Chewy No-Bake Granola Bars

Money Saving Mom

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 ½ cups Rice Krispies (if you want to make these healthier, you can use plain puffed rice cereal)
• 1 ¾ cups quick oats (regular rolled oats work too)
• ¼ cup wheat germ (or ground flax seed, wheat bran, or additional oats)
• ½ cup additional mix-in ingredients, optional (i.e. shredded coconut, chopped nuts, raisins or other dried fruit, sesame or sunflower seeds, etc.)
• ½ cup honey
• ½ cup brown sugar (or sucanat)
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• 2/3 cup peanut butter
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• ½ cup mini chocolate chips

DIRECTIONS:

• Combine first 4 dry ingredients in a bowl.
• In a saucepan, mix the honey, brown sugar and salt. Over medium-low heat, stir until the mixture comes to a complete boil for 30-60 seconds.
• Remove from heat and stir in the peanut butter and vanilla until smooth.
• Pour over the dry ingredients and mix well.
• Let cool for 15-20 minutes before mixing in the chocolate chips.
• Press into a greased 9×13 pan and let cool before cutting into bars.

These freeze well!!

Mommy made these for the first time tonight and they were so good!  I used wheat germ and raw sunflower seeds as my options.  Man, they are good!  I can't wait for you children to try them (they weren't finished before you headed to bed).  Daniel came in and said, "You aren't eating all those tonight are you?  Oh, no, it's 10:00 and you couldn't eat a whole pan by yourself tonight!".  You are right, Buddy.  Don't worry.  I'll save some for you!

Love Always,

Mommy

Swedish Pancakes

2 C milk
4 eggs
1 TB veg. oil
1 1/2 C flour
3 TB sugar
1/4 tsp salt
Lingonberries or raspberries
seedless raspberry jam, warmed
whipped topping

In a blender, combine the first 6 ingredients.  Cover and process until blended.  Heat a lightly greased 8in nonstick skillet; pour 1/4 C batter into center of skillet.  Lift and tilt pan to evenly coat bottom.  Cook over med. heat until top appears dry; turn and cook 15-20 seconds longer.  Repeat with remaining batter, adding oil to skillet as needed.  Stack pancakes with waxed paper or paper towels in between.  Fold pancakes into quarters; serve with berries, jam and whipped topping.  Makes a lot! :)

Yield: 20 pancakes

 Oh yum!  These are incredible!  I love these with raspberry jam or real maple syrup.  We ate something similar in Holland.  They would make these with any kind of topping you can imagine.  Lots of different kinds of "pancakes" with meat and an assortment of veggies.  I don't have any idea where I got this recipe but we have been making these for years.
Love Always, 
Mommy

Smoothie Hints

Smoothie Hints

Smoothies are a yummy and filling way to get all kinds of "good for you" things into your diet.  Here are some smoothie basics.

Use a combination of fresh and frozen fruit.  The frozen fruit will make it cold without diluting the flavor.  Bananas, as well as apples, are great for adding sweetness.

Choose just a couple types of fruit.

Add raw honey or maple syrup as a sweetener if needed.

It is so easy to add probiotics, some greens (spinach, lettuce, etc), liquid vitamin D, chia seed gel, egg shell water, ground flax seed, apple seeds, etc. to boost the nutritional value.  Hannah doesn't like green smoothies so if adding greens I usually make sure and use blueberries to make it purple instead.  :)

Raw milk, Kiefer, raw milk yogurt, or juice work wonderfully to thin the smoothie to the desired consistency.

Don't forget to add a splash of vanilla for extra yumminess!  :)

Very Berry Smoothie

Mommy created recipe

2 apples
2 bananas
10 frozen strawberries
small handful frozen blueberries
small handful frozen raspberries
small handful frozen blackberries
splash of grape juice

Quarter the apples and remove the stem.  Peel the bananas.  Blend all ingredients until smooth.

Mommy likes to make smoothies for breakfast or lunch.  They are never the same twice but Hannah liked this one so much she wanted me to write down what I did.  :)  It was really good!  Smoothies are a wonderful way to get all kinds of "good for you" stuff and still have it taste really yummy!


Love Always, 
Mommy

Shell's Granola

Mommy modified recipe

1 C. butter
1 C. honey
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
7 C. oatmeal
1 C. wheat germ
1 C. raisins
1 C. golden raisins

In a large dutch oven pot melt the butter.  Stir in the honey and let it simmer for 2-3 minutes being careful not to burn the mixture.

Add the salt and cinnamon and stir well.  Remove mixture from heat.  Stir in oatmeal and wheat germ and coat well.  Spread granola on a large baking sheet.

