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Big Family Food and Fun: November 19-25, 2023

November 26, 2023 by Laura 1 Comment

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Here’s our Food and Fun: November 19-25 post!

Here’s what we ate and what we did all week!

Big Family Food and Fun: November 19-25, 2023

Saturday night I started a pork roast in the crock pot to cook overnight to eat after church the next day. Here’s my pork roast recipe. Here’s the overnight cooking method.

To go with our roast, I made a big pan of Party Potatoes. I had intended to make Honey’d Carrots, but left the carrots steaming too long and burned them, ugh. So we steamed some peas instead.

For dinner that night I pulled out some leftover taco meat we had in the fridge and stirred it into a triple batch of Creamy Mac and Cheese. We ate it with baby carrots, easy peasy.

It’s been in my head for weeks to work with the kids to put together Fall Treat Bags for our neighbors. Sickness and the craziness of life has derailed us. But we’re finally finishing our project and packaging up goodies! We had stickers from Delight Design to put on our brownie and muffin bags – so cute!

We had set up our tree with lights the night before and on Sunday night, the kids added ornaments.

Monday morning after Brayden and Kiya got to school, we put BabyBoy#11 down for a nap, left the three little girls with Daddy, and Keith and I headed to the Food Distribution site to help set up for the Tuesday giveaway. Our goal is to help our kids learn to serve and help others. The one-on-one time with Keith is so good too. Here he is, admiring the table of snacks we set up.

For dinner that night we made Tuna Melts with Tomato Soup and fresh pineapple.

I had made a bowl of Easy Pumpkin Whip that I intended to serve for dessert. But I saw several almost-empty containers of ice cream in the freezer that I wanted to get rid of and forgot all about the Easy Pumpkin Whip. Goof. So we had the Whip for breakfast on Tuesday instead. It’s only lightly sweetened, has protein and pumpkin in it – so it made for a good breakfast!

Our friend Paula had dropped off this loaf of Pumpkin Bread and we enjoyed it that morning too! So good!

I had sausage patties and a lot of English muffins, so I scrambled some eggs and put together 14 Breakfast Sandwiches to have on hand.

Three of the kids put on swimming suits that morning, haha. Josie stayed in her jammies. Meh, it was Thanksgiving week and I was extra busy. Regular clothing was optional. The three little girls had a get-together in our playroom saying over and over, “So nice to see you!” “So nice to see you!” in their preschool and toddler language. It was so sweet.

I had two appointments that morning and the second one was right by Sam’s. So I took advantage of being kid-free and ran in to get as many groceries as I could. I got a couple of special items for Thanksgiving – Martinelli’s and fancy whipped cream. Otherwise I got the regular needed items – milk, produce, peanut butter, sliced cheese, grass fed hamburger meat, and our favorite beef smoked sausage.

After school, Brayden, Kiya, and I went to hand out food at the Food Distribution site. When we got home, Matt had started warming up the casserole I’d put together from Sunday’s leftovers plus leftover peas.

Wednesday, Matt and Elias headed to York to work on our properties. Kelsey had the day off so she came over to help with kids and Thanksgiving prep! We had a huge day in the kitchen, getting a lot done for the holiday and then some.

I had picked up this 10-pound box of bacon at Sam’s the day before. It was highly discounted and ended up being just $3.40/pound so I was pretty excited! We baked several cookie sheets worth of it that morning, eating it for breakfast and then putting the rest in the fridge for easy-t0-warm-up breakfasts or sandwiches during the next few days.

Kelsey took the three littlest girls into the living room to color while Kiya, Keith and I worked on Pumpkin Pies.

Kiya did most of the “work” of adding ingredients to the blender and Keith helped push buttons on the blender. ;)

Our pies turned out great! Here’s our easy, real food Pumpkin Pie recipe.

Next, Kelsey got the kids involved in potato scrubbing and carrot peeling/cutting.

So far, we hadn’t let these two use knives, but Kelsey talked them through it and they did great!

Meanwhile, we browned 6-pounds of hamburger meat to use that night and through the weekend.

I used half of the cooked meat to make Sloppy Joes for dinner. We ate them with grapes and salad.

Thursday morning Justus showed up at 5:20 to get the turkey on the smoker. I had coffee and God time, then got mashed potatoes in the crock pot.

Mid-morning I made these rolls – first time I’d made rolls in a long time! Kelsey snagged this photo. :)

We’d FINALLY finished our “take fall treats to neighbors” project and were determined to deliver before our Thanksgiving meal. Our bags were filled with frosted brownies, muffins, and oatmeal cookies.

Matt loaded up all the bags plus six kids and walked around the neighborhood handing them out and wishing people a Happy Thanksgiving!

Meanwhile, guests started to show up and we finished the meal prep. Justus’ turkey turned out amazing!

Here are all of my Thanksgiving meal recipes.

