Planned Leftovers
..........pairing up what's on sale and what I have on hand

Wednesday: Roast Chicken and Individual Apple Crisps

• crockpot-roast a whole chicken, with added mushrooms, onions and some root vegetables
• with my not-so-crisp apples I will make two individual custard cup-sized  apple crisps.
  
• put the stripped chicken bones and skin into my large crockpot with celery, garlic, water
  spices and onions to  cook overnight. 
• in the morning cool it, take the fat off the top and chill 

Thursday: Chicken Pasta Soup and Pineapple Upside-Down Cake

• tonight heat up what is needed for soup to pour over the leftover pasta 3-bean casserole.
• add leftover chicken to last few minutes of heating up the soup
• for dessert make a pineapple upside-down cake using rice flour, fresh pineapple
  and strawberries to put inside the pineapple rings.

Friday: Ground Turkey Stir Fry and Cucumber-Orange Salad

• cook up two night's of rice---one for tonight, one saved plain for Sunday
• zest orange peel very finely, about 1 teaspoon then juice the oranges to use in a sauce
  to mix with the rice
• add some soup broth to the rice if needed for sauce 
• use ground turkey and lots of veggies: mushrooms, broccoli,
  celery, cabbage, onion, and cauliflower and some pineapple to make a stir-fry.
• when it is done add raw chopped tomatoes to it on the plates
• mix thinly-sliced cucumbers in small custard cups with a quick sprinkling of
  soy sauce mixed with green onion and a splash of raw apple cider vinegar and orange zest.
• no salad tonight---we have lots of raw and crisp-cooked veggies.

Saturday: Shrimp Egg Rolls with Egg Drop Soup

•  add  last night's leftover stir-fry to a tiny bit of leftover rice
• add a handful of cooked, cleaned shrimp cut into tiny pieces 
• save two of the shrimp to add to egg drop soup. 
• add chopped shrimp to the rice/veggie mixture and use it to fill egg roll skins
• fill the wrappers, seal and fry the allowing them to drain on a paper towel when done
• put them in the oven to keep warm.
• take some of the chicken broth made earlier bringing it to a boil
• while this is coming to a boil whisk raw egg mixed with a little flour and drop it
  into the boiling broth
• pour into bowls, add a few cooked, leftover sliced mushrooms
  and some fresh green onions cut on the diagonal.
• float a shrimp on to of soup 
• add a few match-stick sliced carrots and float a few leaves of spinach or cilantro
  
• before bed put any kind of meat  you like---beef or pork, ground or stew-type meat
  in crock pot with water, curry or turmeric, onions and diagonally-sliced carrots

Sunday: Malay Curry Dinner and Apple-Cinnamon-Choclate  Egg Rolls

• before church put cool and put cooked meat sauce in refrigerator
• after church heat up meat sauce
• warm leftover rice
• in bowls dice into separate bowls:  raw tomatoes, green onions, pineapple, green or red
  onions, cukes, olives. Add also unsweetened coconut, sliced olives, avocado, bananas and
  raisins and nuts or seeds.
• to serve pour sauce over rice and top with ingredients in bowls
• top with a little yogurt if you wish
• for dessert chop apples, pecans or walnuts, add chocolate chips, cinnamon and raw sugar or
  another healthy sugar.
• fill egg rolls skins with mixture and fry
• let drain on paper towel
• serve warm or cold

Monday: Grilled Ribs and Pineapple with Purple and Green Salad and Leftover Jumble Dessert

• make barbecue sauce for beef ribs that I had in my freezer
• grill, adding more sauce as needed
• serve with my Purple and green salad (recipe to follow in a couple of days!)
• add leftover fruit, dried fruit, nuts, seeds, plain rice and coconut to yogurt earlier in the day and freeze
  in a glass bread loaf pan 
• soften a little before serving with chocolate chips, coconut, nuts and sliced strawberries on top

If there are little tidbits of leftovers, freeze them or toss them into something that sounds good.

Hope this thread helps you!

Enjoy!

Kathi~

 

Tasty Tuesday

.....Monday and Tuesday nights' dinners and a challenge for a
leftover thread!

This is a picture of the salad we had last night for dinner. We had eaten kind of heavily Sunday
afternoon----- things we don't ordinarily eat---- so my husband asked for something lighter and I agreed.

There were leftover salads---three bean and marinated cucumber/onion salad.

