Comfort cooking at it's best

When you’re hungry and have a house full of growling tummies what does one make on a perfect snowy morning? This is even great to make when you’re camping too.

Sausage & Gravy n’ Biscuits 

of course!!!

Here’s a super easy recipe that can be changed as you make it to suit your tastes.

Gravy:


· 1 lb. of sausage (or more depending on how much sausage you like or how many you’re feeding)
· Flour about a ¼ cup
· 2 – 4 tblsp. Butter
· 3 c. Milk
· Chicken bullion
· Salt & Pepper

1. Take a large skillet and brown up the sausage. Once the sausage is browned, use a slotted spoon, and place in a bowl with NO paper towel!

2. With the grease still in the skillet, lower the heat to about medium and toss in about 4 tablespoons of butter. (And if you’re thinking this is a healthy recipe sorry to disappoint ya!) Melt the butter while mixing it up with the grease. Keep the temperature low otherwise your butter will burn. Once it’s melted start sprinkling in flour, I do 2 tablespoons at a time while whisking it into the butter and grease until smooth.


3. With heat still at medium, gradually whisk in milk and cook till thicken.

• Now here comes the differences. My mother in law leaves her’s like this and serves it. But I like a little bit of extra flavor so I take some chicken bouillon and sprinkle about a tablespoon of the powder in & stir it in. I add mine till it tastes a little less floury. One of my friends will take chicken stock and slowly add it in for taste and to thin it out a little. It’s all a matter of preference. Play with it, have fun.

4. Add sausage; use a spatula to get any grease drippings out of the bowl into the gravy. Stir.

5. Add salt & pepper to taste (I don’t add any salt since I NEVER cook with it), simmer for around 15 minutes.


6. Serve over drop biscuits, either make from scratch or use Grand’s.

This is really an easy recipe and the ONLY way to ruin it is to not check the milk, make it, serve it and for everyone to spit it out because it’s been determined you just used rotten milk to make the gravy AND the biscuits.

BUT I would NEVER know that from personal experience!

Oh no Mr. Elliptical you won't win this battle

Last week I finally hit 155lbs. I was SOOO excited, finally back to my normal weight range that’s been for the last 8 years or so. Twelve pounds down in 2.5 months and I didn’t even have to cut out my beer. Sadly I think I gained it all back by my snacking lately. I am back to 158lbs, but it could be the mountain of sweet tea I’ve been drinking today.

Most woman I know around this time of year are hitting the gyms hard, dieting, not straying; me on the other hand I love my food and snacks well too much to give them up. I even have an elliptical in the living room facing the TV and yet it serves as a coat rack. I hate to say it but I am also lazy to a point. I like to exercise but if I don’t see immediate results then I give up after the 3^rd day. Besides those reasons, I have to be honest for the most part I love the way I look. Yes I would love for my stomach (hold on as I was typing one of my cats just jumped off my bed towards to open door and instead of running out of the room he jumped right into the door and bounced back. Funniest thing today. True story.) to not stick out so far, but really only by 2.5 inches. I would love for my thighs to not rub together all the time but I like having semi-big thighs, they are sexy in a skirt my husband says. I would DIE (yes really I would commit murder) to get rid of the arm pit fat I have so I could wear strapless shirts and not feel self conscious. I wouldn’t mind not having back fat, but it’s really not huge so hmm scratch that. And of course I would kill for a breast lift but no matter how much weight I loose and muscles I gain, I will still have lost my perky girls to breastfeeding and pregnancy. But that’s okay too because I can say with pride that I have carried healthy beautiful children into this world and gave them the nutrients they needed from me.

It truly helps that while my husband pushes for me to eat healthier and work out more, it’s not because he wants me to lose weight. He likes my curves and I think he would die if I lost them. He just wants to see me firmer, which I admit I would love to see too. Unfortunately the Peanut Butter Reese’s cookies that Wal-mart’s bakery sells disagrees; and fortunately for the cookies my love for peanut butter and cookies over powered the urge to lose those dreaded 2.5 inches.

