When ever possible either double the recipe for a casserole or divide larger ones into half . Cover, wrap and freeze the remaining portion for a busy night when you don’t have time to prepare dinner. If properly wrapped, most casseroles freeze fine for up to a month with little or no change in taste…and if a friend or neighbor is sick or otherwise in need, you can come to the rescue with no last minute fuss.

Never overcook foods you are going to freeze for later. In fact, under cook it slightly. The foods will finish cooking when they are reheated.

Don’t ever refreeze cooked, thawed foods.

A few drops of regular vinegar added to simmering rice will keep the grains separated and the rice extra white.
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The freshness of eggs can always be tested this easy way: Place eggs in question in a large bowl of ice water, if they float to the top, better not use them.

Make your own self-rising flour like this:Combine~
4 cups of all purpose flour
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons baking powder
Store this mixture in a Tupperware type container in your pantry

Never, ever soak vegetables after slicing. Most of the nutrients will be lost in doing so.

Add a heaping teaspoon of sugar to the water when cooking green vegetables. It helps them maintain their beautiful color and adds just a slight taste of sweetness.

Grandmas Rule Of Thumb:
If you are cooking a vegetable that grows ABOVE ground, cook it without a cover on the pot. IE: Above-er–no cover…corny yes, but true none the less. Grandma knows!

Rolling and Cutting

• Cookie dough is much easier to work with after it’s been refrigerated for at least half an hour–and the cut-outs will hold their shape better if the dough is cold.
• Keep cookie cutters from sticking to the dough by misting them very lightly with cooking spray.
• If you’re cutting out delicate or large shapes, roll out the dough on parchment paper, lifting off the scraps; slide the paper directly onto a baking sheet.

Frosting Ideas

• One popular frosting for sugar cookies is a simple glaze of confectioners’ sugar and either milk or fruit juice. By adjusting the ratio of liquid to sugar, you can make this glaze as thick or as thin as you’d like.
• Royal icing is another option: it dries to a hard, crunchy finish and also holds up well in the mail.
• Buttercream frosting is soft and thick; tasty, but not good if you plan to stack the cookies.
  Instead of frosting, you can also dip half or all of a cookie in chocolate and then in chopped nuts or crushed candy canes.
• Sprinkle on coarse colored sugar, nuts, colored sprinkles, or other small candies.
  Or make colorful designs on the unbaked cookies by painting them with a mixture of egg yolks tinted with food coloring. The finished cookie will be bright and glossy.

Mailing

• When making cut-out cookies for mailing, choose fairly sturdy shapes without too many pointy edges.
• Pack decorated, dry cookies in a flat, sturdy container with a tight-fitting lid. Line it with parchment or waxed paper.
• Pack a selection of cookie shapes in a single layer, fitting them together as closely as possible. Now pile more cookies into the container, stacking same-shape cookies on top of each other.
• When the container is full, put wadded-up pieces of wax paper or unbuttered air-popped popcorn into any empty spaces, then seal the lid. Wrap the container in bubble wrap, and pack it into a box. The cookies should arrive fresh, beautiful and full of home-baked love.

No, we didn’t find pathogens such as E. coli O157:H7, listeria, or salmonella. With our small sample size — 208 containers representing 16 brands purchased at stores in Connecticut, New Jersey, and New York — we didn’t expect to. (The Department of Agriculture, in a test of more than 4,000 samples of loose and packaged salad in 2008, found salmonella in two of them. All of our tests included packaged greens.)

Check out the rest of this article here >>

After all, who wants to deal with making a whole chicken, before you even start the main recipe? Furthermore, who has the time to do that on a weeknight?

Fortunately, rotisserie chickens are a simple, readily available solution. From carryout shops and casual dining establishments to small grocery stores and huge food warehouses, most of us don’t have to travel far to find aready made roast chicken.

Served whole or cut into serving pieces, rotisserie chicken is great for on-the-fly weeknight suppers. But with a little time, it’s easy to take the meat off the bone and use the cooked bird as an ingredient in a more complicated recipe.

