Heavenly Homemakers

Encouraging women in homemaking, healthy eating and parenting

Flourless Chocolate Banana Blender Muffins (Big Batch!)

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Flourless Chocolate Banana Blender Muffins: When you create a muffin that the entire family loves to eat, you make a big batch and you share the recipe with the world!

Now, of course, I always put together a “big batch” of whatever I’m making because we have a large family. But even though we have a lot of kids, not all of them have teeth or eat much yet. So we don’t need as big of batches of steak and broccoli at this point. Muffins though?

Must. Make. Muffins. In. Big. Batch.

We go through muffins like crazy around here. Our just-turned-one-year-old only has a few front teeth, but she is good at gumming her little nibbles of muffins and she loves them! Our 2-year-old and 3-year-olds LOVE muffins. Our six and eight-year-olds love muffins. Our teens and adults love muffins. Well. We go through a lot of muffins around here.

Here are more muffin recipes!

40 + Real Food Muffin Recipes

Muffins Freeze WellYum

So that’s why I’m giving you a Big Batch recipe for these Chocolate Banana Blender Muffins. If we’re going to dirty up some dishes, why not make a big batch of something that freezes well? When I make these muffins, I set them out for today’s snack and tomorrow’s breakfast. Then, whatever is remaining goes into the freezer to pull out for another day!

I love that these muffins are flourless. I love that all of these ingredients go into a blender and are mixed up so easily. And of course, I love that these are moist and taste so delicious!

You can make them gluten-free (if you use GF oats) and dairy-free (if you use coconut oil and coconut or almond milk).

Flourless Chocolate Banana Blender Muffins

5.0 from 2 reviews
Flourless Chocolate Banana Blender Muffins (Big Batch!)
 
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Serves: 24
Ingredients
  • 4 eggs
  • ½ cup milk
  • 4 overripe bananas
  • ½ cup melted butter or coconut oil
  • 3 cups whole rolled oats
  • ¾ cup brown sugar or sucanat
  • 1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 2 teaspoons baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon baking soda
  • ½ teaspoon sea salt
  • ½ cup chocolate chips (optional)
Instructions
  1. Put all ingredients (except for the chocolate chips) into a blender, beginning with the liquids.
  2. Blend until smooth.
  3. Fold in chocolate chips.
  4. Pour into 24 paper-lined muffin tins.
  5. Bake in a 400 degree oven for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into a muffin comes out clean.

 

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EASIEST Bean and Cheese Quesadillas Our Family Loves

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Our family loves these Bean and Cheese Quesadillas even though they thought they wouldn’t!

This idea is not new or innovative. No one will actually be very impressed. But it is still worth sharing because we all need to be reminded from time to time of the best and easiest lunch or snack ideas!

We’ve always been a simple cheese quesadilla family.

Cheese quesadillas are no-brainers. Tortillas. Cheese. Melted together. In a skillet. That is all. Cut them into triangles. Dip them in salsa. Serve them with fruit. This is lunch.

But in an effort to figure out:

  • how to get my toddlers to eat more protein
  • what other soft foods our barely-has-any-teeth- 1-year-old baby can gum
  • more ideas for easy lunches, suppers, or snacks our whole family will like
  • inexpensive ways to feed our army of children

I decided to open a can of refried beans to smear on our tortillas when I made quesadillas one evening.

Yeah. Wow. I opened a can. It’s so easy I’m wondering why this hasn’t always been my go-to meal idea?? We can always wonder about this.

How my kids first respondedYum

When my kids asked what we were eating for dinner and I said “Bean and Cheese Quesadillas” my 6-year-old said, “Ok, but can you make mine with just cheese and no beans please?” And then my 17-year-old asked the very same thing. Because change is hard? Beans are hard? We don’t know. The bean version just didn’t sound good to them.

Fair enough. But I told them that I wanted to eat the bean version first and then if they really didn’t like it, I’d make them a plain cheese version.

Man, this story is not that exciting. Laura told her kids she was putting beans in their quesadillas. They were nervous. She made them try anyway. Thank you for sharing.

