What we ate for dinner tonight!

We ate another new freezer meal tonight.  A-M-A-Z-I-N-G-L-Y yummy!  We put them in the oven before going to the gym and then stuffed ourselves when we got back.  Here is the recipe if you want to try them!

Picture from http://www.kevinandamanda.com/recipes/dinner/creamy-chicken-enchiladas.html

Now it's time to listen to Lucy singing to her babies in bed and for us to watch 30 Rock. 

<3 Love <3

What we ate for dinner

I found this recipe for Garlic Chicken Farfalle and decided to try it on our last cooking day.  We ate it tonight and it was AMAZING!!!!

Picture from http://www.kevinandamanda.com/recipes/dinner/becky-higgins-garlic-chicken-farfalle.html

The one I made wasn't nearly as pretty as this picture.  Still tasty though! 

We will definately make it again.

Chicken Broccoli Cobler

This meal has turned into a real favorite (for Matt and me).  I got the recipe at a church women's night and thought it looked easy.  Then when I started doing the big cooking days, I realized this would be a great freezer meal!  It is a little Christmasy with red & green veggies in it so if you need a Christmasy dish (in 8 months) give this a try.

Chicken Broccoli Cobbler
(Original recipe was half of this and said it feeds 4.  I double it and we get at least 10 servings)

6 cups broccoli florets (I use frozen and don't cook them at all.  Just cut them up a little if necessary)
6 cups of chicken or turkey, chopped
2/3 cup roasted bell pepper, chopped
2 jars Alfredo Sauce
3/4 cup sour cream
4 Tbsp white wine or dry sherry

topping:
1/2 cup butter
6 cups sourdough bread, cubed
1 cup shredded Parmesan cheese

Divide butter, bread, and Parmesan cheese in half and place in freezer bags for topping.  (I put the cheese in a snack bag, wrap the butter in plastic wrap, and then throw the bread in a 1 qt zip top bag with the butter and bag of cheese.)

Combine broccoli and next 5 ingredients in a large bowl
Divide in half and place in gallon freezer zip top bags
Label, attach toppings and freeze

To Serve:
Thaw 24+ hours in the fridge
Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Place in a 2 quart baking dish or 4 individual serving bowls
Bake 30-35 minutes (25 minutes for individuals)

So yummy and SO easy!  Enjoy!

Yummy Potato Soup

One of my favorite recipes lately is a Potato Soup recipe from my sister-in-law, Heather.  It is super easy and really yummy!  (And freezes really well which is a must!)

Potato Soup

1 bag Redskin potatoes (5 lb bag)

1 bag celery cut up

1 cup onion, chopped (about 1 medium sized onion)

4+ cups chicken broth

1 tall half and half (what is that... a pint???)

2 cups Mexican cheese

1 package bacon, cooked and crumbled

salt, pepper, and parsley to taste

Wash and quarter potatoes (I cut them in smaller than quarters so they cook faster)

Add potatoes, onion, and celery to a large pot

Cover with chicken broth just to the top of the potatoes

Boil until the potatoes are soft

Smash potatoes in pot when they are still hot (I used a stick blender last time and it worked GREAT!)

Then add half and half, cheese, bacon pieces, salt, pepper, and parsley

Cool, divide into 3 gallon zip top bags, label and freeze

(Makes a total of about 12-15 servings)

To serve after freezing:

Thaw 25+ hours in the fridge

Reheat on stove top



Mostaccioli Bake

I've been taking pictures of dinner lately and realized I am not good at taking appetizing looking pictures of food.  I'm sorry about that!

Monday night, we were going to have our small group over, but Lucy was sick so we cancelled.  That left a ton of yummy casserole ready to bake.  Here is a picture of our favorite pasta casserole (and Lucy's FAVORITE food!  She will eat more of this than me!)

Mostaccioli Bake

(makes about 18 servings- 3 meals for our family)

2 lbs ground pork (beef works too...)

1 box (16 oz) Mostaccioli noodles

2/3 cup brown sugar

2 jars spaghetti sauce (we like the kind with mushrooms)

2-3 cups of shredded Mozzarella cheese

Boil noodles until just barely tender (for freezer meals make sure you don't overcook the noodles) and drain.