Keep a few things in mind when buying a rotisserie chicken:

• If there’s a choice, opt for plain instead of flavored. Although most of the flavoring is concentrated on the skin, which you’ll probably discard, it does inordinately perfume the meat and accumulated chicken juices (which you may want to use if the recipe calls for broth).
• Look for a large, full-breasted chicken. It has more meat, of course, but it also has less waste and is less likely to dry out under a heat lamp or in a hot box.
• Pull the chicken from the bone as soon as you get home. It’s easier to separate while warm, it saves room in the fridge, and you can start your recipe without delay.
• If you have time, dump the bones, skin and accumulated juices into a soup kettle, barely cover with water, and bring to a simmer. In 30 minutes, you’ll have a pot of stock that tastes like it’s been simmering for hours.
• Use shredded chicken to top pizzas, flavor pasta and rice, toss in salads, or beef up soups. I especially like it for curry and enchiladas – dishes I might not have time to make from scratch.

One final piece of advice: At the checkout, double-bag the bird in plastic and keep it upright–a cardboard box is even better. It’s no fun cleaning chicken juice off car seats.

Written by Amy Grisak

Lasagna gardening sounds delicious just from the name, but it’s a great term for what others call “sheet composting” or composting in layers. In the end, it’s a fantastic method to create highly productive soil without much effort.

The name is from the book Lasagna Gardening by Patricia Lanza. The beauty of this technique is it doesn’t involve digging, and you can leave the rototiller in the garage. In areas where topsoil is precious, it’s beneficial because you’re not removing sod and thereby a layer of soil. Plus, since you’re not turning under the soil, you don’t bring long-dormant weed seeds to the surface. It’s practical in every application.

Here’s a quick run down of how to go about it:
~ Spread cardboard or several layers of newspaper (only the black and white pages, not the color sections) over your soon-to-be garden area.
~ Soak it down very well.
~ Alternate layers of “green” and “brown” materials such as leaves, grass clippings (that haven’t been sprayed with herbicide), kitchen waste, coffee grounds, compost, peat moss and other normally composted items.
~ Soak this down well, too.
~ Give it time to “cook” and create a lovely, rich bed of the perfect planting medium.

I spoke with a local lady who likes to make her lasagna beds in the fall to allow them to process over the winter, but she said you can do them in the spring without a problem. She recommended pulling black plastic over the bed to help speed up the composting process, which is a good idea, particularly in windy or colder areas of the country.

Also, if you create a lasagna type bed in the spring, you’ll most likely have to add topsoil or compost to the top layer in order to seed in it. As the plants grow, the roots will work their way down into the composted material, and will grow like gangbusters in the fertile soil.

The nice thing about this method is it can be done anywhere. It’s a perfect way to fill raised beds. Or, if you’d like to create a bountiful island of veggies in the backyard, the lasagna garden is the way to go. It can even be replicated in containers.

Plus, weeding is an absolute breeze. You might have weeds simply because the seeds are broadcast by the wind, but because the soil is typically so light and fluffy, they pull without much effort. And if you keep mulch around the plants throughout the summer, it will make it even easier.

So go out there and make some lasagna!

Beginning this Saturday I am on a food challenge. I want to spend only $150 next week on food. This will be easy because I have plenty of meat frozen. My second rule is I will only buy what is on sale. Now that does not mean I will buy or eat anything bad. The quality must be good and it must be the brands I like. I am not a generic girl. I must have my Folgers Gourmet Selections Caramel Drizzle coffee. But I stocked up on it the last time Target had it on sale and now I am fine until its on sale again. Of course I could print out a coupon from their website. KMart has double coupons this week.

My shopping rules

• I try to only buy USA made/grown products.
• I only buy if it is on sale or I have a coupon.

Strategy

• Sunday Check the grocer store flyers, sales, and coupons and then create my menu.
• Having an idea of what we are eating all week prevents me from buying uneccessary items.
• Make a list. Organize my coupons. Hit the stores.
• Never go grocery shopping hungry or tired. That combination is recipe for disaster and will cause you to buy way more than you need.

Depression cooking

My 90-year-old Grandfather was talking to my children about the depression. And he said, ‘you never go hungry if you know how to grow food and cook food. Pasta and beans every night if you have to. And you will never tire of it if it has flavor.’

So when you see olive oil on sale, stock up. Garlic, onions, kosher salt and olive oil are my most important ingredients. Add it to anything, okay not ice cream, but most everything and you will have an amazing dish.

