Heavenly Homemakers

Encouraging women in homemaking, healthy eating and parenting

Menu Plan for the Week

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Same as last week, between traveling and having company, I’m just making out a few meal and snack lists to draw from for the week. Yay for flexibility!

Breakfast Ideas:

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Lunch and Dinner Ideas:

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Snack Ideas:

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Don’t forget to grab your new FREE summertime menu planners and grocery lists here!

Be sure to visit Organizing Junkie for more menu planning inspiration!

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Menu Plan for the Week

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Between having lots of company and doing lots of traveling this summer…I have decided that my “menu plan” for the next few weeks needs to look a little bit different than it normally does. While I love to be organized, especially when it comes to feeding guests, sometimes a girl needs to be able to fly by the seat of her pants. Whatever that looks like. 

Seriously, who comes up with these phrases? Go ahead…picture me. Flying. By the seat of my pants. In my kitchen. I’ll likely konk my shoulder on the corner of a cabinet door, ram my head into a watermelon and land with my elbow in the butter dish in the process, but whatever.

Instead of outlining my meals day by day…I’ve just made a list of meal and snack ideas to draw from. That way, depending on what each day holds, how many people I’m feeding, or what activity we’re running off to…I can pick and choose what food will work best for each day. 

Breakfast Ideas:

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Lunch and Dinner Ideas:

Snack Ideas:

*I was so excited for the folks at Triscuit Home Farming to send me two boxes of their crackers, plus a $20 gift card to purchase supplies to plant herbs from the Plantable Seed Cards inside each box! Did you know that herb seeds come tucked away in each box of Triscuits!?  I’ve got my supplies and will be planting my herbs this week and will patiently await my fresh basil and fresh dill!!! Thanks Triscuit Home Farming! Mmmm…fresh basil!

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Old Fashioned Homemaking just put out a new FREE Healthy Recipes Ebook! You’ll want to check it out!

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Find more menu planning inspiration at Organizing Junkie.

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

Healthy Strawberry Shortcake

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When fresh strawberries are in season, nothing much tastes better than Strawberry Shortcake. This variation of Strawberry Shortcake is lightly sweetened with honey and made with whole wheat flour. We had the entire cake eaten up in just a few minutes!

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Yum

 Strawberry Shortcake

1 1/3 cups whole wheat flour (I use freshly ground whole wheat)
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 eggs
1/2 cup honey
1/3 cup oil (I use coconut oil)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup milk

4-5 cups of fresh, sliced strawberries
Whipped cream (fresh cream whipped to form soft peaks, with a bit of stevia added for sweetness)

Mix together flour and baking powder. Add in eggs, honey, oil, vanilla and milk. Stir well (or mix well with hand mixer). Pour into a well buttered 8×8 inch baking pan. Bake at 350° for 20-25 minutes.

Allow cake to cool completely. Top with fresh strawberries and whipped cream. (9 servings)

Strawberry Shortcake with Whole Wheat and Honey

If you’d like more ideas for what to do with all the fresh strawberries that are in season right now, you may want to take a look at this fun recipe list!

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The Decision to Eat a Healthy Diet

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simplesteps

When I introduced this series, I suggested that the first step I felt each of us should make as we worked toward eating a healthier diet was to simply begin adding more fruits and vegetables to our diets. As I got ready to publish that post, I asked my husband what he thought was the first step people should make toward healthy eating. I wanted to see if he and I were thinking along the same lines.

Matt thought for a moment and then he said,  “Well, the first thing anyone has to do if they want to start eating healthier is to make the decision to do it. If they’re in it with half a heart, they’re likely to stay in unhealthy eating patterns. But if they decide that eating healthy is what they need to do, then a big part of the journey has already begun.”

And then he said something like, “Laura, you look absolutely beautiful today.”

Okay, he didn’t really say that part. I just made it up. I mean he has said that before…but not usually when we’re talking about vegetables and making healthy food decisions.

Anyway.

While I think that my “eat more fruits and veggies” idea is a good first step…I agree with Matt. The first, first step toward healthy eating is that you have to make the decision that you’re going to do it.

You have to decide that eating nutritious food is best for you.

You have to decide that eliminating bad food is best for you.

You have to decide that making tough changes are possible for you.

You have to decide that the difficulty of making dietery changes is worth it.

You have to realize that it won’t be as hard as you think.

You have to know that you aren’t alone and that you’ll have help.

You have to decide.

And that’s all there is to it. 