How my kids liked the Bean and Cheese Quesadillas after trying them

Well, I couldn’t keep up. I stood at the skillet and kept making quesadillas until the entire package of tortillas was gone. I cut the quesadillas into triangles and kept throwing them onto plates. I cut the babys’ quesadillas into tiny bites and kept throwing them onto the high chairs.

The 6-year-old forgot about the beans. She just ate her first quesadilla triangle and asked for another. And then another. And then another. So there you have it.

The 17-year-old? Same story. He ate his fair share and was like, “Wow Mom. These are actually good.”

Meanwhile, the 8-year-old, the 2-year-old, the 1.5-year-old, and the nearly-toothless 1-year-old ate and ate and ate.

I served the quesadillas with these smoothies, therefore we also loaded up on greens and fruit:

Bean and Cheese Quesadillas are a WINNER!

But you probably already knew that. This is old news. Everyone already makes these. Laura is 24 years behind.

Just in case, here’s how to make these:

5.0 from 1 reviews
EASIEST Bean and Cheese Quesadillas Our Family Loves
 
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Ingredients
  • Whole Grain Tortillas
  • Shredded Cheese
  • Can of Refried Beans
Instructions
  1. Smear beans on a tortilla.
  2. Sprinkle shredded cheese on top.
  3. Top it with another tortilla to make a "sandwich."
  4. Heat it on low in a skillet until the cheese is melted, turning from time to time to heat both sides.
  5. Cut the quesadilla into trianges and serve as-is or with salsa, sour cream, and/or guacamole.

Add Bean and Cheese Quesadillas to your go-to fast meal idea list!

 

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Spiced Holiday Tea

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Tasha made this Spiced Holiday Tea for us one day and we fell in love with it!

holiday spiced tea

Spiced Holiday Tea

by Tasha Hackett

Or as I like to call it the drinkable potpourri. I’ve been simmering water with lemon rinds and a cinnamon stick for the past month just to enjoy the smell, but why only use it for the smell when you can drink it, too?

This spiced tea was introduced to me the first time I went home for the Thanksgiving holiday with my then boyfriend. He’s now my husband, and I won’t claim this drink has brought us together because for some odd reason, he doesn’t like it. Which is completely fine with me and his mother, because that means more for us. My mother-in-law always has a pot of this drink simmering on the stove over the holidays.

Sweeten your spiced tea to taste!

 

I have stayed true to my mother-in-law’s recipe in all except the sugar content. The original recipe that she used calls for a full cup. But I’ve decreased it to 1/2 cup in year’s past and nobody noticed. This year I will add even less, but please don’t tell them!

To get started, first boil a full gallon of water in a large pot on the stove. Then turn the burner down and add the tea bags. Please never boil the tea! Follow the directions on the package of your tea to brew a full gallon—I use decaf so we can enjoy anytime of day and share with the kids without any caffeine messing up our sleep.

Once you’ve removed the tea bags, add in 5 cinnamon sticks, 10 whole cloves, and one of each limeade and orange juice concentrate. (Not straight lime juice, but the sweetened limeade in the freezer section with other fruit juices.) Basically you just used tea instead of water to mix the juice. You do not need to add extra water with the juice concentrates. Add in the sugar to taste, approximately 1/2 cup more or less. Wait to taste for sweetness until the juice concentrates are mixed in.

Let the holiday spiced tea simmer—but not boil—for at least an hour.

This tea is better tomorrow.Yum

After we’ve all enjoyed a cup, we store the rest in the fridge overnight, keeping the cloves and cinnamon sticks in the pitcher and the tea gets a stronger spiced flavor throughout the holiday weekend. We enjoy it cold or reheated. I can’t really tell you which is my favorite because I like it both ways!

What’s your favorite holiday drink?

Tasha HackettTasha Hackett is a friend of Laura and has officially been writing since she asked for a journal for her 10th birthday. Her first novel, a historical Christian romance, Bluebird on the Prairie was released just this year, 2021, and she looks forward to sharing many more of her stories with the world. For now, you can read more about her and her fiction from her website: www.TashaHackett.com. 

