Super Fast Pizza Bread

My husband showed up with a store-bought package of hoagie buns the other day and I thought...ugh.  What am I gonna do with these?  He knows I'm trying to limit grain consumption in our family (especially any pre-packaged crap), but sometimes falls back on old habits.  I wanted to find a way to use them up quickly, so I decided to make some individual pizza breads.  They're not the healthiest things in the world, but I have to assume it's better than a frozen pizza loaded with sodium and preservatives.  Here's what you need...

Hoagie Rolls
Ground Beef, cooked
Spaghetti/pizza sauce
Mozzarella or Monterey Jack
Garlic Powder
Italian Seasoning

Tear apart the hoagie halves and lay them on a foil-lined baking sheet.  I was surprised to see all natural ingredients I recognized except for two, which is unusual.  Most store-bought rolls have tons of awful things in them. Still not on the top of my list for good food, but at least I'm not throwing them away.

Slather a spoonful of sauce over each.  This one from Aldi's has all natural ingredients.

Sprinkle on some garlic powder.

Add a couple of tablespoons of your toppings of choice.  I elected for hamburger, hamburger and onion and black olive, Tommy's favorite.

Add a sprinkle of cheese to each one.  It took the whole 8oz package to cover all 10 pieces.

Sprinkle on a little Italian seasoning.

Because I knew I wanted to freeze these and bag them, I thought I should probably smash down the cheese so it wouldn't fall off the minute I put them in a bag.  If you look closely, you can see my newly-acquired tan line where my wedding ring normally is.  Sexy, no?  Yeahhhh, that's about the only tan line this girl is willing to reveal!  Trust me on this one...you don't wanna go there!  Well, maybe I'd show off my farmer's tan, too!

Put the tray in the freezer until pizzas are frozen solid.  Throw in a baggie and keep in frozen until needed.

When you want to make some, take them out (still frozen) and throw them in the toaster oven.

 I baked mine at 350 for about 10 minutes.  Looks pretty good!

These got the seal of approval from the boss!

All together, these came to about $4.50 for all 10 servings, or .45 each.  I'd say that's not too shabby for a convenience food!

Packing a cut apple in a child's lunch

My son loves either apples or grapes in his lunch every day.  He usually has them cut up and sprinkled with some Stevia drops and cinnamon.  You just mush the apple pieces, cinnamon and Stevia around in a baggie and it keeps your apples from turning brown by lunch!  Not to mention, it is soooo tasty!  Feels like you're eating a healthy version of apple pie.  I eat this a lot when dieting because it makes me feel like I'm cheating, hee hee!

But the other day, he said he wanted a WHOLE apple.  Well, I didn't have a problem with that, but I know he hates biting into a whole apple.  He always eats the peels when I cut the apple up, but has an aversion to eating a whole one by itself.  I never said he was a normal child, lol!  So, remembering an email I received about clever little ways to do things, this came to mind!  I'm sure showing step by step instructions may make it look more difficult than it seems, but it really does take only a few seconds to do.

Take your whole apple and wash it.  Cut a slice down one side, about 1/4 way through the apple.  Excuse my disposable cutting board paper plate.  I've been trying to use less of them, but darn, they can be so handy!

Turn your apple a quarter of a turn and cut the next 1/4 off.  You're trying to avoid the core while doing this.

Turn your apple another quarter of a turn and cut another 1/4 off.

 

Before we turn another quarter of a turn and cut off the last 1/4, I'm going to put my puzzle pieces back together first.  If you don't care if your pieces are small, don't do this.  It's actually a little dangerous because the apple can become slippery.  Don't want to cut yourself.

 Now, if you're extra anal sweet like me, you can  figure out how to make all your pieces nice and easy for your child to eat by making each side look like this.

The next step is to match your puzzle pieces together.  Hopefully your apple-cutting skills are a little better than mine.

Wrap a rubber band around the whole thing.  Pack in a baggie.

So, why would you want to go through all of this trouble so you can essentially create an edible puzzle?  Well, number one, it's cool.  Number two, when the apple is opened up at lunch time, even the next day, the apple will still be nice and white inside because the slices were only exposed to air while you were cutting it.  Neato, huh?

Since my son requested the whole apple, I told him that I want to make sure he eats the whole thing.  I told him to please do not end up throwing half away.  Not so much because I'm a hardass who insists you eat what you take, but because wasting is just silly.  When he came home, I asked him if he ate his whole apple.  He said, "YES! Wellllllll, I didn't eat the core, if that's okay!"   LOL!  What a stinker!

