Make It Yourself Monday

I hate to admit it but my hubby and I use to love the On -Cor Salisbury Steaks. I also hate to admit that before the kids were born we could polish on a family pack by ourselves. Yeah I know kind of why I'm working on the weight loss bit now.



Now a days I make it myself and I have to tell you it's a whole lot tastier then the stuff in the box. The Recipe I use comes from a set of cook books my hubby got from his mom. It's the Woman's Day Encyclopedia of Cookery (copyright 1966)

I don't even know if this set is still in print but you can have the Salisbury Steak recipe cause I'm going to share it with you .

Salisbury Steak with Mushroom Sauce

1 lb beef chuck, ground
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1 can chopped mushrooms drained (feel free to use 1 cup fresh)
2 Tbls butter
2 Tbls Flour
1 tsp curry powder
1 Cup Water
1 beef bouillon cube

Mix meat, salt, and pepper and shape into 4 patties. Pan fry in lightly greased skillet until it reaches desired doneness. Remove from the skillet and keep hot. Cook mushrooms in butter for 2 or 3 minutes. Blend in flour and curry powder. Add water and bouillon cube; cook until smooth and thickened. Pour over meat patties and serve.

Makes 4 Servings

This is a simple recipe to make and beats the boxed stuff hands down.

Don't You Love ...

Don't you love company scare tactics to separate you from your money?

I was at the gym the other day when I looked up at the TV and saw a commercial for this


This is the Lysol no touch Hand Soap System. On the commercial they showed the HORROR of your regular pump soap. OMG look how many germs on on that pump.

AAAAHHHHHH RUN AWAY

UMM So What?

You are about to USE a product that is designed to kill the germs on your hand other wise why use it?

Lysol wants you to be scared of the big bad germs so you will buy their more expensive soap pump.... which by the way wastes more plastic and batteries. Save your cash and just buy a bar of soap. It's cheaper and just as effective at killing germs as the more expensive stuff.

Make It Your Self Monday

A couple of weeks ago I posted a recipe for Baking Mix. Today I'm going to share a couple easy recipes using it.


PANCAKES:

2 Cups Baking Mix
1 Cup Milk
2 Eggs

1 Heat skillet or griddle and spray with cooking spray.
2. Stir all ingredients until mixed well.
3. Pour 1/4 cup on to hot skillet for each pancake and cook until edges are dry flip and brown the other side.

For variations add 1 cup chocolate chips, blueberries, strawberries, apples and 1 tbls cinnamon, or our personal favorite 1/2 cup white chocolate chips and 1/2 cup smashed banana.

BISCUITS:

2 1/4 Cup baking mix
2/3 Cup milk

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees
2. Mix ingredients until you get a soft ball of dough
3. Place dough on flour covered surface and coat turn to coat. knead and roll until 1/2 inch thick.
4. Cut using biscuit cutter.
5. Place on ungreased cookie sheet and bake 8 to 10 minutes.

You can also make drop biscuits by dropping spoonfuls on to cookie sheet instead of rolling out and cutting.

CINNAMON COFFEE CAKE


Topping:
1/3 c baking mix
1/3 packed brown sugar
1 tbls cinnamon
2 tbls firm butter
Mix all dry ingredients together then cut in the butter until mixture is crumbly.

Cake:
2 cups baking mix
2/3 cups milk or water
2 tbls sugar
1tsp vanilla
1 egg

1. Heat oven to 350
2.Grease a 9 x 1 1/2 inch round baking pan
3. Mix all ingredients until blended and pour into pan.
4. Sprinkle with topping and bake 18 to 22 minutes.

You can make this Apple Cinnamon Coffee Cake by chopping up a small apple and putting it on top before the topping.

Happy 2nd Annual Save the Frogs Day

I just read this morning that today is Save the Frogs Day. I didn't know if I should post this Here since its environmental or on Cats and Dogs Turtles and Frogs, since it's about Frogs... so I'm compromising and posting it on both.

Frogs are one of the best indicators of whether or not an environment is healthy since they are the first affected by changes. If there are no frogs then you know something is wrong!

According to the ENN (Environmental News Network) There will be activities in 15 counties around the world. Including protests against restaurants that sell frogs legs. Apparently over 100 million wild frogs are captured and killed for their legs. YUCK!

