Sweet Corn Cakes

When Liam was born my parents came over and made Tacos for us. The tacos were good, but mom made Corn Cakes! I love the corn cakes at Chevy's and always ask for extra. 

Mom had found a bag mix at the grocery store and you added a can of cream corn. I haven't been able to find the mix (which probably is $2-$4 anyway), but I did find a recipe to make them from "scratch". There's a lot of recipes where you use corn meal, corn flour, corn, and like 10 other ingredients. And I found an easy three "ingredient" one. Butter, Jiffy Mix, and Canned Cream Corn. While it's not the healthiest recipe, it's a good treat with a mexican dish.  

Sweet Corn Cake (Mini Muffins)

Ingredients

• One 15-ounce can Cream Corn
• One box Jiffy Corn Bread Mix
• One stick of butter - melted

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425 F
2. Melt butter (if you missed it listed above.)
3. Mix the three ingredients together
4. Spoon mixture into mini-muffin tin. OR you can use a glass bread loaf pan.
5. Bake Mini-Muffins for 20 minutes, or the loaf pan for 25 minutes. 

Spinach Ricotta Stuffed Shells

I love Italian food. Just love it. Thanks to my mom! I add garlic to everything. Except breakfast items.

So I have been wanting to do some more bulk cooking. And I figured I'd give Stuffed Shells a try. They are time consuming so I wanted to do a bulk. Liam has been cooperating with his napping so I've been able to get more things done while he's napping.

I looked on pinterest for recipes and using some of the basics I found, here's mine.

Spinach Ricotta Stuffed Shells

Ingredients

Filling/Stuffing

• 1 15-oz. container ricotta
• 1 cup shredded mozzarella
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• 1 10-oz. package frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed dry (OR, 2 ounces of fresh spinach leaves chopped, and sauteed with garlic.) 
• Garlic
• Salt & Pepper

You'll also need

• A large box of jumbo pasta shells
• Additional shredded mozzarella
• Around 4 cups (20-26 ounces) of Pasta Sauce (I made my meat sauce, without the meat.) 

Instructions

1. Cook pasta shells to al dente, you want them firm enough to handle. Drain and set aside to cool.
2. While pasta cooks, in a large bowl, stir together ricotta, mozzarella, egg, spinach, and S&P, garlic to taste.
3. Preheat oven to 375ºF. (You can do this first, but my oven preheats quickly and I'm slow at stuffing shells.)
4. Spread 1 cup spaghetti sauce over bottom of a 9×13 baking dish. Stuff shells with cheese mixture and place in dish. Spoon remaining sauce over shells and sprinkle with shredded mozzarella.
5. Cover baking dish with foil and bake for 35 minutes. Remove foil and bake about 10 minutes longer, until bubbly and cheese begins to brown.

I made these in bulk. I did the filling times four and slowly boiled shells and stuffed them. I used two full boxes of jumbo shells. It resulted in 86 shells. I made a set of 20 in a 9x13 which we ate for dinner. Then I made four foil pans full, a 20-count, two 15-counts, and a 16 count. 

 Spinach & garlic, mixed into the ricotta cheese mixture.

Stuffing shells & adding more pasta sauce

Chicken Huts

One our favorite recipes are chicken huts. They are simple to make and very delicious. We recently had them given to us during a "Potluck Exchange" and they included a can of Cream of Chicken Soup. Which made them EVEN BETTER!!! 

They freeze well so I decided to make them in bulk. 

Chicken Huts
Ingredients:

• 8 oz. cream cheese
• (2) 10 oz. cans of  cooked chicken (in the grocery store by  the canned tuna)
• salt & pepper to taste
• (2) 8 oz. cans crescent rolls
• 2 T melted butter
• 2 T sesame seeds  (or bread crumbs)
• green onions (optional)

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 
2. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. 
3. Open and drain canned chicken well. 
4. Blend cream cheese, salt & pepper, chicken and green onions (optional) and mix well. 
5. Separate each can of crescent rolls into 4 rectangles (pat severed part together). Cut each rectangular in half. (Tip - Use a pizza cutter.)
6. Put a large spoonful of chicken mixture into each or rectangle of dough. 
7. Pull 4 corners of dough to top of center of chicken mixture. Press corners together. 
8. Brush top with melted butter, sprinkle with sesame seeds (or bread crumbs). 
9. Bake 25 to 30 minutes or until brown and toasted on top.
10. (Optional)  Heat up a can of cream of chicken soup (do not add milk/water.) Spoon over huts. 

