I have a confession to make. I love muffin mixes. :0 Yes, me, the person who likes making everything from scratch. I know that it’s simple to make muffins from scratch and that they are way better for you. (I do still make banana muffins from scratch, because I don’t really like the flavor of the banana muffin mixes. I also make pumpkin/winter squash muffins from scratch because our winter squashes have grown very well the past couple of years.) Maybe it’s because I have to make almost everything else from scratch. It is just so nice, to grab a box from Betty Crocker and add eggs, water, and oil. Plus, just having a mixing bowl and a spoon to wash up afterward is nice too. 🙂
Blueberry Oatmeal
But . . .
I don’t just make the make what that box says. Those 12 little muffins never fill up the hungry tummies that I have around here. I have discovered the magic of add-ins. It’s super simple, makes that box of mix stretch, and results in much more filling muffins. You simply make up the standard muffin mix and then start adding things. At the least, I add some old fashion oats (about 1/2-2/3 cup). I usually also add a couple of large spoonfuls of ground flaxseed. I keep a tub of freshly ground mixed nuts (almonds, walnuts, and pecans) in the fridge, so 1/2 cup of those probably gets tossed in as well. Depending on the type of muffins I am making, I may add things like cubed apple pieces (great in cinnamon muffins) or shredded coconut (perfect in chocolate chip). You can always add more fresh berries to blueberry muffins. I used to slice up strawberries or toss in some fresh raspberries, but DD doesn’t like fresh berries baked in things. I typically don’t add them anymore, unless I am making another kind of muffin as well. Seeds can be a great addition as well. Your imagination and your family’s tastes are the only limiting factor here.
One of the things that I miss a lot since I developed my onion allergy is Chinese food. After some trial and error, I have come up with a tasty homemade version of some of my favorites – egg rolls and stir fry.
This recipe for egg rolls is easy and much healthier, because you bake the egg rolls instead of frying them. DS and DD don’t like the taste of the wrappers but love the filling, so I will usually make a little extra filling and just let them eat it over rice or soba noodles.
Fixing the filling is simple and only uses 1 skillet. Yay for fewer dishes!
Filling them is super easy!
Baking instead of frying makes these so much better for you, but you still get that satisfying crunch!
Here is the full recipe.
Ingredients:
1 small bunch of broccoli
1.5-2 carrots – depending on size
1 14 oz can of bean sprouts (drained)
1/2 roll of sausage (mild breakfast sausage)
1 tsp garlic powder
1.5 tsp ground ginger
1 package egg roll wrappers
Small bowl with some water
Directions:
Cook and drain sausage, being sure to break it up into little pieces like taco meat. The return to the pan.
Shred broccoli and carrots either by hand with a box grater or using a food processor’s shredding disk – I used to use a bag of broccoli slaw but decided this was much more cost-effective.
Add broccoli, carrots, and bean sprouts to the sausage and saute on med-low heat until they start to soften. Mix in garlic and ginger while things are cooking.
Line a baking dish with parchment paper and preheat oven to 350° F.
Lay an egg roll wrapper on the parchment paper so it looks like a diamond (not a square). Place a small amount (about 3 TBSP) of the filling in the center, then fold up the bottom corner of the diamond. Fold in the 2 sides. Using your finger, lightly wet the edge of the remaining side (this should be the top) and then roll the egg roll up from the bottom. Set aside. Repeat until all the egg rolls are filled. As you go along, you may have to adjust your filling amount.
Line completed egg rolls on the parchment paper lined baking sheet and bake for about 20 min or until lightly browned on the edges and slightly crispy. Try to line them so they don’t touch, otherwise they may stick together while baking.
Enjoy with your favorite dipping sauce.
DH would be happy to make a meal out of these anytime I fix them.
So I promised that I would post my homemade tomato sauce recipe once I perfected it. When all three of my differently palleted family members tasted this sauce, they deemed it “the BEST sauce ever!” I’m calling that good!! 😉 The tomatoes that I used were straight out of my garden – mostly Roma tomatoes but a few other types thrown in because I had them. I had picked 2 small buckets full, quartered them, cooked them, and run them through my food mill with the salse screen. I canned 7 pints but still had about 5 left in the pot. I didn’t have time to can any more that day so I figured that I would make the rest into pasta sauce for dinner the next day. I ended up with 1 pint that didn’t seal so that got thrown back into the pot giving me about 3 quarts (6 pints) of tomatoes. If you can’t start with fresh tomatoes, then use about 6 or 7 15oz cans of petite diced tomatoes instead. To smooth it out a little, you might want to throw it in the blender or use an emersion blender to lightly break up some of the tomatoes. My salsa screen breaks the tomatoes up into chunks about 1/2 the size of most petite diced tomatoes. This sauce is great on its own, but feel free to cook and drain some sausage or hamburger or to throw some of my meatballs in.
Ingredients:
Approximately 3 quarts of cooked tomatoes, run through the salsa screen of a food mill (or roughly chopped to your desired chunkiness).
1 1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp ground red pepper
3/4 tsp paprika
1 tsp chopped fresh oregano. You can use dried but start at about 1/4 tsp and gradually add more tasting as you go. (Dried herbs tend to be more potent than fresh.)
So here is a recipe that I came up with for vegetable soup one day when it occurred to me at lunch that I had completely forgotten to thaw soup for dinner. I had vegetable soup on the menu so that’s what I made (but trust me that doesn’t always happen.) This would also make an easy and healthy weeknight dinner. since you can get it on the table in under 45 min.
