Homemade Sweet Potato Chips

My family loves these! You can make these with regular potatoes too.


First, preheat the oven to 450F


Than wash and slice about 2lbs potatoes, make sure they are thin.

Coat lightly w/oil and sprinkle with seasoning of choice. (We have used sea salt, Chinese 5 spice, and....I can not remember the other one =)

Bake for 10-12 min until crisp.

Enjoy!

It's dinner time!

This time I made:

Spaghetti w/ Meat sauce
Garlic Toast
Chocolate chip Cookies for dessert


Love,

Candy Making Maiden

We needed caramels for our pie tonight, we didn't go to the store

to buy them because what they had put in the caramels, so

we decided that we would make our own!

First we mixed all the ingredients, poured them in a pan,

then turned the pan on and began to cook it, and stuck a

thermometer inside. Then, we waited till it reached 250 degrees.

Once it reached 250 degrees, it looked like this! and
increases three times it's size.


Then we poured it in a lightly greased pan, and waited
for it to cool.

Once cooled...

we sliced the caramel into strips

then cut them into squares

And now! here they are! All nice and wrapped up!

Plus their good tasting too!

It's Dinnertime!

Today I am making:

chicken sausage

sauteed spinach w/garlic

pineapple chunks w/shredded coconut

Parmesan Potatoes

Here is the recipe you asked for Mrs. C. We hope you like it as much as us.

1/2 cup flour of choice
1T salt
1/2-3/4 cup parmesan. cheese
2 tsp lemon pepper
1-2 tsp garlic powder
1-3 tsp dr. parsley
2/3 cup butter or oil
4-5# potatoes



~Split butter in half and melt in 2 9x13 pans
~Wash and cut taters into chunks
~Mix seasonings together in large bowl or bag
~Toss wet/damp potatoes in seasonings to coat
~Lay in single layer in 9x13 pan on the butter and bake for 1 1/2 hours at 350 degrees

hope you like it:-)

It's Dinner time!

Today we had:

Nachos! They were made with leftover Corn and Bean Salad and some rice and cheese on top of nacho chips. Baked at 350 degrees until they start to smell good.

Pretty simple :-)

Love,

Baked Zuccini

Here is the zuccini recipe you asked for, this works nicely with yellow squash too. We also use matza farfel or crumbs in place of the bread crumbs some times.

You will need:

abuot 4 zuccini
grated cheese
basil(dried)
oil
bread crumbs/stuffing mix

Grease a 9 x 13 or 11 x 15 with oil.
Cut fat 1'' thick rounds and lay in bottom of the pan.
Sprinkle the rest of the ingridients on top.
Bake at 350F for 30 min.+


This is really good, my Dad really liked it!



Love,

It's Dinner Time

Today I made:

Parmesan Potatoes

Grilled Chicken (I can take almost No credit for it,Elijah, my 10yr old brother, grilled it and it was really fantastic!)

Sauteed Spinach (I learned that it takes a lot of raw spinach when you are cooking it. It shrinks a lot! I used a whole pound)

and boy was it good!

Love,

Making Sourdough Starter

Our family would like to start using sourdough instead of using commercial yeast. So Mom put me in charge of making a starter (with her supervision). Personally, I really like sourdough. It takes a lot of time but it is worth it! We are taking the GNOWFGLINS Sourdough eCourse together to learn how to make the change to sourdough.

It is best to start this project in the morning or before bed because you will need to feed your starter every 12 hours.

In a pint jar, put 3/8 cup of wheat flour and 1/4 cup water, and mix vigorously. Cover jar loosely and let sit on the counter for 12 hours between feedings. (It is important that it be filtered because chlorine kills sourdough.)

It is best if both are at room temperature. The starter grows best between 65 and 85 degrees.

----------

First Feeding

If you don't see any activity,(bubbles) than let sit for another 12 hours. If you do, feed it 1/4 cup of water and mix well than add 3/8 cup flour and mix well. Cover loosely.

----------

Second Feeding

If you still do not see life, toss it and start from scratch. If you do, Remove half of the starter and add 1/4 cup water and stir, than add 3/8 cup flour and again stir. Cover loosely.

-----------

Third Feeding

Take out half of the starter, than add 1/4 cup water and mix, than add 3/8 cup flour and mix vigorously. Keep in mind that your feedings are every 12 hours,so you need to get into a morning/ night routine.

-------------

Fourth Feeding

Take out half of the starter, add 1/4 cup water, mix than add 3/8 cup flour and mix vigorously.-------------

Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Feeding

Repeat above process until it consistently showing signs of life, at least one week. Well done! your starter is complete!

You may start using your starter, but it is reccomended that you keep it on the counter and feed it regularly for the next three weeks at a ratio of 1:1. (Doing this will strengthen your starter for long term use.) Afterwich time you may store in the fridge if desired, feeding it once a week.

When you want to use the starter you feed the amount of water and flour you intend to use. For example if your recipe calls for 1C of starter, you feed your started 1/2C water and 1/2 C flour and you mix it really good and let it sit a couple hours (or longer). Than you take what you need and leave the rest.

We'll show you some things we try as we go... check out GNOWFLGINS - there courses are great and you pay what you can! (And its Homeschool Science!)

Hope you have fun,

It's Dinnertime!

I am in charge of Tuesday night dinners in our home and sometimes it gets postponed or we end up doing leftovers or something, so please bear with me. I thought it would be fun to post my menu each week. If others would like to join me, that would be very nice. (It's OK if your Dinnertime Day is different than mine.)

I try to plan my meals a day ahead, pull out any meat from the freezer, and ask my Mom if she has any other plans for the food I want to use. Also I use things that we already have on hand. If you want any recipes just let me know and I will post them.

