Save money - eat healthier - Cook it yourself!

All of the recipes you'll find here and at www.carlcooks.com are made from healthy ingredients rather than processed food - that's because we don't want to fill our bodies with chemicals from food any more than from prescription drugs.

But if that isn't enough, how about cooking to save money? Some things take so little time to do that buying the expensive packaged variety is just silly. For instance, salad.

Not only do you run the risk of buying contaminated lettuce - remember the scare last year - you pay dearly for that little bit of convenience. Not only that, bagged lettuce wouldn't last for weeks in that case if they weren't treated with something - do you REALLY want to eat preservatives?

A little bag of already cut up lettuce costs $3 or more - while a head of lettuce runs about a dollar. And you can choose the extra stuff you want to put in it - carrots, celery, a bit of spinach, a little onion. Most of those things will last in your refrigerator for quite a while, but if you don't think you can use it all before it goes to waste, split your salad fixin's with a friend.

Now consider a can of soup as opposed to the homemade variety. 12 oz. of Progresso chicken soup costs in the range of $2.50 - $3.00. You can make it yourself with one potato (can be cooked, leftover), one carrot, 1/2 cup of frozen peas, a couple of boullion cubes (or chicken broth) 1/2 cup of pasta shapes or noodles, 1/2 cup of cubed chicken (leftover), and enough water to make 2-3 cups of soup.

(Add the pasta after everything else is almost cooked - otherwise it will turn to mush. If you're using cooked potatoes, put them in toward the end as well.)

I prefer making enough for 6-8 cups of soup, because I'm lazy. I want extra to put away for tomorrow or the next day.

Since at least part of that list can come from leftovers that would otherwise sit in the refrigerator until they turned into a green science project, the cost is minimal - and the soup tastes better. You also get the benefit of controlling the sodium level - add enough to please your taste buds. Use Sea Salt if you have it.

Some of the things I see for sale shock me - Like the potatoes in a plastic bag that are already peeled and cut up - so you can microwave them and then mash them. Why pay 3 or 4 times extra just so you don't have to peel a potato? You still have to mash them yourself!

Beef & Rice Stuffed Green Peppers

My retired carpenter is falling down on the job lately, and leaving the cooking duties to me again. I guess he thinks that plowing and shoveling snow all day gives him a pass.

Maybe it does. I'd rather hang out in a warm kitchen than in the cold snow.

So, because I get bored cooking the same things over and over, I've been searching for old recipes that I used to like. I found this stuffed green pepper recipe in my Mom's old cookbook. It's a good way to use up that little bit of leftover ground beef - and you can add it cooked if you happen to have a leftover burger patty in the fridge. Just crumble it.

This is kind of like having old friends come to visit...

6 green peppers
1/3 cup rice
3 cups canned tomatoes
2 cups water
1 t. salt
2 eggs
1/4 t. onion salt (or 2 Tablespoons minced onion)
1/2 cup crumbs
1/4 - 1/2 lb. ground beef

Wash the rice. Bring the tomatoes and water to a boil and add the rice and salt. Cook until the rice is tender, stirring frequently. Add the eggs, onion salt, bread crumbs, and ground beef.

Wash the green peppers and remove the seeds. Then fill with the rice and beef mixture. Put these in a dutch oven or baking pan with sides, cover, and cook at 350 degrees until the peppers are tender.

Boiled Raisin Drop Cookies

These are the cookies "Grandma used to bake" when my kids were small. Because I have no self-control when there are cookies in the house, I don't bake often.

That's why, when my son called asking for the recipe I had to go on a hunt.

It took a lot of searching through all the little slips of paper in my Mom's old cookbooks, but I finally located it, and thought I'd share.

These cookies are soft and cake-like, so when you layer them in a storage container, slip a sheet of plastic wrap or waxed paper between the layers. Otherwise they'll stick together.

2 cups raisins, boiled 20 minutes
1 cup of juice from the raisins
3 eggs
1 tsp.soda
1 cup shortening
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1 cup nuts (optional)
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. baking powder
3 cups flour
1 tsp. salt

Sift together flour, soda, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt - set aside.

Cream shortening and sugar, add eggs one at a time and beat thoroughly. Add the juice from the raisins, alternately, with the dry ingredients. Add the raisins and nuts.

Drop by spoonfuls on a greased baking sheet and bake for about 12 minutes in a 350 degree oven.

Swedish Potato Sausage

Swedish potato sausage is a Christmas Eve tradition at our house. My Mother made it, my Grandmother made it, and her mother made it. Now I make it, and I love it.

Just thinking about it while I was stuffing the casings today made me feel like one of Bob Cratchet's kids - remember how they jumped around squealing in anticipation of the Christmas goose?

Some people think I'm nuts - they don't like it at all. But that's OK, because I wouldn't eat an oyster or caviar if you paid me. (Well, for a million bucks I might as long as I could swallow fast.)

Anyway, if you want to try it, here's what you need:

Sausage casings - you get them from the guy behind the counter at the meat market. I've never seen them on display.

4# pork shoulder - you don't want it too lean
4# beef
8# potatoes
4 smallish onions
2 t. allspice
3 t. salt
1/2 t. pepper

Grind the meat, potatoes, and onions, then add the spices and mix, and mix, and mix.
(This is a 2-handed job.)

