Amazing Homemade Strawberry Ice Cream

Well, the kids and I have picked about 6 or 7 quarts of strawberries off of our little strawberry 'pyramid' in the yard in the last week. I love strawberry season!

This is a recipe my husband came up with while modifying our go-to vanilla ice cream during last year's strawberry harvest. It's chock-full of strawberries (yes, that's 2 *pounds* of strawberries in there!), so if you don't like your ice cream with more fruit than cream, you can certainly decrease the amount you use. But if you're trying to use up every last one of the berries from your garden, this is a great way to do it!

Amazing Strawberry Ice Cream

2 large eggs
3/4 C. sugar
2 1/2 C. Heavy Cream
2 1/2 C. Milk
2 t. Vanilla
2 lbs. Strawberries, diced

Whisk eggs in mixing bowl until well blended and slightly fluffy, 1-2 minutes. Whisk in sugar a little at a time, continue mixing about 2 minutes. Add in cream, milk, and vanilla and whisk together well. Mix in strawberries and freeze according to your ice cream freezer directions.
*Our freezer makes 2 qts. and this recipe makes more like 3 qts.

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This recipe is linking up to Tasty Tuesday at Beauty and Bedlam and Tempt My Tummy Tuesday at Blessed with Grace.

Things I Love Thursday--Pioneer Woman!

Have you heard of the Pioneer Woman? Go ahead, check out her blog for a few minutes. I'll wait.

Did you see this section?

Or this one?

What about this?

Yeah, there's even more than all that. I don't know how the woman does it all and manages not to be pronounced insane. But if she's not sane, she at least distracts you with tons of inspiring and motivating articles.

She drove me to make these the other night. And split a whole batch with my husband. We ate them all. Maybe I should do some sit-ups or something now.

She's got a book, too. I bought it for my good buddy for her birthday. Now my good buddy loves the Pioneer Woman, too. I'm just sharing the love, here.

Find more Things I Love Thursday over at the Diaper Diaries!

Non-Casserole Freezer Cooking Ideas

I just found a great post by Crystal over at Money Saving Mom. She's got ideas for freezer cooking if you and your family don't like casseroles.

I personally really like casseroles, but I've had friends ask me what they can cook ahead if their family doesn't like them. I've really been at a loss as to what to tell them!

Well, now I've got some ideas up my sleeve, and you can too--check out the info HERE.

Thanks, Crystal!

Cooking on a Budget

I found a great blog that shows, step-by-step, how to create delicious and frugal meals for your family, without skimping on nutrition.

$5 Dinners

I subscribe to her e-mails and get one several times a week. They usually feature a yummy original recipe and/or money-saving grocery shopping tips. I've really appreciated the way she demonstrates skills essential to living on a budget: shopping the store sales, meal planning, and working with what you've got instead of running to the store constantly to buy expensive ingredients.

I made her Roasted Red Potato Salad this evening and it was fabulous! My kids aren't big on potato salad, but I didn't hear any complaints about this one. I love the texture of the spuds when roasted instead of boiled--so creamy and delicious. Give it a try, or any of her other free recipes!

Super Bowl Recipe--Crab Rangoon

I just wanted to post this here so I wouldn't lose the link. We're hosting a Super Bowl party for some friends this Sunday, so I'm figuring out my food plan.

I checked out some ideas HERE and HERE, then stumbled upon THIS. It's a recipe for Baked Crab Rangoon. I LOVE crab rangoon! And to have it at home, without all the mess of frying, sounds heavenly.

Definitely going to try this. Any favorite appetizer recipes out there?

Bulk Cooking Day

I told you I was planning to do some 'freezer cooking' the other day. Well, Saturday came along without any activities to take me out of the house, so I charged ahead with the plan.

I started out by browning about 6 pounds of hamburger with 3 diced onions. That was a lot of meat in one big pan! When you have that much meat to cook, it really does take a while, so I just set it on medium heat and stir it around now and then while I'm doing other things.

In the meantime, I started shredding the chicken that had cooked in the crockpot all Friday night. I got some great deals on IQF chicken breasts last weekend and stocked up. I love having cooked chicken in the freezer to throw into casseroles or mexican dishes! I got 2 quart bags of shredded chicken, and another bag FULL of chopped chicken.

