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Ontario, Canada
I am a wife, mother and grandma who enjoys the many aspects of homemaking. A variety of interests and hobbies combined with travel keep me active. They reflect the importance of family, friends, home and good food.
Cook ingredients that you are used to cooking by other techniques, such as fish, chicken, or hamburgers. In other words be comfortable with the ingredients you are using.
--Bobby Flay

For Your Information

Please watch this area for important information like updates, food recalls, polls, contests, coupons, and freebies.
  • [March 19, 2020] - Effective Mar 17, this blog will no longer accept advertising. The reason is very simple. If I like a product, I will promote it without compensation. If I don't like a product, I will have no problem saying so.
  • [March 17, 2020] - A return to blogging! Stay tuned for new tips, resources and all things food related.
  • [February 1, 2016] - An interesting report on why you should always choose organic tea verses non-organic: Toxic Tea (pdf format)
  • Sticky Post - Warning: 4ever Recap reusable canning lids. The reports are growing daily of these lids losing their seal during storage. Some have lost their entire season's worth of canning to these seal failures! [Update: 4ever Recap appears to be out of business.]

Popular Posts

Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Lasagna Revisited

The weather is chilling so the comfort foods are coming out in full force as well as testing out new recipes that may become family favourites. These are the foods that later become comfort foods. Comfort foods are a true must have during the winter months!

lasagnaLasagna

Lasagna is one of our family favourites so I've posted a lot about it. Just to wet your whistle pictured is one of three lasagne I made last Friday. We enjoyed this beauty Friday night with left-overs for Saturday. I always make lasagna using a home meat sauce that can easily be substituted using your own homemade meat sauce. Once the sauce is made it really becomes a method for creating lasagna. I always start with sauce, cheese mixture, noodles, cheese, spinach/cottage cheese/sauce/cheese then the rest of the layers are comprised of noodles/cheese/cause/cheese ending with a cheese layer.

Now a few things come to mind. First some don't like adding spinach but it adds flavour, nutrients and texture. Second is the issue of adding cottage cheese. Cottage cheese adds a wonderful flavour but if you do not like using cottage cheese due to the texture, try blending it or substituting with ricotta. Both will add a rich, creamy flavour to your lasagna.


Tuesday, November 03, 2009

Cherry Picking the Sales - Beef & Pork

My apologies for a later than usual post. I try to get a post out daily usually in the morning hours as I know many look forward to them. I ended up doing a bit of a foodie run for the shear purpose of taking advantage of a couple of excellent sales. That ended up with me not getting home into the mid-afternoon hours so by the time I put everything away and vacuum sealed the dried foods this is the first real chance to sit and get caught up.

One of the grocery store chains is running their dollar sale. I decided this was an excellent opportunity to cherry pick the sales. Cherry picking refers to going in and buying only those items on sale. This is one way to stock your freezer and pantry without having to spend a lot of money. Pork shoulder roasts (bone in) and boneless outside round (bottom round) roasts were on sale for $1 per pound. Well this is such a good price that I just had to pick up a couple of each regardless of the fact that both the pantry and freezers are stuffed. The roasts are cryovaced so will keep in the refrigerator for a couple of weeks or longer.

pork shoulder roast and outside round roast or bottom roundBeef and Pork

I bought 2 pork shoulder roasts totaling just slight over 17 lbs for $17.21 for both roasts. One common question regarding pork shoulder roast is "How do I cook a pork shoulder roast?". I've posted the following methods for cooking pork shoulder roast: home canned barbeque pork, maple glazed pork, slowcooker (crockpot) pork shoulder roast, and glazed pork shoulder roast. All are excellent ways to cook a pork shoulder roast! These are bone in pork roasts so I'm going to be trying at least one different method such as dry roasting with rub. I'm also considering curing one of the pork shoulders. The bones can be used to make hearty bean soup or Canadian split pea soup.

I bought 2 outside round roasts totaling just over 7 lb for a total of $7.35 for both roasts. Outside round roast is a Canadian term. The same cut of beef is also known as bottom round roast outside of Canada. The outside round roast is cut from the hip part of the cow so can have a chewy texture if cooked improperly due to connective tissues. This cut is ideal for for braising but can also be dry roasted long and slow. It is important to not over cook this cut of meat. I have a couple of ideas for cooking the roasts but haven't decided yet.


