Category Archives: Staple

Beef-n-Noodles

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These noodles were my favorite meal growing up.  My mom would serve them with mashed potatoes and green beans with shelley beans and I couldn’t have been happier.  Now, my trio enjoys them.  And the best part — they are super easy to make thanks to a secret ingredient from the freezer section that makes them “semi-homemade.”

The secret ingredient is Reese’s frozen noodles.  Instead of slaving over homemade noodles, I just grab a package of these and cut the prep-time significantly.

Apparently, beef-n-noodles is a “southern” thing — not the true south — but a Southern Illinois thing at least.  After I married Mike (he’s from the suburbs of Chicago) and made noodles as part of the meal for the first Thanksgiving I hosted — I quickly learned that these noodles aren’t “normal” in families from North of I-80.

No matter if you’ve had beef-n-noodles before or you’ve never tried them — give this recipe a try.  They are a delicious comfort food and I’ve yet to meet a kid who doesn’t love them.

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Beef-n-Noodles
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Serves: 8
 
Ingredients
  • 4 cups beef stock
  • 1 cup cooked beef chunks (I use leftover roast beef)
  • 2 beef bullion cubes
  • water
  • 1 bag Reese's Frozen Noodles
  • pepper
  • salt
Instructions
  1. In a large pot (I use a stew pot) combine the beef stock, beef chunks, and beef bullion cubes. Add water until the pot is ¾ full. Heat until boiling. Add the noodles and reduce heat. Cook on low for several hours, adding water as needed. The longer they cook, the better they taste! Add generous amounts of pepper and salt before serving. Great with mashed potatoes.

 

Crockpot Steel Cut Oatmeal

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I’ve always loved oatmeal, but for the past several years I haven’t eaten it often — mostly because I simply didn’t have the time in the mornings to babysit a pan of oats on the stove to make sure they reached the right consistency.  My mornings are filled with attempting to feed, dress, and contain my trio so that they end up at school on time.  In text, this seems like a simple task, but in reality, it made dealing with a pot of oatmeal for 30 minutes in the morning nearly impossible.

Recently, I discovered the perfect crockpot steel cut oatmeal recipe.  It is divine!  I’ve eaten it nearly every day for the last two weeks and it is perfect for my busy mornings!  I make a batch on Sunday evening and then I have breakfast ready for four days that week.  I make the batch plain and add my toppings based on my mood. To the oatmeal above, I added half of a sliced banana, a teaspoon of brown sugar, and 10 pecan halves chopped.  Amazing.  Seriously.  It’s the texture and creaminess of the oatmeal that makes it so delicious!

The recipe below makes 4 servings, but can easily be doubled or tripled if more people in your family eat oats.  I store them in a Tupperware container and scoop out what I would like into a bowl and microwave for about a minute and 15 seconds before adding my sweetener and toppings.  Some topping ideas besides the banana/pecan mixture include mini chocolate chips/chopped almonds/sugar, chopped apple/crunchy peanut butter/honey, and this mornings creation – raisins/brown sugar/vanilla extract – tasted like an oatmeal cookie!

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Crockpot Steel Cut Oatmeal
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Serves: 4
 
Ingredients
  • 1 cup steel cut oatmeal
  • 3 cups water
  • ½ tsp. salt
  • desired toppings/sweetener
Instructions
  1. In a small crockpot, combine the steel cut oats, water, and salt. Stir. Cook on low for approximately 4 hours, on high for approximately 2 hours until desired consistency. Transfer to a Tupperware container and store in the fridge for up to 6 days. Dish out and microwave in the morning - topping with your desired ingredients.

 

Homemade Vanilla Extract

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The secret ingredient in the Snow Day Ice Cream I posted earlier in the week is good quality vanilla extract.  After paying through the nose for vanilla for several years, I ran across several Pinterest pins that discussed recipes. In June, I decided to give it a whirl and at Christmas, I gave bottles of this tasty Homemade Vanilla Extract to nearly everyone on my gifting list.