Bake at 375 degrees for 10 minutes or until golden brown.  Stir and let cool.

Add both types of raisins and store in an airtight container.

We usually eat this over cereal or yogurt.  This is an easy recipe to make but so yummy.  It's our favorite granola recipe.
Love Always,
Mommy

Best Pancake Batter

Crystal Paine from Money Saving Mom

3 cups flour 
3 Tablespoons sugar
3 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
3 beaten eggs
3 cups milk plus 1 1/2 tsp. lemon juice
6 Tablespoons oil
2 tsp. vanilla

Combine dry ingredients in a pitcher. Add wet ingredients. Stir together, digging deeply to get all the flour moist. 

Cook on a hot, lightly greased griddle (375 degrees) or heavy skillet.  Pour batter from pitcher onto griddle.  Flip when the top is all bubbly.

Makes approximately 20 standard sized pancakes.

There is no other pancake batter for Team Southerland!  Mommy found this recipe from Crystal Paine years ago when she ran the website Biblical Womanhood Online.  She now runs Money Saving Mom.  This is a fantastic recipe to make along with bacon, eggs, and homemade hashbrowns for Breakfast for Dinner.

Love Always,

Mommy

Strawberry Milkshakes

Modified from a recipe from Heavenly Homemakers

1 C. milk
1 C. heavy whipping cream
2 C. frozen strawberries
2 TB maple syrup
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Pour milk and cream into blender.  Add frozen strawberries, maple syrup, and vanilla.  Blend until desired consistency is reached.

What a fun breakfast!  We need to make these more often.  What a wonderful summertime treat.
Love Always,
Mommy

Freezer Jam

Jevonne Humphrey


3 lbs. strawberries
2 C. sugar
7 TB Instant pectin


Puree strawberries in the blender.  Combine pectin and sugar in a bowl.  Pour in 4 3/4 C. strawberry puree and mix for 3 minutes.  Pour into desired containers and let stand for 30 minutes.  Store in fridge for 3-4 weeks or freezer for a very long time!


Hannah and Mommy made this last fall and it was so yummy!  We put it on toast, stir it into yogurt, or eat it on bagels with cream cheese.  So delicious!  I bet it would be awesome on pancakes too.
Jevonne is a gal Mommy went to elementary school with.  Mommy and Jevonne got reacquainted on Facebook in 2011 and she shared this recipe with us.
Love Always,
Mommy

Apple Butter

http://moneysavingmom.com/2011/10/homemade-apple-butter-recipe-plus-free-printable-labels.html

• 6 pounds medium apples 
• 2 Tablespoons vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups raw or brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon ground cloves
• 3-4 teaspoons cinnamon

Peel, core, and slice apples in fourths. Put them in the crockpot with the vanilla and cook on low for 6-8 hours. Stir every few hours. Once apples are very, very tender, mash with a potato masher and stir in sugar and spices. Cook on low for another 5-6 hours, stirring occasionally.

Cool and pour into jars or an airtight container. Store in the refrigerator for several weeks or freezer for a long time.

We made this in the Fall of 2011.  It was yummy.  We like to stir it into yogurt or put it on bagels with cream cheese.  The house smells so yummy while this is cooking!

Love Always,

Mommy 

Daniel's Birthday Cinnamon Rolls

http://amysfinerthings.com/moms-cinnamon-rolls


1/2 c. very warm water
1 T. sugar
2 T. yeast
1/2 c. melted butter
2 eggs
2 t. salt
1/2 c. sugar
1 1/2 c. warm milk
5 1/2 c. flour
butter
brown sugar
sugar
cinnamon

Icing

2 TB butter, softened

2 tsp vanilla

2 TB milk

1 C. powdered sugar (use more to get desired consistency) 

1. Combine water, 1 T. sugar and yeast.  Set aside for 5 minutes to activate.
2. Mix 1/2 c. sugar, melted butter, eggs, and salt.  Add yeast mixture.
3. Stir in warm milk.
4. Add 5 cups flour, 1-2 cups at a time.  More flour may be necessary.
5. Knead dough on a well-floured surface, adding flour as necessary, until dough isn’t sticky.
6. Let rise until double (about a hour or so) in a clean, oiled bowl.
7. Punch down risen dough.  Separate into two pieces.
8. Roll out dough in a large rectangle.  Spread with softened butter.  Sprinkle liberally with brown sugar, white sugar, and cinnamon.
9. Roll dough into 13" log.  Ct dough with dental floss into about 12 (1-inch) rolls.  Place in 9×13 pan.  Let rise until double (about 1 hour or so).
10. Bake at 350° for 20-22 minutes.  Spread icing while hot.