Here’s this year’s crew! It included all of our family plus one of our housemates (who is now part of our family). Plus a dear friend from York and two YU soccer guys we’ve come to know.

After the feast, the guys played a game in the living room and we gals rested for a while on the couches.

I packaged up a plate of food for a friend who wasn’t able to enjoy a Thanksgiving meal that day, then we started getting kids ready for Eva to take our family photos.

UGH. It was then that Anna came down from her “nap” with styrofoam stuffing all over her. Which meant that something had busted open and the filling was also all over her bedroom. Praise God for sweet daughters-in-law who cleaned it all up for their tired mother-in-law.

Eva is a rock star who took individual photos of all of us, plus one big family photo. (I’ll share them with you when we get them!) We came home and put together a Nacho Bar for dinner.

Then, we turned on a Christmas show for the kids to watch while we adults played Stuff Happens before bedtime. THAT was my favorite part of the day!

Friday I got zero pictures, hahaha. I was so tired that day I wasn’t on my top game. We picked up our Bonus Boy for the weekend (age 4, former foster son and half sibling to some of our kids), ate leftovers, we made mac and cheese, I took a nap. That’s about all I remember. :)

Saturday we loaded up all 8 kids and took them to the Children’s Museum for the morning. It was a great and needed outing!

We ended our time at the museum with the kids all “working” at Runza. It was one of the cutest things I’ve ever seen them do as a group. They had on hats and aprons, flipped burgers, took orders, filled drinks, made fries – goodness it was sweet.

Elias had started lunch for us so that we could eat right away when we got home – Cheese and Spinach Quesadillas with Tomato Soup and apples.

For dinner that night, I baked whatever chicken tenders and patties I found in the freezer. Plus I put waffle fries in our air fryer, steamed broccoli, and opened up cans of fruit. It was a fun, easy meal and a great way to end our week!

And now – Christmas time!!!!! Here’s to a great new week!

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So Many Fun Peppermint Candy Crafts!

December 14, 2015 by Laura 5 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

You may have seen the DIY Peppermint Candy Bowl tutorial floating around online. Usually, I see videos like that and I’m like, “How nice for you. You like to take twenty-seven steps to make a recipe or a craft. You turn out amazing-looking dishes/crafts. Your videos make it look easy for everyone (but me). I must now go back to making kiddie crafts and stirring together 5-ingredient recipes because I can’t handle more than 2 steps while making anything.”

But the Peppermint Candy Bowls were different. This craft idea is as easy as opening a bag of candy, melting it for a short time in the oven, and…hmmm. That’s it. That’s all you do. It’s really that easy.

This is why I purchased a bulk amount of round peppermint candies before Thanksgiving. I would have peppermint bowls – I would. People would be impressed. My house would look festive. I could do this!

peppermint bowls

And then I cheated. I turned the job over to a college girl who was staying at our house during Thanksgiving week. She made all the adorable Peppermint Candy Bowls and I cheered for her. In the meantime, I ironed tea bags and she cheered for me. (Not really, because my craft didn’t look like much at the time so nothing motivated her to say, “Wow, Laura, you sure can iron.”)

Nonetheless, while our friend made Peppermint Bowls, I turned out these Lavender Oatmeal Bath Teabags – the gift tags of which made us both cheer. Also, we watched a cheesy Hallmark Christmas movie while she was visiting because #sappymovies #girlstuff #absolutelynecessary

The boys got home from basketball practice before the movie was over. They immediately began making fun of every line and every situation and all the fake snow falling at just the right time. Just whatever, boys. I cater to you and watch your blow-up movies all the time and don’t make fun of your fake explosions and people with unrealistic abilities to climb buildings or throw large machines. #whyineedgirltime

lavender tea bags11

So girlie stuff. Since the peppermint bowls were such a success, we talked about making more peppermint crafts. We bought more peppermint candies and put all the boys to work opening all of them and putting them into a bowl. (Why did I not get a picture of this?) It was our friend’s idea to fill an entire cookie sheet with peppermints and melt them down to make a tray. We never got around to it before the dorm opened up again, so lookie what I made all by myself!!!

peppermint trays

If you look real close (please don’t) – you’ll see that I got distracted and let my peppermints stay in the oven about one minute too long which resulted in a few pepperminty bubbles. The trays are still adorable and now my house is filled with fun, festive decorations!

Easy Peppermint Candy Crafts

What you need to know about making Easy Peppermint Candy Crafts

1. Get all the detailed instructions here. But in short, you put peppermint candies on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper (we found that a Silicone Baking Mat worked much better.) Bake in a 300° oven for 7-8 minutes.

2. Watch carefully the last few minutes of baking so as not to over-melt the peppermints. You want them just barely melted. Once they become shiny and runny, they become a peppermint disaster and you’ll have to throw out your oven and then you might as well move to another state. (I’ve obviously been watching an over-dramatic girlie movie.)