Another thing they are trying to bring to light is the use of the herbicide Atrazine. which is linked to the chemical castration of male frogs. If you want to read the whole story check out ENN.

Things are Kind of Slow

Things have been slow around here and I'm sorry there haven't been as many posts as I want to make. I've been wanting to do a make over of my blog and have been trying to decide on what to do. Here are a few updates from older posts I made

I didn't make it a month before needing to go shopping. Since my Hubby decided to do the Atkins diet I kept having to go back for things like eggs, more meat and salad stuff. I still think in the long run this is the best shopping plan for us but I'm going to wait until he is off the induction phase to go back to it. Until then I'm going to practice matching ads to the coupons I have. I've very lucky to have several grocery stores within one mile of the house so I can hit all of them for their sales without wasting gas.
Wait loss... I've lost 17 lbs so far. I'm hoping to get under 200 ..... yes unfortunately I'm over that ... by June. They have a spring ball at the Merchant Marine Academy where my Hubby works and I don't want sore feet at the end of the night from the damn high heels. My second goal in that respect is to lose enough weight to trim these ample hips enough to fit into a Kayak. My Hubby has agreed that if I lose the wait then that would be my prize!

Well That's about I have to head off to work. For the most part I like working at Petco. It's alot of fun working with the animals and helping people pick out just the right pet. The best part is my whole pay check is going straight into the bank for a down payment on a house when we move.

Make It Yourself Monday

I love places like Buffalo Wild Wings and Wings Stop but lets face it your paying a lot of money for those little tid bits of chicken. Well the Hubby has been craving some wings and we cant really go to a wings place because we can't really tell what's in there that might not be so Atkins friendly for his diet. So Here are a couple of tasty wings recipes to make at home whether your on Atkins of just love wings as much as I do. Enjoy!

Lemon Pepper Wings

2 lbs. chicken wings
1/2 c. lemon juice
1 whole garlic clove (4 slices chopped) 1 tbsp. pepper
2 tbsp. salt
1/4 c. vegetable oil

Place wings in bowl; pour on Sprinkle on the salt and pepper then pour on the lemon juice, and oil; stir.
Marinate for 2 hours at room temperature, stirring occasionally to keep coated.

Wings may be barbecued or baked 20 to 30 minutes, basting occasionally.

Hot Wings

We bake our wings so this recipe is based on that
Bake thawed wings for 25 to 30 minutes (for a little extra crispy spray with cooking spray). While they are baking mix together Hot sauce below. After wings are done toss them into the sauce and coat thoroughly. We always bake ours for an extra five more minutes but if you want to do this be careful because hot sauce vapors can clear the house lol.

Hot Sauce for Hot Wings: ¼ c butter
¼ c hot sauce 1 dash black pepper
1 dash garlic powder

Mix the butter, hot sauce, pepper and garlic powder in a small saucepan over low heat. Stir together and heat until butter is melted and mixture is well blended. Remove from heat.

Bikes For Africa

I will be the first to admit that a lot of times people let me down. If you watch the news you see every type of inhumanity that a person can commit. On the roads people ignore the laws designed to keep up safe so they can get one car ahead, one second closer to the "important" place they just have to be.

Then there are the teens at Wheatley High School. I met them today as they spent their Saturday collecting bikes for people in Africa. I recycled two of our bicycles with them today. The kids had outgrown them and they have been sitting in our garage since we got to New York. They will be sent with the other bikes collected to help people in Africa get around. Whether to work, get to school, collect firewood or water they will have a way to get it done faster and safer.

Can you think of a better recycling program then this?

Want to learn more here is a quicky link to their website: Bikes For Africa

UPDATE: The site used by the Wheatley School Teens is www.ghanabikes.org . Thanks Melissa!

Spring is such a busy time

As you can see I've started some seeds. I figured I would try to use up some of the seeds from last year and had a little success. Most don't seem to be doing much. The one in the corner I'll be transplanting today into one of the yogurt containers I saved from last year. It's running out of growing room in the little seedling green house.
I started some romaine lettuce too but it's looking a little scraggly since I forgot to water it. Hopefully it will bounce back.