I changed the menu from what I was going to make just slightly.

This was Monday's dinner:

• I put some of the three bean salad on top of  Romaine lettuce and
  shredded  green cabbage pouring the marinade from both salads over the leaves. 
• I sliced and  sauteed the mushrooms, with white onion slivers and the broccoli
• I placed the marinated cucumbers around the edges of the salad.
• I soaked some hardened sour dough bread in the marinades and then added them to the saute pan to soften and get warm
• On the very top I added a small dollop of leftover deviled egg filling. 

It was a nice, light dinner.

Tonight:

• I cooked whole grain, organic pasta and drained it
• added the last of the sour cream 
• broke up and added some cooked fish
• all  the rest of the three bean salad with olives was added 
• added the last  2 ounce piece of mozzarella. 
• it was a little boring so I added some salsa---not enough to change the light color
  of the dish, just enough for some zip! 

There is enough left over to add, at the last minute, to steamy chicken soup.

I will start a new thread on Thursday.

Our local store is having a sale that day and just about everything on my shopping list is on sale! 

Wow, that never happens! 

What's on sale that I intend to buy:

• whole pineapple
• tomatoes
• several kinds of meat
• avocados
• cauliflower
• broccoli
• small watermelons
• apples
• cantaloupe
• strawberries
• several kinds of fish
• cheese
• red and green grapes
• spinach
• organic baby herb salad
• red potatoes
• organic Greek yogurt
  
  What I have on hand:
• soy sauce
• cabbage, green onions, mushrooms
• shredded unsweetened coconut
• nuts and seeds
• oranges that need to be juiced
• brown rice
• eggs
• chicken, whole
• beef ribs to grill
• apples that aren't crisp
• rice flour
• organic dark chocolate chips
• pecans
• cinnamon
• turmeric

And, of course lots of other things!
I listed these things because I have several
nights of entrees in mind.
I will share them with you tomorrow.
But today, play with my lists and see what you come up with.
Enjoy being creative!

Share any ideas you have with me!

Goodnight,
Kathi~

Catching Up
...what I've been doing while still sick

I am glad to report that I seem to be over the flu. I am building up my strength slowly---more slowly than I'd like. But patience is a virtue the Lord keeps teaching me in different ways.

I was not able to go to the stores where I shop without getting sick until last Friday. I had felt well for two days. My husband and I went to the grocery store south of us one afternoon and barely made it through the store I felt so ill. Happily, I did well this time unless you count the blisters I got walking too much in too many stores, too quickly. We didn't need much since my husband had just done most of the shopping for us a couple days earlier. But the lists I gave him were short and only what we absolutely needed. Friday I fun-shopped for things for St. Patrick's Day meals and a few gift items and other things we needed.

Regarding cooking, I have been trying to conserve my energy, cook healthful meals, and  without much work. I managed to create leftovers from leftovers, freezer freebie meals and a couple of special dishes.

Below is a taco salad using leftovers from a chicken, black beans and rice dinner with sour cream and salsa mixed for a dressing.

 These below are what I made with a surplus of our eggs and some winter squash that needed to be used up.
Squash pudding with cinnamon-----essentially it is your favorite pumpkin pie recipe without a crust.
I made two, froze one and made a several-night dinner pan with some potatoes that needed to be used, a little mozzarella cheese, more eggs and leftover asparagus on the bottom right. This last dish was served the night it was made, as a side with chicken and asparagus, served the next night as the main dish with a Mexican salsa sauce and a big salad, throughout the week it was also served as an occasional breakfast.
The eggs in the old coffee tin were from our hens that day.

 Earlier in the week I baked chicken tenders with leftover Asian green beans, mushrooms and onions in a homemade cream sauce for dinner. Later in the week I stove-top cooked boneless chicken thighs with mushrooms and onions and steamed the last of the asparagus. That night, after dinner I combined these two dishes into a small lasagna pan and put it in the freezer for a freebie dinner or two.

