Archive for 'Food'
Crockpot Enchiladas
Need a simple – lower carb mexican food fix? Do you have leftover meat, need a great recipe for it? Why not try Crockpot Enchiladas. This meal is very quick to put together and is great if you have to be away from the kitchen a few hours before dinner. When you return, your delicious dinner will be ready!
For this recipe, I use a 6 qt. crockpot.. If yours is smaller, then reduce ingredients accordingly 
3 flour tortillas
4 can refired beans
4 c. meat – I used turkey with this particular batch.. but chicken, ground and shredded beef would also work great!
1 large can green chile enchilada sauce
shredded cheese
sour cream
olives (optional)
Start by spraying your crockpot with a non stick spray such as Pam. Place 1 flour tortilla on the bottom. Layer 2 cans of refired beans, meat, olives, sauce, sour cream (lay dollops on top of the meat) and cover with shredded cheese (I’m pretty liberal with the cheese). Repeat the layer on more time.
On top place the last tortilla, smother with sauce and sprinkle cheese. Hi or Lo heat depends on how fast you want to eat it. I start mine of on Hi for an hour or so, then reduce to Lo for 2-3 hours. Do keep in mind, all crockpots cook differently, some hotter than others.. be sure to accomodate cooking time according to your crockpot. Enjoy!!
The finished product.
Smoked Salmon
Posted on June 21, 2011, under Food, Food Preservation, Snacks.
A friend/coworker of my husband gave us a HUGE filet of salmon a few days ago. What a blessing! This act of kindness inspired me to pull our our Little Chief Smoker. Smoking fish (or pretty much anything) is simple. All you need is time 
Wash your filet with cold water. Grab your sharpest knife and a cutting board/mat.
Prepare your 'brine'. Everyone has their own mixture. Mine happens to have just two ingredients - salt & sugar. Cut the fish into desirable pieces and roll/dip thoroughly in brine. Once all of your pieces have been covered, set them in a bowl for an allotted time (mine sits for about an hour).
While fish is soaking in it's brine. Prepare your smoker racks. I spray Pam on the to prevent sticking. About 15 minutes before the soak is finished, I start the wook chips in the smoker... I used cherry wood for this particular batch. If you are using a fire smoke house.. you should start your low heat fire at this time After the fish has soaked in the brine, rinse each piece thoroughly with cold water. Place each rinsed piece on the smoker racks.
Place your loaded racks into smoker.
Depending on how much smoke flavor you desire... is how many pans of wood chips you burn. Each pan burns for approx. 1/2 hour. I usually burn through 2-3 pans. You need to watch for the lack of smoke, which indicates a new pan is needed. Once you have burned through your allotted pans, you leave the fish in their to continue 'cooking' until done. This batch took about 10-11 hours.
The prize at the end! It is sooo good Refridge or freeze after cooled. Smoked salmon can be preserved by canning.. but that is for another blog
Coleslaw – Made From Scratch
Posted on June 19, 2011, under Food, Side Dishes.
Cabbage is a favorite around our home. One way it’s consumed – Coleslaw. There’s no need to go buy a coleslaw dressing, as you can make it at home with better for your ingredients & for less $$.
Coleslaw Dressing
1 1/2 c. Mayonaise (I used store bought this time.. but homemade would be even better!)
1/3 c. Sugar
2-3 Tblsp. Lemon Juice (depending on how tart you like your dressing)
Mix all the above ingredients.. set aside in the refridge to meld. Chop cabbage into desirable peices. To prevent the coleslaw from becoming soggy, mix the dressing into the cabbage last minute.. right before you serve it For added flavor, nutrition, color.. you can add grated carrots!
Yogurt, Made From Home
Homemade yogurt is delicious! All it takes is a smidge of work and about 12 hours of time. This recipe makes 1/2 gallons of yogurt. If you have the machine with the smaller cups.. you will need to cut this recipe in half.
Homemade Plain Yogurt
1/2 gallon fresh raw goats milk
1/2 c. plain ‘good cultured’ yogurt (you can use yogurt starter granules, but I haven’t found them safisfactory)
Heat milk in pan to reach 185 degrees. While milk is heating, put your jar/s in the yogurt maker, plug in/turn on to preheat jar/s. Remove pan from heat and cool milk to between 105-110 degrees. If you want to hurry the process along, as I usually do, I set the pan in a bowl of ice cubes. That method only takes a few moments to bring the temp down. Add your yogurt starter (I use Nancy’s plain yogurt).. whisk till blended.