Sometimes it’s hard. You may have a hard time getting your husband or children on board with you. Your friends and family may think you’ve gone bonkers because you used to love poptarts and now you are on a mission to find a local farm source who will provide you with grass fed beef. Your local grocery stores may not supply many of the foods you are now looking for. You might still crave cheetos. You may feel overwhelmed with trying to make all the dietary changes. You might not know what to do with all the boxed, processed food that is in your pantry. There is so much information out there you may feel like you don’t even know where to start.

But you’ve made the decision to eat healthier…and that is the most important first step.

And you’re reading this, which means that you’ve come to the right place. Not because I have all the answers, but because I’ve likely been exactly where you are. I know how it feels. I’ve walked the journey. I’ve felt the frustration and been completely overwhelmed with where to start and where to turn. 

I’m going to help you do this! We’re all going to help! This is a team effort. You are not alone!

Making the decision to eat healthier is hard. Realize that if you’ve made the decision, you’ve taken a huge step into your journey already.

Woohoo…here we go! 

Are you on board?

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Laura, Are You In the Kitchen ALL the Time?!

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It’s a question I’m asked frequently. Especially from women who:   a) are new at working to feed their families a healthy diet…or b) don’t enjoy cooking at all.

Does eating a healthy diet mean that I am now going to be a slave to my kitchen?!!

It’s a fear that makes complete sense if you’re transitioning toward eating more whole foods. Do I have to make EVERYTHING from scratch? Isn’t there ANYTHING convenient about eating healthy? How am I supposed to find the extra time in my already full schedule to make healthy meals and snacks? And what if I hate cooking?

I addressed this topic quite a while ago in this post entitled Getting it All Done. In that post, I discuss the importance of menu planning, keeping food simple, cleaning the kitchen as you go, making breakfast while you’re making dinner and a few other helpful tips.

Today, I’d like to talk more about freezer cooking as a way to get ahead and save yourself some precious time in the kitchen. And, to answer the original question, nope…I’m not in the kitchen all the time. I do happen to be one of those people who loves to cook…so I may spend more time cooking and baking than the average person. But that’s just my choice. I love to feed my family, and I love to feed extras. I could spend less time in the kitchen and still feed my family a healthy diet…I just choose to tinker with recipes and hang out with my bowls, spoons and grain mill a little more than others. It’s my hobby.

A couple of weeks ago, I decided to fill my fridge and freezer with healthy convenience foods. I spent a few extra hours in the kitchen over the course of three days. The result of my efforts? All kinds of healthy, grab and go foods! Hours of time saved! Dirty dish messes out of the way!

Did it take a few extra hours of time during those three days? Sure. I was in the kitchen a lot during those days. But now all I have to do is go snag something out of the freezer and re-warm it for a quick meal. I LOVE it!

Here are the results from my last “cooking ahead” days and the time it took me to prepare each item…

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I baked up several pounds of potatoes one night (10 minutes of scrubbing), then chopped them and froze them overnight for future fried potatoes (following this Frozen Hashbrown method). The next day, I mixed up a double batch of cornbread and made Corn Dog Muffins and Sloppy Corn Muffins (20 mintues). Both went into ziplock freezer bags. Somewhere in there, I also mixed up and baked some Chocolate Chip Cookies (15 minutes, not including bake time). It seems like we always have events that I need to take cookies along. Having some already made in my freezer is so helpful!

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The next day, I made a big double batch of  Whole Wheat Tortillas so that I could grab them out for an easy lunch of quesadillas or tostadas. I also baked a double batch of Orange Muffins and a bunch of Porcupine Meatballs (the recipe for which I will share as soon as I perfect it). It just took me a little over an hour to do all of this (not including baking time)…and look at all the time it saved me for later!

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The next day I made about four pounds of Venison Sausage – using this Turkey Sausage recipe (15 minutes, not including cook time). Because it takes so many different spices to make the Turkey Sausage, I love making it ahead like this. I froze it in about six small baggies to pull out for a fast breakfast casserole, or for biscuits and gravy. This pre-cooked Sausage is a great combo with the pre-made Frozen Hashbrowns, by the way!

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I also mixed up a quick batch of Mudballs. Although, since one of my boys can’t have peanut butter…I used sunbutter to make these this time. (about 15 minutes)

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Later that afternoon, I decided to make some Whole Wheat Hamburger Buns to freeze and have on hand. (about 30 minutes of work time)  Those will last us for about two meals worth of Hamburgers or Sloppy Joes.

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Last but not least, I made some homemade peanut butter (3 minutes)…

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And used it to make a pan of Chewy Granola Bars to have in the fridge. (10 minutes)

It was fun. It was productive. I was exhausted.  :)  But the few extra hours I put in preparing the extra food has saved me more than a few hours of work during the past few weeks. 