Last week instead of tossing the over-ripe bananas in the freezer, peels and all like I usually do. I made a banana cake I had tried and loved years ago. I had a little more banana than the recipe called for so I increased the recipe by half again making three cake layers. The recipe is from The Better Homes and Gardens (red checkered) Cookbook----Banana Cake. I substituted wholesome ingredients for things we do not eat. We ate one off and on for a few days as a dessert, often with organic, plain Greek yogurt and raw nuts and seeds. Yesterday I got the two other layers out to thaw. I made the cake in the picture below for tonight. The frosting is peanut butter (the natural kind, salt-free---just peanuts) mixed with cream cheese, local honey, organic agave, organic coconut oil, butter. I love peanut butter on bananas so that was the taste I was going for. I just kept mixing until I got the right texture, amount of sweetness and the taste I wanted. Then I topped it with chopped pecans and organic dark chocolate chips. Can't wait to try it. 

For our larger midday St. Patrick's Day meal I made Guinness Beef Stew: beef cubed, one onion chunky-cut, one turnip, a couple handfuls of organic small carrots, Brussels Sprouts, quartered large mushrooms, celery leaves and three small stalks, cooked in Guinness beer, water, a touch of soy sauce (subbed for the Worcestershire sauce) Costco's Organic Salt-Free Spice. This slow-cooked all night in my 7 quart crockpot. I left out the potatoes and instead made Colcannon----a mixture of mashed potatoes, milk or cream and chopped raw organic kale  wilted by mixing it into the hot potatoes and served with butter. It was delicious! I saved some of the cooked potato pieces out to make Potatoes O'Brien with our own garden bell peppers in the freezer and organic onions. Served with our organic eggs and local natural sausage. But I think we are too full tonight and will have that tomorrow for a breakfast dinner!

So, this week I cooked three meals and refashioned them into several meals and we had one meal after I was in town all afternoon from our natural food store----Calmata Olive Rolls, Lemon Chicken Basil Salad served on the cut rolls with the store's  Brocoli, Bacon, Red Onion and Sunflower Seed Salad, and on the side sliced Bubbies fermented pickles (did you know that pickles were not originally made with vinegar but fermented as sauerkraut is----best pickles on earth without all the bad stuff too!) on the side with a small pile of Organic tortilla chips, with a small vegan brownie a piece and a tall glass of Outrageous Ginger Ale.

It was an easy and fun week. A good one in which to recuperate from my long bout with the flu.

 I love to cook for St. Patrick's Day. My husband's father was half Irish, half British and he loved the day. We celebrate it in honor of him/family tradition and in remembrance and celebration of history of who St. Patrick (the evangelist) really was. Google him! Quite a story!

Hope you have had a good week and maybe enjoyed some Irish dishes today. It's fun to try new foods. 

Kathi~

Pictures and Menus for this Week's Meal Threads

Monday:  I made Crockpot vegetable beef soup with a small piece of round steak that was on sale.
Tuesday:   Steamy soup as it was just coming to a boil before serving. It was not ready to eat on Monday.

Wednesday:  About 1/3 of round steak was removed from soup late Monday night when soup was done. I refrigerated the soup and the meat chunks, and later shredded and heated it to fill homemade tacos with cheese, onions, romaine lettuce, diced avocados and halved grape tomatoes. Frozen tamale casserole from previous thread served on shredded romaine, halved grape tomatoes and slivers of yellow onion.

Freebie: I fried the rest of the tortillas last night while the tamale casserole was baking and set them aside. After dinner I  added leftover tamale casserole to the tortillas I had fried and formed into tacos. Topped this off with some grated cheese, slices of avocado and halved grape tomatoes with lemon juice (lime would have been better with Mexican food but I didn't have any) squeezed over the top to prevent discoloration of the avocados. I put this in the freezer for another night.This recipe was inspired by a pictures a friend posted on her Pinterest board. I was going to follow the recipe but then when I saw half the tamale casserole was leftover I just couldn't resist and used that as stuffing for the tacos to bake later. And I also could not resist using the leftover avocado half! This will be a "freebie" for next week or the one after that.

Thursday:  Tonight we are having the Shepherd's Pie I made in the meatloaf thread of leftovers to which I will add the rest of the soup veggies that we had on Tuesday night because I didn't have many when I made and froze the pie a couple weeks ago.

Friday: Tomorrow night the menu is for pieces of chicken cooked in a barbeque sauce using the last of the soup broth. This will be served with raw veggie slices, homemade potato salad, and two deviled eggs.  Tomorrow, I will cook extra chicken so I have a base for another leftover thread.

Saturday: Perhaps Chicken Cacciatore since we are getting an Italian veggie pack with our Bountiful Baskets Co-op order Saturday morning. We will probably get another eggplant which we don't like.

