Healthy Snack Carnival

Stephanie over at Keeper of the Home is hosting a healthy snack carnival. I don't have many healthy snacks that we bake but I can share what we do for snacks. OK...so not a picture of a very healthy snack at right but they were homemade and made with WW flour so a LOT healthier than what you would buy at the store!

So...for snacks we do the following:

Fruit - Huge for us. My boys LOVE apples, bananas, oranges (prefer clementines), kiwi's, grapes (if I can find organic), pineapple, etc. I usually buy at least 4-5 different kinds of fruit every week.

Veggi's - right now just for Bennett. He eats everything! Aiden is a picky almost 4 yr right now.

Cheese - Right now we do mozarella cheese sticks and cubed cheese. I am currently reading Nourishing Traditions and am planning to start trying to buy raw dairy products again so we will probably do sliced raw cheese.

Crackers - we have been buy TLC crackers but I have collected a few recipes that look excellent so I plan to start making our own crackers.

Pretzels - Aiden LOVES to make pretzels.

Toast or Bread & Butter - another favorite. I love the toast fingers Stephanie mentions in her post. I think my kids might like it. Although Aiden is big into having a big piece of toast. He doesn't want us to cut anything anymore.

Raisins - and other dried fruit. Raisins not as much since we saw an article about how raisins and grapes (even just 1-2) can be toxic to dogs and my kids LOVE to feed Abeey.

That is all I can think of for right now.

Make sure to share your healthy snacks over at Keeper of the Home!

Tipster Tuesday

I have been wanted to join in on Kitchen Tip Tuesday's for a while now. I love all the tips I have gained from everyone over the last few weeks. So...my tip for this week. BUY IN BULK and buy a freezer.

We are a member of a local food cooperative. We just LOVE it. I can purchase almost everything we need in bulk from our food coop and it is usually a ton cheaper than buying the same items in the store. We also buy all organic products and by buying these items in bulk I can usually get these items for the same price I would buy that same item but non-organic at the store. I bake a lot of our own food so I buy the following items in bulk:

Flour (usually WW Bread & Pastry)
Rolled Oats (I make oatmeal, granola, etc.)
Sunflower Butter
Oils (Olive, Canola, Sun & Safflower)
All of our bathroom products (toothpaste, shampoo, etc.)
Cleaning products (dish soap, liquid, cleaners, etc....although trying to learn to make some of these myself to make it even cheaper)
BAKING SODA!!! (I use this for everything from diapers to dishes and just got an AWESOME dish washer tip from Passionate Homemaker this week!)

There are a ton of other things I buy in bulk also. Check around in your area to see if you can find a food coop or start one of your own. You don't need to buy much to be able to buy at these wholesale prices.

And a freezer is a must for saving money also. I have a wonderful organic farm down the road a bit and at their little farm stand they sell their produce for cheaper than you can buy traditional produce at the store. Things that I can't seem to grow that well like peppers, onions, carrots. I also go to a pick your own strawberry & blueberry farm in the summer & fall. With my freezer I am able to store all of this lovely produce through the winter and still have blueberry muffins & pancakes and strawberry smoothies all winter long. It is also a lot cheaper as I can purchase a quart of organic wild Maine blueberries for only $1.50 and you can't even get a pint of traditional berries at the store that cheaply! We also raise our own Turkey's & Chickens and buy Beef & Goat meat from friends that raise them naturally (not organic certified but they are grass fed and are not give any hormones, etc.).

We also LOVE bananas. We use them in everything! And they always put the ones that are starting to get soft on sale at the grocery store...usually for at least 1/2 off, if not more. So, I buy these up and when I get home I peel them and throw them in the freezer. Once they are frozen solid I seal them in seal & save bags. We use them in smoothies, muffins, bread, etc.

And lastly I am trying to do more baking 1-2 days per week and freezing items so it is easier to prepare meals. A large freeze makes this all so much easier. I hardly buy anything at the grocery store any more!

I have gained TONS of great ideas from all the other ladies that share their tips so I thought I would share some of my favorite tips I have gained over the last few weeks of browsing.

I love this idea to make play dough for your kids so they can "cook" while you are cooking also. Homemade play dough in pretty jars also makes a great gift for the children in your life and is SO easy to make. I just ordered a pound of cream of tartar from my food coop to make lots of play dough with!

Making a recipe binder is definitely something I am going to work on. Right now I
have cards and paper everywhere with recipes on them.

And I also definitely need to make a kitchen spring cleaning list!

