamburger with the onion and other veggies if you are using them over medium heat. Add the rice and seasonings when the hamburger is almost done, until the rice is toasty and slightly opaque. Add the tomatoes and water. Stir it up and bring it to a boil. When it starts to boil, cover the pan with a lid and reduce the heat to very low. Cook for 45 minutes. My family really loves it when I shredded a little cheddar cheese over the each individual bowl.



To make stuffed peppers: (makes 6-8 peppers)

Double the above recipe

Add 1 can of tomato paste to the leftover rice mix

core and stuff 6 large or 8 small peppers, place the peppers in a 9x13 pan

bake at 350 for 35 minutes


Yum!

The Harvest

Does food ever call to you? I'm not talking about chocolate cake when you are on a diet... I'm talking about 20 pounds of pears stacked in your kitchen that you KNOW you need to deal with.

All this work toward the first day of school has put lots of other things on hold. I am out of laundry detergent and yogurt, I need to make up a batch of both. I really need to bake some granola bars for snacks and muffins for breakfasts... I'm out of everything, so I'm feeling a little behind. The harvest is here too and it doesn't wait around until you are ready.

Last year we were blessed to glean a friend's apple orchard. We had more apples than we knew what to do with. I made a ton of gallon ziplock bags of apple pie filling for the freezer. I never make pies, we just don't eat a lot of deserts, so I ended up dumping them in to big pots of oatmeal in the mornings. Needless to say, it was sure a treat for my kids, they loved the warm, cinnamon-y apple oatmeal on the many cold mornings that we had.

So, since I have all of these pears, I decided to try it with the pears too.

Of course, you can actually make pies or crisps, it's really a great recipe. I am not sure how pies would turn out with the more watery pear but for my purposes, it doesn't matter.

You can try it too:

Apple pie (and now, pear!) filling:

18 cups baking apples, peeled and sliced (I didn't peel the pears)

1/2 cup of lemon juice

4 cups of brown sugar

1 cup of corn starch

2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. nutmeg

8 cups of water

(5 quart sized Mason jars if you want to can this instead of freeze it)

In a large bowl mix the apples together with the lemon juice to keep them from browning. Set aside. In a large pot combing brown sugar, cornstarch, cinnamon, salt and nutmeg. Add water and bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly. Boil for two minutes. Add apples and return to a boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer until apples are tender, about 6-8 minutes. If you want to can this, have your jars and lids hot and ready, pack each with filling to 1/2 inch to the top, screw down lids and process in a boiling water bath for 20 minutes. Otherwise, if you are like me (read lazy) just let it cool, put it in five freezer bags and freeze.

The canned version is a very nice Christmas gift though, if you are the type that thinks ahead.

I also tried drying pears,they turned out really well. I tried peaches a little earlier in the summer and they don't seem to turn out. Of course, dried apples are great and if you have more vegetables than you know what to do with from the garden, you can always dry zucchini and tomatoes for winter soups. My dryer has been humming away in the corner of the pantry for a while. I have to just remember to rotate the trays so nothing gets too crispy.

I had another go at making fruit leather too. Last year the ones I made were too brittle. This year I read up on them and it seems that you need to add honey to them so they stay pliable after drying. Anyone have experience with a good recipe? This time I added cinnamon too.

We ended up making four gallons of pear sauce too. I had lots of helpers with all of this, as you can imagine.

All of this fruit everywhere has caused an influx of fruit flies. My next post will be how to make a no fail fruit fly catcher. A little piece of information every homemaker simply must have!

Got Rhubarb?

Rhubarb Crunch

2 cup flour
1 1/2 cup oats
2 cup brown sugar
1 cup melted butter
2 tsp. cinnamon
2 cups white sugar
4 Tbsp. cornstarch
2 tsp. vanilla
2 cups water
8 cups rhubarb, chopped

Combine flour, oats, brown sugar, butter and cinnamon until crumbly. Set aside. In saucepan, combine sugar and cornstarch, mix well. Add vanilla and water. Cook over low heat until thick and clear, stirring constantly until sugar dissolves. Line a 9x13 pan with part of the crumb mixture. Pour liquid with rhubarb over the crumb mixture in the pan. Top with remaining crumb mixture. Bake at 350 for 1 hour. Serve with whipped cream or ice cream if desired.

