Monday, October 22, 2012

Food Storage Beef Stroganoff

1 cup dried onions 1 cup water 1/4 cup olive oil 3/4 cup whole wheat flour 1 tsp. salt 1 tsp. pepper 4 to 6 cups water 1 Tbsp. dried garlic 8 to 10 beef bouillon cubes 3 cans (4 oz each) sliced mushrooms, with liquid 1 Tbsp worcestershire sauce 3 Tbsp ketchup 2 cans (15 oz each) beef chunks, with liquid 1 cup dried sour cream, reconstituted with 1/2 cup water 10 cups water 1 tsp salt 6 cups uncooked wide noodles Rehydrate onions in water for 15 min. Drain. Pour olive oil into a large pot on high heat. Add onions, cook for 2 min. Add flour, salt, pepper, mix well with oil and onions, then pour in 4 to 6 cups water and continue to mix. Add garlic, bouillon, mushrooms, Worcestershire sauce, ketchup, and liquid from beef chunks. Turn heat down to medium and continue to stir and thicken for 30 min. Add beef, being careful not to break apart chunks. Stir sour cream into the stew. Boil 10 cups salted water in a large pot. Add noodles and cook until tender. Drain well and then serve beef mixture over noodles. Makes 4-6 servings.

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Frugal, it doesn't mean being cheap it means being SMART!

There are so many sayings that we all have heard time and again. Some may be ,"Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without", which is one of my favorites; there are so many others. *Nothing is a waste of time if you use the experience wisely *"Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted." --Albert Einstein Well I have just tried so hard to do what I could to use it up, everything, not be wasteful. When there are leftovers (save them and freeze them) how many times recently that I was going to throw away a little corn or green beans that were left and at the time not worth saving, keeping them in a small container in the freezer, after a couple weeks there's enough different veggies in there for a "FREE" meal of wonderful beef veggie soup! Wear it out - I am losing alot of weight (Thank Goodness!) so instead of having the fun LOL and the cost of buying more clothes I just keep taking them in! I am grateful for anything friends or neighbors give me for my kids or anything else for that matter and I use it the best that I can! I bought a bunch of fleece pajama pants that ended up being way to big for Brian and instead of taking them back because they were only $2.00 per set of pajamas, I used the material for the pants and used that to make the boys new fleece hats and matching mittens. Then the shirts I took in and remade them so I could wear them. I also when going through the boys clothes try to find other uses than clothes for them. I think I already blogged about this too but I picked up two king size sheets at a thrift store close to us for .99 cents and ended up cutting them into squares and made 44 (approx.) cloth napkins! Can't buy material for that price! Please share with me what ways you are trying to be more frugal and smart! I would love to hear and learn from your ideas as well!

Cookie Storage

Ah, don't forget about yummies in your food storage! What a great idea! I found this on none other than Pinterest, my fav! I loved this idea, I am going to try it here and I will post my pic's this weekend. I just loved the idea!
Ok blog readers, so we are working hard at building our food storage. Now, they emphasize eat what you store, store what you eat. I don't know about your family but mine love sweets! Sugar! So we are always TRYING to keep a decent storage of chocolate, cookie making supplies, chocolate, sugar, etc. I am sharing some of my families favorite treat recipes along with the links of where they came from. Enjoy, and don't forget to add CHOCOLATE to your food storage ;)