Once that was done, I started mixing up some bread dough. I don't have any big fancy kitchen machine/bread maker type things, but I've got my KitchenAid and I love him. (Yes, it's a he. Humor me.) So we whipped up some dough and got it to rising.

Next up were the meatloaves. I doubled our usual recipe HERE and had the brilliant idea to just shove the meat mixture into a couple of gallon-size freezer baggies and squish it into shape and freeze just like that. I usually line a loaf pan with foil, add the meatloaf, wrap the whole thing up nicely, freeze, then remove the meatloaf from the pan (still wrapped in foil) and stick that whole thing into a baggie.

I've gotten away from using loaf pans for meatloaf anyway, so this way I can just pop the frozen meat-chunk out of the baggie and into my 9x13 pan to thaw in the fridge before baking. It just saves the step of messing with foil. Nothing like this is ever in my freezer long enough to need that extra layer, anyway. *smile*

That afternoon, I was joined by two of my dear daughters who wanted in on the cooking fun. (okay, so it was getting to be quite a bit of work by now, and I kind of begged them to help. But I think they kind of enjoyed it. A little, anyways.) One whipped up a batch of muffins, which went into the oven as soon as the bread came out. The other kept busy cooking pancakes--a chore no one ever wants to do first thing in the morning! We will all enjoy these special breakfast treats in the coming weeks.

In the meantime, I used up the last of my thawed hamburger by forming it into hamburger patties and freezing. I really don't enjoy frying hamburgers, so we don't eat them much in the winter. But a couple of the kids had asked for them recently, so I guess I can suffer through it. *smile*

I mixed up another batch of bread dough and some dough for dinner rolls at some point, though it's all a blur right now. I just put the bread dough in the freezer to use later--maybe it will be bread, maybe pizza crust. I like leaving my options open.

I went ahead and formed the dinner rolls, then froze the dough balls on cookie sheets before I put them all into freezer baggies. I plan to thaw the dough overnight (next weekend) in order to bake next Sunday morning for our church's potluck lunch.

All in all, a successful freezer cooking day! I like looking over the list of everything we got done:

2 loaves bread
2 lbs. bread dough
2 dozen dinner rolls
2 meatloaves
10 hamburger patties
5 qt. bags browned hamburger
3 qts. cooked chicken
2 dozen muffins
17 LARGE pancakes

Our Favorite: Chicken Enchilada Casserole

This has been one of those recipes. I made it once, exactly as written, and we all loved it. It's one of those recipes that you just don't need to tweak at all because it's so perfect.

It's creamy and flavorful and so satisfying. We love it with lettuce and tomatoes on top, but if they're out of season, it's still great without them. Serve with rice and corn, or some green veggies, or chips and salsa--it goes great with any of them. It's quick and easy, perfect for using up leftover chicken, or some precooked bags you've got stashed in the freezer

Chicken Enchilada Casserole
3 chicken breasts, cooked and shredded
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 cup Sour Cream
1 cup Salsa
1 diced onion (or about 1/4 C. dried minced onion)
1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
flour tortillas (about 6)
~2-3 cups cheese (cheddar, colby jack, or mexican blend is the best)

Mix first six ingredients in a bowl. Cut or tear tortillas into pieces and cover bottom of 9x13" pan with a layer. Cover with half the chicken mixture and half the cheese. Repeat layers. Bake at 375 for about 20 minutes or until bubbly.

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What's your family's favorite?

Freezer Cooking

Wouldn't it be great to have dinner ready for you to just pop in the oven several evenings a week? I really love having that convenient option for when the day just gets away from me.

It's one reward that is well worth the time and effort you put into it.

Crystal over at Money Saving Mom and FishMama are putting together some Freezer cooking days this weekend. You can get all the details for how to get ready and follow along HERE.

I think I'll be pulling some hamburger out of the freezer this evening to thaw. I'll brown some with onions to bag up for easy spaghetti/chili/mexican dishes, then I might make a couple of meatloaves and/or meatballs.

I may even throw a couple of bags of frozen chicken breasts (bought at an AWESOME sale last weekend) into the crockpot to cube or shred for casseroles and such. Some of it will probably end up in our favorite Chicken Enchilada Casserole (recipe HERE). Yum! Looking forward to it already!

So, do you have any plans to join in on this Freezer Cooking weekend? What dishes will you be preparing?

Friday Night Feast

Nearly Every Friday night, we have friends over for a big ol' potluck-style Feast.