What are some of your favorite foods to prepare ahead of time? 

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Menu Plan for the Week

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I suppose it goes without saying that we’ll be eating a lot of strawberries and salad this week. I’m experimenting with a healthy strawberry shortcake recipe today that I can hopefully share soon in the Healthy Celebrations series!

And speaking of healthy…um…or not so healthy…take note of what we’re having for lunch Tuesday. It’s Asa’s birthday, which means he gets to choose everything we eat that day. He hesitantly asked if we could please have ramen noodles.  Blech.  Okay, since it’s your birthday. Can’t be worse than hot dogs. I find it funny that he thinks of ramen noodles as a treat! And um…$0.18/pack? WHAT is this stuff made of? Never mind.  I don’t want to know. 

In other news, we have an extra little boy “moving in with us” for a few weeks off and on all summer. Remember the red head? We love having him here! Plus, some friends from out of town arrived last night to stay for the week. We’re in for some busy, fun days!!

Here’s what we’ll be eating:

Sunday, June 6
Strawberry bread, bananas
Pizza casserole, tossed salad, strawberry shortcake
Grilled cheese sandwiches, strawberries and cream, carrot sticks

Monday, June 7
Scrambled eggs, turkey sausage, creamy orange cooler
Taco salad, fresh pineapple
Grilled hamburgers on whole wheat buns, potato salad, peas

Tuesday, June 8 (Asa’s birthday choices)
Whole wheat cinnamon rolls, fruit
Chicken strips, ramen noodles, pineapple, strawberries
Southside Grille, lemon pound cake, ice cream

Wednesday, June 9
Strawberry crepes with whipped cream
Picnic lunch at the park – sandwiches, fruit, chips
Fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans

Thursday, June 10
Chocolate chip pancakes, applesauce
Creamy mac and cheese, steamed broccoli
Homemade pizza, tossed salad

Friday, June 11
Strawberry peach slushie, peanut butter honey toast
Tuna salad on crispy cheese crackers, cantaloupe
Tacos on homemade tortillas, watermelon

Saturday, June 12
Whole wheat donuts, fruit
Chicken quesadillas, apple slices
Rice and veggie stir fry with chicken, zucchini, carrots and broccoli

Snacks to have on hand or to make for our guests:

Visit Organizing Junkie for more menu planning inspiration.

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

Freezer Cooking for June

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Here’s a picture from our freezer cooking day in April!

The Problem:  I am out of town visiting family. (Visiting family is not a problem. I’m lovin’ it. But it is a little bit hard to make frozen meals when you’re several hours away from your kitchen and your freezer.)
The Other Problem:  My freezer is full of frozen meat. (Wait, frozen meat is not a problem either – it’s a blessing.)
The Actual Problem:  The only thing in my freezer was frozen meat…we’d eaten up all of our frozen, homemade healthy convenience items.
The Additional Problem:  If I’d waited to make freezer meals until after I got home from my trip, there would have been nothing for my husband to eat while we were gone, plus nothing for me to feed the boys once we got back while I was trying to catch up on twenty-eight loads of laundry.

The Solution:  Make the freezer food before the trip!

Ah, and so that is what I did. I took a few days last week to make up some healthy convenience foods for the freezer. Matt has been eating on it while we’ve been out of town, and when I get home, there will be easy-to-warm-up food in the freezer to make life easier for me while I recover from being away from home.

This was my to-do list:

Check back in a few days and I’ll share how my cooking attempts went. Also, I plan to address the question many of you have asked:  “Laura – are you in the kitchen ALL the time?!”

:)

One of my sponsors, Old Fashioned Homemaking has a wonderful,
helpful post about Freezing Meals Ahead for the Beginner. Be sure to check it out!

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

Should I Get a Juicer?

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My friend Valerie is traveling quite a bit this summer. I miss her already, but while she’s gone…she left a little piece of her behind for us to remember her by. 

Yep, she left us her juicer. Isn’t that exciting? (Well, it’s exciting for me. I’m weird though, remember?)

For the past couple of years, we’ve tossed around the idea of investing in a juicer. Would it help us get more fruits and vegetables in our diets? Would we use it enough to get our money’s worth out of it? Do we want to deal with one more appliance in our kitchen? Is it even good for us, since drinking just the juice of the fruit has the potential to make us overdo our intake of fruit sugar?

So, with Valerie’s juicer in our home for a few weeks, we’re playing around with different yummy combinations of juices. We’re using it to help us decide whether or not we may want a juicer of our own some day.