Notes:

Mixing together the ingredients

The originally recipe did not call for cutting the crescent rectangular into two. The picture posted shows the difference in size. The larger ones are very filling, almost too big, which is weird since you can eat two of the smaller ones. 

You don't have to use the soup. It's optional. I like it. 

To make them in bulk, I used:

Sam's Club Canned Chicken - It is a 5-pack of 13-ounce cans. 

One Schnucks brand Canned Chicken - 10 ounces

4 - 8-ounce Cream Cheese

5 Cans of 8-count Crescent rolls

Small bunch of green onions. 

I made four large ones (for dinner and leftovers tonight) and 48 small ones. Then I ate four of them. Yea, I did. I am freezing in groups of 8.

The crescent roll - cut into two. Add the chicken mixture, then pinch together the corners. 

Add caption

Unbaked and Baked comparison. They really puff up.

Here's the four "large ones". I didn't cut the crescent rolls into two squares.
This is a 9x13 pan, so you can imagine how larger they are.
We had asparagus and salad as a side. 

Just raising a baby

It's been a month since I last blogged! So much has happened! Liam is growing like a weed! Between his 5-month and 6-month checkup he shot up two inches. At his six month appointment on April 6, he weighed 17 pounds and 5 ounces and was 27.5 inches long! 

The past six months have been amazing. I've really enjoyed watching Liam grow and develop. He's rolling all the way over now, and sometimes will sleep on his stomach. He's learned who mom and dad are, he smiles when he sees Monday and Grandma. As much as I love being home, not worrying about the stress of a job and all, I do miss work. I miss adult interaction. I miss going outside the home. Sometimes I go a day or two without leaving the house. I've tried to increase my workouts to twice a week and am waiting for the warm weather so Liam and I can hit the walking trails. 

I've had a few job interviews, and most recently was the top five of 50 applicants. That made me feel good. I'm hoping the right job comes along like around September. That way I have the entire summer off. I spend a lot of time looking for jobs to apply to. Now that Liam is napping I have more quiet time to job search.

Jason and I have switched back to a cash budget, and I'm working harder at meal planning. We've been doing well with eating in and eating out of our deep freeze. I'm looking to make more freezer meals, but we have a lot of other things to go through first. 

I sometimes feel like I go go go. Even when Jason gets home from work and he can help with Liam, there's still stuff to do. Like making dinner, or folding laundry (we do around 6-7 loads a week now, instead of 2), cleaning up something, making a list for something else. Some evenings I get to just sit and do nothing, but I feel like those are few and far between. Since Jason is studying for the PE on the weekends, I'm on baby duty then too. I try to leave him be because passing is huge and I want him to pass. The easiest has been to just leave the house (with Liam.) If I go somewhere else then Jason won't hear him fussing or crying if he's protesting a nap. 

I have a new recipe to post. It's easy, I think you can figure it out by the picture and don't need instructions. But if you do, the steps are listed below. 

How to make a Baby Burrito

1) Get a baby

2) Place on blanket and start rolling

3) Roll all the way up!

Mom vs Dad - Time Differences

I stumbled across this article. Why Mom's Time Is Different From Dad's Time

It takes me 30-minutes to an hour to get Liam to sleep at night. And then sometimes 5 minutes of Dad time. Last night during bedtime Jason vacuumed. It doesn't take long to vacuum, and I really really hate doing it, but I would have rather vacuumed then nursed Liam to sleep. (And he didn't need Dad last night.) 

I find that some points of the article to be true. But not completely related to my household. While I do a lot of putting to bed (I have the boobs afterall to do it,) Jason will have helped with bathtime and/or changing him into PJs and a nighttime diapers. Then while I'm sitting in the nursery playing Candy Crush and nursing Liam, Jason will finish cleaning up the kitchen or like last night, vacuum. He's also in charge of trash so Wednesday night he'll get that ready and out the door. 