I made my husband stop eating so I could take this picture! :)

Quick Tip

Hey! Did you know that you can get FREE buckets at the grocery store? You know, like two and a half or five gallon buckets to make laundry detergent in, your homemade granola, the many products from your last Azure order?

Yes, at the grocery store. Next time you are there, stop over at the bakery. Ask the bakery manager to save you some of the buckets that icing comes in. If you ask really nicely, they will even save the snap on lids for you too. :)

Bubblepalooza

Are your children tired of playing outside? Too many sunny, warm days in a row? Remind them that it will cold and dark out all too soon. Something that has helped my children to find the outdoors fresh and fun again is a little dish washing liquid and some imagination.

I know that bubbles are a toddler staple. But did you know that you can make them? And did you ever stop to think that those little wands aren't the only things that make bubbles????

Give this a try:

Bubble Recipe

1 cup Joy or Dawn dish washing liquid (you can do it with others but Joy is the best bubble maker!)

3 T glycerin (found at any drug store - you can make it without but the glycerin helps the bubbles hold up longer)

1 gallon of water

You can make this by the gallon using a clean, recycled gallon milk jug or you can make a little bigger quantities... what about the little wading pool? Make three gallons or so and pour it in.

Find some fun bubble paraphernalia. Anything with a hole or holes in it will do. Do you want to make little tiny bubbles? Try those green baskets that strawberries typically come in. Do you want great big bubbles? Take a couple of plastic hangers down from the closet and try those. The potato masher, paper cups with the bottom punched out, even string tied end to end will work.

Not only will even your big kids want to get involved in the fun, but everyone will think that you are a genius!

Homemade Mayo Recipe

When it's hot out, we tend to go through mayonnaise like crazy. Chicken salad, macaroni salad, potato salad, sandwiches and on and on. I finally got smart and quit buying it because it is so easy to make!

Blender Mayonnaise Recipe (makes about 1 1/4 cups)

1 large egg
1 T vinegar
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp dry mustard
1/8 tsp paprika
dash red pepper
1 cup oil
1 T lemon juice





Combine the first six ingredients in the blender container. Cover, blend about 5 seconds. With blender running slowly, gradually add 1/2 cup oil (use a rubber spatula to scrape down sides when you need to). Add lemon juice and then pour the other 1/2 cup of oil in while the blender runs slowly. Store for up to 4 weeks in a tightly covered jar in the refrigerator.





We like to double this recipe and it turns out well.

There you have it, cheap and easy mayo!

(A big thanks to my fab daughter who actually did all the work, aren't those the best pictures of mayonnaise that have ever been taken? :)

Making Yogurt

Making yogurt is one of the things that I never thought that I could do. Then I tried it. Easy! You can do it too!

You need:

a gallon of milk and about 8 ounces of yogurt Everything I've read says that you should use Dannon plain when starting out but I used Safeway brand and it's turned out just fine.

The first time I made yogurt, it turned out a little thin. I read that you can add 2 Tbs. of powdered milk to your cold milk to make a thicker yogurt. That little trick works well.

Directions: Pour your milk in to a pot. Put a thermometer in with the lid on. I use a metal stemmed meat thermometer but candy thermometers work well.

Turn your burner on to medium heat. I used to stand there and stir, which took forever, now I just leave it alone and it's fine. While you are waiting it to reach the right temperature, go fill your sink with cold water.

and a cooler with hot tap water.

When the yogurt temperature is up to 185, it's done. Place it in your cold water bath.

When the yogurt is cooled down to 130 degrees, mix your yogurt in. Incorporate it well.

Pour it in to your jars. Don't forget to make one specifically to start your next batch. I always label it and hide it in the back of the fridge.

Here I am using old jars. When I was taking all these pictures this afternoon, I broke my favorite gallon jar that I use for yogurt! I hope that one on the left doesn't turn out to be pickle flavored!

Place your filled jars in the hot water bath in your cooler. Don't touch for three hours. If you leave it longer, it turns out fine. Place in the fridge. And there you have it... a gallon of fresh yogurt for the same price as you paid for a gallon of milk!