3. To make a peppermint bowl, turn the melted peppermints out over the bottom of a small glass or plastic bowl for easy shaping. We found it was best to wait about 30 seconds after the mints came out of the oven before shaping.

4. We found that it was best to make just one bowl at a time. These are a little bit time sensitive.

5. You need 19 peppermints for one bowl; 149 for a large tray (I did 6 rows of 14 alternated with 5 rows of 13); 17 peppermints for the tiny tray.

6. These are breakable. Do not bang these on a table or play soccer with them in the living room.

7. These are only barely sticky once completed. This makes them great for decorations or gifts. You probably don’t want to use the bowls for cereal and milk, though. I mean, you make the call.

Warning: These crafts are so much fun you’ll consider buying a warehouse full of peppermints so you can make an entire house of melted candy. You’ll want to experiment with other shapes and household items. You will become addicted to watching peppermints melt and become cute. The men in your life will wonder if you’ve lost your mind (again) as they dutifully take thousands of wrappers off peppermint candies as you have directed them to do.

Have you ever tried crafts like this? Have any fun ideas for shapes?

P.S. Check out Cantina’s adorable Ribbon Tree Ornament!

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Cinnamon Sugar Pecans ~ a Great Gift or Christmas Snack

December 13, 2015 by Laura 13 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Cinnamon Sugar Pecans

I don’t know how much these cost in the mall. All I know is that last week when my friend munched on these Cinnamon Sugar Pecans that were sitting on my table she said, “You made these?? These are phenomenal! We buy these at the mall every Christmas – but you made these??!”

Ah, well. I sure do love it when my friends come over and say nice things about my food. I mean – I love it when friends honor me with their presence and I can, in turn, bless them with something tasty to eat. Well, shoot. The food and friends thing – it’s just a win-win you know?

So back to how much Cinnamon Sugar Pecans cost at the mall. I have no idea. They must cost a lot because making these at home is not the least expensive snack or gift you’ll make this Christmas. Pecans aren’t cheap. I prefer organic nuts, but the cost throws me a little bit. I’ll only make these for the occasional treat seeing as our family (along with some friends) downed almost an entire pound of these in a day and a half. Of course, this is not surprising. We are the Coppinger family after all. “Oh look at all her tall, thin boys. They must not eat as much as other teens.” {Laura passes out with laughter.}

The least I can do for us all is to provide a recipe so we can make these at home to avoid having to spend more on these specialty pecans at the mall. I’m guessing these are lower in sugar, too. You’ll love how easy these are to make. And they do make a great gift – if you can package them up before they all get eaten by your family. Christmas blessings to you on that one.

Here are some online sources I like for pecans:

Braga Farms – I love this source. We visited their farm. They are fantastic people. I buy from them when I can.
Amazon – These are about half the price as those above, but they aren’t organic. They are a good quality, though.

Cinnamon Sugar PecansYum

5.0 from 2 reviews

Cinnamon Sugar Pecans ~ a Great Gift or Christmas Snack

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Author: Laura

Ingredients

½ cup sucanat or sugar
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon sea salt
1 egg white
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 teaspoons water
1 pound pecan halves

Instructions

Mix sucanat, cinnamon, and salt in a gallon-sized ziploc-type bag.
Set aside.
Whisk egg white, vanilla, and water in a large bowl until frothy.
Toss in pecans, coating them all with liquid.
Pour the coated pecans into the bag with sucanat/cinnamon/salt mixture.
Seal the bag and shake gently to coat the pecans as evenly as possible.
Spread the coated pecans on a parchment paper or silicone mat lined cookie sheet.
Bake in a 250° oven for 1 hour - stirring every 20 minutes.

Here’s a little look at each easy step of making these pecan snacks: whisk the egg white mixture, stir in the pecans, shake them in a bag with the sugar mixture, spread them on a pan to bake. None of this is difficult.

Steps to Make Cinnamon Sugar Pecans

Easy Cinnamon Sugar Pecans
As a happy aside – my family enjoyed sprinkling some of these on our French toast this morning at breakfast. I’m so excited that these are now a part of our list of holiday goodies to enjoy!

cinnamon pecan french toast

I feel like I should now make a gift card to go with these pecans, just in case I can set any aside to give as gifts. Here are some pretty terrible options I came up with as to what the card should (not) say:

Hope your Christmas is as nutty as you are!
I think you’re nuts!
You’re gettin’ nuttin’ for Christmas.
Don’t open before Christmas -no pecan! (that one is truly horrible)

Please, Friends. Help me come up with a good gift card tag line. Or maybe we should just eat all of these without sharing.

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Thanksgiving Break Fun ~ and My Butter Famine is Over

November 21, 2015 by Laura 10 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

My butter famine is over! But first:

Now I know how my mom felt when my brother and I came home from college for holiday breaks. Never mind that Asa has only been five minutes down the road in the dorm since August. Looking forward to and preparing for him to be home for a week has made me so excited! Brittany is joining us this week too because she has to work all week. Yay for me! Another girl in the house! (We have made plans to do our nails, make crafts, and watch some girly Christmas movies. Yes!!!)