I'm on Level 425 in Candy Crush. I'm over 100 levels ahead of Jason, who used to be ahead of me (before September.) I estimate I spend over an hour a day playing Candy Crush, and another two hours or so online reading crap (really, it's crap), and looking at Facebook. I wish my FB were online as much as I am during the day. I base all these numbers on the fact that I spend around average 2.5 hours a day nursing and and 30 minutes pumping. 

I used to feel very overwhelmed because I wasn't able to accomplish anything during the day, except keeping Liam clean and fed. But now, with his longer sleep schedule and nap times, I have some time to clean up the kitchen, do laundry, and even MOP. I also have a little more time to blog and job search. 

And today's naptime was a big fail. Took an hour and a half to get him to sleep.....for an hour... and he's up. 

But he's adorable. 

Banana Blueberry Bread (Dairy Free)

I had some bananas and it took me a few tries to find a banana bread recipe that didn't have milk in it. I found this recipe and altered it. The recipe says it's very forgiving, which it is, and which is good because I made a handful of errors. The bread shouldn't have turned out at all, but it did and it's delicious! 

This makes two loaves.

Banana Blueberry Bread

Ingredients

• 2 cups white sugar
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 4 eggs, beaten
• 5-6 medium bananas. mashed
• 4 cups flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup orange juice
• 2-3 cups fresh/frozen blueberries

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Spray two loaf pans with non-stick spray. Line the pans with parchment paper (see photo). 
2. Beat sugar and oil in a bowl. Add eggs and mashed banana.
3. Sift together dry ingredients and fold into banana mixture alternately with orange juice.
4. Fold in blueberries.
5. Pour batter into loaf pans.
6. Bake for 45 minutes to an hour depending 
7. upon pan size. A toothpick inserted in the center which comes out clean is the best indicator that the loaf is fully baked.
8. Cool in the pan for 10-15 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Rump Roast

We picked up our quarter of a cow from Crooked Creek Beef a few weekends ago. We received 200 pre-processed pounds of quarter-cow, it cost us just under $600 total. That means we paid $3.00/pound for everything from ground hamburger to t-bone steaks to roasts. We wound up with 38 one-pound packages of ground beef, and the rest was everything else. (Note - After processing, it's estimated we received approximately 115 pounds of beef, which amounts to approximate $5/pound. This is still a great price for the quality of beef we receive. Have your priced beef lately? And then priced hormone free beef?)

The reason I decided to go with Crooked Creek (aside from my friend Sarah using them) is because the beef is grass fed, hormone, antibiotic free beef. It's very high quality and you know where your meat comes from. When Liam is a little older, we will visit the farm and be able to see the cows we might be eating later that year. 

I'm still wrapping up using a few things from the last quarter of cow we got. I'm doing better at figureing out how to cook things I've never made before. I made the rump roast this week. And it turned out amazing! I love prime rib, and it was very similar. The quality of meat we receive tastes amazing. 

Rump Roast

The rub below is enough to use for 2.5-3.5 lb. roast (this is a good rub for any beef cut that you will roast). Remember, the spices only penetrate about 1/4 inch of the meat as it cooks. The roast should be served rare, and cut against the grain in thin, thin slices.

Before and After

Ingredients

• 1, 2.5 - 3 lb. rump roast
• 1/2 teaspoon all-purpose black pepper
• 2 good teaspoons granulated/powdered beef bouillon
• 1.5 teaspoons Kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon cornstarch
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano leaves
• 1/4 heaping teaspoon dried thyme leaves
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 teaspoon regular paprika
• 2 tablespoons olive oil

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
• With a damp paper towel, wipe all sides of the roast.
• Leave the saddle of fat on the roast. It adds moisture and taste.
• In a small bowl, mix all the dry ingredients. Rub the olive oil into the roast and then coat with the dry rub.
• Place roast on a metal rack in a shallow metal pan/dish.
• Roast until it reaches an internal temperature of about 120-125 degrees. (Use a meat thermometer you can leave in the meat while cooking.) This will take anywhere from 50-70 minutes. 
• Remove from oven and allow to stand without cutting for 10-15 minutes. This allows the juices to stop flowing out and settle back into the meat.
• Cut against the grain when carving. 
• Remove roast to a cutting board and cut into thin slices. Sometimes a sharp serrated knife works best.

Meat Sauce

Another recipe from The Pioneer Woman on the Food Network. 