The key ingredient to this recipe is time!  It’s really quite easy to throw together and the taste is delicious — but it really needs a good six months to become worthwhile.  That’s why I had to make it in June for Christmas gifts!

I ordered 24 Italian Glass Flasks and vanilla beans in bulk from Amazon.  I picked up several large bottles of vodka from Costco and then I was ready to make my extract.  I sliced the vanilla beans in half and split them open.  In each bottle, I used two full vanilla and used a funnel to fill the bottle with vodka.  Once all of the bottles were filled, I put them in one of our storage rooms so they would have a cool dry place to work their magic.  I tried to go in and shake them every week or so but there were definitely some weeks where I forgot about them.

To finish them off and make them “gift worthy” I purchased a Groupon for My Own Labels and customized the label you see above.

I love this type of an item as a gift since it’s usable.  It’s not just another trinket that’s going to take up space and end up in the garage sale pile in a year or two.  Now, I need ideas for what to do for everyone for next year…

 

Italian Herb Bread

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If you don’t have a bread machine but love fresh bread, you need to add one to your Christmas Wishlist.  Yes, it takes up a lot of room on my counter, but the smell of fresh baked bread with relatively little effort is completely worth it!

I received my bread machine for my birthday two years ago. At the time, I was still nursing my twin girls and didn’t have to worry about calorie or carb counting.  Now, I have to be a bit more aware of how much of this delicious bread I consume, but it’s still a staple recipe in our house.  I’ve made it dozens of times and it’s perfect to take with dinner to a friend post-surgery or to serve with spaghetti or lasagna on a chilly fall night.  Best of all, it’s quick and easy and requires relatively little prep, which is why it’s one of our favorites.

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Italian Herb Bread
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Serves: 8
 
Ingredients
  • 1¼ cups warm water
  • 2½ Tbsp. oil
  • ¼ cup sugar
  • 2 tsp. salt
  • 4 cups bread flour
  • 2 Tbsp. dried Italian Seasoning
  • 2¼ tsp. yeast or 1½ tsp quick rise yeast
Instructions
  1. Pour all ingredients in machine in the order listed above. Set to the basic setting for a large loaf. We prefer light crust. Bread machines make this recipe extremely easy!

This recipe receives Five Wooden Spoons from my family as they all love it. Especially slathered with butter.

Crockpot Chicken Stock

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I’ve spent the afternoon making dinner to take to one of my friends who just had her fourth child.  The primary ingredient in many of the dishes that I made (and will hopefully be sharing with you soon) is this amazingly easy, cheap, and delicious crockpot chicken stock.

Mike and I just discovered the wonders of making our own chicken stock about a year ago.  We make large batches and freeze it so we always have homemade chicken stock on hand.  I think the flavor is much deeper than the canned broth — plus it’s significantly cheaper too.  Especially for days like today when I need mass quantities!  Today I used over 10 cups of chicken stock!

The main ingredient in our stock is the carcass of a rotisserie chicken.  Every couple of weeks Mike will pick one up on his way home from work for an easy dinner.  The kids love it plain and we enjoy making wraps with the shredded meat.  Once we’ve picked it clean (or as clean as we want — we aren’t big fans of the dark meat) I throw it in the crockpot with ingredients that we always seem to have on hand and let it simmer away for a day or so before straining and freezing.  Homemade chicken stock is the base for many of my recipes.

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Crockpot Chicken Stock
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Serves: 8
 
Ingredients
  • Rotisserie Chicken Carcass
  • 2-3 stalks celery, chopped
  • ½ onion, chopped
  • 8-10 baby carrots, chopped
  • 1 Tbsp olive oil
  • 2 Tbsp minced garlic
  • 2 Tbsp. parsley, dried or fresh
  • 2 cubes chicken bouillon
  • 8-10 cups water
Instructions
  1. In a large crockpot, drizzle the oil and add the chopped celery, onion, carrots, and garlic. Let simmer a bit until the veggies are warm and then add the chicken carcass, water, and parsley. Simmer on low for 10-12 hours. Strain. Stock can be used immediately or frozen.