Playdough Recipes

I have tried and tested a few playdough recipes over the years, and these are the ones I liked the most:-

Homemade Playdough 3 cups flour
1/4 cup salt
1 cup water
1 tablespoon oil
food colouring

1. Mix flour with salt.
2. In a jug, mix water with oil and food colouring.
3. Add liquid to flour slowly and mix with hands until it feels like 'playdough'.
4. Store in an airtight container.

Koolaid Playdough (smells sooooo good and feels great to play with) 1/2 cup salt
2 1/2 cups flour
2 packets koolaid
3 tablespoons oil
2 cups boiling water

1. Mix dry ingredients.
2. Add oil.
3. Add water and knead (careful, I usually let this cool a bit first before handling).
4. Store in a plastic bag in the fridge.

Cooked Playdough 1/2 cup salt
1 cup flour
1 tablespoon cream of tartar
1 tablespoon oil
1 cup water
food colouring
1 teaspoon Orange/strawberry/vanilla essence

1. Combine all ingredients in saucepan, stirring all the time.
2. Take off heat and allow to cool.
3. Knead.

Finger paint (not playdough, but still fun on a rainy day)
1/4 cup cornstarch
2 cups water
food colouring of choice.

1. Add all ingredients together.
2. Paper down and off you go!

Stocked up on bacon? no problems

I always find if I am low on meat in my freezer, there is always bacon left in there. Bacon is cheap, really easy to buy in bulk, separate and throw in freezer bags. So just what do you do with all that bacon?

Here are a few ideas:-

Bacon Family Chowder
1 tablespoon oil
3 rashers bacon
1 onion, chopped
2 carrots, chopped
3 potatoes, diced
any other veggies you want (Celery, capsicum, sweet potato etc)
2 1/2 cups hot veggie stock (I use one cup veggie stock, one cup bacon stock)
440g tin creamed corn
2 tablespoons plain flour
1 1/2 cups milk

1. Heat oil in pan. Cook bacon and onion until cooked through.
2. Add other veggies until half cooked.
3. Put into a big oven proof pot along with stock and cook covered for 5 mins. Stir in creamed corn.
4. Blend flour with milk to make a smooth paste. Stir into soup. Cook for 10 - 15 mins.
5. Stir in dried parsley or seasonings if required, or add grated parmesan cheese or swirl in a little cream to make it creamier. (Note: I only add the parsley, because it's usually salty enough with the bacon and bacon stock in mine).

Bacon Wrapped Potato Gems
Bacon (whether you leave the rind on or off is up to you)
Frozen Potato Gems

Soooooo easy. Just wrap the potato gems with the bacon and bake for 15-20 mins until bacon outside is crispy. Fantastic entree, just not that great if you're on a diet!

Hawaiian muffin pizzas
1 rasher bacon
1 English Muffin cut in halves
2 Ring of pineapple, drained
2 slices of cheese

1. Lightly toast the muffin halves until only just golden.
2. Put slice of cheese, pineapple and bacon on top
3. Pop under grill until the bacon is crispy and cheese is melting.

Bacon Caesar Salad
Lettuce
Chopped, cooked bacon (dried on paper towel)
Croutons (cubed bread under the grill, lightly sprayed with cooking oil if you like)
Parmesan cheese

Add all ingredients together, drizzle with Caesar dressing (1 teaspoon white vinegar, 2 tablespoons mayonnaise)

We had the Bacon Family Chowder for dinner tonight, and my kids are already on their second bowls. A really fantastic family recipe!

Simple Savings

Simple Savings is a website that is designed to do, well, just that. Save!

Here's a little bit of what they have to say:-

Most people pay too much money for things but never realise it, so they are always behind. They are always in debt and continually playing catch-up. It is a pretty horrible time-deprived way to live.

They do have a 'vault' and you can pay $47 to access all the tips and tricks members have put in there, but you can also browse all the other things they have for free, and learn a few things along the way just by doing that.

What I love is the monthly challenges they have in their "ATTACK YOUR DEBTS MONTH BY MONTH":-

January was 'Find a Better Deal' on your service providers for eg home phone, insurance, internet or credit card.

February was 'Find Time'. Finding spare time to then be able to think about what you're purchasing.

March is 'No Spend Month'.
Here's the blurb about this month.

Sometimes we need a big jolt to shake up our spending habits. So here's one for you! Your challenge for March is not to buy anything non-essential. The ONLY things you can buy this month are pure essentials such as basic food and prior bills. Ask yourself at the end of day, did you buy any non-essentials today? If not, tick the day as a success, well done!
I'll add the new challenge for each month to my blog, if only to keep myself reminded of what's in store.

Spring Hill Beef Hampers

A little info on Spring Hill Beef Hampers, if anyone is interested:-

At Spring Hill we guarantee 100% pure, hormone free, premium quality Angus cattle. Each steer is raised in the quiet, stress free environment in the misty green hills of the NSW Southern Highlands.