In preparation for Thanksgiving break week and Thanksgiving day itself, I think I have bought out all the grocery stores from here to Lincoln. I have two full refrigerators, a full pantry, many full freezers – there is food everywhere. After standing on my head to find places for the last of my (many) grocery purchases yesterday and completely filling every space in both refrigerators, I realized we’d be getting our Bountiful Basket order today.

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Thankfully, most of the order didn’t have to be refrigerated. And of course, we’re already doing a great job of beginning to eat our way through all the food, thus creating more refrigerator space. It doesn’t take long for food to disappear around here.

How blessed are we? Plenty to eat, plenty to share.

Do you want to hear about the end of my butter famine now?

Remember how we talked about the high cost of butter and how my supply was running low? Many of you shared the same situation occurring where you live. So have you been able to find some good butter deals now that it’s holiday season? I hadn’t until this week. Wednesday when I was in Lincoln, I made a stop at Aldi and bought 12 pounds for $2.49 each since that’s the best I’d seen it in a very long time. Back home two days later, I found a $2.49 price match for Challenge Butter (a great brand which is normally $5 a pound!). Plus I had a couple of 50¢ off coupons. I bought another dozen pounds, and then I saw that there are 55¢ off coupons inside each box!

tgiving4

I’m pretty sure I am going to be weird and open every single box, cut out all the coupons, then go back before the sale ends to get another dozen with the coupons. It’s Challenge Butter that I can get for $1.94!! So what if I’ll have 48 loose sticks of butter in my freezer? There’s nothing weird about that. Nothing at all.

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tgiving3

Those pictures don’t do my butter-filled freezers justice. They only show part of my madness. Basically, I’ve just stuffed butter boxes in every nook and cranny of any space in my freezers that I can find. It feels so good to have an abundance of butter again. The holidays can now commence.

We started off our Thanksgiving break with little gifts. I couldn’t help it. Our boys are into crazy socks, and Elias and I found some fun Christmas socks in Lincoln after a follow-up doctor appointment for him Wednesday. (You can guess that those cat socks are for Malachi.) I found a free printable Thanksgiving candy wrapper which I prepped to go with the socks. Here’s the link if you want to make some (candy wrappers, not socks).

tgiving1

The boys have their first homeschool basketball game tonight. I can’t wait to see them play, but I’m almost more excited to see all the moms I rarely get to see except for during basketball season. I love how God has provided these families and the friendships that come with them.

The rest of the week, we have plans to watch movies, play Settlers of Catan, eat loads of food, kick back, and unfortunately, do a few math lessons that we’re behind in. With tiny bit of school work and a big bit of fun, hopefully the math won’t seem too bad! I even bought take-and-bake pizzas to make my load easier.

Are you taking a break during Thanksgiving week? Traveling? Staying home? Buying lots of butter?

Have a great weekend!

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Free Printables That Make Great Gifts

November 17, 2015 by Laura 1 Comment

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Before we get to the printables, I thought I’d give you a little insight into family life around here our place.

Soccer season ended just in time for basketball season to begin. I feel like I’ve finally come up for air since school started this fall. Breathing is so very nice.

Asa (our 18-year old) is as busy as ever juggling his freshman year of college. He’s rocking it, working very hard in his classes (and on his social life too). Sleep is optional for him. ;)

Justus (our 15-year old) is taking one college class on campus – Basic Speech – which has been great for him. This is a kid who does not get the least bit nervous giving speeches in front of traditional college students. Dual credit classes are so nice. Elias (our 13-year old) was super sick for 4 weeks and is finally just about back to normal. Ugh, that was awful. I’ve never been so thankful to see my kid eat. Malachi (our 10-year old) has had the opportunity to attend a fantastic horse class as well as participate in some wonderful science days with our local homeschool group.

horses1

science day

So Wiggams. You remember Wiggams? That darling cat has been so high maintenance the past few weeks, bless her little cat heart. You can read here to catch up on all the mama-baby-drama if you dare. Not wanting to risk going through that again, we took her in to be spayed last week. It is a relief to have this taken care of. When we went to pick her up the next day, they said that she appears to have a bladder infection. Ugh, not this too! The poor thing.

wiggams

Since she is an outdoor cat they kept her (at our local Adopt-a-Pet facility) so she can heal properly before she comes home. Poor Malachi misses his daily Wiggams play time. We go visit her when we can sneak in a trip (in my spare time).