Holiday Spiced Tea
 
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Total time
 
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Ingredients
  • One gallon of tea brewed to instructions on tea package (regular or decaf)
  • Limeade concentrate
  • Orange juice concentrate
  • 5 cinnamon sticks
  • 10 cloves
  • ½ cup sugar (more or less to taste)
Instructions
  1. Brew the tea in a large pot on the stove.
  2. Once the tea bags are removed, add the rest of the ingredients.
  3. Simmer for a minimum of one hour, being careful not to boil.
  4. Enjoy warm or cold.
  5. Store leftovers in the fridge.

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Simple DIY Coconut Milk

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Simple DIY Coconut Milk

by Tasha Hackett

diy coconut milk

Dairy-free milk is good to have on hand these days. This simple DIY coconut milk is going to wow you, I’m sure of it. Even if you’re not on a special diet, the chances are high you know someone who is! Of all the nut milk options, coconut milk is the one I’ve landed upon for all my dairy-free baking and cooking. After almost a year of eating paleo to combat migraines, I’m embarrassed at how long it took me to try to this simple method. (Hi! Tasha, here.) If I wanted a yogurt or cream substitute, I used canned coconut milk or coconut cream. If I wanted simple coconut milk for smoothies and baking, I bought the jugs and ignored any added ingredients.

I finally tried making my own coconut milk.Yum

Don’t get too excited. I’m not out there foraging coconuts and shredding the meat into milk. #aintnobodygottimeforthat. But I am side-stepping buying water in a jug. I had convinced myself that making my own was going to be too complicated. Silly Tasha. Once I mustered the proper sense of adventure and ingenuity, there’s really been no turning back.

Not only is this simple DIY coconut milk unadulterated with added ingredients, it is significantly cheaper, and saves the landfill and the factories from dealing with those obnoxious plastic/cardboard jugs. And because I Subscribe and Save my canned coconut milk from Amazon, I don’t even have to think about buying it. It just magically appears on my porch. Poof!

Simple Coconut Milk Recipe

I’m really stepping out on a limb here to call this a recipe. But if Laura can tell you to pour salsa on the chicken in the crock pot and call it a recipe, than we’re calling this a recipe.

You will need a half gallon glass jar and a can of coconut milk. I currently use this brand. I’ll go over all the steps very slowly for you, just be sure you can keep up: Open the canned coconut milk. Pour it into the jar. Fill the jar the rest of the way with water and leave an inch or so at the top. Put the lid on the jar. In case you missed it, that last step is very important. A lidless jar is hazardess. Shake your lidded jar before using the coconut milk in smoothies, pancakes, muffins, and any recipe that calls for milk! As it happens, I pour a splash of it into my coffee each morning.

DIY Coconut Milk Recipe in Pictures

Because this recipe is very complicated, I decided to go the extra mile and show you the process step-by-step. I hope this clears things up for you.

Set out your supplies.

canned coconut milk

Open the canned milk and pour it into the half gallon glass jar.

 

diy coconut milk

Fill the remainder of the jar with water.

homemade coconut milk

I hope you don’t mind, but I combined a step in this picture. See how the lid is on the jar?

Store in the refrigerator and give it a shake before using. That’s all, kids! I hope you enjoyed learning a new skill that will impress all of your friends the next time you’re at a party in need a parlor trick.

homemade coconut milk

 

Tasha HackettTasha Hackett is a friend of Laura and loves to eat homemade chocolate bars, potato chips, and yes, even salsa on chicken. A homeschooling mom of four, author, and recovering DIY addict, she loves to take a walk on the prairie as time allows. Her debut novel, a historical romance set in 1879 Nebraska released Summer 2021: Bluebird on the Prairie. (Print and Kindle options available.) Though Tasha likes to do All The Things, most of her time is spent with four chatty children and an incredibly supportive husband. They give her the kind of love people write books about.

To learn more about Tasha and her works of fiction, find her at www. TashaHackett.com.

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

The BEST Pumpkin Bars

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Are these really the BEST Pumpkin Bars? I guess you’ll have to try them to see!

I love how moist these are! And how cool is it that they are made with whole grains and no one can tell?! (I use freshly ground soft white wheat, which is a whole wheat pastry flour, to make these.) I love that they are lightly sweetened instead of loaded with sugar. And this:

I LOVE THE CLOVES.

