RECIPES Archives • Page 58 of 68 • New Nostalgia

Strawberry Freezer Jam

Tis the season of strawberries! It’s the perfect time to make strawberry jam!

My girls and I went to the strawberry patch with some friends recently. We came back with a TON of strawberries-they were only 99 cents a pound! We hulled them, pureed them, then froze the puree. I love having a freezer full of strawberry puree, sitting there ready to be used in Strawberry Bread, Strawberry Smoothies, and yes, Strawberry Jam.

I have never made jam before, but now that I have, I don’t know if I will ever buy store made again! It is so very easy to make your own, especially if you freeze it instead of can it. You can make jam with just 3 ingredients:

~Fruit
~Sugar
~Pectin

It is just a matter of mashing your fruit, and stirring in the sugar and pectin. That’s it! (detailed recipe below)

If you read up on jam, you will find there are 2 versions out there. One uses Sure-Jell Pectin, the other uses Ball Pectin. With the Sure-Jell version, you have to cook it, and it uses 4 cups of sugar to 2 cups of strawberries. The Ball version is no cook, uses 11/2 cups of sugar and 4 cups of strawberries. I’ll give you one guess which one I chose.:)

I usually do not use refined white sugar when I make things here at home, but I have found that there are just a few food items that I am willing to compromise on! Example-until I can find a Homemade Lemonade Recipe I like that does not use sugar (I’ve tried quite a few with honey and a couple with maple syrup), then by golly, I’m gonna use sugar! Same with Jam. I was up to my elbows in strawberries, and misplaced a recipe that I had found that used honey and grape juice instead of sugar, so white sugar it was. (gasp-ha!)

Kimba, at A Soft Place To Land, did a GREAT post on Strawberry Jam. She tried both brands of pectin and both recipes, just to see the difference between the two. She ended up with 25 containers of jam in her freezer! She is crazy awesome.

I used the low sugar recipe, and it perfectly sweet. Granted, our taste buds are now accustomed to food that is less sweet in my family due to the recipes I make, but I really think it is plenty sweet for everyone, and I have had very positive feedback from those who I have given a jar of jam to. Kimba thought you would need fairly sweet strawberries, to begin with for the ball recipe, but ours were not super sweet and it still turned out plenty sweet.

Here is the Ball Recipe I used (the insert in the Ball Pectin box has these same instructions)

Ball No-Cook Strawberry Freezer Jam

1 pkg. Ball No Cook Pectin
11/2 cups of sugar
4 cups crushed strawberries (about 4 lbs or 2 quarts)

~Wash & hull strawberries.
~Use a potato masher to mash up the strawberries for a more chunky jam. If you prefer less chunks, use a food processor or a hand blender.
~Add the sugar and pectin and stir.
~Ladle into containers, these can be any type of jar, or plastic containers with lids. (make sure to leave some room at the top for expansion when freezing)
~Let sit for 30 minutes. Put into refrigerator or freezer.
~A jar will keep in the refrigerator for 3 weeks, and in the freezer for up to a year.

I love that I now know how easy this is. I put mine in cute little jars and have already given many away to friends, family and new neighbors. We use it over ice cream and put a spoonful or 2 in our oatmeal in the morning–mmm–Strawberry Cream Oatmeal.
I will make this even in the winter, using frozen fruit that I can hopefully find on sale!

Have you made freezer jam?
Do you have any favorite strawberry recipes for me? Even if they use sugar, send them on through, most recipes that use sugar can be modified to use other forms of sweeteners, such as honey, or pure cane sugar.

FUN/DIY/ Holidays/Parties/ How-Tos/ RECIPES

How To Feed A Large Crowd Without Cooking Or Baking

Need to feed a large crowd of people but don’t want to turn on the oven?

Want to have a party without showing up exhausted from cooking?

Do you want to know how to create a lite and healthy, well-rounded meal without spending much time in the kitchen?

Well, this post will tell you how. Actually, it will tell you how my sisters and I did it. A week ago today, we threw my youngest sister a baby shower. We had about 20 people coming, and we wanted to have a beautiful array of food, but did not want to spend much time making it all. My youngest sister was only in town for a few days, so we didn’t want anything to keep us from spending as much time with her as we could, and we were not interested in hanging out in a hot kitchen for that spent time!

Our solution was to make our own Hearty, Healthy & Delicious
SALAD BAR!

We wanted it to be hearty enough to pass for dinner, so we made sure we included toppings that were filling and hearty– protein and carbs along with typical vegetable toppings and fruit. Some of our protein toppings included shredded chicken, bacon, cheese and nuts. (could also use hard boiled eggs and beans.) For carbs, we included whole-wheat mini bow-tie pasta noodles, and served bread along with the salad.

{that is my sisters hand, don’t you like her funky green nail polish?

