Category Archives: in my kitchen

May 05 1 comments
in my kitchen, recipe, vegan, vegetarian

Make Your Own Biscuit Mix

Continuing our series on easy, healthy, frugal convenience food mixes, today we’re going to talk about biscuits.

You may or may not have a good use for biscuits. At our home, we enjoy biscuits and gravy for breakfast. That’s how we eat biscuits most frequently. Occasionally, I make a pot pie and put biscuits as the pie crust layer. And sometimes, I make strawberry shortcake and I use biscuits cut in half for the shortcake. Mmmm!

Today, I have two biscuit recipes for you. Try them out and see which you like better — they’re both yummy. The whole wheat version is obviously healthier, but you can select which one your family will like better. Or you can make some of both!

Remember: decide how you want to remind yourself of the remaining ingredients to add on the day that you bake the cornbread or muffins, along with the baking directions. Here are a few ideas:

  • Write on the Ziplock bag. However, that could be a serious nuisance if you decide to reuse the Ziplock bag, and say, decide to put pancake mix in there next time around. I have to admit, I have been doing this lately, but I have also come up with some other ideas for you to try.
  • Print off labels with the “wet” ingredients and baking instructions listed, and stick them to the bag and hope that they stay stuck in the freezer.
  • Print off a paper with multiple directions per sheet of paper, and cut the paper apart. Place one little directions sheet either inside the mix or tape it to the outside. {Did that make sense?}
  • Make a “master directions cheat sheet” for ALL your mixes on some cute paper, print it off, and tape it to the inside of the door of, say, your spices cupboard. The cupboard should be close to wherever you would assemble the mix. And SHHH! don’t tell anyone it’s there. They’ll think you have a magnificent memory, and it’ll be our little secret.

And now, the recipes!

Whole Wheat Biscuits Mix

  • 1 3/4 cup whole wheat flour
  • 1 tbsp. sugar
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1 1/2 tsp aluminum-free baking powder (such as Ener-G, Featherweight or Rumford)

Place each of these ingredients together in your Ziplock bags, assembly line style.

Write on the bag or type on your “cheat sheet” the following directions:

Mix together 2 tbsp oil, 2/3 cup nondairy milk, and 1 tbsp lemon juice and add to the biscuit mix. Use ice cream scoop to make biscuit mounds on a greased cookie sheet. Bake in a preheated oven at 425° for 15-18 minutes or until lightly browned.

Wanna-Be-Bisquick Biscuit Mix

  • 2 cups flour (either all white flour, or half white and half whole wheat if you’re trying to make a healthier mix)
  • 1 tbsp sugar
  • 1 tbsp aluminum-free baking powder (such as Ener-G, Rumford, or Featherweight
  • 1 tsp. salt

Place ingredients in your ziplock bags, assembly-line style.

On your cheat sheet or bag, write (or type):

Mix 1/2 cup oil and 3/4 cup nondairy milk together and add to the biscuit mix. Mix well and then use an ice cream scoop to squeeze biscuit portions onto a greased cookie sheet. Bake in a preheated oven at 450° for 10-12 minutes, until lightly browned.

Mmm… now I need to go find some biscuit mix! Homemade biscuit mix certainly works for me!

May 04 3 comments
gifts, in my kitchen, recipe, vegan, vegetarian

Easy, Delicious, Inexpensive Soup Mixes

Today I’ll be sharing three soup mixes that are easy, delicious, and inexpensive to make. If you missed my post about the benefits of making a mix, click here to catch up.

Before the recipes, here’s how you’ll make the mixes. You’ll put the mix ingredients into a ziplock bag. Then, choose one of these options to write the rest of the directions or ingredients:

  • Write on the Ziplock bag. However, that could be a serious nuisance if you decide to reuse the Ziplock bag, and say, decide to put brown gravy mix in there next time around. I have to admit, I have been doing this lately, but I have also come up with some other ideas for you to try.
  • Print off labels with the “wet” ingredients and baking instructions listed, and stick them to the bag and hope that they stay stuck in the freezer.
  • Print off a paper with multiple directions per sheet of paper, and cut the paper apart. Place one little directions sheet either inside the mix or tape it to the outside. {Did that make sense?}
  • Make a “master directions cheat sheet” for ALL your mixes on some cute paper, print it off, and tape it to the inside of the door of, say, your spices cupboard. The cupboard should be close to wherever you would assemble the mix. And SHHH! don’t tell anyone it’s there. They’ll think you have a magnificent memory, and it’ll be our little secret.

Now, here are the recipes.

