Easy {Homemade} Weeknight Meal - Homemade Hamburger Helper and Easy "Bread sticks"

I love easy meals. Meals you can put together quickly. It is even better when you have the ingredients on hand so you don't have to run to the store.






 Today's meal is

Homemade Hamburger Helper from Kitchen Stewardship

Ingredients

• 1 lb. ground beef
• 1 tsp black pepper
• 1 tsp onion powder or 2-3 tsp. onion flakes
• 1/4 tsp garlic powder (or 1 clove minced garlic)
• 1 1/4 cup tomato sauce
• hefty squirt of mustard
• 1 3/4 c. water
• salt to taste (at least 1/2 tsp?)
• 2 1/2 c. pasta (see note below)
• 2 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese

Instructions

1. Brown and drain beef.
2. Stir in pepper, onion powder, garlic, tomato sauce, and mustard.
3. Pour in water and pasta.
4. Bring to a boil and reduce heat;
5. Cover and simmer 15 minutes, stirring occasionally until the water is absorbed and the pasta is cooked.
6. Turn the heat off and stir in the cheese.

I usually  make corn or a salad with this meal.

I also like to do easy bread sticks.

Take 5-6 pieces of bread.  Butter and sprinkle with garlic salt and bake at 350 till lightly browned.  Cut into strips and serve.

 

Homemade Ketchup

Last year I tried to make homemade ketchup and I did can it but it was not good.  This year I wanted to try it again but I did not want to waste my own tomatoes in case it did not turn out again.  So, I bought this 6 lb. can of diced tomatoes from Sam's Club for $2.53.  Hey - they were Red Gold and were at least processed in Indiana.

I used Mrs. Wages ketchup mix.  It tasted like . . . ketchup!   Success, of course next year I will try it with my own tomatoes (and maybe I might do it again this year), but I need to wait to make sure my family will like it.  We are big ketchup fans here.

With the 6 lbs. of diced tomatoes I ended up with exactly 12 half pints (jelly jar size) of ketchup.

Here is the numbers - I paid $1.50 for Mrs. Wages mix and $2.53 for the tomatoes.  I did have to add tomato paste, sugar and vinegar all totaling about $0.75.  It is about $0.40 per half pint.  Of course, if I would have used my own tomatoes it would have been about $0.20 per half pint - definitely worth it!

What are you canning?

A list of things I no longer buy at the store

This is a list I have wanted to start for a long time. I'm a fan of not going to the grocery store.  I prefer to stock my pantry and be able to make what I need.  This is a list of things that work for us that I have tried and liked.  It is in no particular order.

Groceries:

Homemade Vanilla
Sandwich Bread

Applesauce
Peaches
Corn
Green Beans
Peaches
Ranch Dressing
Tomatoes

Household Products:
Mirror Cleaner
Shower Cleaner
Oven Cleaner
Dusting Spray
Dishwashing Rinse Agent
"Fabric Softener"

Personal Products:

Lip Balm

To Try (soon!):
Pizza Sauce
Pasta Sauce
Ketchup

I will be adding to this list on an ongoing basis.

What things do you no longer buy at the store?  I would love to try some things out.

Testing Homemade Cleaning Products that REALLY work!

 At times, I need some motivation to clean because it is not my favorite homemaking task.  I had been wanting to test some new homemade cleaning product recipes because I have been LOVING my homemade shower cleaner!  I use my shower cleaner as toilet bowl cleaner as well.  I just spray down the inside of my toilet and let it sit for a little while and then come back in about 30 minutes and clean it.  I also wanted very simple recipes that work and that don't require a lot of ingredients I don't keep on hand.  I have found them!

I guess I should note that I keep my baking soda in a glass jar in my fridge because I use it for baking as well and I buy a huge bag of it so this is easier than keeping the huge bag in my fridge.

Vinegar works really well, but I don't like the smell so I put several drops of essential oil in all of them.  I like fruity smells so I use orange or tangerine.  It really does work to cut the vinegar smell.

I have tried A LOT of different homemade glass cleaners and none of them worked really well.  I have also used all natural ones and also Shaklee's Basic H.  Yesterday I decided to to do a side by side test of the following Mirror Cleaner with Windex.  My husband loves Windex and so I keep it around for him so I made him come and try to figure out which side of the mirror I used the Windex on and which I used my mirror cleaner on and he couldn't tell!  It was that good.  Now I tried using cloth baby diapers, paper towels and coffee filters and by far, the coffee filters did THE BEST JOB of keeping the mirrors streak free and free of lint.

