Basic Vanilla Homemade Icecream Recipe Mix

Recipe taken from Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream Book and Modified by Mikael's Dad

Makes 1 qt mix (which fits in a 2 qt ice cream maker)

Eggs (2-8...see below)
3/4 C. White Sugar
2 C. Heavy Cream (Whipping Cream)
Whole milk (Possibly...see below)
Imitation Vanilla (2 tsp-3 T....see below)

In a mixing bowl whisk eggs

The original recipe calls for 2 whole eggs, but you can do 3-4 whole eggs for more creaminess or my Dad prefers 6-8 egg YOLKS...any work

Whisk eggs until light and fluffy or you are tired of mixing.

Add sugar to eggs slowly, whisking as you go.

Add cream slowly, whisking as you go.

Add enough milk so that the total mixture is 1 quart.  Sometimes depending on the size of your eggs you will not need to add any milk.

Add vanilla (even if adding other flavors or fruit).  A minimum of 1 capful (2 tsp).  If doing a straight vanilla icecream add 2 caps (1 T) up to 3 T. for a lot of vanilla taste.

Transfer mix to a pot.  Heat while stirring constantly with a whisk.

Use a thermometer to heat to anywhere between 140-160 F.  (Remember to stir constantly)

Remove from heat so the eggs stop cooking.  Allow to cool in pot in fridge (set pot on a hotpad) until it is cool enough to pour into a glass quart jar.

Pour mixture into quart jar.

Continue cooling using one of the following methods depending on how much time you have.  You must cool it to below 40 F degrees.  35-37 F is ideal:
Cool in the fridge overnight
Put in the freezer (but you must shake it every 20 minutes or it starts freezing and make ice crystals)
Put quart jar in an ice bath (ice and water in a big bowl...set the quart jar in the ice and water bath)

Once it is cooled you can put in your icecream maker and let it freeze.

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Note as a time saver:   Harmons sells a 1 gallon jug of Vanilla ready made icecream mix that you can pour right into your icecream maker.  It is good.  It tastes like Arctic Circle Soft Serve Icecream.

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Notes from Mikael:
I didn't follow directions very well and it turned out awesome.  Here is what I did...
Combine 2 whole eggs and 3/4 C. sugar in an electric mixer on medium high for 10 minutes. (Could probably do less).  In a pan combine that mixture with 2 C. cream and 1 capful imitation vanilla.  I did not add any extra whole milk.  Heat on Medium high until between 140-160 F.  I measured with an instant read meat thermometer.  Put pan in fridge to cool a bit.  Pour into 2 quart jars with lids (mine wouldn't fit in 1 quart jar).  Place jars in ice bath until mixture reads below 40 F.  Place jars in fridge until ready to use.

Homemade Ranch (Quick and Easy)

This was fast and yummy!  All of my family even the kids liked it!

1 c. mayo
1/2 c. sour cream
2 tsp. dried parsley
1 tsp dried dill
1 tsp dried chives
2 tsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp sea salt (I used kosher salt)
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/4 C. unsweetened almond milk or coconut milk or watered down heavy cream (I used milk)

Whisk all ingredients together except milk.  Add milk gradually until you reach you desired consistency.  Ideally refrigerate for an hour before serving.  But if that is not possible do at least 10 minutes.

Recipe taken from here https://www.wholesomeyum.com/recipes/low-carb-keto-ranch-dressing/

Homemade Mayo

Submitted by Sister M. Stans

Recipe originally from
From "Well Fed" and "It Starts with Food"

1 1/4 C. light olive oil (it must be light), DIVIDED
1 egg @ room temp (or 3 minutes in warm water)
1/2 tsp mustard powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 to 1 lemon, juiced @ room temp (it takes several hours to overnight)

1.  Place the egg, 1/4 C. oil (NOT ALL) and spices in blender
2.  Blend thoroughly
3.  Slowly drizzle in remaining oil, while mixing
4.  After thoroughly mixed, add lemon juice to taste

