Fried Apples

Today we had a pajama day. We all wore our pjs all day and were only allowed to eat breakfast food. By dinner, I was feeling a little breakfast food-ed out. Until. I found these - fried apples. WOW! I forgot how much I like apples. And the sauce over waffles was more like candy than breakfast!

I love www.allrecipes.com. See here for this tasty treat!

Apple Pie Oatmeal

This recipe is not an original. It was taken years ago from a magazine I simply cannot remember the name of. However, it is too good not to share, especially with apples in season and fall upon us!

3 c water
2 medium tart apples, chopped
1 1/2 c old fashioned oats
dash of salt
1/4 c packed brown sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 c chopped almonds (I like walnuts too! I would just use whatever nuts you have on hand, they are all fairly nutty)

Boil water. Add apples, oats and salt and boil, while mixing, for five minutes. Remove from heat and stir in brown sugar, cinnamon and vanilla. Cover and let stand for 2 minutes. Sprinkle each serving with nuts and add milk or syrup. Or, let me go out on a limb here, what about a scoop of vanilla ice cream? It is dairy, right? How about apple pie oatmeal a-la-mode? No problem getting breakfast eaten today!

Pirate Cake, with a treasure discovery

Hyrum wanted a pirate cake for his birthday this year. I wanted to do it, I did not look forward to using the fondant recipe I have used for the past several years. So, I looked throught trusty allrecipes.com and came up with a great Marshmallow Fondant recipe!

It did take some work to do all the detailing, but it was SO fun! I can't wait for the next!

Black Bean Soup

This recipe is an alteration of one I found in a Southern Living Cookbook. I happen to believe in pressure cookers, and this alteration takes a fraction of the time.

1 lb dried black beans
1T salt
1/2 onion, sliced
3 (14.5 oz) cans chicken broth
1.5 c chopped onions
.75 T minced garlic
2 T olive oil
1 (10oz) can diced tomatoes and green chilies
1/3 c lemon juice
1/2 t pepper
1 t hot sauce
sour cream

Sort and rinse beans. Place in a 1.5 quart casserole dish and add 1 T salt and 1/2 sliced onion and fill the rest of the way with water. Cover and microwave for 20 minutes. Pour out water and onion and put beans in pressure cooker with chicken broth. Bring to pressure and cook 10 minutes. Beans should be tender. Saute chopped onion and garlic in hot oil in a large skillet until tender. Stir in tomatoes and next three ingredients. Cook 5 more minutes. Process tomato mixture and 2 cups beans in a food processor, pulsing just until mixture is chopped but not smooth and pasty. Stir remaining beans and just enough bean juice to make a nice mixture, but not too brothy, into processed mixture. Ladle into soup bowls, and top each serving with sour cream. Yum!

I have to get this going!!

OK, so I am REALLY struggling with menus!! And I need to do them especially now that we're down to a paycheck every other week, so I need to plan better. So I think this will make me do it!! I'm trying to just eat oatmeal for breakfast and lunch is just insane to plan, for me. So, I'll start with just dinner and then go from there when I get better !!

Here it goes:

Monday:

(already I draw a blank!!!)

Italian Chicken

peas

bread (homemade)

Tuesday:

Meatloaf

Baked potatoes

corn

Wednesday:

Left over Italian Chicken

(we always have way to much)

Thursday:

(blank, blank ,blank)

Pork Chops

(never made them, sad I know!!)

Bread

Potato side

(I'm going to try a new one, I'll tell you how it goes)

Friday:

Waffles

( I never do breakfast for dinner, I think Madison will like it!!)

Saturday:

Pizza

(I made it last week and the dough didn't' raise so I'm trying again!!)

OK, so see this is why I need help!! BORING food!! SO I need easy CHEAP ideas!!

Chocolate Chip Cookies

My most favorite thing to bake is chocolate chip cookies, so I thought I would share my recipe. It is an alteration of a Betty Crocker recipe and it goes like this:

3/4c granulated sugar
3/4c brown sugar
1 c stick margarine, softened
1 egg
2 1/2 c flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 c chocolate chips

Heat oven to 375. Mix sugars, margarine and egg. Stir in flour, soda and salt (batter will be stiff.) Stir in chocolate chips. Drop by rounded teaspoonful (you know, the ones you eat with - I actually use my handy-dandy Pampered Chef little melon baller scooper thing so they are uniform and really nice sized) onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 7 minutes - they should not quite be brown on the edges, but another minute would brown them. Take them out before they brown. Put a dish towel on your counter and drop your cookie sheet from a height of 6". Do this a couple times. This makes them better. Because they are a little doughy, wait until they cool a bit before eating.

These are SUPER soft and tasty. Hope you enjoy!

Week 2

I obviously didn't get to this on-time this week. The problem for me in meal planning is that I often overplan. We didn't finish all the meals from last week, so this week we are finishing up. I will try to post more tomorrow.