Monday, November 02, 2009

Frugal Kitchens 101 - Gifts from the Kitchen

Frugal Kitchens 101
While homemade goodies have always been popular for gift giving over the holiday season there is a renewed interest in gifts from the kitchen this year. Part of the reason for this is the forced belt tightening of the recession. The fact is many have lost their jobs and many more are facing the very real possibility of losing their jobs. At the same time the holidays are a time of celebration and a time for a brief period of time to put the cares of the world aside for a few days. Gifts from the kitchen need not be expensive and it is surprising how creative you can get. Today's Frugal Kitchens 101 will focus on some of the basics necessary for getting the necessary materials needed for creating some gifts from the kitchen.

There are two main components for making gifts from the kitchen:

  • the edible component - For the most part choose foods where refrigeration is not a concern especially if the gift needs to travel any distance.
  • the non-edible component - This consists of any wrapping and/or containers for the food itself, the container to carry the food in and/or any additional items such as stuffings and decorations.
Edible component (of course as many homemade as possible):
  • good choices - breads, cookies, cakes, dry mixes, many home canned foods, jams, jellies, maple syrup, candies, vinegars, oils, chocolates, spices, herbs, coffee, teas
  • themes - Try to establish a theme for gift baskets or packets. One year we made movie theme baskets for friends of ours who had younger kids that included a video tape, a coupon for a free video renta, popcorn and pop. They still talk about that! What really matters with the theme is to come up with something that really reflects the recipient.
Non-edible components:
  • think non-disposable - Choose baskets or re-usable bins to put the packaged foods in. Get creative! For example one of your friends brown bags it. Make a cute and thoughtful gift basket using a reusable lunch bag with water bottle packed with appropriate eco-friendly lunch goodies. If at all possible use non-disposable wrappings for the food itself. Consider the reusable food container part of the overall gift. Find cute but inexpensive mugs to include as part of breakfast basket. Add in inexpensive items like serving spoons or butter knives to accent the the basket. Package in reusable but inexpensive tin cans and wood boxes found in discount stores, dollar stores and department stores (bought on sale). One cute idea would be to fill those a large silicone gloves with a few different spices and maybe a kitchen gadget then give it that way. There are so many possibilities. Many store bought baskets have some type of stuffing usually plastic or paper to make the basket look fuller than it is. Replace this with T-towels for a useful part of the gift baske.
  • wrapping - Most store bought gift baskets come wrapped in some type plastic wrap. If you need some type of wrapping aside of the actual basket or tin get creative using inexpensive T-towels or dishcloths something the recipient will find quite useful.
Please watch for next week's Frugal Kitchen 101 post that will continue the discussion on gifts from the kitchen.


Sunday, November 01, 2009

October Contest Wrap-up & Kitchen Chit Chat

Campbell's Soup Kids Cook

My gosh I can't believe it is November 1st already! Where has the year gone? We are now starting to gear up getting things ready for the holiday season. So it's time to sit and do a little chit chatting in the kitchen. October began with a lovely five day road trip of which I shared some of the highlights. When we arrived home I was back into preserving mode thanks to the generosity of a friend who dropped off nine dozen ears of corn. As you know my husband and I ran a small contest in October to discover a couple new ingredients. My husband chose ground turkey for his two creations and I used coconut milk. This contest was fun simply because neither of us built on what we already knew. I'm not going to create a poll for this contest because it was just meant to add a bit of inspiration in our cooking. Towards the end of the month I ran a poll regarding microwave usage. I have to tell you I was a bit surprised at the results.

Of the seventy seven voters 46% used their microwave ovens 2 or more times a day, 24% used their microwave ovens at least once a day, 14% used their microwave 2 to 6 times per week, 2% used their microwave oven once a week, zero used their microwave oven less than once a week and 11% did not have a microwave oven. From this data it appears for those owning a microwave oven use them. What I also realized is we are in the minority at using ours at maybe at best just barely squeaking into using our microwave oven 2 to 6 times a week but that is really stretching it. In keeping with my philosophy that every appliance in my kitchen must earn it's keep I am embarking on an adventure on how to use the microwave oven more effectively.

I have a few ideas for what is to come in November's posts. Many are trying to find frugal Christmas presents so I will be posting a few loving from the kitchen ideas that aren't going to cost you a lot. It also a busy and expensive time of the year so I will be posting a bit more about using the microwave oven. Finally I have venison, moose, wild geese, wild duck and fresh caught fish (perch, bass, pickerel) so will be posting on that as well. Aside of that you will likely notice a few subtle changes in the layout but nothing disruptive of major. If there is I will be sure to give you a warning.