These Make Ahead Burritos sound yummy!

And simplifying is my favorite word lately. We are cutting down majorly to try and simplify our lives so this great list of ways to simplify in your kitchen is definitely a great starting point for me!

And what a great idea for storing muffins in your freezer!!

I am in the midst of kitchen organizing and I LOVE this idea for storing measuring spoons and I think I will use the idea for my measuring cups also (I asked for new stainless steel measuring cups & spoons for my birthday).

And this is something I definitely need to do to declutter my own kitchen! I have way to many kitchen gadgets!

I have absolutely got to try these pizza pockets! They look so yummy and are a very easy make ahead and freeze type meal. And you could cook enough for the family in the toaster oven making it a great warm weather, don't want to heat up the stove type recipe. You could even make them on a grill I bet! Can't wait to try!

Great recipe for Taco seasoning!

And what a great tip for using up the leftover bread, flour & eggs used for making breaded chicken. Sounds yummy!

Lots of great ideas out there. Thanks to everyone posting their tips. They have come in very handy or hopefully will soon!

Menu Planning Monday...on Tuesday

Sorry! It was a long day yesterday and I ended up not getting on to put up my menu. So...I am going to be trying out the monthly menu planning to try to reduce the number of shopping trips I need to make...but seeing as it is mid-March I am going to start with a 2 week plan and then do a month plan for April. So...no Menu Plan from me next week...but we are trying out a few new recipes so I will post on Monday how those went. So...without further ado her is the menu.

Monday - WAS a boiled dinner. I forgot the cabbage but we had corned beef with carrots & potatoes. We don't cook beef roasts often because you can't really get them organic around here but it was yummy!

Tuesday - Porkchops & applesauce (I have a few jars of sauce left from fall canning so I figured might as well get them used up) with vegi's (probably corn to please my hubby)

Wednesday - Fried Rice, recipe thanks to Passionate Homemaker. We will use the leftover pork in it also.

Thursday - Homemade Pizza (lots of onion & spinach...and maybe a little sausage for hubby :) for Erik & I...just Cheese for the boys)

We are also having some of the moms and little ones from church over to celebrate SPRING so I will be baking some yummy looking strawberry merguine cookies. I found the recipe online but didn't keep the link. I will try to remember to post the recipe and pics once I bake them. We will also be doing some crafts. I will try to post photos of all later this week.

Friday - My BIRTHDAY!! I'm not sharing how old though. LOL. Hot Cross Buns for Breakfast and Rice Jumble for dinner. (Dinner needs to be quick and easy as we are attending a Last Supper performance at our church and then I will hopefully be going out with a friend to celebrate both our birthdays with some bowling or something).

Saturday - My parents are up but only until early Sunday so we are going to do a Roast for lunch on Saturday with them. Erik & I are going out Saturday night so dinner will be something easy for my parents.

Sunday - Erik & I are going to leave the boys with my Mom & Dad and go to Sunrise services at the church. I haven't figured out breakfast yet. I am thinking either a quiche or baked french toast. Maybe both!! Then we will have a Turkey for dinner.

Monday - Rice & Bean Burritos, recipe thanks to Keeper of the Home. Between her and Passionate Homemaker I don't need any cookbooks!!

Tuesday - Turkey Quesadillas (using up leftover turkey from Sunday)

Wednesday - Hamburgers (we haven't had them in FOREVER...will make hubby so happy!)

Thursday - Homemade Pizza

Friday - Fried Rice

Saturday - Turkey Soup

Sunday - Leftovers (we will be at a church potluck that afternoon/early evening so need something simple)

I am also going to try to squeeze in a baking day sometime soon. Maybe on Friday afternoon. I'd really like to try soaking my grains that Lindsay talks about at Passionate Homemakers.

I will keep you all posted on how this goes!

Enjoy!

Menu Planning Monday

Well...I'm going to be a little easier on myself this week. I had planned to try a few new recipes & barely stuck to my menu at all (honestly I think only 2 maybe 3 of the days...ugh!). For this week I think a few tried and true recipes are going to be best for us. We are having lots of visitors this week and I have a meeting Thursday night so we will probably do Pizza night again on Thursday. I also didn't get a chance to try the baked oatmeal (but will probably do that on one of Erik's days off as he LOVES oatmeal) or the crackers.