Aunt Olive's Soup

I brought this to Souper Saturday yesterday.  Aunt Olive was my Grandma's older sister.  So this recipe has made it through several generations of my family.  The way this recipe was handed down to me was that you make huge batches and bottle them.  A few years ago I experimented with it and made the recipe smaller so you could just make 1 dinner.  I will include both recipes.  It has basically the same ingredients as salsa...so you can grow the same items in your garden.  Sister Dabb has a really similar recipe (the larger canning version), but she does not put the noodles in before canning.  There are advantages to this...you could then use rice or noodles and the noodles don't take up space in your jars.  But the advantage to having the noodles already in the soup are that it makes it easier to open up and have a quick dinner.  I have listed spicy sausage to add...but you could alternately add ground beef or ground turkey or shredded or cubed chicken.  It is also good without meat.  We were brainstorming yesterday and saying it would be good with beans in it also...but I have never tried that.  Please note that the  bottling methods listed have not been approved by the Utah State Extension Office...they are just what my family has always done.

This is the bottling recipe...

1/2 bushel tomatoes

1/4 C. salt

1 C. sugar

1 tsp. pepper

9 C. macaroni (cooked and drained)

3 large bell peppers, diced

1 bunch celery, diced

5 medium onions, diced

1/2 lb. of real butter

Melt butter in large frying pan add vegetables.  Saute until light brown and fully cooked.

Peel tomatoes (can blanch if desired).  Cut into small pieces or blend in blender.

Fully cook macaroni (do not overcook).

Combine all ingredients except macaroni and boil hard for 15 minutes.  Add hot (and drained) macaroni).

Put in bottles.  Process in water bath.  Pints 20 minutes, Quarts 25 minutes.

Makes about 35 pints.

When serving, if desired, you can add any of the following: sausage, hamburger, chicken, cheese.  I also think it is too thick when I open a jar so I will blend a bottle of tomatoes and add that in.

Here is the 1 dinner recipe...

10 tomatoes peeled and blended in blender, OR 2 quarts of bottled tomatoes (with a possibility of 3 total).  If you do fresh tomatoes you may want to have 1 jar of bottled tomatoes on hand just in case it is too thick.

1 T. salt

3 T. sugar

quite a bit of pepper

2 1/2 C. macaroni (or other noodles), cooked and drained

1 bell pepper, any color

2 ribs celery, diced

1 medium yellow onion diced

2 T. oil or butter  (add more if vegetables start to stick while sauteing)

1 tube Jimmy Dean Hot Sausage (by the hot dogs)

1.  To peel the tomatoes you cna blanch them first to make it easier.

2.  Saute vegetables until lightly browned and cooked through.  

3.  Brown meat, drain if desired (I did not for Souper Saturday...but sometimes I do).

4.  Cook noodles through and drain

5.  Combine all ingredients

6.  Boil hard 15 minutes

7.  If not soupy enough when done, add blended up jar of bottled tomatoes.  And heat through.

Instead of the hot sausage you can do hamburger or chicken if desired.  And instead of noodles you can do cooked rice if desired.

If you double this recipe it will completely fill a large crockpot.

Cheesy Cauliflower Soup

by Sheryl Punter in the Taste of Home magazine
August and September 2010
Prep:25 min  Cook: 5 1/2 hours
Yield: 9 servings(2-1/4QT)

1 large head cauliflower, broken into florets
2 celery ribs
2 large carrots
1 large green pepper
1 small sweet red pepper
1 medium red onion
4 cups chicken broth
1/2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce
1/4 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper
2 cups(8 oz) shredded cheddar cheese
2 cups half and half cream

Place cauliflower in a 4 -qt slow cooker. Chop the celery, carrots, peppers, and onion; add to slow cooker. Stir in the broth, Worcestershire sauce, salt and pepper. Cover and cook on low for 5-6 hours or until the vegetables are tender.
In a blender, process soup in batches until smooth. Return all to slow cooker; stir in cheese and cream. Cover and cook on high for 30 minutes or until cheese is melted.