With that said, I have to share last night’s dinner. It was the best in the world, better than any restaurant I’ve been too but maybe that’s because I didn’t have to send it back two or three times reminding them to take that nasty horrible disgusting sauerkraut off it.

First marinate a brisket in a can of beer and water. (don’t mind the mess on the cooker another causality of the children’s FABULOUS washing skills) I prefer to cook my meats in a slow cooker frozen, therefore as it thaws the water keeps it moist. Depending on how big your brisket is you can use one or two cans. Cook on high for 2 hours then turn to low on for the remainder till dinner time.

Once ready, take out and cut into thin slices or shred it, your choice. Heat up a skillet, butter 1 side of two pieces of rye bread. Place 1 slice in skillet, pour some 1000 island dressing, Swiss cheese, corn beef, Swiss, 1000 island, and top with the other slice. Toast on either side. Serve with a side dish of 1000 island if you like to dip ‘em.  And for the kids made cheesy garlic mashed ‘taters since we couldn’t find ‘tots in the freezer.

It’s okay to drool, just don’t let it hit the keyboard. And this my friends is why I can’t go on a diet. Food is pure love.

It's okay to use trash TV as a form of medication

Wanna know a secret? Sharon from transportation called me yesterday apologizing for the mix up on numbers. Why you ask? We are allotted 8,000 lbs. and our weight totaled 9,065 lbs. I was originally under the impression we were only 250 lbs. over. Hmm yeah I really truly do not know what else to get rid of in our house. Everyone keeps pushing me to do a partial DITY but with driving the kids and pets 2600 miles ALONE I want to be selfish and not have haul 1,000 lbs of our stuff either. Oh well that will work itself out as we get closer. Till then the point of my post.

I will be the first to admit that once the kids are asleep you can find me vegging in bed watching mindless trash TV. The Man can’t stand it. Drives him bonkers. When he catches me watching them, he’ll make snide little comments about my intelligence being sucked away and if I dare to leave the remote unattended he will have the audacity to grab it and turn the show off. I mean who in their right mind would feel that it is their duty to deprive their wife’s NEED to watch “reality” TV? Doesn’t he realize this is my way of escaping poopy diapers, whining runny nose toddlers, Miss pre-period hormone raging attitude pre-teen, fielding the constant tattle tales from Mr. “I’m the middle kid but still feel I deserve the same privileges as my older sister”? For his own safety to ensure that he will live to see the sun rise another day that I HAVE to watch these shows to regain the very little bit of sanity that is left! For the last 6 months I have been indulging in every show possible, DVR’ing them in case I am swept away by George Strait look alike Mr. Sandman, I don’t miss a minute of the dead beat fathers, over drunkenness skirt rising, hair pulling fights. With that said, I am so incredibly sad to see another season of The Bad Girls Club ended this week. Now I must find another new show. I did see that the We TV is going to have a new show starting soon called Sunset Daze. It follows old people in their retirement community! O.M.Gee can you just imagine the drama that will blossom on that show? I am actually giddy about getting to watch it.

** WARNING WARNING If you're on a diet PLEASE do NOT scroll down! WARNING WARNING**

When I’m too lazy to make an actual “meal”, I break out my favorite food.. Comfort Burritos.

They are so incredibly simple to make. Brown some sausage, we like the maple flavor. Sizzle the bacon, we like hickory smoke or brown sugar cured. Add a butt ton of butter and brown up some hash browns. Now the other day we were out of them but I had some o’brian taters and they worked just fabulous! Once everything is ready, scramble the eggs up. Before the eggs are set, add in your favorite cheese, sausage, hash browns, and you can even crumble the bacon up. I prefer my eggs to be totally dry, I know there are some out there that like them in their “wet” stage (if you are one please no offense) but that’s just yuckies for my pallet. Serve up on a warm tortilla and then top with your favorite. One of the kids likes chunky salsa and sour cream on theirs while I prefer to drown mine in ranch.

Sit down with your favorite movie, kick your feet up and enjoy. Now this meal is PERFECT for anytime of the day, breakfast, brunch, lunch, dinner, late night snack. It’s filling and oh so yummie!

One day Panda Express I will figure you out!