Here's what I did. It was DELICIOUS. I actually hope to make it again soon to keep a healthy stock in the freezer. 

Ingredients

3 pounds ground beef (I will use 2 pounds next time)

2 pounds sausage

3 tablespoons olive oil

2 large yellow onions, diced (about 1.5 pounds)

3-4 bell peppers, seeded and diced

6 cloves garlic, minced

1 cup white wine or stock (your choice)

Two 28-ounce cans crushed tomatoes

Two 24-ounce jar good store-bought marinara sauce (or a 44-ounce jar)

Two 15-ounce cans fire roasted tomatoes, drained

One 6-ounce can tomato paste

"Spice Mixture"

2 tablespoons sugar

2 teaspoons salt

2 teaspoons Italian seasoning

4 bay leaves

3 tablespoons parsley flakes

Directions

In a large pot over medium-high heat, brown the ground beef and sausage until totally browned. I added some Italian seasoning and garlic. Pour meat & liquid into strainer. Set meat aside.

Discard any grease in the pot, but do not clean the pot. (You can skip this step as I did below.) Drizzle in the olive oil. When it is heated, throw in the garlic, onions, and bell peppers. Stir and cook for ~5 minutes. Add the wine or stock and allow to boil/bubble and let reduce, another ~5 minutes. 

Add the crushed tomatoes, marinara sauce and tomato paste. Stir to combine, and then add the "Spice Mixture". Stir, and then add the cooked meat. Mix well. Place the lid on the pot and allow to simmer for 1 hour+, stirring occasionally. Discard the bay leaves before serving.

Notes: 

• Add a little water or some low-sodium broth if it needs more liquid.
• I was impatient on waiting for the meat to cook. Cooking five pounds of meat can take a while. The Pioneer Woman fools you during her half hour show and spending 10 minutes on the sauce. So while I started the meat I also started the rest of it in another pot. You could precook the meat the day before or hours before. 
• Prep everything before hand! I cut all the onions and peppers, and then mixed together the "Spice Mixture" in a little bowl. I had all the cans ready to go, and a paper bag ready to put the cans for recycling. 
• I like the Pioneer Woman because she does use shortcuts. I don't want to cook and crush my own tomatoes. Adding an extra jar of sauce is helpful, and cost effective!

COST

I want to take into account the cost to make this. The Pioneer Woman says she gets 12 servings from it. I got approximately 15 servings. We used some for dinner tonight, I put some in a Tupperware for dinner later this week, and then filled 3 one-gallon freezer bags full (around 3 servings each) for freezing and use later. 

The meat came from my Crooked Creek Cow and I bought some extra pork from Williams Brothers. You can get pork for around $2-4/pound. It just depends on what you purchase. I estimated the meat to be $15. I prefer name brand canned goods, you could make this cheaper by using off brands. 

The other ingredients (minus the staples you should have, like EVEO, garlic, and the Spice Mixture), total almost $15. So $30 for 15 servings, or around $6/meal. Which is pretty good. I got worried at one point with the meat and all the canned goods this would add up and not be reasonable. I think it is reasonable, and can be made cheaper. Next time I'm going to use 2 pounds of ground beef instead of 3 pounds. The sauce was almost too meaty for me. My dad would love it. He likes a little sauce with his meat.

Use what have (AKA, The Freezer Cleanout)

The next quarter of a cow from Crooked Creek Beef is ready.

Big thanks to whoever is also using them! I earned a referral bonus on my quarter and got $35 off. Since I blog about it and FB, I'm not sure who it is, but thanks!

So Saturday we pick up like 150 pounds of meat. And um.... I'm not exactly sure where it's going!

Remember, we have *two* deep freezes! In the beginning of September our stand up freezer looked like this.

<----

And four months later it looks like this ---->

We really need to have two cleaned off shelves for the meat we will receive. 

We still have a ways to go! But not really. Our (Andy's) 5 cu ft freezer is around half full. It was also full before having the baby. 

(NOTE - The rest of the post is mostly for me..... I'm going to keep an online list of what is in my freezer.) 

Our current stash includes: 

2 Tater Tot Casseroles

2 Mom's Lasagnas

2 Red Enchiladas

1 Green Enchiladas

Turkey Chili and Black Bean Soup (Those are the small containers in the door, and filling up the top drawer.)