 Mirror Cleaner

1 1/2 cups of vinegar

1/2 cup water

8 drops of essential oil (I used tangerine)

Mix in a spray bottle.

Stephanie from Keeper of the Home actually just posted this recipe as an air freshener but I saw it listed somewhere else as a mirror cleaner - so I guess it could do both!  One last thing - it will look cloudy for a minute until it dries - but do not worry - it will dry very nice and clean!

Homemade Dusting Spray from Homemade Mothering

 1 cup white vinegar
1/2 teaspoon olive oil
3 cups water
8 drops of essential oil (again I used tangerine)

Pour all three ingredients into an empty spray bottle. Shake well and spritz on furniture. Wipe with an old cotton t-shirt. Done!

This homemade dusting spray is really good.  It also works really well.  I have also tried a few homemade dusting sprays and this is the best one I have tried.

Oven Cleaner

Baking Soda
Vinegar

I use a baking soda paste and then I pour a little vinegar on it.  It takes some elbow grease but works really, really well.  I find that if I leave it sit on there and walk away for a while it is much easier to scrub clean.

Before the cleaning

After - still has a few stains but MUCH better

Dishwasher Cleaner

Baking Soda
Vinegar

Sprinkle baking soda on the bottom of your dishwasher.  Fill a cup up with vinegar and put it on the top of the dishwasher.  Run a cycle.  My vinegar spilled a little before I started it but it came out very clean.

Finally, check out my homemade shower cleaner that I mentioned above and here is how I clean my shower head and it works every.single.time (thanks MJ for the reminder):

I just fill up a plastic baggie with vinegar and put it around my shower head and rubber band it and let it sit there for a few hours and I just rinse it.  If you have some hard water you can scrub it with a tooth brush (used for cleaning of course) but it will be gleaming!

Sink cleaner

I use a baking soda paste as my sink cleaner and I love it!  Just sprinkle baking soda and add a little water to it and rub it in with your rag.  Rinse well or you could have a white film from the baking soda - but if you rinse it well it will be very shiny!

Dishwasher Rinse Agent - I always just fill up my rinse agent resevoir with vinegar.

Fabric softener - I never use fabric softener or those dryer sheets but I do use vinegar as my fabric softener.  I don't always measure but usually I just use 1/2 cup (thanks for reminding me Katy).

Also, I use vinegar as my coffeemaker cleaner.  I just fill up my coffee container glass thing about half full with vinegar and water and pour it in and run it through.  Then I run two more cycles of just water and it works great!

One last tip - I recently bought a steam mop that only uses water so we don't even use anything else on our floors.  And we love it - even my husband likes to use it!


Please try these homemade cleaners and come back and comment and let me know how you like them or leave me a comment and tell me your favorite homemade cleaner!

Also, here is a great article about the disinfecting powers of bleach versus vinegar - so you can decide!

Homemaking Tuesday - Secrets to Homemade meals in around 30 minutes

I love homemade cooking.  Although, I don't like spending hours in the kitchen despite what you might see on this blog.  I use several things to have homemade food in a small amount of time.

1.  Freezer, Bulk or Batch cooking
2.  Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day or A Bread Maker
3.  Canning or freezing vegetables
4.  Menu Planning
5.  Stocking my Pantry
6.  Slow Cooker

I use all of the above to be able to put together a quick meal usually within a 30 minute time period, but doing that does require some prep.

For example, today we had Three Cheese Garlic Chicken, Green beans, salad and Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day.

I almost always cook whole chickens because you get so much more bang for your buck.  We can eat sticky chicken for one meal and then I will make broth from the bones and take the extra meat and put it in the freezer.   Therefore, I have shredded chicken in the freezer for future use and the price of organic boneless, skinless chicken breasts is OUTRAGEOUS!

Today I pulled out my freezer chicken and thawed it.  I mixed up a batch of Artisan Bread in 5 minutes a Day this morning and let it sit on my counter until it was close to supper time.  This is so easy that all you have to do is stir it.    I formed the bread loaf and let it rise for 20 minutes while I gathered my ingredients for cooking and did some other tasks.  I put the bread in the oven to cook for 30 minutes and heated up the green beans, cooked the Three Cheese Garlic Chicken and put together salads.  Dinner was done!