Pour milk/yogurt mixture into maker and set your timer. The best batches I have made come from yogurt that set for 12 hours in the maker. Remove from maker, place yogurt jar/s in the fridge. Save 1/2 cup of your yogurt batch to use as your next starter. I usually start with a fresh starter (Nancy’s yogurt) after using my own for several batches.
You do not have to own a yogurt machine to make yogurt. You can use your food dehydrater, an ice chest, or you can get your jar the proper temperature and rap a thick towel around it to insulate it. The trick is trying to keep it at a constant low heat of about 105 degrees. I want to add, I always use glass when making yogurt… I try to avoid heating plastic :-)
To change things up a bit, you can add a teaspoon of vanilla.
Goat Milk Peanut Butter Fudge
This recipe is out of this world yummy! And, best of all… simple
Peanut Butter Fudge
1 c. goat milk
2 c. sugar
2 Tbsp butter
2/3 c. peanut butter (I use crunchy)
1 tsp. vanilla
Combine the sugar and milk in a pan. Heat over medium-high heat, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Continue cooking at a slow boil, stirring often, until the mixture reaches the soft ball stage or 234 degrees.
Remove from heat, and stir in the butter, peanut butter and vanilla. Beat by hand until thick and smooth. Pour into greased 8 X 8 pan, and cut when cool
Homemade Pizza
What a treat! My family can’t get enough homemade pizza. The pizza dough is made from scratch. I make the pizza sauce out of tomatoes I canned from our garden. The cheese is homemade goat milk mozzerella and the meat is home processed venison. You can’t get more from scratch than that!
I thought I would share my recipe
Pizza Dough
1 2/3 c. water
2 Tbsp olive oil
2 Tbsp sugar or honey or agave
2 Tbsp dry milk
1 tsp. salt
2 1/2 c. all purpose flour
2 c. whole wheat flour
2 tsp. yeast
Prepare dough by hand or bread machine. This recipe make 2 pizza crusts.
Pizza Sauce
1 qt. canned tomatoes
1 Tbsp. dried oregano
2 tsp. basil
2 cloves garlic
Simmer all the above ingredients for a couple hours.
2 lb. Goat Milk Mozzerella Cheese (any kind of mozzerella would work)
2 lb. Ground Venison (any ground burger would work)
1 Onion
2 c. Chopped spinach
Since I count every calorie, protein & carb that hits my mouth, I found this great website for doing such a task with homemade food. http://recipes.sparkpeople.com/recipe-calculator.asp gives you the ability to enter our own recipes.. and it figures your nutritional values. Great, great tool!
Nutritional Info For The Above Homemade Pizza
Serving Size: 1/16 (two pizza’s divided into 8 pieces each.. your serving is one of those pieces)
Calories: 373
Fat: 16.5 g
Carbs: 31.5g
Protein 24.8g
Why I LOVE Second Hand Shopping
Posted on February 17, 2010, under Food, Our Adventures.
My husband, children and I frequent second hand shops rather regularly. I would say we try to hit them once a week – If not.. it’s every other week. I find so many items that I have been looking for (and of course some that I didn’t know I was looking for..lol). I hardly ever have to buy jeans for my boys. I keep my eyes open and buy them next to new, used.
I wanted to share one of my recent experiences. Last summer, I came across a used Cuisinart ice cream maker. This one is the kind you freeze the bowl a head of time (atleast 24 hrs). Oh, let me tell you.. that was the BEST ice cream ever. I milk my own goats.. and the recipe is only three ingredients.. milk, sugar and vanilla. The only problem was.. this maker only made 1 qt of ice cream. Not very much for a large family. We each just got a taste.
Well.. guess what I found last week??? Yes, another ice cream maker. Different brand, never been used before. I plugged it to make sure it worked, etc. Yeah!! It is the same set up.. freeze the bowl a head of time. This coming summer, I will be making a half gallon per time. Each maker cost me $7.95. What a bargain!
Pepsi Throwback
I survived the superbowl party The crowd was a bit smaller this year - few people cancelled due to illness, etc. All in all, it was A LOT of fun. We finished the painting @ about 10pm Saturday night, UGH! I cannot believe how close we came to not finishing! I hope I’ve learned some lessons through this process
I just had to blog about the above box of Pepsi. My husband and I were conversing about it.. he made this comment, ”It is pretty bad when the box specifically mentions, ‘Made With Real Sugar, Limited Time Only’ ” I agreed!
