Yup, on Tuesday. Just roll with it, mkay? This week I needed to just keep things simple, no new recipes this week, and I wanted to make sure I used many of the items we received in our organic produce co-op share. But later this week we’ll have some honest to goodness chilly weather again so it will be perfect weather for soup!

Tuesday ~ Grilled Chicken Salads (using several items from the organic produce co-op: green leaf lettuce, broccolini, red bell pepper and parsnips. Also, green onions)

Wednesday ~ Meatloaf, sweet potatoes (from the co-op, baked or mashed I haven’t decided,) home-canned ranch beans and cornbread

Thursday ~ Baked potato soup (using co-op potatoes) with bacon, cheese and green onions.

Friday ~ Tacos (using the lettuce and tomato from the co-op, as well as the avocados.)

Saturday ~ Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup with potatoes and carrots

Sunday ~ Pancakes for supper – with sausage, scrambled eggs, and I’m thinking, a CRANBERRY COMPOTE with our co-op cranberries, yes??

Menu Plan Monday is hosted by Laura the Org Junkie (and yes, I’m going to start trying to do this again! Between the produce co-op and all the goodies my mom and I are canning, I need to make sure I use all up the good food we’re getting!)

As I said the other day, last week I made a commitment to start making more things from scratch again. I’d kinda let that fall by the wayside a little bit. I’m not talking about things like making enchiladas instead of buying a frozen enchilada meal.. I do THAT all the time. I talking about the individual ingredients. For example, it’s been a while since I’ve made my own tortillas. MAN, those things are good, I should do that again soon!

MMm.. tortillas… I digress.

Maybe I haven’t been making tortillas this week but there are plenty of things I *have* been making.  Or if I haven’t made them in the past week, then they’re on the list for things to make this week.

1. Kale Chips (counting this, because even though it might be considered a “side” I was thinking “Storebought chip replacements!”)
2. Buttermilk biscuits -  no biscuit mix here! I used the copycat KFC recipe at the bottom of that page. And real buttermilk. And real butter. And unbleached flour. MMmmmmm.
3. Yeast Rolls. Easy! The leftovers made GREAT sausage “biscuit” sandwiches for lunch the next day.
4. Granola. Easy peasy. I didn’t even look at a recipe. I tossed some oats with honey and cinnamon to coat and baked them til done. Little Prince ate it like cereal with milk on it.
5. Granola Bars – the yummiest ones I’ve ever made. I think I should have baked them a smidge longer get them a little firmer…
6. Coffee Creamer and more Coffee Creamer! (Oh my goodness, you have to try this.)
7. Yogurt (in the crockpot.)
8. Fruit Leather made with apples and pears.
9. Slow Oven-Roasted Dried Tomatoes for snacking or instead of chips. Say, “Goodbye chips!”
10. Dried Apples- more good snackins!

Hm. Looking at my list again I think I could have called this, “10 Recipes to Eat Simply.” I feel like I’m adding all these gourmet foods to our diet but the truth is that they’re all very SIMPLE. And basic and back to the way God made them.. AND OH SO YUMMY.

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by Amanda @ Oh Amanda. I thought I’d join in for a while — I have a lot of things to catch up on and share and Top Ten lists sure are an easy way to do that!! =)

One of the things that I wanted for my blog when I started it way back when, way back when it was “Bringing Good Home” on WordPress, was to blog about “good things.” The blog title came from the verse that’s on my header right now: “She brings him good, not harm, all the days of her life.” I wanted to blog about bringing “Good” into our home. Lately, I’ve blogged mostly about homeschool. And that’s a good thing. But there are other good things — recipes, etc– that have fallen by the wayside. That’s partially because there’s been a little bit less of that thing around the house lately, and partially because there’s been an increase in homeschooling with three kids in school now (which is why there’s been a little bit less of the other good stuff.) And when I find time to blog it’s mostly for homeschooling blog posts.

But this past week I set a goal to cook more stuff from scratch again. I knew it was going to take some time and planning (and it DID) but it has been worth it! On Saturday I went to my mom’s house and while we canned some pinto beans I also made some granola bars (which turned out Y.U.M.M.Y!) and some homemade coffee creamer. The results of which, were also Y.U.M.M.Y.