Lentil Soup Mix

Place all those goodies above in the ziplock bag. On the label or ziplock bag, write (or type) the following directions:

Place in a crockpot (slow cooker) with 1 quart water, 2 carrots (peeled and sliced), and 2 diced potatoes. Simmer on high for 6-8 hours. Add 1 quart stewed tomatoes just before serving, and serve with cornbread (why not use the cornbread mix!)

Split Pea Soup Mix

On the label or Ziplock bag, write (or type) the following directions:

Place mix in crockpot (or slow cooker) and add the following: 2 quarts water, 1 carrot (chopped and peeled), 1 rib celery (chopped and peeled). Cook in crockpot on high for about 6-8 hours. Serve with cornbread (made from your own mix, of course).

Middle Eastern Red Lentil Soup

  • 1 cup red lentils
  • 1/2 cup dry minced onion
  • 1 tsp. cumin
  • 1 tsp. coriander
  • 2 tbsp. white rice
  • 1 tsp. salt

On the label or bag, write (or type):

Add to a crockpot (slow cooker). Add 8 cups of water. Cook on high for about 4-6 hours.

Happy soup making!

In addition to making my own family happy, I have made these as gifts for coworkers. Especially around Christmastime, people love receiving the gift of an easy, delicious comfort food meal that is homemade!

This post is linked up at Tempt My Tummy Tuesday and Kitchen Tip Tuesdays.

May 03 4 comments
in my kitchen

Menu for week of May 2

Here is my vegetarian menu for this next week. I’ve already made a couple of these meals and boy, that baco-chip gravy was sooo good! My husband basically said I can’t make any other gravy than that one from now on… ha. What? You say you want that recipe? Sure, I’ll be posting that recipe here soon!

Breakfasts:

  • French toast with fruit sauce
  • Toast with baco-chip gravy
  • Waffles with carob pudding topping
  • Pancakes with fruit sauce
  • Breakfast potatoes and tofu frittata
  • Rice pudding
  • Cereal and muffins

Lunches:

  • Vegetarian Chili-Mac
  • Chickpea A La King on basmati rice
  • Sweet potatoes, salad, and vege-meatballs
  • Lasagna (vegan)
  • Enchiladas (vegan)
  • The other lunches will likely be leftovers I make too much food… ha!

Suppers (we keep it simple):

  • Butternut squash soup and breadsticks
  • Smoothie with bread
  • Fruit crisp
  • Sandwiches

In addition, I’m going to be doing some make-ahead prep on some meals to put in the freezer for quick and easy meals later. I’m going to try and put away some:

  • waffles
  • calzones
  • veggie sandwich slices

This post is linked up at Org Junkie’s Menu Planning Monday.

Apr 30 1 comments
frugal living, in my kitchen, recipe, vegan, vegetarian

Unsausage Burgers

Recently, I participated in a financial workshop which had a fun twist: frugal, healthy recipes.

I talked about how to make unsausage burgers. We all know how pricy it can be to eat out at fast food places all the time. With these burgers, however, you can make your own “fast food” at home.

If you are vegetarian, you know that it can be expensive to buy vegeburgers all the time. One link I found online listed Boca Garden Burgers for $5.19 for 10 oz! That’s for only 4 burgers.

This unsausage burger recipe is economical because it is made out of oatmeal, which you can get for great prices. Here’s the recipe for an economical burger that’s also healthy and it tastes good!

  • 4 1/2 cups warm water
  • 1/2 cups soy sauce or Bragg’s Liquid Aminos
  • 1/4 cup oil
  • 1 tbsp. onion powder
  • 4 tsp. honey or brown sugar
  • 2 tsp. ground sage
  • 4 tbsp. nutritional yeast flakes
  • 1 tsp garlic powder
  • 1/2 tsp. Italian seasoning
  • 4 1/4 cup quick oats

Place water and seasonings in a pot and bring to a boil. When it is boiling, add the quick oats and cook, stirring, for about 5 minutes.

Spray a cookie sheet (or two) with nonstick cooking spray. Form into patties, using a canning jar ring (like these) and lid (or spatula) and an ice cream scoop. (The kind with the lever that you squeeze works best.) Here’s how you do it. Scoop the hot oatmeal mixture with an ice cream scoop. Place on the cookie sheet. Place canning ring around the mound of seasoned oatmeal, and press down using a canning lid or even spatula. You may need to wet the spatula with water or spray it with cooking spray to prevent the burger mixture from sticking to it. Continue until you have perhaps 9-12 burgers formed on your cookie sheet.

Bake for 15 minutes, then remove and turn the burgers over, and continue baking for 15 more minutes.