Sooooo...... If any of you have any yummy eggplant recipes please add them to the comments below! Sure appreciate it!

Kathi~

Baked Chili Relleno Casserole
......a recipe from my mom's recipe box (from her friend Pat)

7 oz. can whole green chilies with seeds removed (or use Poblano peppers you prepare yourself)
Cheddar cheese for grating on top of dish
Jack Cheese for stuffing or layering peppers
6 eggs---or more to cover chilies and cheese
3 tablespoons flour
1 can evaporated milk  I use half and half or leave milk out entirely adding another egg or two.
**Mom's recipe does not give full instructions but  I add the flour to the cold milk and then to the egg mixture.

Grease glass pan.
Place chilies on the bottom either stuffed with cheese or layered (Mom always made them with thick slices
of cheese wrapped in a whole chili spaced evenly on bottom of pan.
Whip egg mixture and pour over chilies

Bake at 325* for one hour or until eggs are set up. Let sit 30 minutes.(I never have done this)
Add tomato sauce  and some grated cheese. (sometimes I pour mild salsa over the top instead)

**I make my own tomato sauce from tomato paste. Tomato paste is usually just tomatoes. Tomato sauce now has other things added like sugar and salt and often other spices.

Variation: add ground beef or meat of your choice to tomato sauce.

Hope you enjoy this as much as we always do. It is a little spicy but not bad I don't think.

Kathi~

Got eggs?

....real men don't eat quiche

My husband will not eat quiche-----well, unless we are at someone's house and they serve it. His mom and dad taught him to be polite.  He may even ask for seconds, but he decidedly does not care for the dish.  Frankly, neither do I, so, it's not a problem at our house. But, we have chickens and since we have started heating their feed and cooking up too-small potatoes from our garden to give them also, they are producing like it is July! We do have a couple of customers who will buy eggs from us and we give eggs to our kids---those that live near us. But we still have too many eggs.

So, I need to plan meals or other dishes to make using eggs. Of course we love them cooked in any fashion for breakfast or the occasional breakfast-for-dinner meal. And I have been using the winter squash we grew last year with the eggs to make custards which kind of taste like crust-less pumpkin pie.

I do have some recipes that use a lot of eggs-----Chili Relleno Casserole, angel food cake, pound cake to use up the yolks from making angel food cake, pumpkin pudding, omelettes...and so on. But here is an out-of-the-box idea I'd like to share.

Breakfast Egg Loaf

• scramble and then whisk eggs (I use six in a glass bread loaf pan, you can also use a muffin tin---use more or less depending on how many eggs you have and how many you are going to feed this to and for how long----mine usually lasts 3-4 days) until just  blended, not too much or you'll end up like I did last week with a giant bubble on top of what tastes like scrambled eggs (my squash custards).

• now, go to your refrigerator to see what you find there to add to the eggs. These are things I often use in this recipe---not all of the ingredients just a few:
  -mushrooms
  -tomatoes
  -avocado
  -onions
  -peppers
  -cooked zucchini and or spinach (raw will give off too much water and spoil the loaf)
  -any other veggies you like that lend themselves to being paired with eggs
  -cooked ground meat, shredded beef or sausage
  -cooked chicken
  -cooked fish
  -cooked ground turkey
  -cheese
  chop, slice or grate---whichever you'd like depending on the way you want it to look and how long it will take what you choose to put in it will take to cook.
• now, go to your pantry and see what else you can find to add. Again, just choose a few:
  -spices
  -sauces, salsa
  -canned beans
  -leftover bottom-of-the-bag chips
  -corn tortillas (fried in ripped or cut pieces)
• take a loaf pan or a cake or pie pan, grease or spray it
• put all the ingredients you have found into the pan, spices go in with the eggs. I have layered the ingredients nicely in the pan only to have the light things  float to the top when the egg was added, so, now I don't bother.
• I usually bake this without any cheese but sometimes I do use grated cheese or top it off with dry Parmesan on occasion.
•  bake at 350* until egg is thoroughly set up.
• Cool it a little bit and put it in the refrigerator with a cloth over it to keep it from drying out. Foil or plastic wrap can make it too moist. Do whatever works best for you.
• I use this cold or warmed up for breakfast or lunch especially when I am in a hurry. Sometimes I grab a slice of  it and go, or I take it in a baggie or container and at other times I pour salsa over it or a dollop of real sour cream. I cut it so that I am taking only about 2 eggs or less. For lunch I sometimes heat it up and serve it atop a bed of romaine or sprouts with some sliced tomatoes and or avocado.
• It's very versatile, easy to make, great for using up eggs and other leftovers. I have even put broken tortilla chips in the bottom for a slight crust.