So, for this week I plan to also start a plan for breakfast. Just certain days for certain foods and will repeat the same every week. I am also going to try to do more of my baking monthly. I've been doing a lot of reading about the monthly baking plan at Passionate Homemaking. I also like her ideas about soaking grains. I am going to try to get a copy of Nourishing Traditions, which she mentioned a few times. I'm going to try to read a little more on that and maybe try it out. Might pick up some Kefir when shopping tomorrow just to see how it works.

I also like the idea of planning a consistent breakfast because we are trying to establish more rhythm at home and this will give the kids a way to distinguish the days. I am thinking I will even make up a little chart to designate the days and what is for breakfast...although my drawing abilities are not the greatest!

Without further ado, here is the plan for breakfast:

Monday - Egg meal (eggs & toast, egg sandwich, scrambled eggs, etc.)
Tuesday - Pancakes
Wednesday - Oatmeal
Thursday- Smoothie, Muffin
Friday - Special breakfast (french toast, quiche, waffles, etc.)
Saturday - Yogurt & Granola
Sunday - Egg meal

I am also thinking about a plan for lunch although we really have a lot less options as my kids will only eat so much. My thoughts for lunch:

Monday - Yogurt & Granola, Fruit
Tuesday - PB&J (homemade bread and sunflower seed butter)
Wednesday - Grilled Cheese, Fruit
Thursday - Plate of stuff
Friday- PB&J, Fruit
Saturday - Grilled Cheese, Fruit
Sunday - Plate of Stuff

And lastly here is the dinner plan:

Tuesday - Sloppy Joes
Wednesday - Going to retry doing the Shepards Pie that definitely isn't being done tonight!
Thursday - Homemade pizza
Friday - Beef Ribs in the slow cooker, mashed potatoes & corn
Saturday - Rice Jumble (rice with peppers & onions, a little sausage & some pasta sauce)
Sunday - Leftovers
Monday - Quesadillas

Last week I did make the pot roast and it was excellent! I even had seconds. I'm thinking about subscribing to Pioneer Women's blog to keep up with recipes! Also a hit were the meatballs. We substituted cottage cheese for Ricotta and they were still Fab!

Have a great week and make sure to check out more menus at Org Junkie's blog!

Menu Planning Monday

Time for another Menu Planning Monday! I am really enjoying doing this and it really keeps me on track during the week.

So, I am going to be working at changing our diets a little. For those of you who do not know Bennett had eczema when he was just a little thing (4-5 months old). He was still solely nursing so we decided to keep him nursing for a few more months and try to take things in & out of my diet to see what might be causing it. After a few weeks of trying 1-2 things and having his eczema get worse & worse I decided to just go cold turkey on everything that might be affecting him. So...instead of telling you what I couldn't eat...how bought what I could. Rice, Fruits (except citrus), Vegi's, Turkey & Chicken. Yeah...it was a fun 2-3 months let me tell you.

Now...the plus side of this was I did lose ALL (plus some) of the weight gained during my pregnancy.

Long story short, the eczema cleared up, I added everything back and nothing seems to be bothering Bennett now. Weird! But since adding everything back I have also added back about 10 lbs! My naturopath also mentioned that if I wanted to stay on that diet permanently (adding back Eggs) that would be fine with her. While I do not plan to go back on the diet completely I do thing we would all be much healthier if we tried to cut out as much diary & wheat products as we can.

With that said for snacks I am going to make sure to have lots of fresh fruits and vegi's on hand. I also plan to start picking up rice crackers again (excellent with a little sunflower butter). We will stop getting pretzels and try to cut out loaves of bread (we've been going through at least 2 loaves a week plus all the bagels & english muffins, etc...it is crazy how much bread we eat). We have also been drinking WAY too much juice instead of water. No more juice for us!

I pulled out two cookbooks this morning that I plan on trying to pull our recipes from.

I've also been scanning the blogs of others that have already posted their menu's looking for more healthy recipes. Wish us luck!

Tuesday - Pasta & Meatballs

Wednesday - Pioneer Women's Pot Roast (hat tip to Sarah at Sarah's Musings for this recipe...LOVE IT!!)

Thursday - Pizza night (WW Pizza crust with lots of vegi's)

Friday - Flank Steak Sandwichs and Tomato Soup (Thanks to Simple Mom for the Soup idea!)

Saturday - Breakfast for Dinner (I'm thinking a Quiche - This one from Broad Horizons sounds yummy, and it's crustless!!)

Sunday - Baked Potato Soup (Thanks to Margaret's Musings for the recipe idea)

Monday - Shepard's Pie (Thanks to Passionate Homemaking for the recipe)

And I definitely want to try this Baked Oatmeal dish (hat tip to A Day in The Life for the recipe)for breakfast one of the mornings this week. It sounds fab!