Now, a  few notes about apples that may bore you to tears.  If you don't like mildly interesting facts, feel free to skip this part. Most people agree that an apple a day is essentially good for you.  It's high in fiber and rich in vitamins A, B, C, E and K.  An apple can also help those with acid troubles.  Most people who have acid problems actually have too little acid in their stomach, they just don't know it because they have what feels like an acidy stomach.  Next time you're having an acidy tummy, try an apple or some apple cider vinegar (2T) mixed with water and see how you feel.  I've tried it!  It works!  

A larger apple like this has a glycemic index of around 44.  Shoot, a Snickers candy bar is only 68!  So, you see, even though an apple can be a good choice, it can also raise your blood sugar quite a bit. And if you knew how spazzy and inattentive my child can be, you would watch it, too!  So, while I'm definitely not perfect at it, I try hard to give him as healthy a diet as I can, but still have some of the perks of being a kid.  We're a work in progress.   :)  

Kettle Corn!

Every fall, we go to a local pumpkin patch called Vala's and pick out a pumpkin.  We also ride the train and the horses.  There are all sorts of things to do and lots of food to eat.  In the past, we have just forgone the food because really, who wants to spend $6 on a smoked turkey leg?!  I could buy a whole turkey for that!

This last fall, my husband talked me into buying a bag of Kettle Corn.  I'd never had it before (I know, I KNOW!) and was grumbling about the exorbitant price the whole time.  Until I tasted it!  The heavens opened up and God himself seemed to whisper in my ear, "I made kettle corn. And I saw that it was good.  Taste and see..."  Or maybe I was hallucinating from my soon-to-be-sugar-induced psychosis.  Either way, dannnnnng!  It was GOOD!  It's salty, it's sweet, it's crunchy, it's buttery, it's heaven in a big long bag and a twistie!  It's even BETTER when you make it at home! Here's how:

Okay, so our cast of characters is as follows:

• 1/4C of White Sugar or Organic Maple Syrup (I've tried both...review below)
• 1/4C Coconut Oil (or other 'vegetable' oil of your choice if you like being poisoned with rancid and cancer-causing chemicals!  Oops, sorry!  Did I say that out loud?  Hmmm....by the looks of where this post is going, I do believe my pms may actually be showing!  And I don't seem to care, ha ha ha ha!)
• 1/2C Pop Corn Kernels
• Real Sea Salt
• Dutch oven or pan with lid
• Wooden Spoon
• Parchment or foil-line baking sheet

Okay, so we are going to start out by putting our pan over high heat and adding our Maple Syrup and Coconut Oil.  I would say stir to 'combine', but they never really do combine.  So, stir until melted.
If using sugar, stir until the sugar dissolves.

 Pour in your pop corn and stir to coat with oil and syrup.

After making a couple of batches of this, I decided it's best to wait until ONE kernel pops before putting on the lid?  Why?  Cuz I said so!  No, really.  If you put the lid on now, you'll get a bunch of condensation on the lid that will drip into your popcorn, making it sticky rather than caramelized and crunchy.  Avoid any flying kernels that have hot, sticky syrup on them and may poke your eye out.  Just kidding.  They start out really little like this.  Sheesh....the DANGER I put myself in to entertain and educate you people!

Using your skankiest hot pads, gently shake the pan back and forth or in a circular motion.  You just want to keep everything moving.  Heat and shake just until you don't hear any more popping. Immediately remove from heat. It burns very quickly as you might be able see on a few kernels in the next picture or two.

At first, I stirred the corn to make sure I got up any remaining caramelization from the bottom of the pan, but it was actually dry.  Apparently, the corn picks up all the melted sugar on it's way up in the air!  I found this to be true when I made it with sugar and with maple syrup.  So, skip the stirring and pour directly onto your parch-lined tray.  My (skanky) potholder is only laying on it because the parch wouldn't stay flat.  It was the end of the roll and kept curling up on me.  :)

Working quickly (it hardens FAST!), gently flatten the corn with your wooden spoon.  This is just so we have a greater surface area on which to sprinkle our Sea Salt!

Now, I am not usually a big salt fan, mostly because I've always heard it is bad for you.  An interesting side note:  When I was about 12, I recall my dad telling me that salt is not good for you.  Being a strong-willed child, I NEVER put salt on anything again until I was about 35!!!  I cooked with the necessary salt as called for in recipes, but I never salted my food, no matter how bland, LOL!  How weird is that?!  But now that I have this awesome Redmond's Real Salt, I find that I'm actually CRAVING it on things!  Must be all the trace minerals in it.  I (now) firmly believe that our bodies tell us what we need.  You crave things for a reason.  The key is knowing how to listen to what it's saying.  However, as a disclaimer, if your body is telling you that you need salt and you eat a bag of Cheetos, you might have a problem, LOL!  Anyway, I liberally salt this with Sea Salt because it makes such a great contrast to the sweet of the syrup/sugar.