Since we moved to this redneck town, we only get Panda Express when we drive to the big city. Which honestly is about every 3 or 4 months. I went from having them right down the road to being 4 hours away. It was a heart breaking divorce with them. We tested a new recipe out on the kids and it was a hit. I personally think I can do more with it but they both said they loved it and Monkey had 2 helpings of “chicken” until I got him to understand it was pork. Once he realized it wasn't "chicken", he freaked out yelling he hates pork. *sideeye* Hmmm no he doesn’t, he didn’t the other week when we had it as shake it bake with applesauce.  I tried to photograph my cooking but kept forgetting shots as I was trying to shoo Princess from the trashcan and Monkey from the back of the couch. Lol Oh well, it still turned out awesome and I'm sure someone else will enjoy it.

ORANGE PORK

1lb pork chops

1tsp garlic

1 c. Orange Juice

¼ c. Soy Sauce

2 tblsp. Brown Sugar packed

2 tsp cornstarch

4 tsp water

A ton of dashes Red Pepper Flakes

Steamed Broccoli

Steamed Sugar Snap Peas

Water Chestnuts

Cut up your chops into cubes.

Don’t pay attention to how bad my pan is, I love it and can’t part with it. A tsp, or a tablespoon or more of garlic.

Toss in the pork and sizzle the piggy up.

Brown the pork all the way through and remove.

Mix up orange juice, soy sauce, brown sugar, and flakes and add to pan. Bring to boil and reduce for a minute or two. Mix up cornstarch and whisk it into the pan. Now I can’t say this enough WHISK IT!! Don’t be afraid to WHISK IT! I am always too shy about it and end up with lumps, then I’m stuck trying to whisk the lumps out and that’s just more work while you are throwing F-bombs under your tongue praying the kids don’t hear you and the beads of sweat building on your forehead don’t drop into the food. Let thicken.

Add in the pork

Then the veggies. Stir it around to evenly distribute the sauce.

Serve over rice and enjoy!

Move on over KFC, there's been small discoveries today

I wish there was a fabulous update on my scheme but there's not. I don’t THINK the kids know about this blog and even if they did they haven’t been allowed online in over a week so there is no way they could have found out my plan. Besides everyone reading this, I've only discussed, okay more ranted and raved, this in great detail with our dog as I was busy washing dishes by hand because they were yet dirty again. They have been washing the dishes pretty good. But I don’t think it will last. They are never consistent with anything that remotely close to chores, so it’s just a waiting game. I have to admit though, I’ve been feeling almost let down by the lack of dirty clean dishes. I was so excited to put my plan in action and now it’s just stalled. C'est la vie.

Now that I’m not having a nervous breakdown and walking around like the Grim Reaper is following me, I have officially hit the “I’m done waiting let’s get this show on the road and get to Kentucky” mode. I learned something new today about the Army vs. the Navy; you can apply for housing online before you even check into the duty station. How cool is that? I know we won’t be put on the waiting list right this minute but next week we’ll be placed on it and thus starts the constant watch of our place for a house. If I’m not watching out for one thing then I’m watching out for something else. I really need to stop obsessing over things. I am a little disappointed by the PPV (Public Private Ventures the company’s that run and maintain military housing) website. It was a little difficult to locate what housing was for what rank, I felt like I was almost trying to navigate a puzzle with all the same pieces. Along with their lack of floor plans to view and really horrible pictures that were taken at some wrong angles. I know I shouldn’t expect much, but I just feel that things should be simple and easy to help lessen the millions of questions people have when moving. Besides how can you pick a housing area’s wait list if the pictures are crappy and you can’t get a feel of the communities?

Side note: my tush hurts from this falling apart recliner but I refuse to move since it reclines for my footsies. That’s a tossup, feet or tush?