Brown ground pork and drain

Stir together spaghetti sauce and brown sugar.

Add pork and noodles to sauce mix and combine

Divide into 3 gallon size Ziploc bags and label. 

Divide cheese into 3 bags and attach to gallon size bags.

Freeze.

To Serve:

Thaw in the fridge for 24+ hours

Pour noodle mixture into 8x8 pan

Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes

Remove, add cheese to top

Bake for another 10 minutes

So yummy! 

Let me know if you have any good pasta recipes.  I'm always looking for new good recipes!



Cake Pops

These cake pops are so amazing, I thought I'd show you the play by play on how to make the kind I made for my birthday.

Ingredients:

1 box of cake

1 can of frosting

1-2 bags of candy melts/chocolate

6 inch sucker sticks

Styrofoam

To start, you need any box cake.  I used Rainbow Chip which is my FAVORITE cake by far.  I just love the colors!  Bake it in a 9x13" pan.  Let it cool.  Then break it up in a bowl: 

It should look like this when you're done:

Next add half a can of frosting.  I used Rainbow Chip because it's my FAVORITE!!!  I love the little candies.  You can use any.

Combine the cake and frosting with your hands.  It should look like this when it's done:

If it is still really dry, add a little more frosting.  I ended up using about 3/4 of the can.  The first time I made them I added the whole can and they were WAY too sticky and fell all apart when I tried to make balls.

The next step is to roll them into one inch balls.  Then chill them for a little while to get them firm.  (I did about 15 minutes in the freezer.)  It makes about 48 balls.

Next melt one bag of white candy melts according to package directions. 

Take your sucker sticks and dip them in the chocolate and then stick them in the balls like this:

Next dip the cake ball right into the chocolate.  Yum!!

Tap off the excess chocolate into the bowl and stick the pops into styrofoam.  (You could buy some flower foam thing.  I just grabbed some out of the box of some electronic thing of some sort.)

I put some sprinkles on them too.  Here is what they look like:

My little girls likes them!  Yum!

Pot Roast

Here is another freezer meal!  This one is a newer one for us.  I got it from my friend Rebecca who got it from her mom.  It is SO easy and takes no cooking on cooking day.  Just wrap it up and freeze it!



When it's finished, the soups have turned into a delicious gravy!

Ingredients:
2 4lb Beef Chuck Roast (Pork Shoulder/Boston Butt Roast would work too!)
4 cans Cream of Mushroom soup
2 packets dry onion soup

On cooking day:
Lay out a big enough sheet of tin foil to wrap up the roast with the topping
Lay the roast on the tin foil
Spread in layers the soups on top of and down the sides of the roast
Wrap tightly in the foil
Label & Freeze

To serve:
Thaw 24+ hours in the fridge
Place roast still wrapped in tinfoil in a 9 x 13 pan
Bake at 275-300 degrees for 4.5-5 hours

Recommended side dish:  Baked potatoes

Figure 1/2 to 1 lb of meat per person.

Sloppy Joes

I've decided to start sharing some recipes online from my freezer meals.  Freezer meals have been such a blessing for us.  It is always nice to go to the freezer and have the main dish prepped.

I don't normally like sloppy joes but these are GREAT!  Lucy ate almost half a sandwich last night which is saying a lot!  (She has never been a huge meat fan :( )





Ingredients:
6 cups All-Purpose Ground Meat Mixture (see below)
3 cans tomato soup
6 Tbsp brown sugar
3 tsp prepared mustard
hamburger buns

On cooking day:
Place meat mix in a large skillet
Add tomato soup, brown sugar, and mustard; stir
Cover and simmer 10 minutes
Divide in half and place in 2 gallon size zip top freezer bags
Label and freeze

To Serve:
Thaw or 24+ hours in fridge or in a sink of warm water
Heat in skillet
Serve ladled on hamburger buns

Makes 8-10 servings

***
All-Purpose Ground Meat Mixture

Ingredients:
5 lbs ground meat (the recipe calls for beef, but pork works too!)
2 cups celery, chopped
1 tsp garlic, minced
2 cups onion, chopped
1 cup green peppers, diced
1 tsp salt (optional)
1/2 tsp pepper

On cooking day:
In a large pot, brown ground beef.  Drain.
Stir in celery, garlic, onion, green pepper, salt & pepper
Cover & simmer about 10 minutes until veggies are tender but not soft
Use immediately during cooking session or freeze in 2 cup portions for later use

Suggested uses:
Tacos (use 2 cups with a packet of Taco seasoning)
Taco salad
Chili
Stuffed peppers
Sloppy Joes (see above)

Making Cookies

We did this so long ago, but I thought I would still post it.  (I can not get on top of normal day to day things at home right now, so once I do, I'll post more often.)