This soup was really good and easy to make. My family enjoyed. A few things I did different were, substituting red onion for yellow onion, using almost half the amount of cheese, and using whole milk instead of half and half. I probably would have used the right ingredients if I had them all. Enjoy:)

Onion Soup

p. 29 in my new crockpot cookbook.

3 cups thinly sliced onions (I did 1 1/2 white onions) (Next time I will do yellow...I think the white ones made it too sweet. Or I will do white, but omit the sugar)

half a stick butter

3 T. sugar

2 T. flour

1 qt beef broth (I did 4 cups water and 4 beef boillion cubes)

Cook onions in butter in frying pan. Cover and saute 15 minutes stirring frequently. Add sugar and flour mixing well.

While onions are cooking, put broth in crockpot on high. Add onion mixture to broth.

Cover and cook on LOW 6-8 hours.

Serve topped with toasted bread and grated parmesan cheese (we broke untoasted french bread and grated swiss cheese into ours).

I doubled the recipe for my family of 5 eaters and had a lot left over, I probably shouldn't have doubled.

I gave it 4/5 stars.

Macaroni and cheese

J gave this 4 out of 5 stars and I gave it 4.5 out of 5 stars. Kids didn't like it as well as the adults.

1 T butter (up to 3 T) (I did 1)

1 1/2 cups uncooked macaroni (I did elbow)

1 qt (or 4 C.) milk (I did skim)

8-12 oz grated sharp cheddar cheese or cubed velveeta (not the low fat kind) (I did 16 oz-1 lb- velveeta because I wanted to get rid of it.)

1/2-1 tsp salt (I did 1/2)

1/4 tsp pepper

Stir everything together in crockpot. Cover and cook on low for 3 hours.

Mine took about 5 hours. Do not turn up to high. I tried and it started burning.

Broccoli Cheese Soup

This is one of my favorite soup recipes:

Boil in unsalted water (about 15 min, or until tender)

4 carrots finely chopped or 1/2 bag of shredded carrots (from Maceys)

4 green onions, chopped (all but roots)

4 stalks of broccoli (chopped, heads only)

SAVE THE WATER YOU BOIL THEM IN!!! (Put colander over a bowl to catch water)

Melt in separate saucepan:

1/4 C. butter (I used real, but you can use margarine)

Stir in 1/3 C. flour with a whisk

Using a whisk stir in:

2 1/2 C. half and half (purchase 2 pints or 1 quart---then measure at home)

1 1/2 C. of your vegetable water (saved from above)

5 chicken boullion cubes

Stir sauce until smooth and thick. Add cooked veggies. When serving, you can top with cheese, but it is good without it also. One recipe (as listed above) will fit in a small crockpot (is that 5 qt?) if you double it, it will fit in a large crockpot (8 qt?).

Aunt Olive's Noodle Soup

This is a family recipe. It is a soup that you bottle. It is a little time intensive to cut everything up and bottle it in the summer, but it sure make a fast, yummy meal when you go to use it.

I have also cut down the recipe before and made it for one meal (not bottling it). See recipe below.

1/2 bushel tomatoes

1/4 C. salt

1 C. sugar

1 tsp. pepper

9 C. macaroni (cooked)

3 large bell peppers

1 bunch celery

5 medium yellow onions

1/2 lb. real butter

Melt butter in skillet. Add celery, onions and peppers until light brown.

Peel tomatoes, cut into small pieces. Cook all other ingredients. Boil hard for 15 minutes.

Mix together.

Put into clean bottles. Cold pack pints for 20 minutes. Quarts for 25 minutes.

Makes about 35 pints.

The last time we made this we tripled everything except we only doubled the tomatoes. It made 16-24 quarts. It took a total of 4-5 hours.

When you serve this it will probably need pepper. To stretch it you can puree a bottle of tomatoes and add to it. Some other variations are to add cooked hamburger or cooked sausage when serving. You can also top with parmesan cheese or regular cheese when serving.

I know Sister Dabb has a recipe that is VERY similar that she made for RS one time. She doesn't add the noodles to hers (before bottling). Then she can make the soup with rice or noodles. It's a good idea, but it's also nice to just open a bottle and have an immediate meal.

