Sample Menu

By request, here is a sample menu for our family. Mind you, we eat very simple things and are not very adventurous. You may need to click on it to be able to actually read it.

Here's what goes into planning my menu. Lately, I have been trying to build it around what's on sale that week. For instance, if hamburger is on sale, I will make meatloaf. If biscuits are on sale, that's what we have for Sunday breakfast. Speaking of which, when we don't have 8 o'clock church, I make a big breakfast on Sundays. Any other day, it's cereal, oatmeal or frozen waffles. I also like to plan what treat I will be serving for Family Home Evening (FHE). When I don't, we end up with standard cookies or some packaged snack they eat every day anyway. I also choose Monday to try new dishes or make something I know isn't the favorite. Kids eat better when dessert is on the line!

Saturdays I leave open for who knows what. Sometimes we may go out again or we might eat leftovers, it's just a "find it and fix it" day. Also, Sunday dinner is planned by a different family member each week so I can't really shop for that.

Wednesday's are busy as well, so it has to be something I can fix quickly and early so everyone can be out the door by 5. When I have something like Bunko or Enrichment, I like to plan something easy and that I don't really care for like grilled cheese so I can make it and not care if I eat it or not. I'm weak like that.

It really takes very little time compared to the stress free week it will provide for you. All things are movable and changeable if things don't work out like you planned, but what a sweet thing to look at a piece of paper, know what you are going to do, know what time you need to start doing it and then not give it another thought.

Throw it Away

I'm not great at it, but I'm getting much better. I have a little bit of the "organize it" bug lately. What I find when this happens is that I have a lot of CRAP. I sort through things and think "why did I keep this" or "how old is this anyway". Just throw it away! Our garbage man came yesterday and my bin is already full. I honestly don't know what I was thinking when packing some of this stuff away. Good intentions are the culprit. I'm going to fix that or don't waste it or it's still usable. The reality is....fix it now, or get rid of it. You won't go back. Use it now, or get rid of it. If you are currently using it, get rid of it! Oh how refreshing to have clean and organized shelves and drawers. I won't miss a single thing out in my trash barrel. I just wish I hadn't kept it so long in the first place.

If you just can't bare to throw it away, give it to Good Will or DI. See if any friends or relatives could use it. If they all laugh at you or make a funny face....the garbage is probably the best place for it. I'm really not advocating being wasteful, but some things have a time and a season and then need to be disposed of. Before you toss it on the shelf, think to yourself...."Am I really coming back for this??" Out with the clutter!!!

Dinner Menu

This seems old school, everyone knows that...kind of stuff, but it's totally life saving! Sometimes I forget how great it is to have a menu. I get busy and think I don't have time for that when in reality, I don't NOT have time for that. Sometimes I make a menu for a 5 week period and sometimes I just go by the week, planning around what's on sale that week. Either way is perfectly nice for me. When I do the longer term one, I let my kids pick some of their favorite meals and I fill in the rest. I made a list of everything I have ever fixed so I have something to go off of when I'm drawing a blank. It's very helpful.

I try to remember Sunday breakfast and Tuesday is always FFY (fend for yourself) since it's a busy night. I also try to get easy to make "convenience foods" for the weekend when we go out and they cook for themselves.

When I'm diligent at keeping a menu, my shopping is easier, and usually cheaper, then everyday, I just know what I'm fixing and know that I have everything I need to do it. Very few run to the store trips to pick up forgotten items. It's totally great for relieving that stress of "what's for dinner?". It's also helpful to cook the meat ahead of time and freeze it in individual baggies. Dinner comes around and you are making spaghetti, you pull the bag out of the freezer, cook in the microwave for 2 minutes and voila! No frying, greasy mess tonight. Same with chicken you will use in casseroles or mixed with other ingredients. Crock pot the whole bag or whatever.. of it, divide it up into bags and freeze. Comes out shredded and perfect for a casserole or haystacks etc. I just use a blank calendar like this one and fill it in as much or as little as I feel like. It's seems like a little bit of work, but totally worth it!

Apple Pie Filling

This weekend I tried canning apple pie filling. Apples are cheap right now so I just bought them at the local grocery store. I have the opportunity to buy them in #38 boxes, but that is actually a little more expensive and it also requires me to "do" something with them quickly and in bulk. I prefer to do a batch at a time when it's convenient for me. Later this week, I may go buy more apples and do another batch. I don't get as overwhelmed and frustrated as when I try to do mass batches. Just a preference. This is the recipe I used.

5 1/2 cups sugar

1 1/2 cups cornstarch

1 T cinnamon

1 t nutmeg

2 1/2 cups cold water

5 cups apple juice

Cook and stir until mixture thickens. This makes enough filling for about eight quarts of apples. The processing time is 30 minutes boiling-bath.

I used my fabulous apple corer/peeler to do the apples. It went very quickly. I used just about 30 apples to fill 7 jars. My water bath holds 7 quart jars so that's what I plan for when I'm doing small batches. Two things I would do differently next time: I started the syrup boiling thinking it would take a while and then started peeling the apples. Definitely fill all the jars first. My syrup boiled and thickened so quickly, it was almost too thick to pour into the jars by the time I got the apples ready. I also needed to use a plastic knife to push the syrup all the way down to fill in the gaps. I found it better to actually layer the syrup and apples. Two sets of hands for this is best.

I would also change the recipe a smidgen to add more cinnamon and nutmeg. It smelled divine, but upon tasting, it was a little bland. In the future, I would use 2 T cinnamon and 3 tsp nutmeg.

Once they cooled I remove the rings and wiped all the gooey syrup away. This is something I just learned about. Now I know why my peach lids are so hard to get off. Some syrup will boil out and leave residue under your bands. This happens with most things you can, so always remove the rings and wipe down. You can replace them or leave them off, it matters not.

Salsa

This is a repeat post from my other blog, but now I have more information. I have been obsessed with canning lately so that's what I have right now. Canning info. We had tons of tomatoes left after a dinner event so we decided to can salsa. We have a good recipe we like so we started with that. We filled the first 4 jars when I decided to look up how long I needed to water bath them. That's when I found out they needed extra lime juice to help with the acidity level. I had no idea. The next several batches, I just squeezed a lot of lime juice into each one hoping it was enough. I didn't do anything with the first four jars. We water bathed them and they all sealed. This was back in July. We have eaten several jars and they are delicious. However, I found 4 jars that have unsealed. In examining them, I could see white powdery stuff all in the bottom. I dumped them out and they smelled awful! I'm guessing they fermented and that caused the seal to break. Not good at all! So, bottom line....if you can your own recipe, add lots of lime juice!

Not sure what caused the jar to break, but one did while in the water bath.

Our first successful attempt at canning salsa.

So easy, everyone was able to help.