I’m so bummed I didn’t get good pics. My camera quit on me right at the beginning of the shower}

So how to do this without slaving over a stove/oven?

Here is what you do:

~Make a grocery list of salad toppings (the ones we used are listed below)

~Go to Wal-mart, buy ingredients for toppings.

~Stop by Sam’s Club (which is usually right next door to Wal-mart) and pick up a few Rotisserie Chickens and their Spring Salad Mix.

~Swing by Panera Bread (or any bread store/bakery), and pick up a few loaves of Asiago Cheese Bread.

~Hit your local dollar store for paper products.
*I went to the dollar tree and found clear, hard plastic bowls that were the perfect size for our toppings. I knew all the colors of the vegetables and toppings we used would make art on the buffet bar if we used clear bowls. They also had large, clear hard plastic bowls, so I bought 3. One for punch, one for the spring salad mix, and one to hold sliced bread.
I was delighted that they had small, clear serving tongs, 4/$1.00! They also had a punch ladle and small, clear punch cups. I found little coffee stirrer type straws, they were blue and white (matched our shower colors) and were the perfect size for the punch cups.

Once you have all your supplies, it is just a matter of chopping and putting the toppings into Ziplocs until ready to use. We kept chopping to a minimum by buying veggies that were conveniently packaged, for example-shredded carrots, grape tomatoes, shredded cheese, heat and serve bacon. Convenience was the way to go to keep it simple enough to get it all done and enjoy my sister!

Our Menu:
Hearty, Healthy & Delicious Salad Bar With A Trio Of Salad Dressings
Chocolate Cupcakes w/ Cute Cupcake Toppers
Lemon Refresher Punch-I may be posting about this, gotta find out if it is a “secret” family recipe or not:)

That’s it! Simple, Simple, Simple.

The Lemon Refresher and Cupcakes can both be made the night before, which again, helps with simplifying. We were going to make homemade dressings, but then decided to buy it instead. We stood in front of the dressing aisle, a bit stunned by all the different types of salad dressings. We choose Briannas Fine Salad Dressings, mostly because the bottles were pretty:) but also because they had 3 different types that we thought would suit most tastes. We got Poppy Seed (my favorite and the most popular of the evening), Blush Wine Vinaigrette, and Caesar.

This Salad Bar idea would be great for groups large or small, and even though we went a bit crazy with the number of toppings, you really could minimize that, too. The feedback we got from those attending the shower was all positive. We even had a number of children there, and they loved it too! Yes, there were lots of vegetables, but there was also a lot of fruit, shredded chicken, pasta noodles and cheesy bread, which kept the kids happy and satisfied.

I will be doing this often, whether it is for a ladies luncheon, a bridal or baby shower, or just having another couple over-it would work well in many situations. I do love to cook and bake, but sometimes it is just nice to just have a break and keep the oven off!

Our Salad Bar:

Spring Mix Salad

3 Dressings

Shredded Rotisserie Chicken

Chopped Bacon

Whole-Wheat Bow-Tie Pasta

Sliced Strawberries

Blueberries

Grapes

Pineapple

Mandarin Oranges

Dried Cranberries

Avocado

Green Peppers

Cauliflower

Broccoli

Carrots
Peas

Radishes

Cucumber

Tomatoes

Shredded Cheddar Cheese

Feta Cheese

Croutons

Sunflower Seeds

Sliced Almonds

Asiago Cheese Bread

*** I Am Pleased To Be Linking Up To These Wonderful Blog Parties. ***

This post is linked to:

Friday Favorites @ Simply Sweet Home
Saturday Is Crafty Day @ Along For The Ride
Weekend Wrapup Party @ Tatertots & Jellow
Saturday Night Special @ Funky Junk
Tasty Tuesdays @ Beauty & Bedlam

Meals/ RECIPES

Homemade Hamburger Buns From The Bread Machine

I’m so stinkin’ excited about this recipe for Homemade Hamburger Bun! I’ve tried one other recipe that was good, but not as good as this one. I’m sticking with this recipe because:

~ They are hearty but still soft
~ Easy to make, utilizes the bread machine
~ The recipe makes enough to freeze some for later
~They can be used for more than just hamburgers. (chicken salad, egg salad, dinner rolls, hot dog buns)
~They are inexpensive

I grilled hamburgers for dinner tonight. They made me happy. Quite frankly, the whole meal made me very happy. (*warning-brag fest coming up…) These buns turned out great, I used fresh herbs from my herb pot to season Roasted Red Potatoes, the lettuce for our burgers was from the garden, and dessert… oh… dessert is gonna be so good! After I publish this post, I will be off to my local co-op to get some plain vanilla ice cream. I have been up to my elbows in strawberries the last few days, and thought that Banana Splits would just do our bodies some good.:) I have fresh chopped strawberries, bananas, and I’m going to make Homemade Chocolate Syrup. I think I’ll grab some nuts while I’m there at the grocery store. YUM!
I just love summer. (sigh)

The original recipe for these hamburger buns was posted over at Bliss Tree. I use the same ingredients but different method. She said you can use these as either Hamburger or Hot dog buns. If you have a minute, you should check out her post. She goes on a rant mid post that made me smile (and after eating homemade jam made from freshly picked strawberries today, I totally get her)-you’ll have to click on over to know what I’m talking about. Oh, and if you don’t want to make these in the bread machine, click over to her recipe.

