Crockpot Stroganoff

This is one of my favorite ways to take care of leftover beef.  I've used roast, steak, and burger.  All are wonderful in their own ways.  Today I'm using leftover steak.  I try to cook extra when we BBQ just because it adds such a fantastic flavor to the meal.

Ingredients:
4 cloves minced garlic
1 cup chopped onion
2 cups sliced celery
4 cups sliced mushrooms (I love mushrooms.  Less is okay if you aren't a big fan.)
3 cups cubed leftover meat
6 Tblsp brown gravy mix (two packets)
4 cups water

Before serving you will also need:
1 cup sour cream
cooked noodles or rice
shredded cheese (optional)



Once you have all the ingredients gathered and prepped, this recipe goes pretty quickly.

Pour the four cups of water into your crockpot and whisk in the gravy mix powder.

Now to add the rest of the ingredients.  I put the onions and garlic in first.  Follow that with the celery, then the meat.  Top it all with the mushrooms.

Cook on low in the crockpot for about 5 hours.  The meat will be melt in your mouth tender and the veggies will all be cooked nicely.

*picture to come*

Before serving, stir in 1 cup of sour cream.  This gives the stroganoff a nice creamy flavor.  You can also stir in a small can of condensed cream of mushroom soup if you like an even creamier stroganoff.

*picture to come*

Serve over the top of cooked noodles or rice.  Top it all with shredded cheese!

Taco Bake

This is a delicious dinner even my picky kids loved! 

Taco Bake

1 ½ pounds ground beef
½ onion (chopped)
3 cloves of garlic (minced)
Two small tomatoes chopped
2 tablespoons taco seasoning
1 cup water
3 cups shredded cheese (I used cheddar)
Cornbread recipe
Tomato Topping

Preheat oven to 350*F.

Brown the burger with the onions and garlic until cooked through.  Add tomatoes, taco seasoning, and water.  Let simmer while you prepare the cornbread.

Spread your prepared cornbread dough into the bottom of a well greased 9x13 baking dish.  If your mixture is soupy, drain off the liquid first.  Then top the dough with the hamburger mixture. 

Sprinkle with as much cheese as you would like.

Bake in 350*F oven for approximately 30 minutes or until the cornbread is nicely browned.  I can see my cornbread through the clear baking dish.  If you are using a darker dish you may have to poke it with a toothpick.  The toothpick should come out clean.

Top with Spicy Tomato Topping and extra cheese!  Delish!

Spicy Tomato Topping

 4 small tomatoes diced

2 tablespoons dried cilantro
1 tablespoon paprika
1 teaspoon habenero sauce

 Put all the ingredients in a frying pan and simmer while the Taco Bake cooks.  It will cook down into a lovely little sauce to serve on top.

My dream....

Last summer we found my dream place.  The kids and I fell in love with this property on sight.  Hubby required a bit of convincing that the smaller amount of land would work.

No matter how much we loved this place, we still couldn't afford it.  We didn't give up though!  Over the last year we have worked hard to reduce our debt and curb our spending.  Now we are so close to achieving this dream!

The view from the end of the school building to the baseball diamond at the end of the property.

The back property line is a lovely little river.  It's far enough of a drop from the property to no pose a flooding danger.  So idealic!

Six full size classrooms!  The family is all excited about a bit more space to move around.

I am absolutely GIDDY over this kitchen.  I could cook and process food so easily with this space.  All commercial grade and size.

This mixer is as tall as I am.  I don't know what I would use a mixer this size to make, but by golly I want to use it!!

This is a dream pantry.  Notice the second mixer down on the floor.  That little bad boy is at least three times the size of my current Kitchenaide.

The natural lighting in this place is AMAZING.  The only pictures we took with lights on were in the cafeteria, kitchen, and gym.

That's right.  I said GYM.  Can you imagine the glory of a cold and rainy winter day spent playing basketball in your own personal gym?!
 I am so excited by all the prospects of this property.  Now we have to make it through the reality of financing and negotiating.  Wish us luck!  Pray!