The best part is that it doesn’t have loads of artificial junk in it. I typically avoid foods with any kind of partially hydrogenated anything in it but I’ve always made an exception for my coffee creamer. I turned my head and looked away because I didn’t want to look at this:

INGREDIENTS: WATER, SUGAR, PARTIALLY HYDROGENATED SOYBEAN AND/OR COTTONSEED OIL, AND LESS THAN 2% OF NATURAL & ARTIFICIAL FLAVORS, SODIUM CASEINATE (A MILK DERIVATIVE)**, DIPOTASSIUM PHOSPHATE, DISODIUM PHOSPHATE, MONO- AND DIGLYCERIDES, CELLULOSE GEL, CELLULOSE GUM, COLOR ADDED, SALT, CARRAGEENAN, SUCRALOSE.

Pretty, isn’t it? I mean, pretty long and complicated and not-so-healthy. But it’s my COFFEE. And I’m not willing to drink it black. So, I didn’t.

I kept drinking it. Even after I started suspecting that it was making my slightly sick to my stomach (because I didn’t get the same feeling if I just used cream and sugar.) Yup. I kept drinking it. What can I say?

Which is why I was so excited when I found this recipe for homemade coffee creamer! Can you imagine how happy that made me?? I want to leap for joy. Not only is it tasty but it’s really, really easy to make.

REALLY.

And the ingredients look better, too:

Cinnamon Strudel Creamer: whole milk, heavy cream, maple syrup (NOT maple FLAVORED syrup), ground cinnamon (splurge on some good cinnamon, not the generic “ground cinnamon,”*) vanilla extract, almond extract.

Doesn’t that sound so much better?? Yes, it’s whole milk and heavy cream. It has fat in it. Our bodies need some fat. Some healthy fat. And that flavored liquid creamer I was buying? It’s non dairy. It doesn’t count as a milk. It has no calcium. This has real milk, calcium, healthy fat and is sweetened with a little bit of maple syrup, whereas “sugar” is the second ingredient on the storebought label.

It’s just all around a better deal. It’s probably a little more expensive, I didn’t do a cost analysis on it, but it didn’t make me sick to my stomach so that’s worth something, too, right?

One more thing. Check this out…

Nutritional information for one TBSP of the storebought stuff:

• Calories – 35
• Total Fat – 1.5g
• Cholesterol – 0mg
• Sodium – 30mg
• Total Carbohydrates – 5g
• Sugars – 5g
• Protein – 0g

Nutritional information for one TBSP of the homemade stuff:

• Calories – 37.9
• Total Fat – 3g
• Cholesterol – 10.8 mg
• Sodium – 7 mg
• Potassium – 11.6 mg
• Total Carbohydrates – 2.3 g
• Dietary Fiber – 0.1g
• Sugars – 1.9g
• Protein – 0.4g
• Vitamin A – 2.3% DV
• Vitamin B12 – 0.2% DV
• Vitamin B6 – 0.1% DV
• Vitamin C – 0.1% DV
• Vitamin D – 1.7% DV
• Vitamin E – 0.2% DV
• Calcium – 1.7% DV
• Copper – 0.1% DV
• Folate – 0.1 % DV
• Iron – 0.4% DV
• Magnesium – 0.2% DV
• Manganese – 5.1% DV
• Pantothenic Acid – 0.2% DV
• Phosphorus – 0.5% DV
• Riboflavin – 0.5% DV
• Selenium – 0.1% DV
• Thiamin 0.1% DV
• Zinc – 0.8% DV

With as easy as it is to make my own coffee creamer and with the healthier ingredient list, I’d be silly not to keep doing this. It was easy to double the recipe, but I split it with my mom so I’m already getting low on creamer. Looks like it’s time to get some cream and get back in the kitchen, right? = )

*Ceylon cinnamon is the best, called the “true” cinnamon. It’s not as bitter, has better flavor and is apparently healthier. It is also more expensive. Saigon cinnamon is a decent alternative, not as good as the Ceylon, not as bad as the Cassia and Burmanii and not too expensive to break the bank. More info.

** Recipe found here. Nutrition was calculated here. Storebought creamer info found here. Creamer can be stored in pint jars and kept in the refrigerator, for a length of time as of yet undetermined due to rapid consumption in short time frames. ; )

I’m going to try to get back on this bandwagon!!

We have some specific produce items from the co-op that we need to use up and there are several things in the freezer that needs to be used so that’s a definite influence on our menu for this week. And since we now have a non-stop supply of fresh farm eggs (ours), Breakfast For Dinner and Eggs for breakfast are regular weekly occurrences!

Monday

B~ Oatmeal & blueberries

L~ Homemade “lunchables” with fruit

S~ Beef Enchiladas, beans, rice

Tuesday

B~ Banana Nut Muffins, bacon

L~ Lean Pockets, veggies & ranch

S~ Baked Potato Soup (with bacon and cheese.)