For icing, melt butter.  Add vanilla and milk.  Sift powdered sugar into mixture and stir well.

These are the most amazing cinnamon rolls!  We made them for Daniel's 10th birthday and then we made them to take them to church the next weekend.  For church, we made 18 rolls per pan by rolling the dough into 19" logs.  (You always lose an inch somewhere along the way).  :)  These are definitely going to be made again.  I did sneak in 2 C. of freshly ground wheat and they were still wonderful; it didn't change the taste.  When we took them to church we make the dough, let it rise the first time, and assembled the rolls.  We put them in the refrigerator and the next morning we took them out to let them rise and bake.  Our house smelled incredible as these were cooking.  Oh yum!

Love Always,

Mommy

Raspberry Syrup

Mommy invention

12 oz. raspberries
1/4-1/2 C. sugar

Put the raspberries in a saucepan and sprinkle sugar on top.  Mash the fruit and cook over medium heat.  Serve over pancakes or stir into yogurt.

You can use any type of berries.

We had Breakfast for Dinner last week and we made up this syrup for our pancakes.  The children love it.  If the seeds are bothersome it could be strained through cheesecloth before serving.  We have been using the leftovers in our raw milk yogurt. Yum!
Love Always,
Mommy

Raw Milk Yogurt

Mommy modified this recipe that was originally from the Nourishing Traditions book..

6 3/4 C. raw milk
3/4 C. powdered milk
2/3 C. whole milk yogurt, plain

Heat milk and dry milk in a double boiler to 110 degrees.  Add 2 TB of the warm milk plus 1 TB starter yogurt into each quart jar.

Stir or shake to combine.  Pour the remaining warm milk into the two quart jars and add an additional 3 TB of yogurt per jar.  Leave the lids off and incubate in the dehydrator at 95 degrees for 8 1/2 to 9 hours.

This yields 2 quarts of yogurt.

Raw milk yogurt is my favorite for flavor and nutritional value.  I am still experimenting with this recipe to perfect it.  I would like to try leaving the lids off and incubating it at 100 or 105 degrees to speed up the process and reduce tartness.  The recipe as written isn't very tart and is about a medium thickness.  Keeping the raw milk below 110 degrees insures that all the live enzymes are still alive.  This is so very good for you and it's yummy too!  Mommy has found the Nourishing Traditions book to be helpful although I am not convinced that everything proposed is exactly correct health-wise.  As with everything, if you choose to read the book, ask God to give you wisdom and glean what you can from it.  Don't worry about the rest!  :)
Love Always,
Mommy

Yogurt- Dehydrator Incubated

Mommy created from several different recipes

2 qts. of milk
2/3 C. powdered milk
1/3 C. whole milk yogurt with live cultures, unflavored

Combine the milk and powdered milk in a large saucepan.  Heat over medium heat to 180 degrees, stirring almost constantly.  (This takes awhile- 15-20 minutes or so.)

Pour hot mixture into a pitcher and let it cool to 115 degrees.  The quickest way to cool this down is to put the pitcher in some ice water.

Remove 1/3 C. warm milk mixture and combine it in a small bowl with the yogurt starter.  Stir until smooth and yogurt is dissolved.  Combine mixture with warm milk in the pitcher.

Pour into two 1 qt. mason jars.  Leave the lids off and incubate in the dehydrator at 115 degrees for 3 1/2-4 hours.  Put the lids on and refrigerator overnight to thicken.

Flavor individual servings with dried fruit, granola, pure maple syrup, fruit syrup, pureed fruit, honey, or all fruit jam.

I have found that it is much easier to flavor the individual servings of yogurt than to try and flavor a whole quart at a time.  Sometimes the flavoring will thin the yogurt, but that doesn't seem to happen when we flavor our individual servings.  Yogurt is very good for you.  It is something we should be consuming on a regular basis.  Mommy would really like to be better about having either yogurt or kefir a couple times a week.  I am so glad all of my children enjoy homemade yogurt so much.  It is good stuff!
Love Always,
Mommy

Crock Pot Yogurt

A fellow MOMYS posted this and I modified it a bit.

INGREDIENTS:
-1/3 cup of store bought, natural, active/live culture, full fat (not low fat or fat free) plain yogurt. (This will be your starter.  After your first batch of yogurt, you can use 1/2 cup of some of your homemade yogurt as a starter instead.)
-2 quarts of whole milk. Pasteurized and Homogenized is fine, but do not use ultra-pasteurized.
2/3 C. powdered milk

1. Pour the milk into the crock pot and turn the crock pot on low. Cook on low for 2 1/2 hours.

2. Turn the crock pot off, leave the cover on, and let the milk sit for 3 hours.

3. Take a cup or two of the warm milk from the crock pot, and put it in a small mixing bowl. Mix in 1/3 cup of store-bought yogurt, or 1/2 cup of homemade yogurt as your starter.  Mix in powdered milk.