Back to the move; I would love to say we’re packing up and leaving on such and such date. Unfortunately my ex-husband is dodging me phone calls and even dodged Wednesday’s phone call visitation. It would be nice if he would just say yes, no, or I want to discuss this more. It’s frustrating that deep down I know he is going to drag his feet on this, he is going to play hard ball just to spite me. Never mind that this move will benefit him by putting us closer to him so he can have more visitation and not have to worry about plane tickets. I don’t understand why people do this once the marriage or relationship end. Why do they feel that they have to do everything possible to make things continue down the nasty road? I try VERY hard to keep having hope that he is changing and that what he says is true, but each time he goes back on his word, continues to irritate, and just gets me to the point of wondering if he’ll ever be abducted by aliens. There should be a preview before you decide to commit to someone to see what they will be like if on the off set you go separate ways. I would have ran so far in the opposite direction I would have put Jackie Joyner to shame.

I’ve been in a cooking slump this week. Haven’t really felt the urge to stand and cook thanks to the rain but today I REALLY wanted KFC.

Lack of funds + Savy cooking skills = 

Homemade Chicken Bowl

• Boneless chicken breasts (my rule is 1 breast per person, anyone under 4 splits a breast)
• Ritz Crackers (if out, use saltines)
• Garlic Powder
• Egg
• A couple large baking ‘taters (or if you’re lazy like I was tonight some instant ‘taters)
• Corn
• Shredded cheese
• Country Gravy (another laziness of me mix up a packet that is kept hidden for lazy times like this)

Chicken:

1. Heat up oil in large skillet or a fry daddy if you have one. In the meantime, crush up crackers and add as much garlic salt as you love. For this family it means to the point of almost burning our nostrils, in a shallow dish. Mix up eggs in a separate dish. Cut chicken into small strips.
2. Once oil is ready, dip egg in the egg, then coat with cracker crumbs before placing into the oil. Fry until golden brown, flip. Remove and drain.

During the chicken, I make up the mashed ‘taters, gravy and corn. We like frozen corn because if I don’t heat it fully, it’ll have a crisp bite to it. Once it’s all ready, pile it up in your bowl… ‘taters, chicken, corn, gravy, and some shredded cheese. Goes perfect with some cornbread too. It’s not a fancy recipe but it is definitely comfort food that keeps you from spending a fortune at KFC.

Schemed a little schemed, payback is not YOUR friend children

There is a rule in this house, if you can pick up a fork and eat my cooking, then you can pick up a sponge and clean up after dinner.

With that said, there is not a night that doesn’t go by that doesn’t end with someone getting in trouble for flinging dirty dish water across the kitchen, breaking a glass because they are too impatient to put it away right, half washed dishes put away with food still stuck to them clear as day. Actually I think that is my favorite way they do the clean up. I just LOVE getting a glass out, pouring ice cold milk in it, sitting down to eat my food, take a drink and discover as I’m in mid gulp that the remnants from another nights dinner has made its’ way inside my cup and is now crusted on. I am just a HAPPY mommy when that happens. The Man though, oh you’d think that someone had just committed murder right there on the table while we were eating when it happens to him.

Or I love it when one kid, usually ‘Tater, decides that they are going to sing a song horribly off key, purposely forgetting words, and increases their volume each time the other protests. (Seriously NO clue where they get this increase the volume tendencies either) I have even heard farm animal noises waft from the kitchen followed by either more outrageous singing or huge grunts that put a dog trying to pass a shoe to shame, sadly the animal noises and grunts is usually Lil t’.

These antics always end up in the same way EVERY. SINGLE. NIGHT. Me threatening to cut them off from everything sacred to them; the TV, cell phone, video games, library books, friends, and sadly they usually respond with “well you can’t take our imagination away”. At this point I say a silent prayer asking the Lord to please grant my loving beautiful children with a child themselves that will say these kind, sweet, sensitive words to them.

Now as a loving and devoted mother, who puts her children’s needs before her own, who NEVER gets tired, stressed, angry, or upset at them. A mother who has never yelled “O.M.G. You really irritate the piss out of me and my ears are shutting down now”. A mother who never drops the “F Bomb” as she slams the lid on the washer because she has hit her breaking point. A mother who never yells from another room to knock it off rather than go into the kitchen to assist with the problems. I take full control of this situation. I have schemed a little scheme. I am going to save their dirty plates, forks, cups, bowls and the next time I serve dinner, they will get to eat off their own handy work. The more I think of it, the more I feel it’s only fair. If they expect me to eat off half washed dishes then they should eat off them too. I WILL be on the lookout this week for their nasties because I am so ready to serve justice. Let’s see how Mr. Imagination will handle this when he comes face to face with it.