Here is my menu for this week:

Melon Mint Salad

Grilled Chicken Sausage

Sweet Potato Chips

Love,

Yogurt Making Maiden

This is a recipe for nice thick plain yogurt that our friend showed us how to make. This recipe makes a little over a half gallon of yogurt. (2 Qrts and 1 cup)

Ingrediants:

1/2 Gallon of Milk (we use raw but any will do)

1C of Yogurt

Supplies:

A thick bath towel

A crock pot

2 qrt jars and 1 pint jar

A spoon

A candy thermometer

A large pot

Heat your milk in the pot on the stove over a med low heat. Be careful not to burn, this takes a little time. It is a good practice of patience. Stir regularly.

Clip your candy thermometer to the side of the pot and
heat until the milk reaches *180 degrees F.

Remove from heat and let it sit and cool until it gets down to 110 degrees F.

Stiring will help this go a little faster, but it is another test of patience. :-) (It is important to watch your tempature, because if it's too hot, it will kill the culture in the yogurt. If it gets too cold, it will not go through the proper incubation process to make more yogurt.)

In the mean time, you want to warm water in your crock pot so it is ready when your yogurt is. You want a temapture of about 110-115 degrees. 6 cups of water works well in our pot. Use the candy thermometer to check and adjust your water tempature.

Mix in 1C of yogurt* to the warm milk. Than pour into glass jars. Please ask for help with this part, the pot is still a little hot.

*It is good to use room tempature yogurt so it doesn't cool your milk like it would if it were "fridge cold". If you pulled it out of the fridge when you gathered your ingrediants, that should be fine.

Place your glass jars into a heated crockpot with a water tempature of about 110 degrees. The water should come as high as possible on the pint jar which will only be as high as the liquid in that jar.

Make sure the crock is OFF!


Cover the top of the (unplugged) crock with a heavy bath towel. If it is cold and drafty, you may want to use a second towel to wrap around the outside of the crock to help insulate it. My mom has also read that you can do this in a good cooler with the lid sealed tight, but we have not tried that yet.

Let sit for 12-24 hours. It will get tangier if you let it sit longer. NO PEEKING!


Save that pint jar with a cup of yogurt in it as your starter for your next batch and enjoy the 2 qrts in the next week or two. Store in the refrigerator with a lid on.

You can be a Yogurt Making Maiden too!

Love,

*We have started experimenting with lowering the cooking tempature, since it is so high. This week Hailey cooked it to 170 degrees (instead of 180) and we had a delightfully thick yogurt as usual. We are going to continue our "scientific study" to see how low we can go and keep it thick. We will keep you abreast our findings on this post, so check back if you are interested :-)

Grama's Fruit Cobbler

This is my Grama Carol's recipe, and I make it all the time. You can use any type of fruit, frozen (no need to thaw) or fresh. Some of our favorites have been blueberry, marion berries, peach, blue berry and chocolate chip (reduce sugar!), and now...pineapple.

These are the ingrediants you will need:

1 1/2C flour (we use fresh ground flours, wheat, or spelt usally)

1T baking powder

1/2 tsp of salt

3/4C sugar (We use Rapadura/Sucanot)

6T butter

3/4C fruit, chopped or sliced

1/2C buttermilk or yogurt

Gather all your ingrediants then preheat your oven to 350 degree F.

Get a 9x13 baking dish and put the butter in it and put it in the oven to melt the butter as the oven heats up.

Meanwhile in a medium bowl combine the remaining ingrediants in a bowl, except the fruit.

Mix well with a spoon.

Using hot mitts, and carefully pull the pan out of the oven with the melted butter in it. Set it on top of the stove and carefully pour the batter into the hot baking dish over the melted butter. (do not mix) Than layer the fruit on top of the wet batter, covering the top.

Bake it for 30-45 minutes or until golden.

Its a especially good with a tall glass of milk or vanilla ice cream - but not necessary. :-)

Once you get the hang of it, you will find it only takes about 15 minutes to whip up (plus the cooking time).

Enjoy!

Pinapple Tips

How to cut a pineapple:

First you want to select a knife that is bigger than your pineapple is wide. It will be very hard to cut if it is smaller. The wrong knife increases the risk of cutting yourself.

You also want to be sure your knife is sharp.

Start by cutting the top of the pinapple off.

Than cut the bottom off. Try to cut it straight, because this will be your base for cutting the sides.

Now we slice the sides down, as close to the skin as possible.

*Special note: If you get a lot of "knots" when you slice the sides of the pineapple, you can use the tip of a vegetable peeler to scoop them out, or the tip of a pearing knife. This wastes less pineapple then slicing off the whole side again, but it takes a little longer.

This is what it looks like from the top.

Then we cut around the core. Depending on the pineapple's ripeness and sweetness, and what you are are using it for, will determine whether or not you use the core. The core is usually woody textured and not as sweet. We often discard the core; but if your are cooking with it or being very frugal, you may use it.

Now we lay the pineapple flat side down and slice it in 3 or 4 long strips, keeping them together.

Next, we turn the strips around and slice accross the long strips making the chunk size of your choice.

That is how we cut a pinapple!

How to pick a pineapple:

Depending on how ripe you want it (how fast you are going to use it) will determine how you want to pick a pineapple. The leaves will be green and succulent and hard to pull out.

If its has green it means it is not ripe yet. It will ripen on the counter in a few days (depending on HOW MUCH green there is and how warm it is. So you want to watch it; If you wait too long, it will turn brown inside, or the fruit flies or ants might beat you to their sweet goodness! If it ripens before you are ready, you can refridgerate it for a day or two.

It is ripe when the outside skin turns brown or golden. The leaves on top will start to dry, turn brown and can easily be plucked. Now it will be sweet and juicy!

Fresh pineapple is much better than canned. We hope you will try it!

TKM in Training,