Wednesday

B~ Eggs & Bacon, cantaloupe

L~ Grilled Cheese & Kale Chips

S~ BBQ Chicken, potato salad, veggies

Thursday

B~ Cereal & fruit

L~  Mac-N-Wienies, steamed broccoli

S~  Beans, rice, cornbread

Friday

B~ Eggs, Bacon, fruit

L~ Tuna Salad, Crackers, veggies

S~ Grilled Chicken Salads

Saturday

B~ Biscuits & gravy (& bacon and fruit if we have any left)

L~ Leftovers and/or sandwiches

S~ Porcupine Meatballs, veggies

Sunday

B~ Cereal

L~ Tacos

S~ Breakfast For Supper (the highlight of my week!): Scrambled Eggs, Bacon, Spicy Hashbrowns, Homemade biscuits with homemade jam

Have you ever tried Kale Chips? We haven’t. This is the first time we’re making it. CROSS YOUR FINGERS AND PRAY MY KIDS LIKE IT!! =) You’ll notice that bacon is a recurring theme around here. Hubby prefers turkey bacon but the kids and I eat the real thing, and since I’m now convinced that bacon grease is good for you, I’ll never go back. ;0) But we also eat tons and tons of raw, uncooked fresh organic produce and raw milk as often as I can travel the half hour to get some. Our eating habits still need some tweaking but we’re slowly but surely changing to more and more home cooked unprocessed foods. And oh, what a tasty journey!

More Menu Plan Monday @ I’m An Organizing Junkie

My mother and I are learning to can our fresh produce. We’ve had two canning sessions so far–the first time we canned salsa and yesterday we canned pickles, pickled carrots and grapes. Yesterday was quite the learning experience. ; )

Here’s what we’ve learned so far:

1.) The FIRST thing we need to do is to put our water bath on to boil – it takes a long time for that big pot to get hot enough!!

2.) That REALLY BIG POT can only get so hot without the lid on. Put the lid on – that thing will BOIL.

3.) My mom’s new stove makes the kitchen REALLY HOT. But it works well. =)

4.) Overestimate the amount of time we think it will take, it probably will take longer – at least until we get more comfortable with it.

5.) Even though the directions say to pack the jars loosely, judging by the amount of empty space after our jars were processed.. I don’t think they meant *that* loosely.

6.) Even when you think you’ve packed a jar full but not too tightly, you’ll be surprised at how much it all shifts and floats the to the top and how much empty space is left afterward.

7.) Don’t splash the boiling water on your leg. (Ask my mom.)

8.) We need to add vinegar to our water bath next time, we’ve been told that will reduce the hard water residue on the jars.

9.) Read the directions beforehand. “Oh, this recipe says to let the cucumbers marinate in the seasoning overnight. Guess we won’t be using THAT one.”

10.) We need to brush up on our units of measure – how many cups in a pint? Oh yeah. Two.

Our final count from yesterday: 1 quart pickled baby carrots, 7 quarts + 8.5 pints of pickles in various cuts & seasonings, 4.25 pints of grapes. The numbers are a little funny because I accidentally bought some jars that hold a cup and a half… don’t think I’ll be doing THAT again… Make that the 11th thing we learned.

It’s menu planning, healthy eating style around our house these days. We’ve been sticking to our healthier diet, eating healthier snacks and making healthier dinners. And no one has complained even once!
Oh, I jest. Okay, I flat out made that part up. I’ve been having the hardest time finding things all three kids will eat with no one complaining. I’m not a short order cook and I’m determined we’re going to start eating better so we’re having to work through this but I’m sure we’ll get there. Right?

For our healthier breakfasts, we’ve got:

Scrambled farm eggs, bacon in moderation (turkey bacon for my non-bacon family members,) whole wheat toast, fresh fruit, breakfast tacos (with scrambled eggs & bacon & chopped veggies), plain yogurt with honey, oatmeal, bagel thins with light cream cheese, and for lazy days– cheerios and shredded wheat.

Lunches include:

Sandwich wraps, tuna salad, cottage cheese and fruit, meat and cheese and veggie snack trays, black bean and cheese quesadillas, sensible sandwiches, string cheese, wasa crackers and fruits.

Dinners include:

Chicken fajitas, tacos, Grilled chicken, Porcupine meatballs, Turkey chili, Tuna patties, steamed veggies, brown rice, baked red potatoes and lots and lots of salad.

For sweets I’ll be making banana nut bread this week and we have pudding. I know there are still things that we need to improve in our diet but I’m really proud of the changes we’ve made and overall everybody is happy for the most part.

What’s on your menu?

For more Menu Plan Monday, head over to I’m an Organizing Junkie!