• I used to do a lot of whole meal freezer cooking but I do more batch cooking now.  Meaning, when I brown ground beef I might brown 5 pounds and use 1 and freeze the rest.  When I make brown rice I cook it in the oven in a 9x13 pan and use about 2 cups and freeze the rest in 2 cup portions.  When I make meatloaf I make two and freeze one.  When I make applesauce bread, I do the same thing, make 2 and freeze one of them.

• I used to use my bread machine a lot and I still use it sometimes but now I do the Artisan Bread method because it is easy and really delicious, although I do buy sandwich bread *gasp* because my husband likes it better for his sandwiches.

• This past summer I did a lot of canning and freezing of vegetables and it has been so worth it!  It is easy to go grab a jar of green beans or peaches or get some corn out of the freezer.  Even if you don't grow your own produce you should consider getting produce in bulk from a local farmer's market and preserving it yourself.

• You know that I menu plan every week.  It is just all part of things I do to save my sanity.  I have done it for so long that I cannot imagine not having a plan.  Trust me, there were A LOT of years when I did not have a plan.  I don't like to think of them.  Anyway, I did my own menu planning series, but I did get a lot of my information from The Happy Housewife's menu planning series.

• The way I grocery shop now is that I shop to stock my pantry.  I really don't use coupons very much and I don't do the sale ads because I buy more whole ingredients and I get my meat from other sources.  It is actually quite simple, I have a list of items that I buy on a regular basis on an Excel spreadsheet and I just print that off and go through it before I go shopping and check the items I need to restock.  Again, I may do something different down the road but simple equals sanity in my house.

• I don't think the slow cooker needs an explanation.  I have two of them.  I use them as often as possible.  I cook my hamburger in it in bulk.  I make my sticky chicken in it.  I cook baked potatoes in it.  I love it.  I pretty much try to figure out how to make as many meals as I can in the slow cooker.

This is how I am able to make homemade meals without living in my kitchen.  Those are my tips - how do you all make homemade food in a short amount of time?

Homemade Christmas - Gifts for babies

My friend Sonya sent me her list of things she was making for Christmas.  Both of the items above were on that list and I thought they were so cute I knew I had to make them for my two little nephews.  Except that I only got one owl done so I will have to make my other nephew his for his birthday.

They were actually kind of fun to make.  The owl was hard for me for some reason but I think they turned out cute.  If you are interested in making either one of these I will share where I found the tutorials.

The hand held bean bags are from here.  Although she doesn't have a tutorial on her site.  I just used my tag blanket tutorial that I did a few years ago.  I made the bean bags smaller, of course and filled them with popcorn instead of beans because I had a lot of popcorn.


The owl is from here.

Homemade Christmas - A few of their favorite things

Earlier in the school year, my son's school sent home a packet of papers that had all of the elementary teachers favorite things.  It had a little questionnaire that they filled out and they put down their favorite candy, drink, starbuck's drink and various other things.  I held onto it because I thought it might make a neat Christmas gift.  So before their school Christmas play, I went out and bought her favorite candy and small cans of Dr. Pepper (her favorite drink).  I bought a $5 Starbucks gift card and a Hobby Lobby gift card (because that was one of her favorite places to shop).

I made a bag to put it all in and printed out a matching tag.  I hope she enjoyed and I think it is a fabulous idea to give out these info sheets.  If your school doesn't do that maybe you could make up your own and see if you could ask your child's teacher to fill it out. You could even do those sheets for family members and have it handy for stocking stuffers.

If you are interested in making the bag tutorial is from here.  I did it slightly different but it is basically the same.

Homemade Christmas - Pure Vanilla Extract

I started this gift in July.  I first read about doing this on Heavenly Homemakers website and it seemed so easy.  You will find her instructions here.

Here's is what you need:

1 gallon of Vodka (doesn't matter what brand cheap is fine) - I sent my husband to buy this for me
A gallon jar - I bought some used off of Craigslist, otherwise you could try home good stores or Amazon.