Homemade Hamburger Buns (using the bread machine)
1 cup milk
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup butter, melted
1 tablespoons honey
1 egg, room temperature
4 1/2 cups flour (unbleached, whole wheat, or a mix) ( I used 3 cups whole wheat, 11/2 cups white)
2 1/4 teaspoons yeast (or one pkg)
1 1/4 teaspoons salt

~Pour milk, water, melted butter and honey into a glass bowl. Microwave until warm, just to take the chill off. Add the egg.
~Pour into bread machine. Measure flour and put on top of wet ingredients. Make a little well in the flour, add yeast and salt.
~Set machine to dough cycle. When finished, take dough out, knead for a few turns, then divide into 16 pieces (12 for larger buns). Roll into balls, place on greased sheet (I used parchment paper instead), flatten tops down a bit, cover with a cloth and let rise 30 minutes until about doubled.
~Bake at 400 degrees for 10-12 minutes.

*You can brush the tops with egg wash and sprinkle with poppy seeds, sesame seeds, coarse sea salt or whatever you would like. I forgot this step, but I bet they would be pretty!
This Post Is Linked To:
Thrifty Thursday @ Tales From Bloggeritaville

How-Tos/ RECIPES

Hulling Strawberries With A Straw

My girls and I spent the afternoon at a strawberry patch, picking strawberries with good friends of ours. It was so much fun! We came home with almost 40 lbs of strawberries. I plan on making freezer jam, strawberry pancake syrup, smoothies, popsicles, and strawberry bread.

We started the big job of washing and hulling the strawberries right when we got home. I plan on mashing them up, then putting them in jars to freeze, thanks to this post I read. (she talks about why she likes to mash them instead of freezing them whole).

{Click here for my favorite stainless steel straws}
I am so happy that I learned this secret to easy hulling from my stepmom. All you have to do is poke em’ with a straw! You start at the bottom of the strawberry, push the straw up, and the stem and white bit just pop right up! My girls think it is quite fun, & my middle girl wanted to just keep going, even after hulling 10 lbs with me. I said “Wow, honey, you are quite the hard worker,” She said, “yup, as long as I have gum in my mouth” ??? I guess blowing bubbles while hulling strawberries is her thing.

Have any other ideas of how I can use up these berries? I would love more ideas and recipes if you’ve got ’em!

Steps To Healthy Living

photo credit

A few months ago I had the honor of doing a guest post on “The Mother Huddle.” It was such an honor and I had great fun sharing my thoughts over at Destri’s blog. Destri is a pretty special lady, one I consider a friend despite the fact that we have never met in person.

The guest post was titled “Steps I Have Taken To Bring A More Healthful Approach Into My Home.”

As the beginning of summer approaches, I am already feeling the pull of unhealthy choices when it comes to food. BBQ’s, quick dinners at grandpa’s pool, lemonade full of HFCS, the ice cream truck…I don’t know about you, but for us summer brings a bunch more opportunities for healthful eating to go right out the window. I do and will lighten up a bit during the summer when it comes to eating healthy, but I also want to keep in mind the good habits we have established and continue to pursue them. Rereading the post I wrote for The Mother Huddle will help me do just that!

Steps I have taken to bring a more wholesome approach into my home:

We Follow These Rules:

Try to eat like our grandparents did, before convenience foods came about.
No high fructose corn syrup! Studies show that this stuff causes confusion in the area of the brain that tells your body that you are full. It makes you crave more sweets! This is just one of many reasons to avoid it. Also, we found that it was triggering my youngest daughter’s asthma. Since changing our eating habits, she is off all inhalers! Yippee!!
No hydrogenated oils/trans fats and use only healthful oils (olive oil, coconut oil)
Think brown, not white (whole wheat flour, whole grain pasta, brown rice, 100% whole wheat breads, etc)
Stay away from foods if the ingredient list is long and full of words we can’t pronounce.
No more buying white sugar! We replaced it with natural sweeteners like maple syrup, honey, sucanat (rapadura), & stevia.