This recipe makes around 15-18 burgers.

I like making bunches of these burgers at once to put in the freezer. It is very easy to take one or two out and microwave them for a quick sandwich. You can also serve these by placing them in a casserole dish and covering them with gravy. It makes a quick and easy casserole.

This post is linked at Frugal Fridays.

Apr 27 2 comments
in my kitchen

How to Prevent Bread Dough Collapse

Homemade Wheat Bread
Photo credit

If you bake bread, you likely know the problem I’m describing.

You’ve set your bread out to rise in the bread pans. (This is after the mixing, and after the initial rising. This is before baking. Just to get that straight.)

You forget about it set a timer and return promptly to find that your almost-loaves have risen so much that they… just… might… collapse if you gingerly move them to the oven.

Um, yeah. Been there done that.

I’ve come up with a new way of raising bread loaves so that I won’t have issues moving them around after they’re so big and puffy. (Maybe you already know this and I’m just late to catch on.)

I’ve started letting my dough loaves rise in the oven that isn’t hot yet.

Well, why not?! They are out of the draft of the air conditioning, and all I have to do is set the timer so I won’t forget the poor loaves and then just return and turn on the oven when it’s time to bake them. I don’t have to move them until the loaves are baked and they are out of the danger zone of collapsing.

So that, my fellow cooks, is the way that I prevent “bread dough collapse.” (I like that term. I think I’ll keep it.)

That said, here is a disclaimer. This works best if you are using a good recipe, fresh yeast, and following the directions. I’m not going to be held responsible for recipe flops. ;-)

Be sure to visit We Are That Family for Works for Me Wednesday posts!

Apr 27 1 comments
in my kitchen, recipe, vegan, vegetarian

Roasted Brussels Sprouts

Roasted Brussels Sprouts

One super-easy way to fix a love-it-or-hate-it veggie that we know as Brussels sprouts is to roast them.

Here’s how you do it.

  1. Cut your fresh brussels sprouts in half (especially if they are kind of large. The small ones, well, not so much.)
  2. Toss in a bowl with some olive oil. You don’t want them to be drenched/ dripping in olive oil, but you want them to be coated. Sprinkle with salt.
  3. Place them cut-side-down on an oiled cookie sheet.
  4. Bake at 400° for about 15-20 minutes. Keep an eye on them.
  5. During the last 5 minutes of baking, add a minced garlic clove or two and stir the little sprouts around.

These are SO good, you just won’t believe it! I couldn’t believe how good they were when I tried them for the first time. I’d been a Brussels sprouts tolerator. But this converted me into a Brussels sprouts lover!

I’m linking this post up at Tempt My Tummy Tuesday and the Ultimate Recipe Swap, where you can discover more yummy recipes!

Apr 14 1 comments
in my kitchen, recipe, vegan, vegetarian

Corn Bread/ Muffin Mix

Now that you’re convinced of the merits of making your own convenience food mixes at home, let’s talk recipes.

Cornbread mix

Corn bread is a family favorite. It’s the perfect accompaniment for soup or chili, and it’s also great in my Black Bean Tamale Pie.

You’ll want to stock up on Ziplock bags – preferably the quart size.

Into each quart-sized bag, you’ll place the following ingredients:

  • 1 cup cornmeal
  • 1 cup all-purpose flour
  • 2-4 tablespoons sugar (I use unrefined cane sugar—in the States you’d find it called Florida Crystals)
  • 2 teaspoons non-aluminum baking powder such as Rumford or Featherweight
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 tablespoon egg replacer powder (I use Ener-G brand egg replacer)

I find that if I am making multiple mixes at once, I use an “assembly line” process. I line several bags up at once. First, I place 1 cup of cornmeal in each bag. Then I follow up with 1 cup of flour per bag, and so on.

You’ll need to decide how you want to remind yourself of the remaining ingredients to add on the day that you bake the cornbread or muffins, along with the baking directions. Here are a few ideas:

  • Write on the Ziplock bag. However, that could be a serious nuisance if you decide to reuse the Ziplock bag, and say, decide to put pancake mix in there next time around. I have to admit, I have been doing this lately, but I have also come up with some other ideas for you to try.
  • Print off labels with the “wet” ingredients and baking instructions listed, and stick them to the bag and hope that they stay stuck in the freezer.
  • Print off a paper with multiple directions per sheet of paper, and cut the paper apart. Place one little directions sheet either inside the mix or tape it to the outside. {Did that make sense?}
  • Make a “master directions cheat sheet” for ALL your mixes on some cute paper, print it off, and tape it to the inside of the door of, say, your spices cupboard. The cupboard should be close to wherever you would assemble the mix. And SHHH! don’t tell anyone it’s there. They’ll think you have a magnificent memory, and it’ll be our little secret.

