Homemade Baby-food from your Bountiful Basket

Making your own baby food  is fast, cheap and most importantly Healthy. The possibilities are endless. I usually make a fruit blend and a veggies blend. If your child is just starting baby food, start off trying each one individually. First I go through my basket and pick out all the fruit that is ripe.
Here is a list of foods that I throw in
  Raw:
Apples (I make applesauce or pearsauce then use it for a liquid in the blending process)
Oranges
Mango
Spinach
Zucchini or yellow Squash (grated)
tomatoes
cucumbers
Kiwi
Pineapple
Flax seed


Cooked (steamed with a little water, drained and cooled)
Turnips
broccoli
cauliflower
carrots
celery
Pears
Apples


Crockpot or boiled 
Potatoes

Sweet potatoes or yams

Pick your selection and add it to your blender, food processor or magic bullet. Make sure all of the produce has been cleaned, peeled, and diced. In the picture above I have mangos, blackberries, blueberries, raw spinach (I add it to everything) and homemade applesauce for the liquid. If you mixture is too dry try adding more fruit that is real juicy or applesauce. I try to add as little of water as possible and try to use as much raw produce as I can. The veggies mixture I steam multiple veggies all at the same time, drain it and throw it in the blender. Sweet potatoes and yams are a great way to add liquid to your baby food and easy to cook. Add your yams and/or sweet potatoes to your crockpot and an inch of water. Cook for a couple of hours. The peels will fall off and the potato will be soft enough to mash with a fork.

When your mixture is done pour into an ice cube tray covered with saran wrap. freeze over night. When the ice cubes are done pop out and put in a freezer bag that has been label with the ingredients and date it was made.

When you are ready to use it pull how ever many you need (my 9 mth old eats 3) and defrost. You can add baby oatmeal, mixed grain, rice cereal or plain yogurt (for babies 9mth +).

Greek Yogurt

Greek Yogurt

1/2 gallon milk (I use fat free)
2 cups instant dry milk powder
1 6-8 oz. container yogurt with active cultures 

• Thermometer
• Large, heavy, pot
• Bath towel and a dish towel
• Sifter
• cheese cloth or a old washed t-shirt (double rinsed) cut into squares.
• Bowl that will hold the strainer up. 

Place milk in pot and add dry milk powder. Stir well.

 Heat milk to 180 degrees, stirring as much as you can to prevent burning. 

Fill sink with ice cold water and place pot inside sink, to Cool down to 110-115 degrees. Add yogurt and stir well (If you add the yogurt while it is above 115 you will kill the healthy bacteria that is in the yogurt and it will not set up). Preheat oven to 100-115 or turn on the oven for 30 sec then turn off. 

 Wrap lid in dish towel, placing it on the pot. Wrap the whole pot in the bath towel and place it in the oven (oven turned off and door shut with the light on)

Yogurt will be "done" in 4-6 hours you can leave it longer but it will make it more tart.

At this time I usually refrigerate the yogurt until it is firm. (I feel like you don't loose as much yogurt when you strain it. If you want just plain yogurt you can flavor it and eat it now)

Place your strainer in the bowl making sure the bottom of the strainer is not hitting the bottom. Line the strainer with cheese cloth or shirt and dump in half your yogurt (or all of it if you have a large strainer.) Fold the hanging flaps over the yogurt so the yogurt is covered. Place it in the fridge for 6 hr, periodically draining out the whey in the bottom of the bowl.

dump the strained yogurt into a airtight container. If the yogurt is too thick add back some of the whey that is in the bottom of the bowl.

Serve plain with any kind of jam, frozen blueberries, granola, honey, sugar and/or vanilla.