Ingredients:
1 quart of my homemade chicken stock – if you don’t have any homemade stock you can use store-bought cans but homemade is so much better
1 28 oz can of petite diced tomatoes
1 32 oz bag of frozen mixed vegetables (corn, peas, green beans, and carrots)
1 can of cannellini beans (This is just what I grabbed. You could use any kind of beans you want.) Also, feel free to use dried if you can plan ahead and prep them the night before. I would suggest 1 cup of dried navy beans as a substitute for 1 can of cannellini beans. **Update – since first posting this, I have made this soup with 1 cup dried kidney beans, prepped the night before, and it was great!
1 cup of dried lentils
3/4 TBSP sea salt – if you use chicken stock from the store, start with 1/2 tsp salt and add to taste. I don’t salt my stock when I make it, since I prefer to salt the dishes themselves when I make them.
1 tsp garlic powder
Freshly ground pepper to taste
Directions:
Rinse lentils well and then place them and 4 cups of cold water into a small pot and cover. Do not salt the water.
Turn heat to medium-low and set a timer for 30 min. Once the water starts to boil reduce heat to low
While the lentils are cooking, add the other ingredients to a large pot or dutch oven and turn heat to medium. Once boiling, turn heat to low and simmer until the lentils are done.
Once the lentils are done, drain and rinse them. Then add them to the rest of the soup.
Stir the soup to incorporate the lentils well.
Serve warm with fresh bread and enjoy!
It’s a tasty dinner that you can feel good about when you come back for seconds (or thirds).
I don’t know about your kids, but mine LOVE spaghetti. Spaghetti night is one of the few nights when everyone eats happily with no complaining over the menu. As of now, Ragu makes a sauce called Super Chunky Mushroom that doesn’t bother my onion sensitivity. Prego also makes a Sensitive sauce that contains no onions or garlic. We all find that one too sweet for pasta, but it makes an amazing pizza sauce (no I can’t order pizza either). I am still working on perfecting my homemade sauce recipe and will post that when I finish it. That will have to wait until my tomatoes are ready in the summer though. 😉
**Update – My tomatoes came in, and I have finally come up with a great spaghetti sauce recipe. Find it here.
Sometimes we have our sauce meatless or with ground sausage, but the kids’ favorite is with meatballs. Of course, I have to make my own, because the world thinks that onions are necessary ingredients in almost everything.
Here is my super easy venison meatball recipe. This yielded about 72 golf ball-sized meatballs.
Ingredients:
4 lbs ground venison
2 lbs of raw breakfast sausage (the kind in the roll that you can usually find near bacon at the store)
I have found that Kroger’s Mild and Tennessee Pride’s Mild are both safe for me.
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350° F.
Line the bottom pan of 1-2 large baking sheets with sides with parchment paper – you need something with sides to keep the juices from running out.
Mix the 2 ground meats together until they are well mixed . I typically just use my hands.
Pull out golf ball sized pieces of the meat mixture and form into balls, placing them side by side on the tray of the baking sheet.
You can make these bigger or smaller depending on how you like your meatballs. Just be sure to adjust the cooking time.
Feel free to crowd them a bit. They will shrink a little when you cook them so you don’t have to worry about them sticking together.
This is about 54 golfball sized meatballs, right before they went into the oven.
Once the tray is full, place it in the oven.
Bake for about 12-15 min or until done. Use a meat thermometer to be sure that the middle of the meatballs reaches at least 170° F.
Allow to cool, then vacuum seal in bags. Label and freeze. Enjoy in the next 6-12 months.
I usually put about 12 in each bag.
This makes a super easy weeknight dinner. In the morning, I just dump a bag of frozen meatballs into a crockpot with 2 jars of sauce. I set it to low until lunch then turn it down to keep warm until dinner. All I have to do is cook some pasta and slice some veggies or make a salad, and dinner is done! 🙂
Here is my favorite recipe for burgers. I call them BBB burgers because I make them with bambi (what we call venison), beef, and bacon. DD, who dislikes ground meat, will actually devour these. This recipe yielded 44 burgers each about 1/4 lb.
Ingredients:
24 oz fatty bacon – ground
3 lbs of 80/20 ground beef
~6.5 lbs of ground venison
Directions:
Preheat oven to 375° F.
Line the bottom pan of 1-2 broiler pans (depending on what you have and how big they are) with aluminum foil.
Mix the 3 ground meats together until they are well mixed. I typically just use my hands.
Pull out large handfuls of the meat mixture and form into patties, placing them side by side on the tray of the broiler pan.
I don’t have a burger press yet but I am hoping to get one soon. Once I get one, I will probably use my scale and make the patties all uniform 1/4 lb burgers.
Once the tray is full, place it in the oven.
Bake for about 30 min or until done.
Use a meat thermometer to be sure that the middle of the burgers reaches at least 160° F.
I am cooking these to go into the freezer, so I want them well-done. If you are going to eat some before freezing, then, by all means, cook them to whatever doneness you prefer. There are many charts available online that provide cooking times for burgers.
Allow to cool, then vacuum seal in bags. Label and freeze. Enjoy in the next 6-12 months.
I usually put 8 in a bag, as that will provide 2 dinners for the 4 of us.
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