These are the quantities to cut it down to a single dinner...

5 tomatoes, blended in blender .......When I was done it was too thick, so I blended a large can of stewed tomatoes and added it. (you could probably just add more tomatoes at the beginning or use bottled tomatoes instead of stewed.)

1 T. salt

3 T. splenda or sugar

A few shakes of pepper

3-4 handfuls of noodles (curly or macaroni or whatever), this is about 2 1/2 C. cooked and drained

1 bell pepper, chopped

2 stalks celery, chopped

1 yellow onion, chopped

2 tsp. oil

Fry the vegs in oil until tender. Mix everything together and heat through.

Cheese Enchiladas or Casita Burritos

My favorite mexican restaurant was Casa Melinda's in Bountiful. Painfully it no longer exists. We would always order their cheese enchiladas. After years of experimenting this is the closest we can come to their delightful cheese enchiladas. And they are pretty close.

6" Corn Tortillas (not flour)

Shortening

1 can mild red enchilada sauce (soup can size)

2 T. flour

Colby Jack cheese shredded or monterey Jack and Colby Jack

Sauce

Take 1 can enchilada sauce and add 1 can water in a saucepan. Bring to a boil. In a separate bowl combine 1 C. water and 2 T. flour. Stir until not lumpy. Once red sauce has boiled, add a little red sauce to your flour mixture to heat it up a bit. Whisk flour mix into red sauce and cook on Medium-High heat until gravy consistency. (I didn't have enough time tonight because Jason had a mtg...so in my pic the sauce is runnier than normal).

Cooking the tortillas

In a frying pan melt some crisco. Cook a corn tortilla for a few seconds on each side, do not let them get crispy. Set aside tortillas on a plate covered with paper towels until you have cooked enough tortillas as you need.

Assembling the enchilada

Take a tortilla and fill with cheese. It is best if you use 3/4 monterey jack and 1/4 colby. But often I just use colby because I don't want to buy two kinds of cheese. Roll the tortilla and place it seam side down on an oven safe plate. Top with enchilada sauce and then sprinkle more cheese on top. We usually do 2 enchiladas per plate.

Baking

Place our plates (oven-safe ones only) with the prepared enchiladas in the oven at 350 degrees for 8-10 min. Remove from oven with a hot-pad. Plates and food will be VERY VERY hot.

Serving

Serve with sliced lettuce, sour cream, salsa and corn. If you wanted to you could put refried beans topped with cheese on your plate before baking (my family doesn't care for them).

When Casa Melinda would bring you your plate they would say "The plate is hot". So as our family joke we always say that too. (and the plate is VERY hot.)

Okay, so that is Cheese Enchiladas. Now on to Taco-Time's Casita Burrito's...

Casita Burritos

Make the same sauce as above.

Put refried beans and taco meat inside a flour tortilla (only a little bit of beans and meat...not very much). Roll up. Place on oven-safe plate seam side down. Top with sauce. Cheese on top. Bake in oven (on plate) at 350 degrees for 8-10 min. Remove plates with hot-pad.

3 dinners for under $10 total

Okay, so I didn't add up the amounts, but I think I made all three of these dinners for under $10 total. My family does not eat leftovers, so I do not save leftovers. They just go moldy, so I would rather throw them away when they smell good, than when they smell horrible. (I know, not very frugal of me---but that's the way it is.) But, if I can make it into something else, then it works. I haven't done the following plan before, but it worked out quite nicely.

10-12 medium potatoes

Toppings for baked potatoes

1 tube jimmy dean hot sausage

1 yellow onion

1/2 bottle BBQ sauce

9 eggs

S & P

Beef boullion cubes

Biscuits or biscuit ingredients

The first night we had baked potatoes. Mine were red potatoes, but it doesn't matter. Make extra for the following meals... (I think I made 10-12 medium sized potatoes for my family of 5 eaters).

Then a night or two later we had Rancho's Juevos. (My Dad always said it meant "Ranch Eggs" in spanish, but who knows?) Here is how to do it...