I had a feeling that I'd have to break apart these hard clumps, but actually, it tends to fall apart in your hand.

If you can resist eating the whole batch in one sitting, I commend you.  My son and I dove in face first!  Through large muffled mouthfuls of kettle corn, he'd repeat, "This is SOOOOOO GOOOOOOOD!"  We scarfed down about half of it, then thought....let's take the rest to our neighbor, Jay!  It's a good thing, too, because I firmly believe we would have eaten it all within a matter of minutes!  It's so yummy!  Let it cool completely, then store in a zip top baggie.

I didn't measure this, but if I had to guess, I'd say this makes about 8 cups of popped corn.  I'm not sure if it can be doubled without the worry of burning the bottom.  Update: I looked up online how much popped corn a 1/2 cup of kernels would make and it said 16 cups!  I refuse to believe my son and I ate 8 cups of this within two minutes, but ya never know, lol!  It was that good.

I like that it's super duper cheap and tastes great!  MUCH cheaper than the kettle corn we bought at the pumpkin patch, and even tastier!  It also doesn't have the nasty fake oils and fake butter flavor the one at the pumpkin patch uses.  The coconut oil helps to make it a little healthier as far as a sweetened snack goes.  I bet this would be REALLY good with Extra Virgin Coconut Oil, which would give it a little bit of a coconutty flavor.

Now, my review of using maple syrup as opposed to the sugar.  While both of them were very good and disappeared quite quickly,  I have to say that I really enjoyed the one made with sugar better.  Maybe it's because I didn't burn any of it.  If you decide to try it yourself, let me know what you think!

Homemade Magic Shell

Do you remember that chocolatey liquid stuff you could pour on ice cream and it would harden, creating a delicious little shell?  Kinda like a dipped cone at DQ?  Well, you can make your own at home with just two ingredients!  Here's how:

 

Ingredients:

2T Pure Coconut Oil

1/3C Chocolate Chips (I used mini ones)

In a glass measuring cup, add the chips and coconut oil.

Pop it in the microwave for 2 minutes (I used 90% power), 

stirring every 30 seconds.  It will feel really watery at first.  Mix well.

It will thicken quickly.  Scoop out your favorite ice cream and pour on top.

It will start out shiny.  Wait about one minute and it will start to turn dull-looking.

After it's set, crack your spoon in top and eat!

Notes:  

Clearly, if you are allergic to coconut, do not make this, lol!  If you are not allergic to coconut, but don't care for the taste of coconut, this probably is not for you. It does have a nice coconutty chocolatey taste, but I think less is more with this.  The serving you see above was wayyyy too much 'magic shell'.

How does it work?  Well, coconut oil is solid at room temp, but melts at 76 degrees, I believe.

When you heat it up, it's liquid.  When it hits the cold ice cream, it goes back to solid.  And here

we thought Magic shell was, well, magic!

The bad news, coconut oil is fat.  The good news, it's a good fat as far as fat goes!  You can fry food in it, eat it as a supplement, or use it as an ingredient as above.  You can also use it as body lotion it you want to smell like a coconut all day, lol!  I tried it the other day and was surprised to find that it really didn't smell very good when first applied.  As the day went on, it smelled really good, like a day at the beach.  My son hated the smell and kept telling me to take a shower, lol!  It really made my skin so much softer than normal lotions, too.  I noticed that on my hands, my cuticles softened enough where I could push them back easily with my fingernails and they stayed soft.  My heels softened a lot, too.  The moisture seemed to stay in my skin rather than dissipate as with regular lotion.  Very interesting!

Now, coconut oil IS expensive!  The jar you see above cost about $12.  Yikes!  The good thing is that you use it sparingly and it lasts a long time.  When I put it on my body, I probably used 1/2t per leg!  And I have fat legs with lots of surface area, lol!  The above (approx 1/2c) batch of Magic Shell cost about $1 to make.  I'm assuming that's cheaper than the store-bought stuff, but I don't buy it, so I'm not sure. Either way, it was a fun and tasty experiment!

Old-Fashioned Butterscotch Pudding and why it's gross.