No, my husband doesn't especially like this any better than quiche. But if I heat it up, with melted cheese and salsa he will eat it. I just save it for myself.
I have even divided it up into single servings and frozen some of it.
And it works well put in a flour tortilla with some sprouts or lettuce to go.
Don't keep it too long.
Use your imagination putting just about anything in it that you like.

Enjoy!

Kathi~

Safety Quick Tip

Not wanting to have meat that is a few days old added to a soup that will be used for leftovers for a few more days,
I often (if that is the case) add the thoroughly cooked meat to the bowls of soup as it is served, not adding it to the soup itself.
I also do the same with pasta and rice--
but with these it is more an issue of quality
since those things soak up the liquids from hot soup
and totally change the texture and taste of the soup
and the pasta or rice become soggy.
That way those who are
watching carbs, allergic or who are gluten-intolerant
can enjoy the soup too.

Always be safe. 

Pictures of Meals From This Week

Monday's soup: in crockpot ready to slow cook

 Ready to serve

Tuesday's leftovers have no pictures: mug of chili made from last of chicken soup from the week before, with black beans and chili powder added. Sandwiches filled with leftover frozen cooked chicken and sweet broccoli salad with bacon (leftover frozen, cooked). I substituted what  I had on hand for what I did not have that were similar to the recipes I used.

Wednesday's leftovers: Chili Tortilla Pie---leftover broken chips, onions from our garden, sour cream, and
leftover chili from Monday, thickened and made spicier. Leftovers of this went well with eggs for two breakfasts.

Thursday's leftovers: Hungarian Goulash---leftover soup (strained, broth saved) and drop biscuits from picture above,  with added paprika and sour cream.  Strained broth from this dish was lunch for me  yesterday.

This was a short leftover meal thread---4 days. Some things don't lend themselves to many meals. But I actually only spent $3.71 (for pastured chuck steak which was $6.98/lb. for 3/4lb. at $4.71 marked $1 off because the "sell-by" date was approaching) for those four days (for the main entrees) from this week's food budget. So, that's still a great savings.

I still have Mexican dishes in my freezer from Christmas Eve leftovers and three or four meals from the meatloaf leftover thread. When I call a meal a "freebie" I usually mean that it frees me up to not have to cook one or more nights. I got this phrase from my husband's Aunt Chris. When she cleared the table and found something unused, like a spoon or knife she would call out, "A Freebie!" meaning she did not have to wash it. But, I guess it also is free in that I do not spend any money on it during the week I am serving it! I like "Freebies" even more now!

Friday: Tonight, Gyros made with natural ground turkey. Picture to follow IF I can break through the ice in our driveway with a long-handled tool so I can get to my car and the store. I am out of ground turkey in my freezer.

Tonight starts with an initial meal in a short leftover thread that will end on Saturday. Any leftovers, however, will be revived again on Monday with a soup of course! All that will be left is a little of the seasoned fully cooked meat so if there is any left on Saturday I will not put it in Monday's soup but serve it in the bowls with the soup since the soup will be the initial meal in another meal thread for a few days. Always think ahead about how long you are keeping ingredients so you never end up with something spoiling your meals-----or your health.

Have a great weekend!
Kathi~

The Last and  Next Leftover Threads
......Monday to Monday

Last Monday, I started a new leftover thread with soup. I cleaned out the refrigerator and freezer of many things that needed to be used and small packets of leftovers I had frozen. Because of what I had on hand the  soup ended up being spicy which influenced what I chose to do with it the rest of the week.

Tuesday we ate re-created leftover chicken soup whirled in a blender to which was added black beans and some chili powder. This was accompanied by the last of the frozen chicken I had taken off the whole chicken I had used previously for soup. I looked up my favorite recipe from our natural foods store, Lemon Basil Chicken Salad. I did not have fresh or frozen basil so used dry basil and I didn't have candied walnuts so just put in raw cashews instead. I toasted Costco's organic seed bread and used the chicken salad on that for sandwiches. To accompany the mugs of soup and the sandwiches, I made a creamy broccoli salad (many recipes online) using up the last two already-cooked and crumbled pieces of bacon, our last two tiny red onions from our garden, almonds instead of sunflower seeds and raisins (one last box of raisins left over from filling the 11 grandchildren's Christmas stockings) instead of dried cranberries.