We’ve been talking an awful lot about holiday food around here. Well, obviously. Food is where it’s at. There is so much to love about food. Slowly but surely I am making our Thanksgiving food and putting it into the freezer. Check out all of the Getting Ahead for the Holidays info here. Here’s what I’ve checked off my list so far:

If feels great to have so many of those big jobs crossed off my list already. Shoot, I’m running out of Pyrex dishes – if you can possibly imagine. It’s a good problem to have, as long as we don’t need to make a casserole between now and next Thursday.

I’m excited to be participating in a fun online Thanksgiving Recipe Swap this year! It’s a “progressive dinner” so each day this week, more recipes will be added. Start today by finding some yummy appetizer recipes. The first one I’m going to try is the Pumpkin Spice Fruit Dip. Wow, that looks good.

Go check out all the appetizer recipes and see what’s coming up later this week. This is going to be awesome! I love free resources like this!

So now let’s look at the fun printables, want to?

I’m hoping that next week we can take a bit of a Thanksgiving break from most of our school work. We’ll still need to do math lessons, but overall, I hope to play a lot of board games and work on some fun Christmas projects.

All of the following printables are free. I thought you might enjoy looking through them to see what you might want to use as inexpensive gifts this Christmas. For just the cost of paper and ink, you can put together some nice packages!

This first one says “Summer Blessings” but I hereby declare that they can be used in the fall and winter too. Print them onto cardstock, cut them, grab some envelopes, and tie them up with a ribbon.

Blessings Card Printables

Galatians 6:9 is one of my favorite Bible verses. This can be printed and framed for a sweet gift of encouragement.

Galatians69color

Galatians 6:9 Printable

Of course, we have to talk about giving gifts of food. Here are some fun printable labels to go with food gifts that are fitting for this time of year:

Pumpkin and Apple Stickers

Pumpkin and Apple Treat Labels

It’s fun to put together a basket of apples with a jar of homemade caramel dip…

CaramelSauceTag-prev

Caramel Apple Treat Labels and Recipe

Below are sticker printables that can be used to label any treats you put into jars!

Canning Jar Labels

You can print gift tags to attach to any of your gifts…

Christmas Gift Tags HHM

Christmas Gift Tag Printables

…Or fun Christmas cards.

Christmas Card Printables

Our family made these wrapped candy bars last year to give to some of our youth workers at church and adopted college students. They were a hit!

Christmas Candy Bar Gifts

Candy Bar Labels

I have more fun (and inexpensive) gift ideas up my sleeve that I’ll share during the next few weeks!

How are your holiday preparations coming?

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2-Ingredient Cranberry Sauce ~ It’s Too Easy

November 16, 2015 by Laura 32 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

cranberry sauce

Why? Why do we make it hard? And the most important question of all, who loves how the cranberry sauce from the store plops out of the can and remains forever in the shape of the can? How do they do that, anyway?

Don’t answer that. I already know. It’s made with gelatin. I could make my cranberry sauce with gelatin too, if I wanted. It might be kind of fun, actually. I could use a tin can to make a cranberry sauce mold and I could plop it out on Thanksgiving morning. It would bring back fun memories of my childhood, because that was one of my favorite holiday jobs. I could re-live that suction sound it made as the jellied variety of cranberry sauce came out of the can. That would be way, way, way better than my memories of the sound a can of biscuits makes when it opens. I can’t even handle thinking about that one. (I’m a canned biscuit big baby scaredy cat chicken.)

So homemade cranberry sauce. It is so easy. I’d never even made it before last week because I figured it might be hard. Really, Laura? You put cranberries and sugar in a pot and you cook it for a few minutes to create cranberry sauce. Well, I had no idea.

This recipe is a total no-brainer. It’s as easy as Stir-and-Pour Bread. In fact, this sauce tastes very good on top of a slice of that particular bread. I promise to continue to make all of our real food cooking as easy as possible.

Please note though that while this is easy and made with real food – this recipe is very full of sugar. I tried to cut down the sugar – you know – to prove like so many other recipes that all the sugar is ridiculous. Unfortunately, this dish mocked me to my face. (Literally, to my very puckered up face.) It was like, “I dare you to cut the sugar down and not make weird faces. Go ahead. Try it. Heh. Nice face.”

Fine. My face was unbecoming. Make this cranberry sauce of the low sugar variety at your own risk. Keep your camera handy. Your cranberry sauce face photos will be a delight for years to come.

Whatever your sugar content choice, I promise you will love how ridiculously easy this side dish is to make. I will be making mine a couple days before Thanksgiving so that I can simply pull it out of the fridge to serve. I got my fresh cranberries for 99¢ so I was very excited. You probably wanted to know that.

2-Ingredient Cranberry Sauce

Yum

5.0 from 1 reviews

2-Ingredient Cranberry Sauce ~ It's Too Easy

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Author: Laura

Ingredients

1½ cups fresh cranberries (12 ounce bag)
⅓ to 1 cup sucanat or sugar

Instructions

Rinse cranberries.
Combine cranberries and sucanat in a small sauce pan.
Cook on medium heat, stirring occasionally, for 10-15 minutes. Your work here is done.
Place cranberry sauce in a serving dish, cover, and refrigerate for at least two hours before serving.

