At Home My Way

I am back among the living - blogging!  Hurray!  We have had a very, very BUSY (did I say busy?) couple of weeks at our house.  My older daughter graduated from college a couple of weeks ago and this past weekend my younger daughter and one of my nieces graduated from high school.  To celebrate, we had two separate graduation parties and even though it was a TREMENDOUS amount of work getting our Central Missouri yard presentable for guests, we had a great time!  Each party had different foods and we did a pretty good job representing each graduate's favorite dishes.  At my older daugher's graduation celebration we served, this pulled BBQ pork (I baked it in the oven and made six times the recipe of BBQ sauce), and this Super Easy Slaw recipe , and, of course, her favorite deep fried crinkle-cut french fries, some of these  Frosted Sugar Cookie Bars  (which were a HUGE HIT) and lots of other stuff.  At the most recent graduatio...

I love to take my basic recipes and be able to make something yummy with what I have on hand!  I will talk myself out of cooking every single time if I have to make  trip to the store.  The other night I really wanted something yummy.  I didn't have a whole lot of chocolate chips.  I had white sugar but I had just made these  Sugar Cookie Bars - Frosted  the week prior and I wanted to make something a little different.  I decided to replace half of the sugar in this recipe with packed brown sugar and added a few chocolate chips.  These Chocolate Chip Blondies are definitely a recipe I will make often in the future.  Even my husband commented that they were PARTICULARLY good and he's not a big "sweet" person (although he is very sweet :) ). Chocolate Chip Blondies  (These would be great for potluck - could also double this recipe and bake in a 9 x 13 pan (a longer baking time would apply). 1/2 cup room temp (so...

Last night we had leftovers for supper (leftover BBQ chicken).  So that meant I had a little time to make some granola.  I LOVE those yogurt parfaits you get at McDonalds.  I especially loved them when they gave you the BIGGER serving!  Now, I almost need to order two because one just doesn't do it for me.  But, better than buying those things, I have now mastered making them AT HOME MY WAY! Homemade Yogurt Parfaits Homemade Perfect Granola Vanilla Yogurt (sometimes I make homemade yogur t, sweeten with a little sugar and add vanilla) but other times I prefer Yoplait regular (not fat free) vanilla yogurt.  Its JUST LIKE the yogurt in the partfaits at McDonalds Fresh Strawberries Frozen blueberries (I bought all they had on the clearance rack ($.99 each) in fresh produce and put them in a big bag in my freezer) Find yourself a pretty bowl.  I got these cute bright green bowls at my favorite thrift store (called Savvy Seconds) for $1.00/4...

I love to cook and bake all types of things, even the most detailed recipes for pastry, but I DO NOT LIKE TO MAKE FROSTED SUGAR COOKIES!  Something about all that rolling, cutting, baking, cooling, frosting, and decorating, takes the fun out of it for me.  Of course, I do love eating them, just not all that other stuff.  I ran across the best idea on one of my favorite cooking blogs (Mommy's Kitchen)  here .  Why didn't I think of this sooner?  Duh!  I took the basic idea of baking sugar cookies as sugar cookie bars, frosted them, and decorated with colorful sprinkles!  I used my own sugar cookie recipe because its super easy and I had everything on hand. WAH-LAH!  They were beautiful, delicious, cheap, and would be a great dish to share if you have to take something for goody day or potluck.  I stirred up some homemade vanilla frosting, tinted it with food color to frost the cooled cookie bars.  Easy peasy!  I didn't even use ...

HOMEMADE ENGLISH MUFFINS I make up a big bowl of dough (the folks from MOTHER EARTH magazine and this blog showed me how) and from that bowl of dough I make a variety of dishes.  I can make round loaves of crusty bread - bakery quality - to serve with soups and salads.  I can make this delicious Homemade Pizza .  I also make rolls, bread sticks, and one of our favorites, Homemade English Muffins.  Yes.... all from the same bowl of dough, which can be kept in the fridge for my spontaneous cooking delight for about two weeks.  I posted the recipe for the dough when I posted instructions for the Homemade Pizza, but I will post it again simply because it is so good and easy.  Who doesn't have one minute to stir up homemade bread before you run off  to work?  You might think you don't have one extra minute in the morning, but after you taste recipes made with this dough, you will know that you have the time! No-Knead Dough 3 cups very warm wa...

I made dinner the other day for my mother-in-law and her two sisters as well as my niece and her boyfriend! Good food and family always makes for a good time.  I made my daughters' favorite HAMBURGER SOUP (I will post the recipe soon).  Also I made a loaf of french bread and a loaf of pizza bread !  For sweets, I made an oatmeal pie (which was a flop and I threw that recipe away) and a batch of these Quick and Easy Sugar Cookies . They used basic ingredients I already had in my pantry and were fairly speedy since they made a small batch.  I rolled some in colored sugar and some in a mixture of cinnamon and sugar.  The soup was perfect (I only had one small bowl leftover) but the cookies stole the show!  If you need a quick, easy dish to share, this would be a good thing to take! (I got this recipe from a favorite blog - www.hillbillyhousewife.com.)  Quick and Easy Sugar Cookies 1/2 cup soft margarine or shortening (I used margarine.) 1 cup ...

MONDAY:  Breakfast:  Leftover HM biscuits, cereal, chocolate chip pumpkin bread (gift) Lunch:  PB sandwich, banana Supper:  BBQ Boneless chicken on the grill (from the freezer), baked shoestring fries & onion , leftover greenbeans and corn (from Sunday nights supper of Smoked Turkey (from the freezer) with HM rub seasoning, baked potatoes , crusty french bread , seasoned green beans and corn ) TUESDAY: Breakfast:  Leftover HM biscuits, cereal, chocolate chip pumpkin bread (gift) Lunch:  Smoked Turkey Sandwich (leftover turkey from Sunday), strawberries, Supper:  Taking daughter #2 prom dress shopping so we're eating at Culvers.  Leftovers for Dad Next day prep:  Mix up apple/oatmeal muffins using plain muffin recipe from http://www.hillbillyhousewife.com/ (subbing 1 cup oatmeal for 1 cup flour and adding in one grated apple) for baking Wednesday morning. WEDNESDAY (make up some 5-minute a day bread d...