After the baked potatoes cool (you can just leave them in the foil and put them in the fridge) or let them cool on the counter for a few hours. Remove the foil and cube. Put them in the fridge in a ziploc until ready to use. In a large non-stick skillet put the potatoes in and brown edges and heat through. Salt and Pepper. In a separate pan cook 1 chopped yellow onion and 1 tube of jimmy dean hot sausage (by the ham and hot dogs at the grocery store). Add cooked sausage to potatoes. In a separate bowl beat some eggs. (I did 9, but it just depends on how many potatoes you have and how much egg you like). Add eggs to potatoes and cook through. Add half a bottle of any brand/flavor BBQ sauce and serve. You can also top with cheese if desired.

For the third meal I made a beef broth with water and beef boullion cubes. I did 5 bouillion cubes to half a big pan of water. (The normal recipe is 1 cube to 1 C. water...and I estimated that it was about 5 cups of water). Then I added the left over Rancho's Juevos to make a sausage and potato soup. The egg looked a little weird, but it didn't taste bad at all. In fact the soup was really really good. (I figured there is egg in egg drop soup). I also made biscuits to go with the soup. I am still looking for the perfect biscuit recipe so I will not post the recipe I used. (Anyone have any suggestions.)

And there you have it...3 cheap, easy, fast, yummy meals!

Banana Squash

Cut banana squash into the serving size of pieces that you want (smaller than a potato).  Scoop out the "guts".  Place a piece on a piece of tinfoil skin side down.  Put some butter (real butter is best by far!!!) (about the size of a pad of butter you would get at a restaurant to go on your roll) and 1 T. of brown sugar on top of the squash (on the fleshy part that you are going to eat).  Wrap the tinfoil up around it leaving the skin side still down.  Place on a cookie sheet.  Bake at 450 for 1 hour.  Remove from foil, use a knife or fork to remove the flesh from the skin. (You don't eat the skin).  Pour the "juice" on top.  Yum!

Fresh Spaghetti Sauce

So even though our garden looks like the Garden of "WEED"en it really is producing vegetables.  So yesterday I was feeling home-makerly and decided to make spaghetti sauce from fresh tomatoes.  It turned out really good.  Even Jason liked it, which is saying something!

It was from Food.com.  (Fresh Tomato Spaghetti Sauce by Lauralie41)

Here is the original recipe and below is the way I made it (I didn't have all of the fresh hebs and onion, so I used dried).

http://www.food.com/recipe/fresh-tomato-spaghetti-sauce-10837

4 lbs. tomatoes, chopped and peeled
2 med onions
4 cloves garlic
1/4 C. fresh basil
1/4 C. olive oil
1 tsp. salt
4 sprigs parsley
1 T. sugar

Directions:

1. 1
   To cook pasta sauce, heat olive oil over medium heat in a large iron skillet or heavy saucepan.
2. 2
   Add onion, basil, garlic and salt.
3. 3
   Saute until onion is tender, approximately 5 minutes.
4. 4
   Add tomato, parsley and sugar; heat to a boil; reduce heat and simmer, uncovered for about 2 hours, stirring often or until sauce has thickened.
5. 5
   Remove parsley.
6. 6
   Serve over cooked spaghetti or other Italian pasta and top with Parmesan cheese.
   
   
   
   
   HERE'S WHAT I DID...
   4 lbs tomatoes
   2 T. dried onions
   2 tsp. minced garlic (from a bottle)
   4 tsp fresh basil
   1/4 C. canola (I didn't have olive oil)
   1 tsp. salt
   4 tsp. parsley
   1 T. white granulated sugar
   
   
   Boil a big pan of water.  Put tomatoes in water until skin splits open.  Remove tomatoes from water, put in cold water.  Skin will just fall right off the tomatoes.  Core tomatoes.
   
   
   Then I put the tomatoes in the blender (because I don't like chunks).   Pour tomatoe puree in a pan.  Add spices.  Bring to a boil, then simmer for 2 hours.  Let cool.  Reheat and serve over noodles.  
   