We Make Snacks Count By:

Making homemade treats containing ingredients that are beneficial to the body (we loveMudballs)
Having veggie fun! I cut up bright colored veggies into bite-sized pieces, fill a 6 cup muffin tin with a different vegetable in each cup, serve with toothpicks. If I only have 4 types of vegetables, I’ll fill the 2 remaining cups with dip and toothpicks.
Eating fruit as our dessert. I see my 3 girls (age 10, 9 and 7) eye the beautiful bowl of blueberries thawing on the table during dinner, excited to eat ‘em for dessert! They also love frozen cherries, grapes, peaches, mangoes, melons, and pineapple. We eat them all just slightly thawed.
Making homemade popcorn in the microwave using a brown paper lunch bag. My girls love this and do it themselves. Big money saver!
Adding veggies to our fruit smoothies. A large handful of fresh spinach disappears when blended into our sweet fruit smoothies.
Using leftover smoothies to make popsicles. These are delish, and yes, they are the same smoothies that have spinach in them! These type of real fruit/yogurt popsicles are so costly at the store. Its amazing how inexpensive and easy it is to make your own! If you don’t have molds, use paper cups and wooden craft sticks.
Staying away from empty calories–even treats can be beneficial to the body (dark chocolate, desserts with fruit/oats in them, ice cream topped with fresh fruit, whole wheat brownies)

We Are Going Greener:

We got rid of harsh chemical cleaners. I use a vinegar and water spray for just about everything, and have simple recipes to make my own laundry detergent, dish washing detergent and liquid hand/body soap. (this saves us a TON of money, and I believe some of those chemicals contributed to my daughters past issues with asthma, so we are saving money on medical bills, too!)
We drink from reusable water bottles, keeping them in the refrigerator so they are cold and ready to drink.
We got rid of most plastic storage containers and use different sized mason jars instead. I love how they look in my pantry, freezer and refrigerator. They make it easy to see what is inside, and they look orderly.
If it comes in a package, I ask myself “Can I make this homemade?” It is almost always more healthful and saves on the packaging (pancake mix, granola bars) I buy many ingredients from bulk bins and put them in mason jars when I get home.

Taking steps for more wholesome homes can be overwhelming, so be encouraged that these changes did not come overnight for us, nor do we do it all perfectly. We eat our share of junk food and sugar outside our 4 walls, (and even inside them on the weekends), so it ends up being about 80/20,

which I am comfortable with. It has been a step by step journey,

one I will never regret starting as I see such huge changes in the health of my family.

This post is linked to:
The Finer Things Friday @ The Finer Things
Home And Family Friday @ Home Is Where My Story Begins
Its A Hodgepodge Friday @ Its A Hodgepodge Life
Tips Me Tuesday @ The Tip Junkie
30 Minute Blog Challenge @ Steady Mom
Motivate Me Monday @ Keeping It Simple

RECIPES/ Sides

Oatmeal Whole Wheat Quick Bread

I’m super happy about this recipe. We were having spaghetti for dinner and I really wanted some bread to go with it, but only had about 30 minutes. I found this recipe and it was so easy and really tasty! I will be making it often!

Oatmeal Whole Wheat Quick Bread
1 cup rolled oats
11/4 cups whole wheat flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
11/2 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon vegetable oil (I used coconut oil)
1 cup milk

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees
2. Grind oatmeal in a food processor or blender. In a large bowl, combine oatmeal, flour, baking powder and salt. In a separate bowl, dissolve honey in oil, then stir in the milk. (I mixed the milk, coconut oil and honey in a one cup glass measure and microwaved it until the coconut oil melted (the cold milk made it into a solid state, so I needed to liquify it). Combine both mixtures and stir until a soft dough is formed. Form the dough into a ball (I had to add a bit more flour) and place on a lightly oiled baking sheet.
3. Bake in preheated oven for about 20 minutes, or until bottom of loaf sounds hollow when tapped.
This post is linked to:
Show Off Your Stuff @ Fireflies & Jellybeans
Make It From Scratch

Featured/ POPULAR/ RECIPES/ Sweets

Chewy Chocolate Oatmeal Bars – The Best Recipe I’ve Ever Messed Up

Hmm, what to call this chocolate bar recipe? I kind of messed up a chewy granola bar recipe and ended up with absolutely awesome oatmeal, chocolate, peanut butter heaven! How is that for a name?

The Recipe Search for Chewy Chocolate Bars

I’ve been on the lookout for a gooey, chewy granola bar recipe. I checked out some of my favorite sites, and I should have known Heavenly Homemaker’s has been on the same hunt. She, too, wanted one with no corn syrup, and of course, she came up with one. It is one I really want to try again so I can do it right and experience her true recipe, but oh my, am I glad I messed it up because the concoction it made was DELISH!

Two Amazing Recipes for Chewy No-Bake Bars

So you can experience both, I will give you my “oh so good, messed up version”, then I will post her chewy granola bar recipe. I’ll try it again soon and can’t wait. I tasted the mixture after adding the oats and before adding the last cup of my “combination” and it was peanut buttery goodness.

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