Tricks for Home Cooked Food Fast

During the weekdays I leave my house at about 7:30 in the morning and don’t get home until about 6:30 that evening.  This doesn’t leave a lot of time to cook a meal when I get home.   Here’s a few tricks I’ve learned to make home cooked food fast.

On the weekends when I’m really motivated to cook, I’ll cook up a storm.  I’ll make big batches of something, have some for supper and freeze the rest, in meal size. for later.  Or I’ll make several meat loaves or hamburgers (sometimes both), have some for supper and freeze the rest for other nights.  Maybe cook a large ham and use a small portion and freeze the rest in batches for quick ham and beans.  I’m not always in the mood to cook, but when I am, I try to cook big.

In the last year I’ve learned to can meat.  This is a great time saver because there’s no thaw time.

5 Ideas That Have Helped Me Make Healthier Eating Choices

I’ve learned over time you don’t have to have a strict diet to make healthy eating choices. I most definitely don’t deprive myself because, for me, that only leads to binge eating.  But I have found a few little tricks that help me make better choices and I’ve even lost a few pounds along the way.  

Happy Mother's Day

Today is my first Mother’s Day without my mom.  She was my best friend. I was able to tell her anything.  We had breakfast almost every Saturday morning together for the last 30 years.  In the last 10 years or so I began to take care of her and my dad and their finances.  Then dad passed on 4 years ago.  We moved mom to town and continued on.  

Do you really want that cookie?

Yeah, I do.  I LOVE sweets, always have and always will.  In my family, homemade ice was a food group, not just a dessert.  After growing up with homemade ice cream, homemade cookies and cakes I figured out I have to find a way to curb the impulse to eat every sweet I see.  After years of the yo-yo weight gain/loss and attempts at many different methods to avoid the sweets, I found a few things that helped me.  

Store Brand Organic Food

When I first started moving towards organic food, I always bought from the local “Organic” or “Natural” stores in my areas.  As time went on, I was happy to notice natural and organic store brands on the shelf in my local Dillons, Simple Truth and Simple Truth Organic brands.  They were less expensive and most of the time just as good.

I like to save a few bucks where I can but still get the best I can afford.  I’m not always able to eat organic, but I try when and where I can.  What’s nice about the Simple Truth brand is they also

have the natural option, which isn’t “organic” by definition but which still omits 101 artificial preservatives and ingredients, listed here.  It’s different than the organic definition found on their website here, but better than most the well known stuff off the shelf, in my opinion.

On 10/22/14 Business Insider published a story online stating JP Morgan had put out a report showing that within two years Kroger was expected to surpass Whole Foods as a seller of organic and natural foods.

I still occasionally shop at my local organic and natural stores mostly because one of them carries a number of local products from local producers within the state and I like to buy local when I can; and I can’t always find everything I want in my local Dillons.  When I can, I get my produce from the local growers near my home or out of my own garden.

Where do you get your organic food? 

The Thrifty Homesteader: What's so bad about raw milk?

The Thrifty Homesteader: What's so bad about raw milk?: Maybe it's just coincidence or maybe it's just my imagination, but it seems that since Farmageddon was released, the heat has been...

Fall Colors

I'm not real partial to the cold weather, specifically I hate being cold as the cold causes me pain these days, but after seeing the trees in this last week, I'm enjoying the change.  (I guess I'll have to wear another layer of clothes this winter).  In Kansas it's highly unusual that the trees even still have leaves
at this time of year. Generally it gets cold, the leaves turn and in a day or so the wind blows so hard the trees lose their leaves.  So really we usually only have fall colored leaves for about 1-2 days.  This year, it's been different.

These are the leaves on the trees in our yard, the yellow one being a Mother's Day present from my son about 20 years ago and the red one being a gift from my mother also about 20 years ago, although the red one had a tough start and is a smaller tree to begin with, being what's called a Smoke Tree.  I only have a few pretty ones, mostly what we have are hedge that aren't real colorful.  They do look much prettier when the sun is shining especially in the morning, but I had to leave the house before the sun came up that far.  So, when I am able in the next day or so to catch these trees in the sun I will retake these and post new pictures because they really are much prettier than these pictures show.

I work on the 16th floor and have been looking over the city, noting there isn't a lot of red in our landscape, mostly dull yellows and oranges.  As I look down closer to our building I note a number of red fall colored trees, and they're short, I'm thinking you just can't see most of them from my vantage point throughout the city.  Now as I'm driving home from work, I find myself unconsciously looking for more and more tree color in the city.  I don't see as much as I would think or like which is a shame, as the deep, bright and rich reds, yellows and oranges add such depth to the fall colors, they are so bold, bright, so pretty.  We have yellows and oranges, but they just aren't the striking colors you can see in some trees.

However, in the mornings, when the sun comes up, the colors we do have seem bright, like they are alight, maybe even glowing and while on I'm on my way to work, that is what I would call a morning "Smile", making the morning worth the day ahead.

Tell me what you see, what you like in the fall when the trees begin to change.  What are the colors like in your area?  Drop a picture if you like and share.

Enjoy the colors while you can.