Ten Minute ~ Two Ingredient Cranberry Sauce

Make this several days before serving if you wish. Yes! It is another make-ahead dish to save you time on Thanksgiving or Christmas (or some Friday in February). Add this recipe to your Getting Ahead for the Holidays Check-List.

Have you tried making Cranberry Sauce? Ever tried it low sugar? Whoa. Who loves the canned, jellied cranberry sauce suction plop? Ah, the memories.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

While I’ve got you, I am pleased to announce the three Getting Ahead for the Holidays winners of the $25 Gift Certificates good toward any of our eCourses or downloadable items in theHeavenly Homemakers Shop!

Jane J.: bnwalker@
Shelby: sixforemans@
Karen: kloumc21@

Winners, email me (laura at heavenlyhomemakers.com) and I’ll send you a certificate!

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

How To Make Your Own Frozen Pies

November 9, 2015 by Laura 40 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Last I checked, Sara Lee charges over $3 for her frozen pies. I don’t blame her. I’d charge $5. But when I make my own pies, it can cost as little as $1 and I know what ingredients I’m including. Plus I’m making mine with love and all that. (Priceless, no doubt.)

Making a frozen pie is as easy as making a not frozen pie. Not that making a pie is easy. Nor is it really hard. You just have to commit, you know? You have to be like, “Today I am going to mix together and roll out pie crusts. I’m just going to do it and get this job out of the way. Everyone will love the pie. It’s not as hard as it sounds. Let’s do this.”

Then, after you mix and roll your crusts, you add whatever filling you want (pumpkin, apple, etc). You wrap them well, and you freeze them.

This is exactly how Sara Lee does it. Only she puts hers in a box. We’ll skip that part.

This post is chuck full of pie-making tips, recipes, and instructions. Shall we begin?

How to Make a Whole Wheat Pie Crust

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1.0 from 1 reviews

How To Make Your Own Frozen Pies

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Author: Laura

Serves: 1 crust

Ingredients

1¼ cup whole wheat flour
¼ teaspoon sea salt
⅓ cup Palm Shortening (or butter)
4-5 Tablespoons cold water

Instructions

Place flour, salt and shortening in food processor.
Blend until shortening is cut throughout the flour and the mixture resembles crumbs.
Drizzle in the water while the food processor is still whirling.
Continue until a ball of dough forms.
Roll out your dough into a circle on a well floured surface.
Fold the circle in half. Then fold it in half again.
Place your dough in your pie dish with the folded corner in the center.
Unfold the dough, shape it into the dish and make the edges pretty. (see tutorial video below)
Poke your dough a few times with a fork to keep it from poofing up in the oven.
Bake at 450° for 10-12 minutes or until the crust is golden brown. Or, fill it with pie filling and bake as directed in specific pie recipe.

How to Shape a Pie Crust

You can look through a picture tutorial on this post to see the specifics of how to roll a pie crust and place it in a pie pan.

Want to watch me shaping a pie crust a few years ago? Watch the video below. (Click here if the video doesn’t show up for you.)

How to Make a Frozen Pie

How to Make Your Own Frozen Pies

To make a frozen pumpkin or fruit pie, make it according to the directions but do not bake. Wrap the unbaked pie very well in plastic wrap. You might even consider putting the wrapped pie into a freezer bag for extra freezer protection. Label the pie. Freeze for up to three months.

To bake your frozen pie, take it out of the freezer and put it directly into a cold oven. Turn on the oven and bake as directed allowing a little extra baking time if necessary. See how easy this is?!

apple pie freezer 2

If you plan to make a cream pie, bake your crust as directed, allow it to cool, then wrap and freeze. Thaw crust and add your cream filling before serving.

Holiday Pie Recipes

Pumpkin Pie Recipe

2 cups canned or frozen pumpkin
2/3 cup brown sugar or sucanat
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon ginger
½ teaspoon nutmeg
3 eggs
1 ¼ cup heavy cream

Whisk together all ingredients. Pour into unbaked pie crust. Freeze if desired. Bake at 350° for 50-60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the middle of the pie comes out clean.

pumpkin_pies

Apple Pie Recipe

5-6 apples (any variety)
1/4 cup sucanat or brown sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Wash and slice apples. Stir in sucanat and cinnamon. Make a double pie crust recipe. Place one crust on the bottom of a pie pan. Spread apple pie filling into the unbaked crust. Place the second pie crust on top. Seal and shape as shown in the video above. Freeze if desired. Bake at 350° for 50-60 minutes.

I usually have prepared Apple Pie Filling in my freezer, making this super simple.

Dutch Apple Pie Recipe

Make as directed above, only make a single pie crust. Top apples with crumb topping recipe found here.