I won't go into how it began here, but I wanted to share the menu for this week and a recipe or two.

Jan. 22, 2010 (Happy Birthday, Anna! :)

Pickle-Cream Cheese roll-ups
Tortilla Chips and dip

Baked Ham
Mashed Potatoes
Green Bean Casserole
Home-canned Pear Halves

Gooey Cake (recipe below)
Chocolate-Chunk Brownies

Even though we always have tons of food, it's funny because the kids hardly eat anything--there are always at least 5 kids besides ours, if not more. Just too many fun people to talk to and play with!

Today we're planning on a really big crowd--I think we'll have about 38 people here, altogether. I'd better check the stock of paper plates! LOL

Oh, and in honor of my dear friend Anna's birthday, I'm sharing her fabulous recipe below.

Gooey Cake
crust:
1 Yellow cake mix
1 stick butter, barely melted
1 egg
filling:
1 8 oz package cream cheese
2 eggs
3 3/4 C. powdered sugar

Step One: Beat together butter and 1 egg. Add cake mix and stir until well blended. Press into 9x13 pan. Set aside.

Step Two: Beat together cream cheese and 2 eggs until blended. Slowly add powdered sugar and mix until thoroughly combined. Spread cream cheese mixture over crust in pan.

Step Three: Pop that pan into the oven and bake at 350 degrees F. for approximately 35-40 minutes, or until starting to brown. Let cool completely before serving.

I'm sure Anna would want me to tell you that you can use a lemon cake mix and add some lemon juice to the filling mixture to make lemon bars--one of her favorites!

I'm thinking about trying a chocolate version, myself. YUM!

How often do YOU cook?

I cook pretty much every evening these days, but breakfasts and lunches are usually cold stuff or warmed up leftovers.

In the past, I sometimes did some 'planned leftover' type of cooking. I would brown 5 pounds of ground beef, then package it into meal-sized portions for the freezer. Or cook a couple of chickens, or a 10 pound bag of leg quarters, then de-bone and freeze the meat for later meals. This helped a LOT (and I should probably do that again sometime).

But one activity that sounds so helpful, is Once A Month Cooking (OAMC). I've done this only 2 or 3 times in my cooking career, and let me tell you--it's work. But it pays off exponentially throughout the month, when you simply pull meals out of the freezer and reheat them. It's wonderful. But it's a LOT of work.

Money Saving Mom is hosting a Freezer Cooking Day over at her blog. I hope you'll go check it out and click all the links for some great recipes and strategies.

Drive-by blogging

Hihowareyou? We'refinejustreallybusy. I'msureyouare,too. Hopeyouhadahappythanksgiving. Hereisagreatrecipethateveryoneshouldknowhowtomake.

And I'll even use punctuation.

Scotch-a-roos

1 c. white sugar
1 c. light corn syrup
1 c. peanut butter (creamy, please)
Rice Krispies--I used about 10-11 cups, 7 or 8 might be enough.
2 c. Chocolate and/or butterscotch and/or peanut butter chips

Put cereal into large bowl. In medium saucepan, combine sugar and syrup. Bring to rolling boil, then remove from heat. Add peanut butter and stir until combined. Pour over cereal in large bowl and stir to coat. Press into buttered/sprayed 9x13 pan (when I used 11 cups of cereal, I needed all of my 15x10 cake pan).
Melt chocolate/flavored chips in microwave, stirring every minute, until melted. Spread over cereal mixture in pan.

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Enjoy!

Creative recipe

What to do when you're out of bread for sandwiches at lunchtime:

Bean and cheese quesadillas

1 can refried beans
12-16 oz cheese (cheddar or colby jack for us)
some chopped onion (from freezer)
chopped green pepper (from freezer)
1/2 cup (more or less) salsa

Mix all together. Spread about 1/3 c. on flour tortilla. Top with another tortilla. Microwave or grill/fry until melty. Yum.

14 pints and counting...

Salsa, that is. I love homemade salsa. I love trying new recipes, though I won't try them without the recipe meeting a few conditions.

• Not too much cumin.
• Cilantro is wonderful.
• Not too spicy--a few jalapenos are fine, but nothing hotter than that.