I was reading a post for Homemade Butterscotch Pudding over at Lynn's Kitchen Adventures and it looked really good. It called for butterscotch chips, which I did not have and I didn't want to run to the store.  I noticed a lady in the comment section posted that she had a recipe her mom used to make from a 1939 cook book called "The Working Girl Must Eat" by Hazel Young.  So, I thought...well, certainly that has to be  great, right?  Uhhhh, not so much.  Not sure why I'm even posting it if we didn't care for it, but maybe you can learn from my mistakes, right?

 

Ingredients:

1C Brown Sugar

1/4C Corn Starch*

Dash of Salt

2C milk

1 Egg

3T Butter

1t Vanilla

Combine brown sugar, starch, salt, milk and egg 

(basically everything but the butter and vanilla) in a sauce pan.

Whisk together and cook over medium heat for approximately

10 minutes, stirring constantly. 

 Remove from heat and add in butter and vanilla.  Whisk.

Can you see the weird texture?  Look just north of the butter.  Strange.

Pour into cups and cover directly with plastic wrap or plop on a lid.

Refrigerate for at least 2 hours, preferably six or more.

*Before I make any comments, I should give you a disclaimer: the recipe called for flour rather than cornstarch, but I just couldn't get myself to do it!  I envisioned butterscotch gravy! Ewwwww!  In no way can I fathom making pudding with flour.  It's unnatural.  It also called to do this over a double boiler.  Maybe this is why I had the weird texture?  I dunno, but come on...that's too much work for pudding, people!  LOL!

It's not that the taste was bad, it was just not what we're used to when we think of butterscotch.  You know, we're kinda thinking it will taste like the fake flavor in the box, or perhaps a more lighter version of it.  This just tasted like brown sugar pudding, if there is such a thing.  I regret to say that we ended up throwing half of it out.  I really hate wasting, but no one would eat it.  It was the texture that bothered us more than anything.  It was kind of grainy.  Not at all smooth and creamy, like you expect out of a pudding.  I'm gonna consider this one a flop.  I would really like to try Lynn's version if I can find some butterscotch chips for dirt cheap!  Had this worked out, it would have been a real bargain at 98 cents total to make.  But I'd rather pay a little more and have something we'll really eat.  Sorry Hazel.

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"Instant" Mac N Cheese and why it's better to just buy the darn box!

I've seen other people make quick mac and cheese on their sites and I've always thought....how can that possibly be cheaper?  I guess if you're buying the big name brand, it could be cheaper.  We buy ours at Aldi every day for 35c a box, so that's hard to beat.  I thought I'd try it out to see. Here's the deal...

I started out with what I thought I'd need for ingredients:
1/4C Milk (Ended up using a whole cup)
2T Butter
2T Flour
1 1/2C Macaroni Noodles
2 Pcs of American Cheese (I was trying to be frugal as possible with it)

So, everyone knows how to make mac and cheese from the box, right?

You boil your water and add your noodles.

You drain your noodles after 8 minutes. 

And here's where we're gonna do something different.  Leave the

noodles in the strainer and put the same pot back on the stove.

Add in two Tablespoons butter and allow to melt.

Sprinkle 2T Flour over that and mix well.

Cook for a couple of minutes to get the raw flour taste out.

Here's where I (stupidly) thought I could get away with adding 1/4C

of milk in, like the box calls for.  

And here's what I ended up with.  A seized up glob of roux glue, lol!

So, I ended up adding 3/4C more milk.  Much better.  This is just

your basic white sauce, or Bechamel sauce.  Sounds fancy, huh?

Turn heat to low. Even though I am not a fan of processed cheese, I

added two pulled-apart pieces of American Cheese.  I figured 

Tommy would like it and that's more important than if I did.

Stir until melted.  Remove from heat.

Add in that now-congealed mass of noodles and give it a good stir.

You now have homemade "instant" mac and cheese, sorta.

Notes:

So, here's the dealio.  I didn't care for this at all.  Tommy thought it was good, but half way through, decided he didn't want any more.  This homemade version cost me $1.02 to make.  I considered using cheddar, but then it would have cost even more.  I can buy a box of Cheese Club Brand Mac N Cheese every day at Aldi for 35c.  With the added (1/4C) milk and butter (I only use 2T), it comes in at 54c, so almost half price.

Is it healthier?  No, I guess not.  It does have a lot of sodium...1890, whereas mine comes in at 790.  Of course, mine was so bland, it needed salt sprinkled on when served, so my number should technically be a little higher.  I am not a big fan of sodium (or the added chemicals), but budget-wise, the box wins.  Now, if you're one of those people who will pay $1.39 for the Kraft version, then making it at home would be a cheaper alternative.  But I gotta tell you, the Cheese Club one from Aldi actually tastes better!  Yup, it's true!  So, I'm sticking with the box for now.

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