Wednesday I served a dish I made using the leftovers from Tuesday's soup and some things left from the meatloaf meal thread that were in the freezer---meatloaf and cooked rice. I thickened the chili and added the meatloaf slice, broken up and cooked rice. I used the last of the broken chips from the week before, spread them in a pie plate, topped them with the chili, then with some of  the last of our sour cream, sprinkled the top with cilantro and chili powder, decorated the top with whole chips and thinly sliced yellow onions we grew last season. This morning I had a little of the leftovers with two of our eggs for breakfast (actually brunch).

Thursday, tonight, I will serve a Hungarian stew I made from Monday's soup. I strained the soup, added the vegetables and beef to a casserole dish, mixed in paprika and the very last of the sour cream. I topped it with the two leftover drop biscuits from Monday after I slathered the bottom of each with butter so they won't get mushy while cooking.  I have enough broth leftover for one mug for my lunch tomorrow. I will serve this over noodles or homemade dumplings---my mom's recipe!

Friday I will start a new but small thread of meals. I am going to use ground turkey as a less expensive substitute for Gyros, which are usually made with ground lamb, for the first meal. After being covered thickly with garlic, basil, rosemary and whatever else I can find on hand that tastes Greek it will be baked long and slowly in the oven just as it comes out of the tight, round packaging, while still a little frozen so it holds its round shape. If your ground turkey isn't in a round tube, shape it however you like. Read the labels to make sure the meat is just turkey, nothing else. I may make my own pita bread or buy it from our natural food store. I will make my own yogurt dressing and serve it with a marinated raw veggie salad or purple balsamic slaw and a big, naturally fermented pickle and a few chips!

On Saturdays we will probably grill some meat, fish or chicken to have with big salads and maybe grilled bread..

After church Sunday, we will have a salad dinner with the leftovers of the grilled meat from Saturday sliced thinly on top of the salads. If we are hungry later we will have waffles for dinner.

On Monday the second usage of the ground turkey (leftovers from the Gyros) will be added to soup with dark green kale that needs to be used, carrots which are still frozen in my refrigerator, hummus or just the garbanzo beans or white beans, depending on how much time I have and whatever else I have around that sounds like it will go with the Gyros meat!

Hope you find this helpful.
I hope, by now, you are using your own creativity to come up with  your own meal threads and not wasting anything in your kitchen. Always, always, always be careful not to keep things too long.  Getting food poisoning is not worth saving a few dollars!  If you have a long thread like the one I had for meatloaf as the initial meal in a thread, freeze a lot of it.

Have fun and enjoy!
Kathi~

Tasty Tuesday
......fried chicken and other camping food memories

When I was growing up we camped, took day trips, weekend and longer vacation trips.
Sometimes we went alone as a family and occasionally we
went with another family or many in our neighborhood.
We had a blast!
Not only did we have really good times at the beach or mountains, but

I remember many different foods we ate on those trips.

We baked cakes in our box oven atop a campfire or a camp stove.
Popa liked to grill and we made "Boy Scout" potatoes to go with whatever he grilled.
Etched on my mind is the image of him standing outside our tent
in a sudden mountain rain storm holding an umbrella over the fire while he finished
grilling our chicken!
Many early mornings were spent catching trout from a river-side camp site,
cleaning them and giving them to Mom to cook for breakfast with eggs,
toast scorched on those old square top-of-the-burner toasters, and sliced tomatoes.
 Raspberry push-up ice cream, rainbow popsicles or drumsticks covered with nuts and chocolate from the store at our beach camp were favorites.
Remember Jiffy-Pop?
What camping trip would be complete without s'mores?
And why do hot dogs or just plain marshmallows taste better roasted on a green tree branch?
Sometimes Mom made the following  recipe which we all loved.