Boring, maybe. But I love it. Here's the fabulous new recipe I found a couple weeks ago. Wonderful Salsa

The first batch I made as written, but with about half the amount of jalapenos. Very good--a tad spicy for my sensitive tastebuds, but I think it was actually the ton of black pepper rather than the jalapeno peppers. I made a second batch today with some modifications. My local grocery had fresh cilantro on sale, so I bought a couple packages and used some in the salsa, omitting the cumin and black pepper (wasn't sure how those flavors would work together). I LOVE it, it's just perfect. Oh, and I also used fewer jalapenos than called for, but made up the difference with extra green bell peppers (had a ton from the garden).

Also, I used to dread all the chopping that salsa required, but I got the grinder attachment for my KitchenAid mixer a couple months ago, and it makes the PERFECT salsa! It's the same consistency that they have in the Mexican restaurants around here. SO easy, just peel/cut into chunks/shove it in the grinder.

I've also got about a quart of salsa in the freezer. Now this is a different recipe: Tomato Freezer Salsa. I love the fresh lime juice and cilantro. So tasty and easy to fix. You can have a little bit of summer in the middle of winter, it tastes so fresh!

Still stalking twitter for Sock Summit details. I'm such a dork. But I've got about 5" knitted on my sock!

Tomorrow: Family Fun night with our church family. A bounce house, other inflatables/games, and free school supplies for community kids. It's going to be awesome. Especially if the heat index doesn't get to 107 as predicted, ugh.

Off to bed, have a great weekend where you are!

Cooties, CraftLit, and Canning

Some random thoughts...

We've been sick. Some kind of virus-plus-strep throat (for at least one of us). Doc put the whole lot of us on antibiotics which has helped the strep-py kid. The dh and I though? Not so much. Still have sore throats and dh has been very achy and tired. Better today, though--finally! Really not looking forward to winter sickness. We've stayed pretty healthy this summer, but it seems like when the cold weather hits we're sick a lot. And of course, we pass everything around to the whole house, so. Fun. Last winter wasn't as bad as usual, though. Don't know if it's because the older kids have learned to wash their hands more (cutting down the cooties brought into the house) or if it was all the Emergen-C we took. (You can get it at your local health food store or wal-mart.) Anytime we went somewhere, we all took some. Anytime one of us started feeling bad, we all took some. And I think it really helped. Not terribly expensive compared to a trip to the dr. and subsequent prescriptions.

Do you listen to CraftLit? It's an amazing podcast that I started listening to about a year and a half ago. It's done by an English professor, who taught high school for years in New York before moving to Arizona. She does some crafty talk--she knits, spins, draws, paints, etc. Then she teaches about the chapter(s) of the book for that show which is just SO wonderful. I've learned sooo much, which has been an incredible blessing for my dormant-bookworm brain. I used to read ALL.THE.TIME. before I started having baby after baby. I let the urgent everyday stuff fill in all that time that I should have been keeping my brain sharp. Anyway. Gift this podcast a listen. It's a good thing. OH, and she's got CD compilations off all the podcasts, divided by book, in case you've got dial-up or can't otherwise listen to the downloads. You may need to e-mail her for those--I know she's taking some to SOCK SUMMIT (where she's teaching a heel techniques class and a couple podcasting classes). BONUS for listening--her gramma's banana bread recipe. Oh yeah. Made two loaves last night. Let's just say it's a hit for breakfast.

Also, Librivox. In case you want MORE BOOKS! (Sometimes one or two chapters a week on CraftLit just isn't enough.) All public domain, recorded by volunteers. Some good readers, some not so good. But FREE!

Now, canning. I've only canned a few pints of salsa a couple years back. I always think I'm going to do it, I'll can whatever produce I can find good deals on. But I never do it. I chicken out. Right now I've got pint and quart jars that I bought, lids, rings, canning salt, vinegar, a pickling mix, tons of tomatoes and cucumbers exploding all over the vines, and.....um......a freezer salsa recipe that I've already made two batches of. What's my deal? I think it's the intimidation of cooking all the salsa/slicing the cucumbers, then trying to get everything hot at the same time, jar it up without burning myself, and the really scary part? Thinking that I have to keep things STERILE in MY HOUSE. I just don't think it can be done. Too many littles. Too many older kids who like to stick their fingers in things for a taste. I dunno. Maybe I'll get the salsa all ready today, put it in a pot in the fridge, then cook and can after bedtime. Think that would work? We'll see.

In other news? A knitting-related post--coming soon!