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If you’re hoping to Get Ahead for the Holidays, I highly recommend making your pies soon and putting them into the freezer to pull out for easy baking the day before your meal!

Here are the quick links to all the recipes we covered in this series:

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Real Food Green Bean Casserole (a Make-Ahead Dish)

November 8, 2015 by Laura 43 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

gb_casserole_2

If I had to choose a favorite holiday dish, it would have to be Green Bean Casserole. It’s not something I remember eating when I was growing up. I discovered it sometime after Matt and I got married. So yum.

The recipe I learned to make? It was the one with canned cream of mushroom and french fried onions. Man, I loved that stuff.

Once I learned more about cooking with real food ingredients, I knew that the canned cream of mushroom soup and French fried onions didn’t make the cut. But this casserollllllle! How to make a real food version?

gb_casserole

I learned long ago how to make cream soups. French fried onions had me stumped though – mostly because of the time I felt it would take to create them. Then all my plans to keep my real food kitchen simple would be out the window.

Finally I figured out how I could make this casserole without mushroom soup or French fried onions. It goes without saying, then, that this casserole is very easy to make. Just wait until you see how easy!

Green Bean Casserole

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5.0 from 1 reviews

Real Food Green Bean Casserole (a Make-Ahead Dish)

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Author: Laura

Serves: 6-8 servings

Ingredients

3 cups fresh or frozen green beans
2 Tablespoons minced onion
3 Tablespoons butter (if needed)
1 Tablespoon cornstarch or whole wheat flour
2 cups milk
Sea salt
2 cups grated cheddar cheese

Instructions

Steam green beans until tender. Set aside.
In a large saucepan, saute onion and butter together until the minced onion is lightly toasted.
Turn heat down to low.
Stir in cornstarch, then add milk.
Turn heat up to thicken cream sauce, stirring constantly until sauce is thick and bubbly.
Stir in cooked green beans, salting liberally.
Pour the mixture into a 9x13 inch casserole dish.
Top with grated cheese.
Cover and bake in a 350° oven for 30 minutes.
Uncover and bake for 10 minutes more.
Serve.

To Freeze Green Bean Casserole:

Make the casserole as directed in the recipe above. All it to cool completely. Cover and freeze for up to three months.

To bake and serve, thaw casserole in the refrigerator and bake as directed. OR, cover the frozen dish with foil. Place it in a cold oven*. Turn the oven on to 250° and bake for 2 hours. Turn the oven up to 350° to continue baking to heat through.

*Be sure your oven is cold when you put in the frozen dish! Otherwise, the pan will crack because of the extreme temperature change.

Real Food Green Bean Casserole ~ a Make-Ahead Dish!

There is a One-Dish Meal version of this casserole in my Oh, For Real Cookbook called Hearty Green Bean Casserole. It includes hamburger and it is awesome.

Note that if you use corn starch instead of wheat flour to make the sauce for this recipe, it will be completely gluten free.

I think this will soon become one of your favorite holiday dishes! Then, of course, you will find yourself making it many times all year round. No need to wait for Thanksgiving and Christmas for this one!

Here are the quick links to all the recipes we covered in this series:

Getting Ahead for the Holidays

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Simple Meals is here! It’s saving my brain (and many of yours too!). If you haven’t joined yet, now’s the time. Get all the details here!

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

Can You Make Mashed Potatoes Ahead of Time?

November 4, 2015 by Laura 53 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

Oh yes. You can. You can make mashed potatoes ahead of time.

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Now, there are some things you’ll need to avoid. Here are two mashed potato tricks that do not work:

1. Do not boil potatoes with the plan to mash and serve them later.

While this seems like such a good idea, this will turn them into a sticky, gooey mess.

2. Do not make mashed potatoes and freeze them as-is.

I’ve never had success with this. Plain mashed potatoes freeze fine but thaw weird. They are always watery and unappetizing. These are not the kind of potatoes I want to include on my holiday table. If you do freeze them as-is, you must cook the frozen/thawed potatoes in a pot to steam off excess water that has formed in the freezing process. More info to come.

Make-Ahead Mashed Potatoes ~ What Works, What Doesn't.

Ways to prepare this side dish favorite ahead of time:

1. Scrub or peel the potatoes and put them into a pot of cold water.

Want to get the prep work out of the way on a busy day filled with meal preparations? Typically I pull my family into the kitchen the night before the holiday meal. Together, we scrub and chop potatoes. We put them into a large pot, cover them with cold water, put on a lid, and leave them until boiling and mashing time the next day.

potatoes

2. Make mashed potatoes, then use your crock pot to keep them warm.

What I find very helpful is to follow all the instructions detailed in #1 to prep the potatoes the night before. The next morning – hours before our meal – I cook, drain, and mash. I then put them into a crock pot (with butter, always) on the “keep warm” setting until serving time. In the meantime, I can wash and put away the potato pot, then focus on other meal prep that needs to be done.