A Loaf of Chicken

Fry or bake chicken pieces using a favorite recipe.
While the chicken is cooking,
cut the top off and hollow out a large sourdough or other round, unsliced loaf of crusty bread.
Spread herbed butter or garlic butter on the inside of the bread.
Add the fully-cooked hot chicken to the bread loaf and put the top on.
Wrap in foil. Let sit a couple of minutes.
Serve hot.
The flavor of the cooked chicken and the herbed butter will penetrate the bread
which is eaten along with the chicken---tearing off chunks by hand.

Save the bread, from hollowing out  the loaf, in a freezer bag and use sometime for stuffing.
You can vary this recipe by adding any other ingredients you like.
Be creative and enjoy!
Kathi~

Spicy Soup and Drop Biscuits

See what it looked like after it cooked!
Not all the orange stuff is carrots, some of it is winter squash.
Just slightly spicy and really flavorful.

Drop biscuits are yummy and turned out great without a recipe.

Custard---strange-looking, not sure why, but creamy and good anyway.
Goodnight.
Kathi~

Another meal thread

......a chicken in every pot!

Last week I did a thread of meals starting with a three-meat, three-pound meatloaf and a big pot of mashed potatoes.

These are the meals I created: 

Some are frozen for later use, others I made fresh. I like to intersperse other meals from previous menu threads into each thread for variation of ingredients, taste and nutrition.
1- Meatloaf with mashed potatoes
2-Shepherd's Pie
3-Spaghetti and Meatballs (cut-up cubes of meatloaf)
4-Spaghetti Pizza
5-Sweet and Sour Meatballs with rice and broccoli
6-Lasagna for two nights
7-Soup using the thread before this one, adding leftovers from above meals to the last of that soup
8-Hot Meatloaf Sandwiches w/mashed potatoes, broccoli with gravy using chicken broth from next thread

9-a couple of lunches


Next thread of meals: Chicken in a Pot
Yesterday afternoon I put one whole chicken in my 7 qt. crockpot with carrots, onion, garlic and the last of the salvaged celery stalks that did not freeze and about 3 tablespoons of Costco's No-Salt Organic Spice and covered it almost to the top with cold water. I cooked it on high. When it was done, just before dinner, I cooled it and put it in the fridge overnight.

This afternoon I will skim the solidified fat off the top of the soup and take chicken out of the broth and remove all meat. I will grind up the gooey stuff, skimmed fat and skin in the blender and serve a little each day to our cats on top of their food. A little extra fat during the winter is good for them. Bones get put in a 2qt. crockpot with some spices and veggies of all kinds, including soft tomatoes, that need to be used up to make a little broth (strained and solids given to chickens) to use in other recipes or to freeze. The following meals will either be eaten fresh or frozen for later.

Meals I hope to get out of this thread are:
1-Chicken Soup with noodles or dumplings--tonight because neither of us feels very well.
2-Creamy Chicken Pasta  with leftover blue cheese, sour cream and broccoli in a sauce made with broth
3-Cashew Chicken,  a stir-fry with veggies, soy sauce, turmeric and broth
4-Creamed Chicken Soup, blenderized leftover soup in a mug with a cheese sandwich or hummus wrap
5- Chicken-Veggie Salad Dinner with homemade rolls

6-Gourmet Chicken Rolls---last of chicken mixed with mayo, last of the sour cream,  seasoning, veggies, raisins ( I found one box left from the grandkids' Christmas stockings!), crispy bacon (left in freezer from Christmas) and nuts served on buns made the day before.
7-If a little bit of chicken is left I will put it in a container and freeze to add to soup later.

I hope this gives you some ideas. Be creative! Have fun! Use as much of what you already have as you can! You are only limited by your creativity----and, of course, your budget.

My husband and I are empty-nesters and so the initial amount I make is small in comparison to a family who has children at home. Adjust the initial amount to make it larger, cook more than you need so you will have leftovers and can make the meals that follow the initial meal of the thread.

Obviously if you have 10 children you will need more than three pounds of meatloaf or one whole chicken for your meal threads. I am just listing what I do for the two of us. Even if it's not feasible for you to do it exactly the way I do, I believe you will still save money.

Have a great weekend. Tonight I will do a short blog on dealing with calamities in the kitchen, especially when company is expected!

Right now, I must go to the store----the ice on the porches has melted in this 45 degree heat wave we are having today. This week the local store has many things we ordinarily purchase, on sale! My list is made and I will use all the rules for shopping that I outlined in a previous blog.  The sun and fresh air will do me good.  It's a beautiful day!

Kathi~