Crawling

Well, I'm officially the mom of a crawler. At 7 months, he now thinks he has full reign of the house. Just a month ago, baby H was barely sitting up, and just at his peak of rolling-around-the-room-ness. Then his rear end flattened out so he was a pro sitter, he scooted himself around the room backwards, and finally took his first real forward-crawl last week. The next day, I went into the room to get him up from his nap, and he was holding on to the side of his crib in a semi-stand! Why do babies have to grow up so fast?

So, he's been eating solids for about 3 weeks and is doing wonderfully with that. I start my babies on fruits and veggies, skipping the grains for as long as possible, usually 10-12 months. I think this general philosophy has its roots in Nourishing Traditions, but honestly, I can't remember for sure.

Which leads me to a frugal baby-food tip. You thought I was going to say make your own, didn't you? While this would be ideal, and something I aspire to, I just can't right now. There's no produce in season in my area (yet), and I just haven't gotten it done with store-bought stuff. So yes, I'm using the evil jarred processed stuff. Anyway, the tiny stage 1 jars (2.5 oz) are 48 cents and the stage 2 jars (3.5 oz) are 53 cents at my local grocery store. The only real difference is thickness, which can be remedied if your baby needs something thinner, by simply adding some water or br3astmilk. So I get the stage 2 jars, and just dump the small amount needed into a bowl.

I got the May 2009 issue of Better Homes and Gardens, and on the cover is a fabulous photo of fresh strawberry bars. I tried out the recipe last week and thought it was super yummy--but I think a more appropriate name would be peanut butter and jelly bars. The base is like a thick peanut butter cookie, then it has a thin layer of strawberry jam topped with fresh sliced strawberries. I loved it--just delicious!

Menu Plan Monday

I'm a little behind on this, but I love planning out my menus for the week ahead of time so I don't have to think about 'what's for dinner?' at 5:00 every night!

Breakfasts: Cereal, cheese grits, scrambled eggs/toast, oven pancake

Lunches: Sandwiches, leftovers

Dinners:

Monday-EASY Red beans and rice, carrot sticks

Tuesday-Italian Chicken w/rotini pasta, breadsticks, peas

Wednesday-Frito Chili pie, mixed veggies

Thursday--French Fry Casserole (recipe later), corn, crescent rolls

Friday--Birthday Pizza Party! Pizza, Birthday Cake and homemade Ice Cream. Sweet Chex Mix and pretzels for snacks.

Saturday--Baked Potato Bar w/leftover chili and other fixin's

Sunday--Chicken Pot Pie

Menu Plan Monday is being hosted by $5 Dinners this week, so check it out!

Happy Baby Day!

The day got off to a wonderful start this morning--we received a phone call from a good friend at 7:30 a.m. announcing the birth of his first child! This is a young couple in our church who is very dear to us. They were married on our wedding anniversary and started out with a 'bun in the oven' just like we did. They've grown so much in the last 9 months, and it's so amazing to see them becoming parents. We've known the new daddy since he was in elementary school, which is fun (but makes me feel REALLY old). So CONGRATS Ben and Molly!

In other news, DH made the most amazing strawberry ice cream this weekend. He used this recipe which we always use for vanilla, but with more milk to make a 2-qt batch. This time, he added about 3 cups of chopped, smashed strawberries--you know, out-of-season winter strawberries (can't wait for June...). But it was mouthwatering nonetheless, and I personally was responsible for the disappearance of about 1/4 of the batch. It would have been more, but we had company over so decided to share.

Tuesdays and Thursdays are my days off from babysitting. You know, it's only one extra kid for most of the day, and he's really a great kid, but.....it's just such a weight off my shoulders when his dad picks him up (and his 2 siblings that come over after school). My eight kids seems so much more manageable when I'm not responsible for someone else's child, as well.

For supper today, I'm gonna try the wet burritos from The Happy Housewife. I've got some leftover burrito meat (mixed with refried beans) for half of the batch, and some leftover cooked chicken from last night, for the other half. I think it'll work out great. DD made us poppyseed-lemon muffins for breakfast (though she didn't hear the timer go off and let them get a *little* overbrowned), and I just whipped up a batch of granola bars for snacks/breakfast later in the week. Lunch will probably be PB&J today--I'm out of leftovers and we just had ham yesterday. Gotta work on my menus for the rest of the week!