Gluten-Free Meat or Bean Tacos with Mexican Rice

Meat or Bean Tacos with Mexican Rice

This is one of my favorite Quick meals! Rice is cooking, fry the shells, slap on the refried beans, add a veggie and dinner is DONE. My kids LOVE this dish.
Tacos
1 Bag of Mission Corn Tortillas
Canola Oil
Salt
1 lb of Hamburger browned (drained)
1 can Black eyed peas (drained and rinsed)
1 packet of McCormick Taco Seasoning
or my favorite.....
1 Can of Fat free Refried Beans
If you have never had a taste for Hard shell corn tortillas this is for you. Yum! Put about a 1/2 of a inch oil in the bottom of a frying pan. Turn heat to med-high and salt oil. Todetermine if the oil is ready for frying put an end of a wooden spoon in the oil. When there is tons of little bubbles around the end, its ready for frying. Drop first shell in oil cook 8-10 sec flip cook 2 sec more. (cook less if you like them softer, longer if you want it like a chip) Take out shell (Invest in a good set of tongs) fold shell in half and let sit until you are able to handle it. Fill it with meat, cheese lettuce whatever you like. Or spread the refried bean all along one side, cheese and squish.
Mexican Rice
1 can (8 ounces) of Tomato Sauce
1 tsp Better than Bouillon (Beef)
2 T Olive oil
1 cup of Long Grain Rice (uncooked)
1 chopped green onion
2 cups of water
1/2 tsp each of salt and garlic powder (Adams Brand)
Directions: Put the bouillon in the 2 cups of water in the microwave for 1 or 2 min to dissolve the paste. Heat the oil in the skillet on med or med high, then add the rice and stir. Continue to stir the rice until its slightly brown. Stir in the water, tomato sauce, onions and spices. Once it begins to boil, turn the beat down to med-low. Then put the lid on the skillet. Do not stir anymore. Let the rice cook for approximately 20 min. When the water has evaporated the green onions will stay on top of the rice.
(Original Rice Recipe from the kitchen of Lisa Cordova)

First Garden

Gardening

 We first moved into our house a year and a half ago, the first thing I told my husband I wanted was a garden. We have been married 6 yrs and had always been in apartments. I tried to grow a couple of things on the back porch but everything DIED (I have never been one to keep plants alive). This was my time to redeem myself. And bring justice to all the plants that I had killed. Growing up we always had a garden and many fruit trees. My mother was an amazing women. She cooked, cleaned, took care of 6 kids and still had time for gardening. Everything we ate was hand prepared by her. But like most children I spent most of my time eating out of the garden instead of watching how it was made. This was my time shine. Because Texas soil is crummy we built a garden box. As soon it was built I started vigorously planting. Any package of seeds I saw went in. I couldn't wait to see if anything would grow. Within a couple of week the sprouts began to come up, it was the best feeling in the world. I planted something and it actually grew!  I did have some crowding issues but all in all we had a pretty good crop. The best part of all was that my children where able to see where REAL food comes from. They used there tiny hand to plant something that grew into something they ate. If you have ever had trouble getting your kids to eat veggies plant a garden. The boys would be playing in the backyard get hungry and start eat handfuls of peas.  Most of the veggies never got to fully mature because of these little hand, but it didn't matter they were happy.

This month will be my third crop. I have learned by default what works and what's not worth it. Here is my list:
Not Worth it (Didn't grow and/or took up too much space.)
Carrots
Potatoes
Cucumbers
Cantaloupe

Worth it
Any type of lettuce (my fav Butterhead, spinach and spring mix)
Herbs (basil, parsley,chives)
Peas
Beans
Tomatoes

Each crop I am planting something new to see how it does. This crop it's pickling cucumbers, dill. I'll let you know the results.


For those of you that have not heard of Bountiful Baskets you are missing out! It is a fruit and veggie co-op. You pay $15 at the beginning of the week and pick up a variety of fruit and veggies at the end of the week.  Each week is a different variety. So if you are a picking eater and don't like to try new thing, this is not the thing for you. For myself I am a daredevil and like to try new thing. This is what we got  last week:

Reduce Reuse Recycle

Three simple rule that are very hard to follow.  As a mother of three small children I know how difficult it is to recycle. Throwing EVERYTHING in a trash bag is a lot easier. After I watch the video of the Johnson Family decide this was my time to get serious. With all that is going on in world I look at the things that I have and feel selfish. We need to do something now so our children have a future. 

Today was starting day. I found a old trash can in our garage and place it by our door for recyclable. I went through all of my children's toys and took out a big lot for donations. A lot of times I keep a toy, clothes, cooking stuff around because I am hoping some day we will use it. My new rule is if it hasn't been used in six months it's gone. Either to be donated, recycled or reuse in someway. I found a couple of my husbands old dress shirts and made a necklace and a scarf out of them. T-shirts I cut up and use them as cheese cloth to drain my yogurt when I am making greek yogurt. Now that my wheels are turning the possibilities are endless. Tomorrow my goal is to continue through the house find things we don't need or use. Why buy more  bins when you could sell, donate or recycle what you have.