*Edited to add*
Well, it looks like a couple more months of scrimping and saving.  They have come so far down on the price already, there isn't much wiggle room for negotiations.  I'll be patient.  Even at their asking price, we are only a few  months away from being able to do it.
We will still get started on the financing end.  That way we know where we are for sure.
Keep those good thoughts coming!

Lemon Meringue Pie

Oh, this pie is so heavenly! I was amazed by how many eggs it takes, but it is worth EVERY one! This will give you some good practice seperating eggs if you haven't practiced before. I always crack eggs into a small custard dish, then pour the egg over my hand into the whites bowl. The whites go through my fingers, then I can set the yolk into the other bowl. Many people rock the yolk back and forth between the egg shells. I tend to break the yolk when I do it this way.

This is a time consuming recipe. From start to finish it takes several hours. It is so delicious though, I am willing to work and wait!

Lemon Meringue Pie

Ingredients:

16 eggs

4 cup sugar – divided (2 for filling 2 for meringue)

2 cup fresh lemon juice

1 pie crust (I like graham)

1. Preheat oven to 325*F.

2. Separate yolks and whites of all 16 eggs into separate bowls.

3. Using an electric mixer get the whites started whisking for the meringue. This will take a while to form nice high peaks.

4. In a medium sauce pan, whisk the yolks and 2 cups of the sugar together. Add the lemon juice and stir.

5. Heat on low and stir with a flat ended spoon or spatula until it thickens up. Stir the entire time and keep scraping the bottom of the pan. You want to cook the egg yolks, but not end up with scrambled eggs. This will take about 10 to 15 minutes. Be patient!

6. Immediately transfer the lemon mixture into the pie crust and spread evenly.

7. By now your meringue should be starting to get nice peaks. SLOWLY add the two cups of sugar into the meringue. It will make your peaks fall, just keep it whisking until the peaks form again.

8. Top your pie with meringue! You will end up with extra meringue; I like to use it for meringue cookies.

9. Bake your pie at 325*F for about an hour or until the meringue has a nice golden brown top.

Allow to cool completely before serving.

Home Made Ravioli

Today for lunch, I made homemade ravioli served with marinara sauce.  It was SO DELICIOUS!!  Even the kids were begging for more.  They were a bit of work.  However, it worked out much cheaper than the freezer burned ones I can get at our local store.  Plus, I know exactly what went into them!  Here is the recipe for my homemade pasta and a quick tutorial for making raviolis.

2 cup               all purpose flour (plus some to flour the board)

½ tsp                salt

2                      beaten eggs

1/3 cup            water

1 tsp                oil

In a large mixing bowl stir together flour and salt.  Combine eggs, water and oil.  Form a well into the flour mixture and pour the egg mixture into it.

Mix well.

Turn the dough out onto a floured board. 

Knead the dough for 8 minutes.  It will become smooth and elastic.

Dough can be refrigerated for up to three days.

Roll dough out to desired thickness and shape.

Cook until no longer doughy in the middle.  Or, dry and store in an air tight container.

Now for the photo tutorial….

Flour mixture with the well in the middle, pour the egg mixture right in the middle.

I just mixed the whole thing with my hands.  Once it forms a nice ball, turn it out onto the floured surface.  Wash your hands and get ready for your arm exercise for the day!!

Knead for 8 minutes.  Whew!

Let the dough rest for a bit while you make your filling.  I used homemade ricotta, mozzarella, fresh shredded parmesan, and fresh shredded Romano.

Now it’s time to roll out that dough.  Cut the dough ball into quarters.  I used my trusty Atlas pasta roller.  If you don’t have one of these, a rolling pin will work just fine.  You want the dough fairly thin, but not to the point it will rip when you work with it.  I went to a level 5 on my pasta roller.

Next put a spoonful of filling spaced evenly on your pasta dough.  Wet the edges and fold over or put the top layer of dough on.  We used a fork to press the edges closed.  Be careful not to puncture the pocket with the filling in it.  If you do, your filling will come out in the boiling water. 