Peasant cooking

Slice a large white onion and saute in a bit of olive oil with a dash of salt until onions begin to carmelize. Add two sliced garlic cloves, then a can of kidney, white, or lentil beans… Serve over pasta.

Or saute sliced onions, potatoes, garlic, in butter and olive oil with salt and a dash of pepper. When slightly browned cover with a mixture of eggs with milk. Sprinkle some cheese and stick it in the oven.

Lets cut our meat use down to three dinners per week. Add a fish one night. Other nights its pasta, veggies, salads, pizza, and soup.

Stock up, load up, be prepared, and be smart!
Recession proof your kitchen.

xo Darla

Baked Apples
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F., then wash and core apples. Wrap each apple in a square of aluminum foil, and seal tightly. Bake for 30 to 45 minutes, testing with a fork for desired softness. Remove foil, skin, and core. Mash apples. Count on two to three apples to produce 1 cup of mashed apple. You can use the same method for pears, which will reach the desired softness within 15 to 30 minutes.

Pureed Meats
Cut meat into 1/2-inch cubes. Trim off all fat. Add 1 cup of stock (either meat or vegetable) to 1 cup of meat. Simmer until meat is tender – 45 minutes to an hour. Drain stock, reserving the liquid. When you puree, use l/2 cup of cooking liquid for each cup of meat. Freeze extra portions immediately.

Pureed Legumes
Carefully rinse and pick over 1 cup of any legume. Soak in water overnight or bring to a boil for 2 minutes, cover, and then allow to sit for 2 hours. Drain off the soaking water or the cooking water, then add 3 cups fresh water and bring beans to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer, covered, until beans are tender (anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 hours, depending on your choice of legume). Skim the surface often as beans are simmering. Puree with 3/4 cup milk. Freeze unused portions immediately.

Sweet Potatoes
Scrub sweet potatoes and bake at 450 degrees F. for 40 to 50 minutes, testing with a fork for desired softness. Allow to cool. Peel, then mash with a fork, adding vegetable cooking juices, milk, or a bit of apple juice. Acorn squash can be substituted for sweet potato.

Vegetable Purees
Cut vegetables into small pieces and steam them in a vegetable steamer over 1 or 2 inches of water in a tightly-covered pot. Use this water as a thinner when pureeing vegetables. The approximate ratio of vegetables to liquid is 2 cups of fresh vegetables to between 1/3 to 1/2 cup of liquid. Place steamed vegetables and a little of the steaming water in a food processor or baby-food grinder and puree to a soft consistency. To add flavor and protein, try adding an equal amount of baked or steamed potato to the steamed vegetables and puree together. Thin mixture with milk to desired consistency. Freeze unused portions immediately.

Combination Dinner
Place 1 cup cooked meat, 2/3 cup cooked vegetables, 1/3 cup cooked white or brown rice, and 1 cup stock in a blender or food processor. Puree, and freeze leftover portions immediately. Yield should be approximately 3 cups.

There is just no excuse for giving your children hot dogs and boxed macaroni and cheese night after night. You have to get into that kitchen and start preparing some decent meals.

It is easier than you think. You can fry up fresh chicken nuggets with homemade dipping sauce in ten minutes. You can serve them with sliced apples and carrots. You can toss fresh pasta with cut up vegetables like zucchini and red pepper. Add a bit of butter, parmesan cheese to just about anything and your kids will eat it. You have to start while they are young. Introduce them to freshly cooked fish and they will learn to enjoy it. If you give them junk all the time that is the flavor they will aquire. Your children will grow into adults. What you put into their little bodies now will affect their future. Think about it.
NO MORE SODA
NO MORE JUNK

You can cheat once and a while. I take my children out for pizza and soda once in a week. I give them chips and cookies. But these are treats after they have eaten properly the rest of the week or day. If your children eat a wholesome dinner, give them a chocolate dessert. If they ate all their vegetables all week, let them indulge on Saturday with an orange soda.

I know we are busy. But we are certainly not too busy to take a half hour out of our day to make a meal for our families. Get your kids on board to help. Let them slice, stir, and have fun with you in the kitchen.

The dinner table is the place where all the action is. Sit, eat, and talk with your kids.

cooking can be fun
A lot of women want to cook for their families but worry that it takes too long and that what they try to prepare might not taste good. You don’t have to be afraid to cook. I have included recipes any mom can pull off in less than an hour.