3. Embellish the mashed potatoes before freezing them.

While mashed potatoes don’t freeze well as-is, they do freeze well if you add some goodies to them. Take a look at the recipe below for all the specifics! When made like that, they do freeze well. Or, at the very least, you can make them a few days before your holiday meal, refrigerate them, then bake them on serving day. This is the method I plan on using this holiday season.

cheesy_mashed_potatoes

Cheesy Mashed Potatoes are always a huge hit. You can’t go wrong with sour cream and cheese right?

Make-Ahead Cheesy Mashed Potatoes

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5.0 from 1 reviews

Make-Ahead Cheesy Mashed Potatoes

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Author: Laura

Serves: 8-10 servings

Ingredients

8 medium-sized potatoes
1 cup milk (more or less as needed)
sea salt to taste
3 Tablespoons butter
1 cup sour cream
1 cup shredded cheese

Instructions

Scrub and cube potatoes.
Boil them in water until tender.
Drain water and mash potatoes with milk and salt until smooth.
Stir together the mashed potatoes, butter, and sour cream.
Spread into a 3 quart casserole dish.
Sprinkle cheese on top.
Refrigerate until you are ready to bake this dish.
Bake in a 350° oven for 45 minutes.

Freezing Instructions:

Make the potatoes as directed in the recipe above. All it to cool completely. Cover and freeze for up to three months.

To bake and serve, thaw potatoes in the refrigerator and bake as directed. OR, cover the frozen dish with foil. Place the frozen dish of potatoes into a cold oven*. Turn the oven on to 250° and bake for 2 hours. Turn the oven up to 350° to continue baking to heat through.

*Be sure your oven is cold when you put in the frozen dish! Otherwise, the pan will crack because of the extreme temperature change.

What has been your experience with making potatoes ahead of time?

Here are the quick links to all the recipes we covered in this series:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Simple Meals is here! It’s saving my brain (and many of yours too!). If you haven’t joined yet, now’s the time. Get all the details here!

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

Getting Ahead for the Holidays – Join Us!

November 1, 2015 by Laura 110 Comments

This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.

There is oodles of info out there about how to have a simple season and how to relax and enjoy the holidays. I am all for it. Why go overboard and make life complicated? Pinterest can keep its 14-step recipes and perfect looking hand-crafted gifts. I’ve gotta stick with the basics.

But still. Making a holiday special means that I’m going to do extra work on top of all my normal work. There’s no way around it. No matter how simple I keep our holiday festivities, the cookies don’t bake themselves. Packages don’t arrive if I don’t order them. The turkey stays frozen when not baked. I could go on.

Now, I can keep things simpler if I buy pre-made food and gift packages. Sometimes I do. Sometimes in the name of saving my sanity, I feel that it’s worth the extra money and the gross ingredients (don’t read the label, don’t real the label, what you don’t know can’t hurt you, do not turn that package over!). But overall, I want to save money and put delicious real food on the table. While keeping life simple. Is it even possible?

Thus, we begin a fun two-week series here called:

Getting Ahead for the Holidays

This is the best way I know to keep life simple during the holiday season. If I do everything last minute, I enjoy nothing. But if I do a little each day in advance, prepping food and gifts and decorations – I can actually enjoy myself. What a lovely idea. Food can be put on the table (the good kind) without me standing on my feet for hours at a time. I can save dozens (or maybe even hundreds?) of dollars. Food tastes better. Gifts are more meaningful. I can actually look at the people around me and maybe I can even smile.

Getting ahead saves my holiday. Want to join me?

Getting Ahead for the Holidays Invitation

Most of the posts I’ll share will involve food prep suggestions and recipes. This doesn’t surprise you, I’m sure. Decorating is not my gift. Food though? I love it! Nothing will be fancy; everything will be tasty. It’s all real food.

Would you like a peek at the menu we’ll be working through?

All of this (with the exception of the Stir-and-Pour Dinner Rolls) can be made in advance. Some can be made many days in advance. Some should be made the day before. All of the recipes are simple. I’ll walk you through the entire process of methods I use to make these foods efficiently so I can enjoy time with family and guests!

Make plans to join us here. If you want, subscribe so you won’t miss a post:

Daily Newsletter

Weekly Newsletter

There will be recipes, printables…and I’m thinking there should be prizes. What do you think? Should there be prizes? Yes. Let there be prizes.

Every time you see this banner on a post:

Getting Ahead for the Holidays

Leave a comment on that post.

There will be many posts in the coming days where you’ll spot that banner. The more you comment, the more chances you have to win! What will you win?

How about we give away three $25 Gift Certificates good toward any of our eCourses or downloadable items in the Heavenly Homemakers Shop? Three! Sound good?

Let’s get the comments rolling with this question:

Which of the recipes in the Holiday Menu above are you most excited to see first?

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