There’s something about the flavor that the cloves gives this recipe that makes is so very good. Cinnamon? I’m always all in with the cinnamon! Sometimes I skip other spices just so I can enjoy the cinnamon in a recipe.

But don’t leave out the cloves in this one. Oh, it makes the Pumpkin Bars – well – it makes them the BEST Pumpkin Bars.

The BEST Pumpkin BarsYum

The BEST Pumpkin Bars
 
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Serves: 15
Ingredients
  • 2 cups whole grain flour
  • ¾ cup brown sugar or sucanat
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • ¼ teaspoon sea salt
  • 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon ground cloves
  • 4 eggs
  • 16-ounce can pureed pumpkin
  • 1 cup melted coconut oil
Instructions
  1. Mix together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and cloves.
  2. Add eggs, pumpkin, and oil, stirring until batter is smooth.
  3. Pour batter into a 9x13 inch baking dish.
  4. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 30-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Here are more Pumpkin Recipes you’ll love. Twenty more to be exact!

  1. Pumpkin Spice
  2. Make-Ahead Pumpkin Donuts
  3. Pumpkin Breakfast Cake
  4. Easy Low Sugar Pumpkin Whip
  5. Pumpkin Cheesecake
  6. Easy Flourless Pumpkin Muffins
  7. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread
  8. Whole Wheat Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins
  9. Pumpkin Pie
  10. Cream Cheese Pumpkin Muffins
  11. Pumpkin Bars
  12. Low-Sugar Pumpkin Roll-Out Cookies
  13. Simple Pumpkin Pancakes
  14. Simple Pumpkin Waffles
  15. Chocolate Pumpkin Cake
  16. Whole Grain Pumpkin Bundt Cake
  17. Warm Pumpkin Custard
  18. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cake
  19. Pumpkin Pecan Pie Squares
  20. Cheater Cheater Pumpkin Eaters
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The Best Chocolate Pumpkin Cake

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This Chocolate Pumpkin Cake is so good, I decided to repost it so you would be sure to see it and try it this fall!

I love any treat that includes ingredients healthy enough for us to serve for breakfast.

What? Cake for breakfast? Oh yes. All year long. And since this one includes pumpkin, it’s a step above. #veggiecake

Of course, the pumpkin in this recipe makes it super moist. And the chocolate in this recipe? Well, that makes it chocolate. Need I say more?

You’ll love that this cake is topped with a thin layer of Honey-Sweetened Chocolate Frosting. Sigh…while I sure do love summer best, NOTHING can beat fall baking!!

Chocolate Pumpkin CakeYum

The Best Chocolate Pumpkin Cake
 
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Ingredients
  • 1 cup melted coconut oil
  • 1 cup water
  • 4 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
  • ½ cup sucanat
  • dash of sea salt
  • 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 cup pumpkin puree
  • 2 eggs
Instructions
  1. In a large mixing bowl, stir together flour, sucanat, cinnamon, salt, and baking soda.
  2. Set aside. In a saucepan, bring oil, water, and cocoa to a boil.
  3. Pour liquid mixture into the bowl with the dry ingredient mixture.
  4. Stir well.
  5. Add pumpkin puree and eggs, mixing well.
  6. Pour batter into a 9x13 inch baking pan.
  7. Bake in a 350° oven for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Allow cake to cool completely before frosting.

 

Low Sugar Chocolate Frosting

 
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Ingredients
  • ½ cup butter
  • 4 Tablespoons cocoa powder
  • 2 Tablespoons milk
  • 2-4 Tablespoons honey (sweeten this to your taste)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
  1. In a small saucepan combine butter, cocoa, milk, and honey.
  2. Cook and stir over low heat until ingredients are well combined and mixture begins to thicken slightly.
  3. Removed from heat.
  4. Stir in vanilla.
  5. Spread over cooled cake.