I am also going to try out these crackers posted at The Nourishing Gourmet. They sound great and I have to agree...store bought crackers are so expensive but my kids love them! She also recommends a book, Nourishing Traditions that I think I will try to get a copy from at the library to check out. Might be worth getting.

For all of our recipes I do lots of substitutions. I usually substitute any milk called for with Rice Milk. I also substitute vegi broth for a meat broth. I also substitute sweetners and use honey or maple syrup for sugar and I usually 1/2 the sweetner called for. A friend of mine also suggested substituting tofu for cheese in baked recipes like Quiche. I think I might try it.

Menu Planning Monday

Well...I'm late for another Menu Planning Monday over at Org Junkie's blog. So, here is our menu for this week:

Tuesday - Pasta & Sausages

Wednesday - Homemade Pizza

Thursday - Meatloaf, Cauliflower & Mashed Potatoes

Friday - Grilled Flank Steak Sandwiches with Cheese, Onions & Peppers (and maybe some kettle chips on the side)

Saturday - Breakfast for Dinner

Sunday - Leftovers

Monday - Soup (we have a few in the freezer...minestrone, chili & turkey/vegi soup...so we will plan on one of those with some fresh homemade bread I think).

So...there is our week. Breakfast is pretty consistently eggs & toast as we have laying hens. We occassionally throw in Strawberry & Banana smoothies (just frozen strawberries and banana's in the blender...& I just bought a vegetarian protien powder to put in them). I am also planning on making some granola and maybe even granola bars this week.

Lunch is usually what we call a "Plate of stuff." This usually includes just about anything...nitrate free sandwich meats, cheese, kettle chips, pretzels, fruit (apples, kiwi's, grapes, pinapple...whatever we buy that week), raisins, carrot sticks, sun butter, etc. All piled high on a plate for everyone to munch on. This is especially great for warmer weather when the kids want to stay out but are starting to get hungry.

Have a great week everyone!

Menu Planning Monday

I've been browsing the menu planning Monday links on Org. Junkie's blog for a few weeks now. I'm running a little late as we've been sick but I really wanted to partake this week. We so need to menu plan. We've been trying to cut our budget and have really cut out everything we can. We have also cut a ton out of our grocery bills so I am hoping by menu planning we can cut back even more to give us a little extra leeway in our budget.

A few things that we do to cut back on our grocery bill:

1. We belong to a local food coop. So we buy in bulk, which cuts our costs WAY down.
2. Garden (not now! But we save our produce by freezing or canning).
3. Raise our own poultry (turkeys & chickens and hopefully some Ducks and maybe a few pigs this year).
4. We also buy a lot of produce that we don't grown and save that (i.e. I have a hard time growning carrots and she sells her carrots for only $20 for 25 lbs).

This all really helps to cut down our grocery bill quite a bit.

There is a great article over at Heart of Wisdom about why you should meal plan. It was a great article! So...do you menu plan. If so let me know and feel free to blog about it and share your link over at Org Junkie's blog.

Here's our menu:

• Tuesday - Sausage & Spaghetti Pie (recipe found here but I plan to make some substitutions cottage cheese for ricotta, WW spaghetti, onions and peppers tossed in also, etc.)
• 
  Wednesday - Turkey Soup (using up the TON of leftover turkey breast from Monday night) and a nice homemade crusty bread.
• 
  Thursday - Valentine's Day!! Heart shaped pizza's (we usually put onions & spinach on our pizza's...and sometime sausage) and maybe some home made ice cream sandwich cookies for desert.
• 
  Friday - Turkey Fajita's (using up that Turkey breast again)
• 
  Saturday - Breakfast for dinner! Probably pancakes or maybe waffles! (I usually add pureed carrots or squash to any pancakes or waffles I make for added vegi's)
• 
  Sunday - Leftovers
• 
  Monday - Meatloaf, Baked Potatoes and Corn

Nothing all that interesting. We have laying hens so breakfast is usually eggs & wheat toast (or they can have yogurt and occassionally pancakes). We are planning to make some granola and muffins to have on hand for snacks along with cut carrots, apples, bananas and pretzels. We also just do a "plate of stuff" (a mismosh of stuff on a plate for them to pick and choose from) for lunch most days with an occassional PB&J or grilled cheese thrown in.

I'm off to grocery shop in just a bit so even though I was supposed to have this done yesterday at least it is done BEFORE the grocery shopping trip! :)

Have a great day!