4. Mix the yogurt/warm milk mixture into the milk that's sitting in your crock pot.

5. Put the lid on the crock pot, then fold and put a heavy bath towel over the crock pot to insulate the leftover heat (leave the crock pot turned off), and go to bed.

6. The next morning, you'll have yogurt waiting for you in the crock pot. :-) Home made yogurt is thinner than store-bought.

7. Pour the yogurt into a container, cover it, and put it into the fridge. Let the yogurt fully cool down to the fridge temp.

8. Then, if you'd like to add fruit to your yogurt, put a few cups of chopped fruit (of your choice) into a blender, and blend. Then mix the blended fruit into the yogurt and return to the fridge to cool it some more.

More add in ideas:

Honey, cut fruit, jam, maple syrup, or granola are all nice additions as well.

This is an easy yogurt that turns out well without a big failure rate.  This is a good one to use when first learning how to make yogurt.  I always add powered milk to my yogurt to thicken it up.  Enjoy!
Love Always,
Mommy

Baking Powder Biscuits

Aunt Sheri Southerland gave us this recipe and it it our new favorite

2 C. flour
1 TB organic evaporated sugar cane
1 TB baking powder
1 tsp sea salt
1/2 C. palm shortening
3/4 C. milk

Combine dry ingredients.  Cut in palm shortening.  Stir in milk.  Combine dough and knead 10 strokes.  Cut with biscuit cutter and place on cookie sheet sides not touching.  Bake at 450 degrees for 10-12 minutes.

These are nice and fluffy biscuits that I make several times a week for Daddy for breakfast.  I like to make a batch x5 and store it in a container.  Then I just have to measure out 3 C. of mix and 3/4 C. of milk.  Super easy in the morning!  :)
Love Always,
Mommy

Frozen Hashbrowns

Frozen Hashbrowns from Laura at Heavenly Homemakers

Scrub and stab a bunch of potatoes.  Place in an oven proof dish that has a lid.  Bake at 350 degrees for 1 1/2 hours.  Allow potatoes to cool completely.

Peel cool potatoes with a vegetable peeler.  Cut out the bad spots.

Shred potatoes with a cheese grater.  Either cook them now or freeze them for later.

To Freeze:
Lay them out on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet and freeze for several hours.  Transfer to gallon freezer ziplocks.

To cook:
A cast iron skillet on the stove works wonderfully for these hashbrowns.  Melt a very generous amount of butter in the skillet over medium high heat.  Add potatoes and cook them on one side for 4-5 minutes, then turn.  Cook until golden brown and slightly crispy.  DON'T stir them or they will turn to mush.

If hashbrowns are frozen, just cook them a little longer on a slightly lower heat.

These are so yummy!!!  Hannah and I just peeled and shredded about 8 pounds of potatoes.  They are in the freezer now.  :)  I am thinking fresh eggs and homemade hashbrowns for dinner!  That is some good eating!  Thank you for helping me Sweetie!

Love Always,
Mommy

Creamed Eggs Over Toast

Living on a Dime
Good Morning Sunshine

2 cups white sauce
6 eggs, hard boiled and chopped
1/2 C. dry milk
1/4 C. flour
2 dashes salt
2 C. cold water
2 TB butter
6 pieces of toast

In a covered jar, combine flour and salt and mix well. Add water. Shake until all the ingredients are dissolved. Melt margarine in a 1 quart sauce pan. Stir in flour-milk mixture and cook over low heat until mixture thickens and starts to bubble. Keep stirring until thickened completely. Once the white sauce has thickened, add eggs. Serve on toast.

We have really enjoyed the Moody books by Sarah Maxwell. In book 3, Winter with the Moodys, Grandma's favorite meal is "creamed hard boiled eggs over toast". The children and I had never heard of this so I wrote to Sarah and asked her what it was. She briefly described it to me. I went for a search and found a recipe called Good Morning Sunshine on Living on Dime. This, I believe, is Creamed Eggs Over Toast. Hannah and Daniel really enjoy this for breakfast or for lunch. It has been a lot of fun trying different recipes that Ms. Maxwell mentions in her books. Our family has been blessed to have been a test family for 2 of the Moody books- Book 3 Winter with the Moodys and Book 4 Spring with the Moodys. It has been such a privilege to work with Sarah and offer her feedback on her books. It has been so much fun!

Love Always,
Mommy