 

Do you love fall baking like I do? Will you be eating this cake for breakfast? :)

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Easy Lemon Chicken Zucchini for Breakfast

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As promised, in the What To Do with All the Zucchini post, here’s the actual recipe to one of my new favorite breakfasts. Since I have to give the thing a name, I settled on Easy Lemon Chicken Zucchini. But really we call it the “lemon zucchini thing.” Is it easy? Or is it simple? Is it simply easy? Or easily simple? No matter which way you want to look at it, it’s real food that fuels my body and gets me ready for another awesome day. Bonus: It’s paleo! Gluten free, dairy free, soy free, sugar free… but not boring or complicated.

Chicken and zucchini for breakfast?

Do you have to eat it for breakfast? Duh, no. But for some reason I do. That’s about all I have to say on that. Eat it for any old meal you like, but I needed more grain-free breakfast food ideas. The paleo diet is not at all restricting once you get the hang of it, but the western culture has this idea that breakfasts are for all the sugar and carbs, or either all the protein and fats… and as it turns out, there is no authority that says you can’t have chicken and zucchini for breakfast, therefore I do.

Easy Lemon Chicken ZucchiniYum

 

lemon chicken squash

We used a yellow summer squash for this one!

If you’re using a cast iron skillet, remember to slowly pre-heat it so it’s ready to go. (Check out this post for tips on how to use a cast iron skillet.)Pre-heat for a few minutes and then melt 3-4 tablespoons of butter. While the skillet is heating and the butter melting, chop a summer squash—a yellow summer squash or a zucchini both work interchangeably in this recipe. OR A CUCUMBER. It sounds nuts to me, but my dear, sweet husband accidentally chopped a cucumber for this recipe instead of a zucchini and I could smell that it was a cucumber and I could see that it was a cucumber and by-golly I could taste that it was a cucumber, but it was surprisingly delicious. (He did not believe me that it was a cucumber until he tasted the final product for himself.) So we laughed and then ate our breakfast, but now we know… a cucumber fried in a bit of butter in place of squash is still yummy.

Okay, the skillet is pre-heated and the butter is melted, now toss in the squash. (I like to scrape out the middle if it’s a larger zucchini because I think it gets soggy and I don’t like it. ) Let it cook for two minutes and then flip and stir it about. When it’s right on the edge of being done add in a can of chicken. Season with salt and pepper and pour 1-2 tablespoons of lemon juice over the top. It will sizzle and smell amazing.

Lemonize at your own risk.

Ben made this recipe the first two times. (Once with the cucumber in disguise and once with a zucchini.) When I made it, he wasn’t around to ask how much lemon juice to use. Thankfully I’m a pretty smart gal and I used two tablespoons. I even measured it out on purpose to make sure I could tell you exactly how much I used. Two tablespoons was the perfect amount for me. As long as you stir it up well. If you’re scared, just start with one and see how it goes.

What are your thoughts on squash for breakfast?

Tasha HackettTasha Hackett is Laura’s friend and author of the Christian romance Bluebird on the Prairie set in 1879, Nebraska. Though she used to be a closet Cheeto eater, she’s been on a strict paleo died for months to help fight migraines (with great success). She often pretends to be a ballerina while unloading the dishwasher and has a hard time going more than a few days without any homemade chocolate bars. Her favorite thing is writing with hope and humor to encourage and entertain women. She spends most of her time with four chatty children and an incredibly supportive husband; they give her the kind of love people write books about.

To find out more about Tasha and her fiction writing, connect with her at www.TashaHackett.com.

Heavenly Homemaker's Club Members: Access your homepage and all your fantastic resources here! Not a member yet? Please join us!

Easy Cinnamon Crumb Cake

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This Easy Cinnamon Crumb Cake is a lovely treat with coffee or tea.

You may notice that this cake recipe is very similar to my Strawberry Shortcake recipe. One of my favorite things is to take a tried-and-true recipe, then tweak it to turn it into something new and delicious.

That’s how this Easy Cinnamon Crumb Cake came to be. Take a simple cake recipe, add cinnamon, then top it with cinnamon and brown sugar. SO GOOD.