A few weeks before Christmas, Lucy and I made sugar cookies: my favorite!  Lucy helped with every step, and she was amazingly helpful!

Lucy helped make the cookie dough first, but Matt wasn't around for taking photos.  Here is the sugar cookie recipe:
1 cup butter
1.5 cups powdered sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
2.5 cups lour
1 tsp cream of tartar
1/2 tsp salt

Beat butter and sugar until fluffy.
Add egg & vanilla
Add all dry ingredients
Chill
Roll dough & cut out shapes
Bake on ungreased cookie sheet at 400 degrees for 6 minutes

While we waited for the cookie dough to chill.  We made the frosting.  Here is the recipe and the results:
1/4 cup softened butter
1 lb (3 & 3/4 cups) powdered sugar
1/4 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
(good on cookies, cake, cup cakes, graham crackers, fingers, spatulas...)

At first Lucy was really nervous about licking the frosting off the mixer paddle.  But then she realized what it was!

The spatula was good too!  (Don't worry!  I licked out the mixing bowl, and the other spatulas from when we mixed in the colors.  Lucy does come by the sweet tooth honestly!)

Then we moved on to cutting out the cookies.  We had quite a few misshapen and blobby ones this year.

Lucy wanted to roll the dough too, which she did surprisingly well!  She was in general over zealous with the cookie cutter and cut chunks off other cookies and over zealous with getting them off the counter and onto the cookie sheet.  There were a few times when she tried to pry them up with her fingers.

Once they were done baking, we moved right on to frosting.  Lucy "frosted" one cookie before realizing this was the yummy frosting which led to her just eating the frosting.

I called down to Matt to come and take some more pictures and told him someone was eating all the frosting.  When he came up he said "Who is eating all the frosting?"


"ME!"

 Lucy next decided that she should do the sprinkles.  Almost all of them went into her little bowl. 

Notice: Pacifier is on the counter and not in the mouth!

 Here is a picture of how they looked.  Lucy's were the 4 with minimal frosting.  Guess who ate those: Mommy!  Lucy wanted "the pink ones!"

So YUMMY!!!  Maybe I will make stars for New Years or something like that...  hmm...

Someone LOVES frosting!

Making cookies like this is one of my favorite things to do at Christmas, so it was a lot of fun to share it with my little girl!

Homemade Baby Wipes

Last week, I made a new container of homemade wipes, so I thought I'd put the recipe online.  I LOVE these wipes.  They are really absorbant and super easy to make.  They are also cheap!  I probably wouldn't have concidered doing this, but we received the makings for wipes for a gift.  I've been making them for almost 2 years now.

Ingredients:

1 roll Bounty Select-A-Size paper towels

1 1/2 tablespoons baby bath

1 tablespoon baby oil

2 cups water

Start with 1 roll of Bounty Select-A-Size paper towels.  They really need to be Bounty.  I use off brand paper towels for general use, but I tried them once as wipes and they fall apart and don't clean baby bottoms nearly as well as Bounty. 

 Pull the wrapper off and place on a cutting board.

 Using a sharp non-serated knife, cut the roll in half.

They will look like this.  Keep one and put the other one away for next time. 

You need a container to place the wipes in that is big enough to fit the paper towels.  The cover also needs to seal well so they don't dry out.  I found this one at Target.  It's a ClickClack 2.9 quart. 

Measure out 1 1/2 tablespoons of baby wash.

Then 1 Tablespoon of baby oil.  Add both to the container

Add 2 cups of water to the container.

Mix together

Place the roll of paper towl in the container.  I place the cut side down.

Place the cover on the container and turn the container upside down.  Keep it upside down until the paper towels are soaked through.

Open the container.  Pull the cardboard center out of the paper towels.

This is how they look!  We love them!