Here our cattle are treated with kindness and respect. Tranquil grazing on lush natural pastures ensures Spring Hill Beef develops a special taste and tenderness.

Spring Hill Beef is exclusively “Grass Fed”, guaranteed free of hormones and antibiotics. We DO NOT boom-spray weeds to ensure there is no contamination of the cattle’s pastures. Each steer is handed over to our local butcher within a life span of between 18/22 months which guarantees prime tender beef!

They do home deliveries in Sydney with a one off (first purchase) of $10 for a cooler bag. Home deliveries are free with hampers over $175. Delivery fees cost a little more in other places. Check their website for more details.

Dinner Menu Plan

I have found the easiest way to not waste food in my household is to do a fortnightly dinner plan. I've been cooking for them for over 9 years now, so it's not hard to figure out what they like and don't like, and by now we have favourite meals. My kids aren't afraid to try anything new either, and Matthew is excitedly learning how to cook.

For example this week, my dinner menu is as follows:-

Saturday - leftovers (hot pot, tuna bake, sandwiches, whatever is in the fridge that has to be used up)
Sunday - Family Chowder
Monday - Muffin Pizzas (Matthew's turn to cook) and Pineapple Upside Down Cake
Tuesday - a different Pasta Bake (different recipe from the one last week to add variety)
Wednesday - Spaghetti/bacon bread cases (again, Matthew's turn to cook)
Thursday - home made pasta
Friday - Shepherds Pie
Saturday - Leftovers (from a Huuuuuuuge lunch we're having that day)

So how do I do the dinner plan?
Depending on what's going on, how much money we have, how much I can be bothered spending, how adventurous I'm feeling, I'll do the following (or a combination of both:-

1. Sit down and look through my Super Food Ideas Magazines and come up with a few simple recipes. It keeps me motivated to cook, and their recipes are so easy to follow and fool proof. I started buying their magazines before they published monthly ones, and have so many now that I don't need to buy any more, and just re-read older magazines to 'trick' me into thinking it's a new one.

2. Look in my pantry and fridge, decide what needs to be used up and how quickly it needs to be used, what I have available, and design recipes accordingly.

My big meat shop is in just over a week to allow room in my fridge/freezer for this Saturday's BIG DO. I am going to try using Spring Hill Beef Hampers and that's why there's a lot of bacon being used in my menu this week. I'm clearing out my freezer, and I only have ham and bacon left, which is absolutely fine with me. I bought mince specifically today for Friday's dinner.

Get the kids involved. Mine really love to help as much as they can, and although sometimes it doesn't look as appetising, they have to start somewhere right?

Spaghetti 4 Ways

I had to ask my husband to open a couple of containers of my food storage today. If anything happens to him, and I need to use my food storage for any reason, I need a huge hammer to smash the lids on these containers. They do seal really well, so I know I'm not going to get any bugs in my stuff.

We found quite a few cans of spaghetti, baked beans, corn, tuna, dried beans (much to poor hubby's dismay), dried peas (much to my disgust) and some dried instant mashed potato that came from my mother-in-law, use by date '99. Somehow, I think I have to replace the instant potato!

Got me thinking about the spaghetti though. We're talking about the type with sauce and possibly cheese, not the plain kind you have to cook in water. What would you do with the spaghetti. Surely you'd get sick of it after a while.

LOL my daughter just reminded me I can use the dried peas to feed the fish "For their dinner". Thanks for that tip! Yes, goldfish ARE vegetarians and yes, they do love de-shelled peas, broken up a little depending on the size of your fish.

Back to spaghetti. I thought of a few things you could do with the spaghetti if you were simply rotating your food storage.

1. Spaghetti, cooked bacon, bread baskets (cut crusts of fairly fresh bread, cooking oil spray a muffin tin, put bread into muffin pans to make 'baskets', bake until just golden). Add spaghetti to cooked bacon, fill bread baskets and bake a little longer. Add cheese on top if you so desire. Not overly healthy, but my son can make this on his own!

2. Spaghetti bolognaise. Brown an onion and some mince, add perhaps some Italian Capsicum (see below post) and add your tin of spaghetti at the end to warm through.

3. Spaghetti, cheese and ham jaffles. Butter bread on 'wrong' side, fill with spaghetti, cheese and ham and cook in jaffle iron or those new jaffle makers that I always see, but never have the cash on me at the time. Then when I go looking for one, they're never around.

4. Spaghetti parcels. Cut a square of puff pastry up into 4 smaller squares, spoon tinned spaghetti in the centre. Fold up the corners and bake in a 200 degree oven for 15 - 20 mins until pastry is golden brown. My kids love this, and I love puff pastry so it keeps us all happy.

I have to note that we don't eat this type of food all the time. Tonight, for example, we had lamb hot pot with potato dumplings. Looooots of veggies involved, but on occasion I just can't be bothered cooking. Usually it's after I've already spent a day in the kitchen and I'm knackered. Takes two seconds to do something with a can of spaghetti though, and that's something to be happy about.

Happy cooking