Easy Cinnamon Crumb CakeYum

Easy Cinnamon Crumb Cake
 
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Serves: 9
Ingredients
  • 1⅓ cups whole wheat flour (I use freshly ground whole wheat)
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • 2 eggs
  • ½ cup honey
  • ⅓ cup oil (I use coconut oil)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • ½ cup milk
  • 1 Tablespoon ground cinnamon plus 1 Tablespoon brown sugar
Instructions
  1. Mix together flour, baking powder, and cinnamon.
  2. Add in eggs, honey, oil, vanilla, and milk.
  3. Mix well.
  4. Pour into a well buttered 8×8 inch baking pan or a round cake pan.
  5. Sprinkle cinnamon/sugar mixture over the top.
  6. Bake at 350° for 20-25 minutes.

Here are some more tasty fall treats you may enjoy:

  1. No-Knead Cinnamon Rolls with Honey’d Orange Glaze
  2. Cinnamon Smoothie
  3. Cinnamon Nectarine Muffins
  4. Quick Mix Honey Cinnamon Muffins
  5. Cinnamon Apple Toast
  6. Snickerdoodles
  7. Cinnamon Swirl Bread
  8. Baked Apple Pancake
  9. Snickerdoodle Muffins
  10. Vanilla Muffins with Cinnamon Crumb Topping
  11. Apple Pie Filling
  12. No-Bake Snickerdoodle Bites
  13. Low-Sugar Carrot Cake
  14. Zucchini Carrot Bread
  15. Applesauce
  16. Baked Apple Pancake
  17. Apple Pie Filling
  18. Salted Caramel Apple Crisp
  19. Cream Cheese Fruit Dip (to go with your apples)
  20. Applesauce Bread
  21. Apple Fruit Leather
  22. Build a Fruit Salad Bar
  23. Apple Crisp
  24. Apple Butter
  25. Apple Nachos
  26. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread
  27. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins
  28. Pumpkin Donuts
  29. Warm Pumpkin Custard
  30. Multi-Grain Pumpkin Waffles and Pancakes
  31. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cake
  32. Pumpkin Pecan Pie Squares
  33. Pumpkin Pie
  34. Pumpkin Breakfast Cake
  35. Pumpkin Cheesecake
  36. Pumpkin Pie Bars
  37. Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins
  38. Pumpkin Spice French Toast Casserole
  39. Pumpkin Spice Roll-Out Cookies
  40. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cheesecake Muffins

 

 

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What to do with All the Zucchini

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Trying to figure out what to do with all the zucchini?

what to do with all the zucchini

Yum

It’s zucchini season! I didn’t grow any this year. Sad. But other people did and around this time each year people are giving them away because when a zucchini plant does well, it does well. And when it doesn’t, we all curse the vine-borer grubs in unison and praise God for grocery stores and our friends who somehow fought off the nefarious and disgusting grubs. Ah-hem. Back to the yummy part.

What to do with all the zucchini?

Zucchini might be one of our favorite versatile vegetables. Here’s what I do with it:

  1. Chop it up and pan fry with salt and pepper and other stuff to make a quick skillet dinner: a.) garlic, onions, mushrooms, shrimp. b) garlic, onions, beef, cabbage. c.) garlic, onions, tomatoes, parmesan cheese. You get the idea: cook it and eat it for dinner with some meat and garlic and onions.
  2. Shred (or use the food processor to chop) and bake it into muffins, brownies, pancakes, waffles, breads, etc. Some people freeze the shredded zucchini to use for later. I have done this and I NEVER have good luck with it later. It gets all weepy and soggy and then I get weepy and never use it. Best of luck to you if you decide to freeze it. I’d rather bake the bread and freeze that instead.
  3. Cut in half, scrape out the middle and make pizza boats. (Broil, then melt on your pizza toppings. Dip in pizza sauce.)
  4. Slice in half, or chop, and roast, broil, or grill with oil, salt, and pepper and just eat it!
  5. Use a zoodle thingy and make noodles. Easy Alfredo and shrimp used to be my favorite with this.
  6. Have I ever been tired of zucchini? No, I have not.
  7. This is my announcement: I will take your extra zucchini.

Don’t let all the zucchini go to waste, let’s start baking!

Of course, Laura already put together many of her favorite zucchini recipes, but that was ages ago and you may have forgotten about it. Click through some of those recipes or search “zucchini” on this site for more great ideas.