With that I tried a new recipe this week. The original looked a little dull to me, so I changed it up a little.

**This picture does NO justice to the dish especially since they are trying to kill me with the olives, but since my camera picks when it wants to work I found one thanks to Google**

Nacho Casserole

1lb. ground beef (we use only ground turkey)
1 ½ c chunky salsa (I just poured till the smell was strong)
Corn to your desire
¾ c. Miracle Whip (YES I am that person that LOVES my Miracle Whip)
Burrito Seasoning Packet
2 c. crushed tortilla chips
2 c. shredded cheese (I actually found a Colby mixture that had jalapenos peppers in it that scared the tar out of me. Another story for another time)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Brown the meat w/ seasoning packet. Since I use turkey and it really only has excess water, I always put the seasoning packet in with the turkey, but if you use regular beef, you’ll want to brown, drain then add the packet. Remove from heat, pour into bowl and add salsa, corn, and Miracle Whip. Stir.
3. In a 2 quart casserole dish, layer meat mixture, tortilla chips, and cheese twice. End with cheese on top.
4. Bake for 20 - 30 minutes uncovered. It will depend on the type of dish you use. I used my all time favorite Pyrex dish and it took about 23 min, however if I were to use my stoneware dish it would probably take about 45 minutes.
5. Serve with shredded lettuce, diced tomatoes, and sour cream.

Can't go wrong w/ Chicken Stroganoff and Eco-Friendly furniture Polish

I love it when I find a recipe that I’m hesitant to make but still try it and I fall madly in love with it. A couple weeks ago I made Chicken Stroganoff and it was to die for. We’re running low on groceries and I’m lagging on going to the store since it’s been raining cats and dogs. It’s super quick to make, uses my crock pot, and makes the house smell absolutely delicious too.

Chicken Stroganoff

• 4 skinless boneless chicken halves
• 1/8 C. butter
• 1 package of dry Italian salad dressing mix
• 1 package of cream cheese
• 1 can of condensed cream of chicken soup (Have found that all the cream of soups can work great with this)

1. 1.       Cut chicken into strips and place in crock pot along with butter and Italian dressing mix. (Normally I just place the chicken in, then cut the butter into small pieces and scatter it around, then sprinkle the mix over both) Cook on low for 5 to 6 hours. (if your chicken is thawed or half way thawed you can cook on high for about 3 hours)
2. Cut cream cheese into pieces, place cream cheese and soup in crock pot, mix.  Cook on high for another ½ hour. (Depending on if you have let the cream cheese warm up, it will melt faster and actually a little bit easier) Mix well.

After the chicken is cooked you can leave it in strips or as my kids like it; I just chop it up with a spoon till it hits shredded chicken. Now I normally serve this with no yolk egg noodles BUT we were out of them today and went with Penne Pasta, a much bigger hit with the penne pasta. As ‘Tater said, “you get a extra burst of sauce when you bite on the penne’s”. ‘Tater made homemade drop biscuits and brushed them with her concoction of melted butter and garlic salt. I was going to add some veggies into the mix but honestly I forgot until we were half way through. Oh well.

Yesterday I attacked Drop Zone #1. Took longer than I thought because I have a short attention span and kept getting side tracked with watching TV, playing video games, and the lovely FB games. Afterwards I polished it with a homemade eco-friendly polish. Works great, no strong odors, and I don’t even mind throwing the polishing rag into the washer with the regular laundry. I haven't dived straight into going green but I have noticed the kids are a lot more receptive to small changes along the way.

I really need to find some old shoelaces to tie up those cables but until then they will just have to sit there.

The furniture polish recipe:

• 4 TBSP Lemon Juice
• 2 TSP Olive Oil (I just used EVOO)
• 3 TBSP water

If you have a spray bottle, add all together, shake and spray. I don’t so I use an old Rubbermaid container, pop on lid, shake, and then just dip my cloth into the mixture. If you have left-overs just rinse it out as oil can go rancid after sometime.