Heavenly Homemakers

Encouraging women in homemaking, healthy eating and parenting

Homemade Onion Soup Mix (with No MSG!)

by 208 Comments

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

Save money and use real food ingredients when you make Onion Soup Mix!

I’m at church camp this week, loving life, swatting bugs, and trying to stay hydrated. While I’m gone, you can enjoy a re-posting of some of our most popular time-saving, money-saving, healthier eating mix recipes…

Originally posted March, 2011

So far in this Heavenly Homemakers Recipe Challenge, we’ve come up with recipes for Homemade Tator Tots, Healthier Chocolate Milk and Teriyaki Sauce. I attempted a recipe for corn tortillas and while they tasted pretty good…they were NOT easy to make, they fell apart and looked ugly. I’m going to keep working on that one until I come up with a corn tortilla recipe that doesn’t take the whole afternoon to make. :)

This new recipe in The Challenge was super easy to put together! Vicki, one of our readers, sent me an Onion Soup Mix recipe to try and WOW is it simple! I tweaked it a teeny tiny bit, but really, this recipe is more Vicki’s than mine.

What I love about this recipe is that I didn’t have to look high and low for the ingredients. Many onion soup recipes I found call for some sort of bouillon. Almost always, bouillon has MSG. There are MSG free bouillon varieties out there, but what if they aren’t easily accessible to you? And so…I was very happy to see this recipe that contained just dried herbs and spices!

Onion Soup MixYum

Homemade Onion Soup Mix (with No MSG!)
 
Save Print
Author:
Ingredients
  • ⅔ cup dried, minced onion
  • 3 teaspoons parsley flakes
  • 2 teaspoons onion powder
  • 2 teaspoons turmeric (optional)
  • 1 teaspoon celery salt
  • 1 teaspoon sea salt
  • 1 teaspoon sucanat (or sugar if you prefer)
  • ½ teaspoon ground pepper
Instructions
  1. Mix all ingredients in a jar, then give the jar a good shake.
  2. I'd recommend shaking the jar to mix the ingredients well before each use.
  3. Use 4 Tablespoons Onion Soup Mix in a recipe in place of 1 packet of onion soup mix. (I actually found that 2 Tablespoons was plenty in a beef stew recipe I tried.)
  4. Store this in a dry, cool place.

onion_soup_mix

I used the Onion Soup Mix in this simple, one dish stew and YUM!
Find the recipe for Simple One Dish Meat and Potato Meal here.

And with that…I have to ask:

SO many of you requested this recipe that I’m guessing you all must have tons of wonderful ways of using Onion Soup Mix? I would LOVE for you to share what you do with this mix!!! I have exactly two recipes that call for Onion Soup Mix. I’m so excited to use this mix in those recipes because I’ve not made them for years. But what else??? What do you make with Onion Soup Mix??

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

Beef Summer Sausage Recipe

by 22 Comments

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

Summer Sausage has always been a favorite finger food of mine during the holiday season. I’ve tinkered with recipes before, but haven’t felt like I’ve nailed them – until now.

Folks, we can now eat Summer Sausage – worry free. High fives all around!  No MSG, no nitrites, no preservatives. Actually, salt is a natural preservative, so I guess I can’t say “no preservatives.” But the least of my worries is sea salt, especially when I use Redmond. That means that “summer sausage” and “good for you” can be used in the same sentence. Yay!!!

I think you’ll be as excited about this recipe as I am. It’s homemade beef summer sausage!! You will not believe how crazy easy this is to make.

Homemade Beef Summer Sausage - Easy and Healthy!

Homemade Beef Summer SausageYum

5.0 from 1 reviews
Beef Summer Sausage Recipe
 
Save Print
Author:
Serves: 2 sausages
Ingredients
  • 2½ pounds hamburger meat
  • 2½ Tablespoons liquid smoke (I prefer Wright's Brand)
  • 1 Tablespoon sea salt (I prefer Redmond brand)
  • 1 teaspoon sucanat
  • 1 Tablespoon ground pepper
  • 1 Tablespoon minced garlic
  • 1 Tablespoon mustard seeds
Instructions
  1. Mix all ingredients together in a bowl, squishing with your hands until everything is well combined. Cover and refrigerate for 24 hours.
  2. Knead meat mixture, then shape into 2 logs, about 13x2 inches each. (I found that rolling them in parchment paper helped form a nice, round shape.)
  3. Place logs in baking dishes such as Pyrex 9x13 inch pans (so fat drippings will not spill over into the oven).
  4. Bake in a 300° oven for 2½ - 3 hours.

To freeze Summer Sausage:  Allow baked summer sausage to cool completely. Wrap in parchment paper, then with plastic wrap. Place in a freezer bag, storing in freezer for up to 2 months.

As if it wasn’t already wonderful news that we can enjoy healthy summer sausage – it’s even better news that this will be perfect for your Make-Ahead Lunch Box. I’ll be packing this for road trips, for sure.

Share with us! What’s your favorite holiday finger food?

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

Homemade Teriyaki Sauce (No MSG or HFCS!)

by 51 Comments

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

Ever noticed how tough it is to find dressings and sauces that don’t have MSG (Monosodium Glutamate) and HFCS (High Fructose Corn Syrup)? MSG, by the way, is a flavor enhancer that is made up of a bunch of chemicals I can’t pronounce and a bunch of scary stuff I don’t want to know about. You can read all the big words here.

I’ve been so excited each time I figure out how to make a new homemade salad dressing or condiment (see the whole list of healthier condiment recipes on our site)! Making your own condiments is not only much healthier, it’s often quite a bit cheaper too. And, lo and behold, these items are easy to make.

Shall we now all take a moment and enjoy a collective sigh of wonderment? Yes indeed recipes that are healthy, cheap and easy. All at the same time.

The beauty of homemade condiments too is how delicious and flavorful they are…all by themselves. We do not need to add MSG and HFCS or BGNJ to make our food taste good. (I made that last one up just for kicks and it was very fun.)

Well, apparently that was my little “rant” for the day. Try homemade condiments. They taste so good and pure.

And now for the Homemade Teriyaki Sauce recipe!

Teriyaki SauceYum

Homemade Teriyaki Sauce (No MSG or HFCS!)
 
Save Print
Author:
Ingredients
  • ¼ cup tamari soy sauce
  • 1 cup water
  • 1-2 teaspoons freshly grated ginger or dry ground ginger (more or less to taste)
  • 2 Tablespoons honey
  • 1 minced garlic clove
  • 2 Tablespoons organic cornstarch
  • ¼ cup cold water
Instructions
  1. Combine 1 cup water, soy sauce, honey, garlic and ginger in a saucepan and bring to a boil, stirring constantly.
  2. Dissolve cornstarch in ¼ cup cold water and add to sauce.
  3. Stir constantly and allow the sauce to thicken.
  4. If the sauce is too thick, add a little bit of water or soy sauce to thin.

(I use Organic Tamari Soy Sauce from OliveNation which is gluten and MSG free!) We LOVE this Teriyaki Sauce on chicken wings.

Homemade Teriyaki Sauce recipe

And with that, the Heavenly Homemakers Recipe Challenge continues. I’ve almost got another recipe ready to share. I’m not going to tell you what it is, but I will tell you that it starts with chocolate and ends with milk. Otherwise, I’m not giving any hints.

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