Now, for what you would actually write on the bag, the label, or the cheat sheet about the cornbread or muffins:

Cornbread/ Muffins Mix (Don’t forget to label somehow, even if you decide to go the “cheat sheet route”!)

Add:

  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  • 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons nondairy milk
  • 2 tablespoons oil

Mix thoroughly with dry ingredients, place in 8x8x2″ glass pyrex dish that has been sprayed with nonstick cooking spray, and bake. Bake at 400° in a glass pan for 25-30 minutes for cornbread (425° if another pan) or 12-15 minutes at 425° for corn muffins.

I don’t know about you, but I usually write in short-hand to some extent when I’m in the kitchen. “Mix. Bake at 400° for 25-30 minutes.” But some people need the directions written out completely. Do what works for you!

Making cornbread mix ahead of time sure works for me!

Apr 13 9 comments
frugal living, gifts, homemaking, in my kitchen

Top Ten Reasons to Make Your Own Convenience Food Mixes

Baking Mix

1. They taste good. Duh. Isn’t that one reason why we pick up mixes at the store? Whether it’s a cake mix, a box of mac and cheese, or a box of elaborate cous cous with olive oil and garlic, you’d have to agree that if it didn’t taste good to someone in your house, you wouldn’t buy it. You also have to agree that homemade food generally speaking tastes so much better than those boxes at the store!

2. Saves money. When you make mixes at home, you can stock up on whole food ingredients at bulk prices and make a whole bunch of goodies at a time. For example, it’s cheaper per unit to buy a box of split peas or beans at a wholesale foodservice store such as Smart & Final, Costco, or Gordon Food Service.

3. Make food friendly for picky kids. If Joey doesn’t like blueberries in his pancake or Susie doesn’t like mushrooms in her soup, you can leave them out.

4. Structure exactly what types of ingredients you want to add. It is easy to make food mixes for dietary needs and preferences. I do suggest that before making 10 or 12 bags of non-dairy whole wheat biscuits, however, you try them out and make sure your family likes them. If you prefer to add less sugar to your cornbread, you can! That’s the beauty of making your own mixes.

5. Avoid trans fats. Ever read a label and see something that says “hydrogenated” on it? Hydrogenated ingredients are not essential, and they are not good for you, either. They elevate the levels of “bad” cholesterol (LDL) and increase the risk of coronary heart disease.

6. Mixes make great gifts. In previous years, I have given homemade soup mixes to coworkers during the Christmas season, and they have loved them! You know how busy folks are during the holidays. It only takes a couple of minutes to put a soup mix into the crockpot and ta da! They have a meal ready after a long day of Christmas shopping!

7. Mixes are very slow-cooker friendly. Especially soup mixes. Cooking in the slow cooker is already easy. This just saves you even more time!

8. They are FAST and EASY to prepare. Whether you’re making soup mixes or baking mixes, you can mass-produce mixes in a short amount of time. Simply get out your ingredients, read over the recipe, and start adding ingredients to Ziplock bags. You’ll be surprised at how fast you can put together some great-tasting, healthy mixes!

9. Mixes invest in your future convenience. I love the idea of investing time today in making life easier tomorrow!

10. They make hospitality easier. We are admonished not to forget to entertain strangers (Hebrews 13:2). I believe that this call to hospitality goes beyond just having folks over. It might mean sharing food with those who have recently lost a loved one or gained a baby. Whether you take over a ready-to-eat pot of soup and steaming corn muffins, or whether you tie up some time-saving mixes and put them in a cute basket, think of how much easier it will be to heed the apostle’s admonition!

Well, have I convinced you? You’re probably either thinking, this is overkill… or show me more! Give me ideas!

I’m going to be featuring some delicious time-saving mixes that you can make in your very own kitchen, coming up in the next few days.

Be sure to subscribe, if you haven’t already, so you won’t miss any great ideas!

This post is linked to Top Ten Tuesday and Kitchen Tip Tuesday.