Are you a zucchini lover like me? I used to only be a zucchini bread (which is usually cake, let’s not kid ourselves) kind of girl. But then I grew up and realized that as a vegetable it can take on the flavor of butter and garlic and I do so love butter and garlic. Here are some great recipes for you to try as the zucchini crop comes in.

Simple Oven-Baked Pizza Nachos

Finely chopped and baked over the nachos is a great way to sneak more veggies into this meal.

Last Minute Stir-Fry

Frozen chopped zucchini will be a little soggier than fresh, but it holds up better than shredded, OR just add a few fresh ones to your frozen veggie bags.

Zucchini Waffles

This is a pumpkin recipe. I know. You can sub one squash for the other. It will be fine. Really. Many popular baked zucchini recipes have so much sugar in them they may as well be cake… try a less-sugar option and top with just a few drops of maple syrup, honey, or nut butter.

Have zucchini for breakfast!

Why have we decided that most vegetables are for lunch and dinner? Here’s a quick breakfast that I’ve made many times already this summer: In a hot skillet I melt butter, fry up a chopped summer squash (yellow or green), add in a can of chicken (because it’s breakfast and people are hungry for the food), salt and pepper and (here’s the secret ingredient), a tablespoon or so of lemon juice. You must not forget the lemon juice. Once the chicken is warmed and the lemon juice has sizzled for a few seconds, we eat and dance and go about our day warm and well-fed.

In hindsight, I will need to make that one into an actual recipe post for you. You will need to be reminded of it again because it is so delicious.

Do tell, what is your favorite way to eat this amazing and versatile vegetable?

book cover of bluebird on the prairie Tasha Hackett is a friend of Laura and author of Bluebird on the Prairie, a historical romance set in an 1879 Nebraska town. Zeke has his sights set for California, but Eloise prefers the quiet safety of her home. Is it possible they’re both searching for the same things? Find this heart-warming romance wherever books are sold.

To find out more about Tasha and her world of historical fiction, connect with her at www.TashaHackett.com.

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The Easiest Way to Make Steak Gravy

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Have some leftover steak? Here’s the easiest way to make steak gravy!

Did you see my recent post about making biscuits with one hand? It’s by far the easiest way to make biscuits! Very little mess!

That day, while I was only interested in the biscuits so that I could slather on the butter, I knew that Matt and our big boys would be looking around for some gravy to put on them. (Seems that I should write a book called “If You Give a Boy a Biscuit”…)

I remembered that I had some leftover grilled steak that we needed to use up. And so, I used it to make Steak Gravy.

No one complained. No, not one.

The Easiest Way to Make Steak GravyYum

The Easiest Way to Make Steak Gravy
 
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Serves: 2-3 servings
Ingredients
  • 2 leftover cooked steaks
  • ¼ cup butter
  • 3-4 Tablespoons cornstarch or flour
  • 2 cups of milk (more if your gravy seems too thick)
Instructions
  1. Cut leftover steak into small bites. (I use kitchen shears to make this easier!)
  2. Put the bites into a skillet.
  3. Add butter.
  4. Melt the butter while heating the steak.
  5. Sprinkle in cornstarch or flour to make a paste.
  6. Add milk.
  7. Cook and stir over medium to high heat until mixture is thick and bubbly.
  8. Salt and pepper per your preference.
  9. Serve over biscuits

 

 

If your gravy fails to thicken, mix a “paste” of 2 Tablespoons flour with 3 Tablespoons of water. Stir the mixture into your gravy, little bits at a time until the gravy thickens to desired consistency. Do NOT sprinkle flour directly into the gravy. That’s how lumpy gravy is made. :)

Prefer to make sausage gravy? Here’s our easy and delicious Sausage Gravy Recipe.

Steak Gravy over Mashed Potatoes

Yes, please.

What an amazing meal this will be! Here are our easiest methods for making mashed potatoes:

  1. How to make mashed potatoes in the Crock Pot
  2. How to make mashed potatoes in the Instant Pot

Making mashed potatoes with either of these methods creates so little mess to clean up!

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