Friday, February 28, 2014

Lactation Unbaked Cookies


These cookies go by many names - unbaked, haystacks, frogs, s#it cookies. This recipe is "lactation" because of the addition of flax and brewer's yeast to the oatmeal base. These ingredients support a mom in making more milk - plus the cookies are delicious, fast, and easy to make.


Boil syrup ingredients for 5 minutes or to a temperature of 230*F.
Syrup:
2 cups white sugar
1/2 cup margarine or butter
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla

Then add:
1/4 cup flax meal
3 tablespoons brewers yeast
3 cups oatmeal
1/4 cup cocoa
1/2 cup walnuts, raisins, coconut or add in of your choosing

Drop onto wax paper and allow to cool.


Thursday, August 30, 2012

Freezer to Slow Cooker: 10 Meal Menu

I've taken to using other people's work rather than my own... so it figures that Once a Month Mom would decide to go to paid subscriptions. Good on 'em, but not really my style.

So I made my own Freezer to Slow Cooker menu. Check it out here:
http://tinyurl.com/slowcookermenu

Let me know if you give it a shot! I would guess it will take about 3 hours start to finish.

Monday, January 23, 2012

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough (to be eaten, not baked)

(Safe to eat raw) Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough

2 T butter
3 T brown sugar
1/4 c flour
pinch salt
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/4 cup chocolate chips

Mix the butter and sugar well, add the rest. Divide between two bowls. Top with vanilla ice cream, or just eat until you feel you've maxed out out on sweet goodness.

Most recipes for this yield about four times this amount. This is not a responsible amount of cookie dough for me to have, so I scaled it down. It's easy to mix this up in less than five minutes, which is a big enough problem.

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Backyard Plum Sauce






The same neighbour with a cherry tree that overhangs our fence also has a plum tree! My mother warned me that some plums are good cooked and others are bitter, so I did a test by microwaving a couple for a minute to see which I had. They were sour, but not bitter, so I figured we had a winning plum tree. If you're using backyard plums, I advise cooking a few as a test just to make sure you don't end up with a giant batch of bitter plum sauce.

Plum Dipping Sauce
8 cups plums - prune or Damson if you're buying them
1 sweet or white onion, chopped
1 1/2 cups sugar (my plums were sour, so I ended up using about 3 cups sugar)
1/2 cup + 1 tbsp rice vinegar (I used cider vinegar, white would be fine too)
1/3 cup Chinese rice wine, sake, or sherry
4 tsp minced fresh ginger
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 star anise (optional)
2 inch cinnamon stick
5 whole cloves
4 green cardamom pods (optional)
1/2 tsp salt

In a large heavy-bottomed saucepan, stir everything together. I just put my plums in whole, as they are small and removing the pits would have been really annoying. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium low and let simmer for an hour or so until sort of applesauce like.

When I started it looked like this:

Then after about 45 minutes it looked more like this:

Give it a taste and add more sugar if it's too sour for you. Once it's pretty liquid, strain it through a fine sieve or food mill into another saucepan. This part is doomed to be messy. Do it in the sink.

Return mixture to simmer. Ladle into hot sterilized jars, leaving 1/2 inch headspace. (The recipe says 5 - 250 ml jars. I had more plums and ended up with more than that.) Seal with prepared lids and bands. Process jars for 15 minutes in boiling water. Let cool on rack and check that the lids have sealed once cool (if not, put in fridge and eat soon.)

Serve with chicken or pork.

Friday, July 22, 2011

When life gives you cherries...


make some cherry juice!

There is a nanking cherry tree that grows over our fence and our neighbour encourages me to pick whatever I can reach. Today I picked about 10 cups of fruit and boiled up some delicious juice. This is very similar to making jelly, but much easier to use up in our house.


Nanking Cherry Juice
8-10 cups nanking cherries
water to cover
1-2 cups sugar to taste

Wash fruit and put in a large pot. Add just enough water to cover. Bring to a boil and simmer until fruit is soft, approximately 10 minutes. Strain through cheesecloth into a pitcher or another pot. Add 1 cup of sugar per 4 cups of juice, or less if you want it more tart. (I used 1 cup of sugar for about 6 cups of juice.)

Drink straight or mix half and half with ginger ale or lemon lime pop. Also nice with vodka.

Sunday, April 3, 2011

Whole Grain Waffles

Continuing on my quest to have lots of food in my freezer pre-baby, today was waffle day! I made a double batch adapted from this recipe: Whole Grain Waffles.

Whole Grain Waffles
Ingredients:
4 eggs
3 1/2 cups milk
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup applesauce or mashed banana
2 tsp vanilla
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 cup flax seed meal, or 1 cup combined flax seed meal, ground oatmeal, brewer's yeast, etc.
1/2 cup wheat germ
1/2 cup all purpose flour
3 tbsp baking powder
2 tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
Optional: blueberries, chocolate chips, other berries

Directions:
In a 2 L juice pitcher, mix the eggs, milk, oil, applesauce/banana, and vanilla. Add the dry ingredients and mix well. Cook on waffle iron. If freezing, spread waffles on cooling rack and let sit until cool. Place in ziploc bag or airtight container and freeze. Thaw in toaster. Also makes a great PB&J sandwich.

Yields around 26 individual waffles.

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Super-easy Crockpot Lemon Chicken and Baked Potatoes

Super-easy Crockpot Lemon Chicken and Baked Potatoes
Ingredients:
chicken breasts
lemon juice
oregano
garlic or powdered garlic
baking potatoes

All right, this is more of a method than a recipe, but it's so easy and yummy I thought I'd share.

Place your desired number of chicken breasts in the bottom of the crockpot. If they're frozen, no need to thaw. Sprinkle generously with oregano. Add some garlic, minced or powdered. Add some lemon juice (about 1/4 cup, bottled is fine).

Tear off a piece of foil. Layer it over the chicken so it separates the chicken from the top of the cooker. Scrub the potatoes and set them on top. The foil layer makes them a "drier" baked potato, whereas just tossing them in with the chicken will make them more likely to fall apart - but also more lemony.

Cook 4 hours on high or about 8 on low. Serve with salad.