So far, I’m having a lot of fun with it. I ordered a big 40 pound box of oranges from Azure Standard. Plus, I ordered 25 pounds of juicing carrots. Um, that’s a lot of carrots.

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Here I am, making orange-carrot juice. And yes, I am just about to overflow my glass. 
But check out my fascinating photography ability. 
See that drop of  juice just about to drip off of the spout?
It takes a lot of skill to get a shot like that. Simply amazing. 
(And very, very lucky since actually I am as good at photography as I am at soccer.)

The kids weren’t big on the orange/carrot juice combo. Matt and I liked it just fine though. And, I used the leftover pulp that the juicer caught to make an orange/carrot cake. The results on the cake were so-so. I think I should have run the pulp through my blender first to make it less chunky. It’s all about experimenting. Trial and error.

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The juicer we’re using is a Jack LaLanne JLPJB Power Juicer Juicing Machine. It is very reasonably priced and seems to be very high quality. So far, I’m very impressed with how easy it is to use and how easy it is to clean up. All of the parts go right into the dishwasher! Well, except for the motor. That would be a bad idea.

So, for all of you juicing kind of people out there, I’d love to hear what you have to say about this. Do you like your juicer? Do you use it often? What do you make with it? What do you do with the leftover pulp? Do your kids like it? What kind of juicer do you have?

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

Sloppy Cornbread Muffins

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Yum

I’ve decided that I love sloppy joes more than any 36 year old mama ought to love sloppy joes. (Sloppy joes aren’t just kid food, right?)  I’m a little crazy when it comes to my hamburger meat. I like it a lot. Bring on the beef.

As you may recall, this Sloppy Cornbread is a very fun way to eat Sloppy Joes without buns. Over the weekend I experimented making the Sloppy Cornbread into muffins….and YUM!

To make Sloppy Cornbread Muffins you will need:

1 recipe of Cornbread
1/4 recipe of Sloppy Joes (which is 1/2 pound of meat)

which will make 12 Sloppy Cornbread Muffins 

These freeze and reheat very well…which means you may want to use:

a double batch of Cornbread
1/2 recipe of Sloppy Joes (which is one pound of meat)

which will make 24 Sloppy Cornbread Muffins

Is this getting confusing? If you make up the full Sloppy Joe recipe, you could just make some of it into Sloppy Cornbread Muffins, then freeze the remaining Sloppy Joes mixure. Or, you could just bring it over to me and I’ll get a fork and eat it right out of the pan.

sloppycornmuffins

First fill your muffin cups half full (or half empty depending on the kind of day you’re having) with cornbread batter.

The muffins do tend to stick a little to paper muffin liners…so you may have better success just buttering each muffin cup very well.

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 Spoon about a Tablespoon or two of Sloppy Joe meat into each muffin cup.

Bake in a 400° oven for 20 minutes.

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So, what kind of day are you having? Would your muffin cups be half empty…or half full?

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

Menu Plan for the Week

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Remember how I said that our last soccer games were last week? Yeah, just kidding. We got all the way to Lincoln last Sunday afternoon (an hour away) and the gates were locked. We had a team full of very sad ten year old boys on our hands.

I was disappointed too, but since we were in Lincoln already, we took advantage of our “trip to the city” and went to Target and Kohls to make some exchanges. I loved it. But Justus? Shopping was NOT his idea of a fun alternative to playing a soccer game. Poor guy.

So anyway, this week we’re trying again. For real…our last soccer game for the season is today. Probably. I’m pretty sure. Most likely. I think.

Here’s our menu for the week:

Sunday, May 23
Oatmeal, pears
Taco Potatoes, oranges
Soccer team meet up at Culvers after game

Monday, May 24
Honey whole wheat bagels, apples
Black bean taco salad
Cheesy beef and rice, green beans

Tuesday, May 25
Mini apple pies
Bean and rice bowls, watermelon
Cheesy Salsa Enchiladas, tossed salad

Wednesday, May 26
Cinnamon swirl bread, cantaloupe
Cheddar Ranch Burgers on whole wheat hamburger buns, onion rings
Simple soaked pancakes, turkey sausage, scrambled eggs

Thursday, May 27
Breakfast cake, bananas
Spaghetti, tossed salad
Roast, potatoes, carrots, gravy

Friday – Saturday…up in the air weekend plans  :)

Wow, I am loving our fresh lettuce from the garden right now! Are any of you able to enjoy anything yummy from your garden yet?!
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Visit Organizing Junkie for more menu planning inspiration!

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