   
   I did have to add some water at the end because it was too thick for me.  I also added a lb of cooked hamburger.  I think it would have been good without.  Or with sausage.
   
   
   It was good, I would make it again.  A little labor intensive, not too bad.  And you did have to start 3 or 4 hours ahead of when you wanted to eat. 
   
   
   We also had fresh cucumbers and squash and cooked carrots from the garden (the carrots are not pictures because they weren't quite done cooking when we sat down to eat!)  I felt very self-reliant that night!  It's a good feeling!
   
   
   
   
   

Omelets

My Dad was the omelet maker in my family.  My mom would make us scrambled eggs and she knew how to make other kinds of eggs, but she didn't do it very often because she doesn't like eggs.  So that left it to my Dad to be the egg cooker.

I'm sure there are different was to do omelets and different tips and tricks.  So let us know how you do it!!! I will  tell you how I do it and I will include a lot of photos because it's really something you learn by watching and doing, not necessarily from a recipe.

First get everything ready...
Stainless steel (not non-stick) frying pan  (mine is 10.5 inch diameter--but you could probably use a 9 inch up to an 11 inch---I'm guessing?!?!)  (Maybe you can do it with a non-stick coating...but I'm just telling you how I do mine!)

Stick of Butter (margarine doesn't work as well, and definitely not tub butter)  ( I have used margarine before--but do not use a light margarine--I just think butter keeps it from sticking as much as with margarine)

Spatula or 2

Salt

Pepper (I like coarse)

Eggs (I do 3 egg omelets, unless I'm watching my calories, then I do 2 egg whites and 1 whole egg)  (for kids sometimes I do 2 egg omelets)

Toppings:  Grated cheese, chopped ham, green peppers, mushrooms, onions, bacon, sausage, etc...)  (Have them all chopped and grated before you start.

The chopped/grated ham/cheese below would be for 1 omelet.  It is a medium sized fistful of each.

If doing veggies...saute them in 1/2 T. of butter until softened, cooked and browned.
1st pic below is mushrooms, green peppers and onions
2nd pic below is just onions

Remove sauteed veggies from frying pans and place in small bowls to use later.

Wash out and dry frying pan if using same frying pan to cook the omelets in.


Break 3 eggs into a small bowl.

Whisk them (Beat with a fork) for a few seconds until fairly well blended.

Put about 1/2-1 T. of butter in frying pan over med-high heat.

Once butter is melted...swish the butter around the pan and up the sides just a bit so the eggs won't stick to the sides of the pan.

Pour the beaten eggs into the frying pan.

Salt and Pepper fairly liberally.

They cook quite quickly.  Once it cooks just a bit...it will still be a little runny on top...place toppings on 1/2 of the omelet.

A few seconds later (almost not runny at all now--just a tiny tiny bit) lift up all of the edges on the half without toppings.  Then fold over the half without toppings.  Sometimes this step takes 2 spatulas.

Almost immediately flip the omelet over once more to seal the omelet all together.  The one in the pic is cooked just a tad longer than I like it...but still good!)

Carefully remove omelet to plate (sometimes it takes 2 spatulas).



Then immediately rinse your hot pan and spatula.

Scrub out all the eggs with a metal scrubber.

Rinse and dry your frying pan and spatula.

Start over with more butter for your next omelet.

It takes some practice.  You can do it.  It's not as hard as it seems!  Give it a try!

Omelets are best served hot...I serve mine as they come out of the pan...so this is one dinner we don't necessarily eat all at the same time.

Hawaiian Haystacks (Chinese Sundaes)

Well yesterday for our MEATLESS MONDAY we had hawaiian haystacks.

On your plate first you place chinese crunchy noodles.  Then cooked rice.  Then whatever toppings you want such as...olives, pineapple, green onions, celery, raisins, coconut, grated yellow or colby jack cheese, tomatoes, slivered or sliced almonds, etc...