2 lbs Bacon

5 lbs of Ground Turkey

6 lbs chicken (2-2 lbs cut for crockpot fajitas, 2 lbs cut for grilling)

Brats & Hot Dogs, Hamburger patties, and a few pounds of Ground Beef

T-Bone Steaks

Sirloin Steaks

NY Strip Steaks

Cube Steaks

Rump Roast

Shoulder Roast (defrosting actually, just had Beef Stroganoff and I want it again!)

London Broil

Chuck Steak

And a plastic container full of frozen bags of breast milk. 

In the 5-cu ft deep freeze.

2 Frozen Pizzas

2 Loafs of Bread

4-ounce salmon packs (Bag from Sams' Club)

Mozzarella Cheese & Pepperoni

Various Shredded Cheeses

Eggos

Toasted Ravioli

Fresh Ravioli (from Sam's Club)

Bertolli Meal - I dress it up with more veggies and chicken when I make it. 

5-lb bag of frozen mixed veggies (to make more Tater Tot casseroles)

16 Twice Baked Potatoes

8 Potatoes Au Gratin

Homemade Broccoli & Cheddar Quiche

Our upstairs fridge-freezer has Tater Tots, Eggos, Pizza Rolls, Meatballs, Tortillas, Egg Rolls & General Tso's Chicken;  you know, the important things! 

And I'm sure I'm forgetting a few things. Seriously. We won't be eating out for awhile!

I hope to make this Spaghetti Meat Sauce and get a bunch frozen. We would have had ravioli recently, but I have no sauce in the house! I was surprised too! 

Menu for this week includes:

Beef Stroganoff

Chinese food

Ravioli

We'll start there.

Beef Sandwiches

Have I mentioned how much I love watching The Pioneer Woman on Sunday mornings? And last Sunday was no exception! I need to start recording her show. I could go through her recipes online, but watching her show helps me better visual if I can actually make it. 

After Christmas, Jason and I went to the Lake of the Ozarks with my parents. Hell froze over and I got to control the remote control a few times! So Sunday morning, we all watched my favorite show. My mom even liked how she makes her spaghetti sauce. (I did too, I might try it sometime.) 

Searing the chuck roast in oil & butter

Since I still have meat from Crooked Creek Beef that I am trying to get through before my next cow is ready (like in a week or so...), I've been keeping my eye out for good recipes to use what I have left. 

We watched her make Drip Beef Sandwiches. They looked delicious! And since I had a chuck roast, I figured I'd give it a try! I varied it a bit to make it in the crock pot. The following instructions are Crock Pot - while she made it all in a Dutch Oven and same day. Next time I will probably just make it same day in the crock pot. 

Beef Sandwiches

Ingredients

One 3-4-pound chuck roast

Salt and black pepper

3 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons canola oil

2 cups beef broth (One 14.5 ounce can)

1 cup of water

1 jar pepperoncinis, juice and all

1 yellow onion, sliced

3 tablespoons butter

garlic powder, salt & pepper, Italian seasoning

Buns of your choice (Sams Club has these 12-inch hoggies that work well.
Swiss Cheese Slices

Directions

Sprinkle the chuck roast with salt and pepper.

Melt 3 tablespoons of the butter and the canola oil in a skillet over high heat. Sear both sides of the chuck roast until very browned, about 5 minutes in all. Move chuck roast into the crock pot. Pour in the beef broth and 1 cup water. Then pour in the jar of pepperoncini with their juices. Cook until the meat is tender and falling apart, 4 to 5 hours on high or 8-10 hours on low.

Note - You can eat this that night or save it for the next day. I followed TPW's lead. 

Separate the meat and pepperoncinis from the juice. Place in two separate containers. 

The Following Day

The next day, remove the solidified fat from the "juice container." Shred the meat and place the juice, meat, and pepperoncinis in a stock pot on the stove. Simmer on low for an hour. 

Meanwhile, heat a skillet over medium heat and add 3 tablespoons of butter. Add the onions and spices, and saute until light golden brown. Set aside.

To serve, slice bread in half and slightly toast. Heap a generous portion of meat on each roll, and then spoon some of the cooking liquid over the meat. Top with a few peppers from the pot and plenty of caramelized onions. Top with Swiss Cheese. I then placed mine in the toaster oven to melt the cheese.