I’ve got a question to ask…. Why can’t it be made with ‘Real Sugar’ always? Why does everything have to be so highly processed? It seems to me that processing different ‘real food’ items into ‘nonfood’ items, would cost more in the long run.. Wouldn’t it be cheapr to use the original ‘real food’ item? Hmmmm…..
Is A Carb, A Carb?
At the beginning of last month, I decided to get my diet and weight in hand. I joined a local phyisician assisted weight loss clinic. As I have been going through the motions of cleaning up my diet.. I have been researching. The diet clinic has food they would like me to eat, of course.. However, I am more of a ‘natural food’ type girl – and these foods they sell are not natural by any means. There are a few food items they sell that have been very helpful – Love their strawberry smoothies and caramel delight bars!!
This is a high protein, low carb diet. I have got the protein to carb ratio’s down real good. My personal goal each day is to eat about 7 times per day and stay within my ‘prescribed’ calorie range, and to eat a ‘prescribed’ amount of protein. In all of that, I need to keep my carbs right around the amount of protein or less. I am amazed how many foods are considered carbohydrates!
I eat 7 days per day to help control my blood sugars. This helps my body to not go into starvation mode. I want it to burn fat and not muscle. Within about a week of starting the diet, I could just feel my energy gaining momentum
I posed the question in the title because I was looking at labels in the store yesterday and noticed terms like, ‘Net Carbs’.. huh? Most of these items were actually very high in carbs (when looking at the label). So, I just did a tiny bit of research and was left with many questions.. is a carb, a carb or not?
Agave – Better Than Sugar?
I recently bought a gallon of agave through one of our local co-op’s. It was very reasonably priced and I had heard rumors of it’s healthful benefits. The first and most recongnizable benefit is that it has a very low glycemic index. How can that be bad? Sweets without the side effects.
I went on an internet search to find out more info on agave. I had no clue as to how much agave should be used in place of sugar. After a few clicks of the mouse, I found out that you use about 1/4 less agave and about 1/3 less liquids per recipe – a lot like using honey.
The most interesting article I came across was this one – Potential Dangers Of Agave – http://carbwars.blogspot.com/2008/03/potential-dangers-of-agave.html
Quote From The Above Article – ”
“Agave provokes bitter debate as a sweetener,” reads the headline in the March 23rd Chicago Tribune: www.chicagotribune.com/features/chi-0323deardorffmar23,1,7478086.story. The story raises questions about the safely of the trendy, expensive, liquid sugar made from the Mexican agave cactus. Agave nectar is being marketed as a healthful, all-natural substitute for sucrose because it has a very low glycemic index and doesn’t raise insulin levels. However, the dangers of fructose are well known, and agave nectar is almost 100% fructose. As I wrote in this previous post, http://carbwars.blogspot.com/search?q=agave, fructose raises triglycerides, promotes belly fat, and contributes to fatty liver, obesity, diabetes, heart disease, hypertension, and metabolic syndrome. It increases the formation of glycation end-products, which speed up the aging process.
Although the juice of the agave cactus is about half glucose and half fructose as it comes from the plant, it is refined to remove the glucose. “ ‘It’s almost all fructose, highly processed sugar with great marketing,’ said Dr. Ingrid Kohlstadt, fellow of the American College of Nutrition and associate faculty member at Johns Hopkins School of Public Health.”
But wait—there’s more. There have been reports that many of the products labeled as being from the blue agave plant really contain high-fructose syrup from corn and other varieties of agave because blue agave is expensive and in high demand for making tequila. Russ Bianchi, a food and beverage formulator, is quoted as saying, “Agave is really chemically refined hydrolyzed high-fructose inulin syrup and not from the blue agave plant, organic or raw as claimed.”
Although the article includes quotes from some who endorse the use of agave “in moderation,” it also lists concerns about agave consumption, including the following:
- It can contain botulism spores and should not be given to babies.
- It should be avoided if you are pregnant, as some believe it can cause miscarriages.
- It can worsen acne and diabetes symptoms.
- It does not raise blood glucose levels, but it raises blood fructose, which is worse.
- Use only agave nectar that is organic and carries a USDA seal.
The author states that although the FDA does not see a need for action, it requests reports of adverse effects from agave.”
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So, do anybody know if the above is true? I think that I will apply this – ‘Everything In Moderation’ It may or may not be the wonder sweetner… I would like to do more research before I decide.