I left the chicken out for my meatless monday.  But normally I add boiled chicken.  You can either cube it and have it in a little bowl for people to add on or you can mix the cooked cubes into the gravy.  You will use less chicken if you mix it into the gravy, otherwise people pile it on. But it depends...If you think you might have left over chicken then you might want to leave it on the side so you could add it in a casserole or something.  It's harder to reuse it once it's in the gravy and I have a harder time throwing out chicken than I do 33 Cent gravy.  It's up to you!!!

Top with gravy.  Either packaged chicken gravy (you know the ones that are 3 for $1) or cream of chicken soup mixed with 1 C. of milk.  For my family of 6 I need 3 of the packages for 1 meal or 2 cans of soup.

Don't worry about having all of the ingredients...just go with whatever you have.  My kids like to microwave theirs once it is on the plate to melt the cheese.  Of course then they have to put it in the freezer to cool it down...SILLY KIDS!!!

I always make double the rice so I can make ham fried rice later in the week....YUM!!!

Carmel Syrup

This is a really yummy carmel syrup recipe from Jacque.

1 cube butter
1/2 C. buttermilk (from store, or make by mixing 1 T. lemon juice into milk and let sit for a few minutes until it curdles)
2T. Karo Syrup
1C. Sugar

Bring to a boil and stir constantly for 3-4 minutes.  Remove from heat and add...

1 tsp. baking soda
1 T. vanilla

Homemade Syrup

Twice as much white sugar as water.  (For example 2 C. sugar and 1 C. water...but you can do less or more)
Boil until the sugar dissolves and liquid becomes clear.  Add a splash of mapeline (maybe 1 tsp-1 T.).

I store my syrup in the fridge, but don't know if you have to or not.  This syrup is runny unlike store-bought.  I like it better that way because then it absorbs into the pancakes better!

Pancake Mix

These are fluffy and absorb a lot of syrup!  I will do a separate post for my homemade syrup recipe.

Here is the mix (obviously this makes a lot)
12 C. flour
1/2 C. baking powder
4 tsp. salt
3/4 C. sugar
4 C. powdered milk

To make the pancakes...
1 C. mix (from above)
1 T. oil
1 egg
1/2 - 3/4 C. water
This made 4-5 medium sized pancakes (I measured each pancake batter out with a 1/4 measuring cup and it made 4-5 pancakes)

Here is a smaller version of the mix if you want to try it first (this is a fourth of the total mix)
3 C. flour
1/8 C. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
3 T. sugar
1 C. powdered milk

Cheese grilled sandwiches and tomato soup

Tuesday we had good old cheese grilled sandwiches and tomato soup.  And I never thought about it...but I could so that for one of my Meatless Mondays!!!

(I know there are different levels of vegetarians...some that don't eat cheese, dairy, eggs, etc...but we are going strictly for no meat for our Meatless Mondays)!!!

Navajo Tacos

Tonight I am planning on Navajo Tacos.

To make the scones...Buy Rhoades white bread dough.  Let thaw.  Pull off a small blob.  Roll with rolling pin.  Heat oil on Med-high heat in a large pan.  You need about an inch and a half or two inches of oil in the pan.  Try 1 blob first (not a full scone...just a little blob of dough).  If dough rises to the top of the oil then your oil is hot enough.  If it sinks then oil is not hot enough.  When oil is hot enough, place one of the rolled out dough in the grease.  It doesn't take long.  When brown on bottom, flip over with a fork or tongs to brown on other side.  When done...remove from oil with tongs or fork and place on a plate covered with paper towels for a few minutes until oil drips off.

Top with canned chili, lettuce, cheese, sour cream, salsa, (tomatoes if you like them), etc...

I like Cattledrive chili the best...but it is pricey so usually I just have western family!!!

Today for my meatless monday I am going to buy the vegetarian chili.  It is really not too bad.

Since you'll have extra dough you can make more scones and top with honeybutter or cinnamon-sugar for a good family night treat or dessert!

Note after I made this tonight...I did one of the loaves (out of 3 that come in the pkg.).  It made 3 medium size scones and 2 small scones.  It was not enough for my family of 6 and definitely not enough to have scones with honeybutter for dessert.  Next time I would do 2 loaves for dinner and 1 loaf for treats.