Lesson learned….don’t stack the ravioli.  I had to carefully pry all the ravioli apart after I told my daughter she could stack them.  They stuck to each other pretty well.

When you are ready to cook, get a nice big pot of water boiling on the stovetop.  I put salt and a little butter in my water.  It helps to prevent it from boiling over, and prevents the pasta from sticking to each other.

Once the water is at a full rolling boil, gently drop the ravioli into the water one at a time.  I only cooked five or six at a time to keep them from sticking.  You know they are done when they have been floating at the top of the water for a minute or two.  I think I cooked mine for maybe 5 minutes.

Remove the ravioli with a slotted spoon.  Add in the next batch while you dish up the done ones.  I topped them with marinara and more shredded parmesean cheese.

One batch of dough made 19 rather large ravioli.  I’m sure we could have been much more efficient in our cutting/shaping of the ravioli and gotten a few more.  I ate three personally, and that was enough for me to not be hungry.  I probably could have eaten one more. 

Our Adventure in Self-Sustainability

My family is embarking on an adventure of self-sustainability. We are going to try and become as self-sustainable as possible within the range of our abilities.

What is self-sustainable? Well, for some it means living in a tent in the woods completely independent from culture and society as we know it. This is not the self-sustainability that we are looking for. I am way too comfortable with a few of modern society's conventions.

I'm not giving up my car. I live in a very rural community. The nearest larger grocery store is 45 minutes away. My husband's commute to work is 45 minutes one direction. My longest commute is 15 minutes one direction. None of these distances sound reasonable on a bike for me. I am, however, committed to trying to walk and bike within our small community as much as I reasonably can.

I'm not giving up internet. Ah, internet, I think this is the one modern convenience that is a guilty pleasure for me. I simply depend on the wondrous amounts of information at my fingertips. How do I make/do something? Head to the internet!

You will still see me at our grocery store. Gardening is the one area that I am really struggling with. I *want* to be a good gardener. I *want* to provide my family with healthy home grown food. The one year I was successful in growing a garden, I grew Barbie food. Seriously, I grew fully ripened green bell peppers that would fit on a quarter. Fully ripened carrots were smaller than my pinkie. It was sad. I’m not giving up though. I have my lovely container garden going on the back porch this year. My little fledgling starts are planted and watched over. We shall see if we actually get any food from them in a few weeks. We do try to purchase from local farmers as much as possible. I hope to increase those purchases and decrease the purchases from commercial producers even further.

We are trying to minimize our purchases and pay off our debts. We are looking at one large purchase in the next few months. I have my eye on a piece of property that I believe would be a great little homestead for us. A few financial things have to fall into place, and then we can make it work. For now, we will continue to learn and grow on our little slice of neighborhood.

So, I hope you will join me. Follow my adventures in learning to become more self-sufficient in our modern world. I’ll be talking about homemade, homegrown, and community living. Sometimes the commercial alternative may be the best choice, but I hope that I can find sustainable alternatives to as many things as possible.

Do you have a topic you would like to see a post about? Comment! I’ll see what I can learn and share about it.

Multnomah Falls Hiking Trip

My family loves to hike. I thought I would share some of our adventures here along with all the recipes.

Our latest hike was to Multnomah Falls. This was such a breathtaking place to go. It was a bit crowded with people. That normally isn't one of our favorite things. Today it wasn't that bad. I know I heard at least five different languages being spoken around us as we climbed the trail.

My daughter is the wonder photographer for all of our trips. It means we get some really great shots of nature, lots of close up flowers, and maybe one or two pictures of her brothers.

A quick family pic taken by my hubby.

This was a lovely little waterfall we saw as we climbed up the trail to the stone bridge.

The view from the stone bridge was beautiful!

I just love her eye for a photograph.

This was an interesting little hole in the side of the cliff. It just begged for a photo!

Finally, a photo of hubby and I together!

After our trip to Multnomah Falls, we went on to a friend's house. Our daughter had a field day taking pictures in their flower garden.

If you would like to see more of her photos, head to her blog at PinkMenace New Camera