Apr 12 1 comments
in my kitchen

Menu for week of April 11

This week, I’m going to begin by talking about our suppers. Last week I did some serious brainstorming about supper. I have a really hard time coming up with supper ideas because supper is typically our lighter meal of the day. Here’s what I came up with: four generalized types of suppers that can rotate from day to day. See below:

  • Fruit-based supper. Into this category, I would put a meal like muffins and smoothies; fruit crisp; fruit cobbler; baked apples, etc.
  • Sandwich-based supper. Lots of flexibility here! I can do Sloppy Joe’s, subs, mock tuna melts, etc.
  • Soup-based supper. Potato soup, tomato soup, lentil soup… you get the idea. I have tons of soup options. I also came up with several things to enjoy with the soup: crackers, grilled cheese sandwiches, breadsticks, cornbread, etc.
  • Pizza or calzone based supper—I think this is pretty self-explanatory. I’ve an assortment of pizza options that I’d like to try here.

I think this system will work well for our family.

Here’s my menu plan for this week:

Breakfast:

  • Whole wheat pancakes with fruit sauce and scrambled tofu
  • Leftovers
  • Baked apples and oats
  • Breakfast casserole (made of tofu, textured vegetable protein, and potatoes)
  • Waffles
  • Hot fruit sauce on toast
  • Cereal

Lunch:

  • Rice with Un-chicken Broccoli sauce; served with salad
  • Leftovers
  • Penne pasta and vegan cheese (I’d put it down as Mac and Cheese, but they don’t have regular Mac here. The macaroni here is really long, like spaghetti. Not sure how they use it. If anyone knows how to use it, let me know. I figure penne will stand in as a decent substitute.)
  • Unsausage patties with gravy, served with a side of mini-butternut squash. Such cute lil’ fellas!
  • Shepherd’s pie (vegetarian, of course)
  • Red beans on rice

I’m only scheduling six lunches because twice a week, my hubby eats at the hospital where he works, and I have been eating leftovers. I’m not sure if I will actually use all of these menu plans, but it is better to be safe than sorry when it comes to having a plan in mind!

I am working on getting more of my recipes up here so that I can link to them. Bear with me in the meantime!

Visit I’m an Organizing Junkie for many more menu plans!

Apr 08 3 comments
in my kitchen, recipe, vegan, vegetarian

Black Bean Tamale Pie

black bean tamale pie closeup

I found the original for this recipe in one of my neglected cookbooks last week and thought I should give it a try. (It was on my menu plan as Cowboy tamale pie.) But I made several changes to the recipe, so really, it’s not much like the original any more.

I have always enjoyed beans (whether it’s chili, or whatever…) and cornbread together. This dish makes a delicious combo of the two, using cornbread as the “crust” on the “pie”. My husband doesn’t like Mexican food, but he thought this was pretty good (although I suspect he probably wouldn’t want to see it on the menu every week). But he did say it it was repeatable… yay!

We don’t like very spicy food although we generally enjoy the flavors of spicy food. This recipe uses cumin, oregano and paprika to highlight the flavors without the heat. If you wish, you could add chili pepper.

Black bean tamale pie

Filling ingredients:

● 1 small onion, chopped

● 1 carrot, diced

● 1 garlic clove, minced

● 1 red bell pepper, chopped

● 1 tbsp McKay’s chicken seasoning (a vegetarian Chicken-style seasoning)

● 1 15-oz can diced tomatoes

● 1 tsp cumin

● 1/2-1 tsp paprika

● 2 tsp oregano

● 4 cups cooked black beans (I cooked my own in the slow cooker overnight after soaking for several hours. You could also use canned beans) plus a little bit of liquid, either add water or use a little of the liquid from cooking them.

● salt to taste

Cornbread:

● 1 cup cornmeal

● 1 cup flour

● 2 tbsp sugar

● 2 tsp baking powder

● 1/2 tsp salt

● 1 cup +2 tbsp nondairy milk

● 1 tbsp lemon juice

● 1 tbsp egg replacer

● 2 tbsp oil

Directions:

Sauté the onions in a little olive oil, and add carrots, garlic, and bell pepper for a few minutes. Add canned tomatoes and continue cooking. Add the remaining ingredients for black bean mixture and mix well. Simmer for about 10 minutes while you make the cornbread mixture. Do keep an eye on it and don’t let it burn.

Preheat oven to 400°. Spray a 2 qt glass pyrex dish with nonstick cooking spray.

In a medium bowl, combine cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt, mixing thoroughly. Stir in milk, lemon juice, egg replacer powder, and oil in another small bowl or large measuring cup. Add liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients, stirring for about 30 seconds.

Pour black bean combination into the pyrex dish, and spoon cornbread mixture over the top, covering the black bean mixture.

Bake at 400° for 25-30 minutes, until cornbread begins to brown a bit. Makes 1 2-quart pyrex casserole dish.

This post is linked up at Life As Mom’s Ultimate Recipe Swap.