Then stuff the meat into the sausage casings, tying off about every 4 or 5 inches to make individual sausages.

Store the completed sausages in a kettle of water until you're ready to cook them - otherwise the potatoes will turn black. That doesn't hurt the taste, but it looks funky. You can freeze what you aren't going to use immediately.

Drop the sausages into boiling water and let them cook for 45 minutes. You can serve them hot, which is good. But I especially love them cold as snacks. Some people dip them in a bit of mustard.

For me this job is a bit time-consuming, but not difficult. Last year we bought a good grinder with a sausage stuffing attachment. But before that, I used one of those hand-grinders - just like my Grandmother and Great Grandmother used.

Before we got the new "stuffer," I had a terrible time finding something to put the casings on so I could stuff them, and finally purchased a "fat funnel" from the automotive department in the hardware store. That worked, but it was sure messy and it took a lot of hours to stuff 16# of sausage.

Every time I make potato sausage I'm reminded of how my Great-Grandmother did it. She had a grinder, but Grandmother said to stuff the casings she used a hollowed out cow's horn. I suppose that worked better than my little short, fat funnel.

Chicken Tortilla Soup My way

Last week we went out to lunch and I ordered the soup of the day - which turned out to be Chicken Tortilla. I'd never tried it before and the first spoonful had me grabbing for the ice water. But the more I ate, the more I liked it.

So, I tried to find a recipe. There were plenty of them, but none that had the ingredients I saw in that soup. That's when I decided to just wing it... and I'm really glad there's just enough left over for my lunch tomorrow.

Here's what went into the pot...

First I soaked about a cup full of pinto beans overnight. Then I cooked them until they were close to done. I set them aside until time to start the soup.

Into a crock pot went:

The mostly cooked beans
1 can crushed tomatoes
1 can of water
about 1/2 t. cumin
about 1/4 t. cayenne pepper
a few splashes of hot sauce
about 1/2 t. garlic powder
salt and pepper
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/2 cup chopped celery
1 leftover cooked chicken breast, cut into pieces about 3/4" squarish

After it had cooked for a while I tasted it and added a bit more of the cumin, cayenne, and garlic.

To serve, I topped it with finely shredded cheddar cheese and minced green onion.

Yum...

*All the recipes I saw called for cilantro - but since there was none on the shelf and it's 12 miles to the grocery store, I didn't use it. Maybe next time.

World's best pie crust recipe - Sally says so!

Hi all, I'm back.

Got a little side-tracked there, and was actually going to let this blog go and just put all the recipes on the Cooking with Carl website. But I have a bossy kid and he convinced me to change my mind. So, in honor of returning, I'll share a new recipe just given to me by my friend Sally.

She brought it home with her after a visit to her daughter in Minnesota - and she swears that it's the best pie crust she's EVER made - or eaten.

Combine:
4 cups flour
1 3/4 cups shortening
1 tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons salt
1/2 cup VERY COLD water
2 Tablespoons vinegar
1 egg

This recipe will make crusts for 4 pies - and here's the best part. You can make one pie today, roll the remainder into 3 balls, wrap them tightly, and keep them in the freezer until you get the urge to make another pie.

Apparently, this dough is so elastic, you can roll it out thin without it breaking into pieces. My old recipe calls for 2 cups of flour and it only made enough crust for one pie.

I can hardly wait to try this...

How to make gravy

Gravy was a staple in our house when I was growing up. So learning to make it was as natural as learning to fry an egg. That's why I was shocked when a good friend came to dinner and wanted to watch when I made the gravy.

She's known as a very good cook - but it turns out she never made gravy because she didn't know how.

So here goes: First, there are 2 different kinds and 2 different ways.

If you've cooked a roast or a turkey and have drippings in the pan, you'll want to use the cornstarch method.

First, put a tablespoon or two of cornstarch in a small bowl. Add water and stir until it is smooth. Don't ever just dump the cornstarch into the hot drippings, because they'll land in a lump and stay that way.

Now, if you don't have enough liquid in the drippings, add a little water. Then slowly stir in the cornstarch and watch the mixture thicken. Add a little more water, alternating with the cornstarch, until you get the volume of gravy you want. You can also add milk, or the water from the pan in which you boiled potatoes. If you use water you'll get brown gravy, if you use milk you'll have milk gravy.

The important thing is to keep stirring while the gravy is cooking. If you don't, you'll get lumps. Keep watching until you have the thickness you want, then get it off the stove. You can keep it in a warm oven if you aren't quite ready to serve the meal.

The second way is to use the grease that's left in the bottom of a frying pan after you fry chicken, pork chops, or bacon. Some people also use the grease left from frying burgers, but I don't like the flavor as well as the others.

If you have a LOT of grease, pour some in a bowl and set it aside. Then add about 2 or 3 Tablespoons of flour and stir it well. If you've removed too much grease, put some back so you get a kind of crumbly mixture.

Now add milk - about a cup the first time. Then, just like with the other method, keep stirring and adding and stirring and adding until it has the consistency you want. Again, you can use some of the water the potatoes were cooked in for part of the liquid.

Don't despair if you get too much liquid and your gravy is runny. Just keep it on a medium low heat and let it cook down until it's right. Remember to keep stirring, however!

Yours for good eating,
Marte