Vanilla Beans - according to Laura at Heavenly Homemakers, she used 80, but I saw somewhere else where they only used 20 and 20 was cheaper so I used 20.  I bought them from Amazon.

You will need jars to put them in to give as gifts.  I bought 2 oz. jars from Mountain Rose Herbs.  They were roughly $1.25 each.  You want to make sure and get the amber glass with the screw lids.  This mixture will make approximately 20 2oz. bottles.

As far as the label I just used an Avery 5160 label and again, I made it in Word.

If you have ever bought real vanilla, you know how wonderful it is.  Imitation just isn't the same.  When you smell this you will know it is the real deal.  And what could be easier, just let it sit for 6 months.  Follow Laura's instructions (which is what I did) and you should have some really nice vanilla that will last for quite a while.

Homemade Christmas - Lip Balm

Yes I am aware Christmas is over.  I wanted to share with you some things I made for gifts this Christmas and I couldn't really do that before Christmas for obvious reasons.  I plan to share these with you this week.  You could also make these things and not just for Christmas gifts.

First off, my friend Angel and I got together and made homemade lip balm.  I have to tell you I LOVE this stuff.  I have heard nothing but good things from the people I gave it to so hopefully they love it too!

Here is how you can make your own.  I will provide you with the tutorial I used and the links to where you can get all of your supplies.

First off, we used the tutorial from here.  We did not use their recipe.  Here is the recipe we used.  It makes 24 tubes.

4 Tbsp Beeswax pellets
4 Tbsp Coconut oil
4 Tsp of Grapeseed Oil (or Sweet almond oil or sunflower oil)
7 drops of Essentials Oil of your choice (we used Peppermint and Orange)

We melted the beeswax pellets in a Pyrex cup in the microwave.  We microwaved for 30 seconds at a time because beeswax has a very high melting point.  My friend Bess explained that you should "use short intervals of time and stir frequently".

Once the beeswax was melted we added the coconut oil and microwaved for just a few seconds longer until it was melted and then we added the grapeseed oil.  ALTHOUGH - I did it a different way the second time - I used a double broiler to do the above and I would recommend that instead of the microwaving.

Once your mixture is melted add your drops of essential oil if you want it to smell good.  Seven small drops will be good if you want a light smell.  I wouldn't use much more.  We used peppermint on half and orange on the other half of tubes.

Now quickly and neatly pour the mixture into the tubes.  The first time we used a dropper but we found it cooled the wax mixture and it got stuck in the tube a lot.  The second time I did it with the double broiler.  It worked much better because everything stayed warm. I poured from the double broiler and it wasn't easy to not overfill.  It takes time and patience but it isn't difficult.

Also, when the tubes harden they will have an indention in them so just take your dropper and drop a drop or two to make it filled all the way to the top.

We made 50 tubes and we figured up our cost and it was $0.34 per tube (excluding the labels).

Here is where we bought our supplies:

Beeswax pellets - from Mountain Rose Herbs
Coconut Oil - from Amazon
Grapeseed Oil - from local Natural Food Store
Peppermint and Orange Essential Oil - from local Natural Food Store or Mountain Rose Herbs
Containers - from Mountain Rose Herbs

Now for the labels, we used clear Avery labels #8667 which I bought either from Amazon or at Office Depot.  I can't remember.  I then just formatted them in Word and put what I wanted.

Hope you try this for yourself.  If  you do I can pretty much guarantee you will never buy the store bought stuff again.

Homemade Christmas Gift ideas

In case you were wanting some ideas that you could make for Christmas (which is next week) I thought I would share some of the projects I have made in the past.


Here is a chapstick cozy that I made for my sister (I actually have made one for myself and my aunt but we already have our’s).

 

I made a few people some purse organizers.  I made myself one and I do like it and I really do use it in my own purse:

I made my stepmom and my mamaw a crotchet hook holder and bag:

 

I made my daughter a kitchen mat and various other felt foods:

Here's a preemie hat tutorial that I did if you know any little ones in the hospital (or even if you don't make them some and take them to local hospitals).

Nursing covers

A maternity skirt

The Emmaline Apron

These are a few projects I have done and I'm doing a few this year too.  I never get to make everything I want to and I always plan to start early in the year but that never happen.   We'll see if I can start in January.  Feel free to comment and leave a link to some of your favorite homemade projects!