On winter days, it's very hard to say where the inspiration to make dinner comes from. If you're like me, you just don't want to cook when it's so cold outside, but you sure can eat! The solution here? Easy fixins....

The best thing about winter days is that a hot meal is more than just appreciated, it's a have-to thing. One of my winter meal suggestions is meatloaf because it's hot, easy, and goes with everything.

I'll share my recipe with you, but if you use it, you have to tell me if you liked it!

Ingredients:

1 1/2 lb. ground beef
2 eggs
3/4 cups smashed all to pieces cornflakes
salt and pepper
ketchup
3/4 cups diced onions
garlic powder
a dash of oregano
a few splashes of worchestershire sauce (yeah, I spelled that wrong on purpose)
dash of thyme
soul seasoning, just a bit
dash of brown sugar (like 2 tbsp.)

Directions:

1. In a bowl, crack two eggs, and add everything except the meat, brown sugar, and ketchup. Beat the ever loving snot out of it, cause if you don't you may as well call for take out lol.

2. Add the meat. With your HANDS (cause a mixer or a spoon just doesn't do the job), gob everything together and mix well. Okay, now go wash your hands. Squirt like 1/4 Cup Ketchup in there and use your hands to mash it all to pieces again. Form your big ball of meat and things into a loaf shape and place on your baking dish.

3. Bake for about 1 hour and 15 minutes on 350 degrees.

4. In the meantime, mix about 1/2 Cup ketchup and 1/4 cup brown sugar together in a small bowl. When you take your meatloaf out of the oven, slather it all on top like you're icing a cake. Bake for about ten to fifteen more minutes. Then, you're done and you just gotta take care of the gigantor mess you left in your kitchen. Oh, and wash your hands again...

Special side note: The best thing you could ever serve with meatloaf is mashed potatoes, but here's a great idea...add sour cream instead of milk to make your mashed potatoes with. Once mixed, then you could add chives, or some garlic and onion powder. Add green beans as another side, and you've got a meal that your kids might actually EAT. That means quiet time at the table, which means Mom can relax for ten minutes at the least!

My Own Chicken and Dumplings

When I was a kid, a member of my extended family used to make awesome pots of chicken and dumplings. No one in history has ever made chicken and dumplings as good as hers as far as I’m concerned! However, a few years ago, I began to want them so bad I could almost literally salivate from yearning. So, I googled every single recipe I could find, but much to my dismay, none of them were like hers. Not even close.

So, I tried to remember how she made them, though it was years since I’d watched her cook. Fortunately, I had picked up enough of her technique to guess my way through the plethora of recipes I’d found until I got it so close to her recipe that I don’t think it would have turned out that good if she’d taught me herself.

Stories like these are how all the great recipes are born! Without further ado, here is the recipe that I forged from memory and google!

Ingredients:

3-4 lbs of chicken (with a bone in there somewhere is the best way to go).
Salt and pepper to taste
Water (duh)
Self Rising flour, about 4 cups plus
1 cup or a dash more buttermilk
¼ cup of vegetable oil
3-4 tbsp. butter
1-2 cans of evaporated milk (depending on how much broth you have).


Directions:

Put your (bone in) chicken in a pot and cover with water. Add just a few dashes of salt for extra umph. Cover and boil on medium-high heat until your chicken is done and your broth is a nice color.


Remove chicken from water and set aside to cool for a few minutes.



Add evaporated milk to the water and a bit of pepper. Replace the lid to the pot and wait for it to boil slowly.

While you’re waiting on it to boil for a minute, get out your handy dandy mixing bowl and mix the following: flour (2 cups), butter, veggie oil, and buttermilk. Mix well. This is your dough for the southern style dumplings. Yummy!




Okay, so by now you have a good boil going on in your pot, right? Right…Now, you add some flour…do ¼ cup at a time until it’s mixed in just right. You want to mix well after each addition and don’t add more than a few cups. Stand there and mix well until you get a good thickness going on, as thick as you want it.

Now, the fun stuff! With your pot going on medium high heat, you want to go ahead and get your dumplings in there and let them cook too! With a fork, scoop out little dumpling sized bits of dough and dump them in the pot. When it’s all in there, then you can shred up your chicken and add it too if you want. Or you can shred half and leave half to eat on the side. Or just eat it all on the side. Really, it’s completely up to you, but I like mine in the mix with the dumplings and the soup!

Let it cook just a bit together before serving. Stir well. Should only take about ten or fifteen minutes for all the flavors to co-exist well together.



You can serve all this with cole slaw and green beans, rolls, mashed potatoes and just whatever your little heart desires. I don’t like a lot of side dishes with mine, just the chicken and dumplings. Enjoy! Happy cooking!

Glazed Carrots

Okay so no long story as to why I love glazed carrots. I just do, okay, and they're so perfect for fall, take very little time to prepare, and are a great dish for Thanksgiving, in case any of you are having trouble with your Thanksgiving menus. So, here's the recipe.

Ingredients:

1-2 lbs. of baby carrots or larger carrots cut into smaller pieces
3 tbs. butter
1/4 cup or less brown sugar
1/4 cup water

Directions:

In a large pan melt butter and brown sugar slightly together. Add carrots, then water. Bring heat up to medium-high, and allow carrots to cook until tender. Enjoy!


***See...I told you it was easy! :)

Egg Omlets, perfect for fall breakfasts!

Well, now that school schedules and routines have been established and reestablished this year, I thought I'd move right along to fall things. I don't know how the rest of you feel about it, but nothing warms me up more on a fall morning like a beautifully planned egg omelet and a cup of hot coffee.

When I say beautifully planned, I mean that I make them big enough to feed a horse, cause I never eat one alone. My kids love them too!

Without further ado, here's my recipe:

Ingredients:

6 eggs (with or without yolks, is up to you)
1/8 cup evaporated milk
salt and pepper to taste
butter (around 3 tbsp.)

***Optional Ingredients***

(These are the things that you can variate in your egg dishes)

shredded cheddar cheese
mushrooms
shredded or cubed ham and/or turkey
ground sausage, cooked already
bacon, cooked and crumbled
green peppers
onions
red bell peppers
banana peppers
jalepenos

Bon Apetit! Enjoy :)

Back to School Mess...

Yup, it's that time of the year again. The kids will all be going back to school, and the mommies will be wiping tears from those going for the first time. Or, wiping their own...whichever, possibly both.

My schedule is nuts when school starts. I get the kids ready, get them to the bus, then come home and do the house cleaning thing, the paying bills thing, and sometimes, when I'm lucky, the author thing.

This year, I'm pretty excited. Tristan will start his first year of head start. He's three, so he won't be gone as long as the other kids will be, but he'll be going, and he'll be happy once he gets used to it. He neeeeeeeeds to be around others his age!

My problem is that I'll be alone all day long. What's a mom supposed to do? I'm so used to having Tristan on my heels all through the day. When I mop he's two steps behind me, washcloth in hand, trying to help. When I vacuum, he's riding the shop vac (yeah, it's super cute). When I talk on the phone, he's in my lap begging to talk too. So, now it's just good ol' Mom...

Anyhow, here are some good ideas for after school snacks that are pretty light on your budget.

*Apples, oranges, any fruits.
*Cereal bars. You can make homemade ones too.
*Yogurt, pudding, nuts.
*Fresh baked cookies. Look for cookie dough sales or make your own. Heck, buy ready made ones if you're pressed for time.
*Crescent rolls. Fill them with ham and cream cheese. Boy, those are good!
*Mini pizzas. Buy dough, cut into balls, pat out into mini sizes, cover in sauce and a tsp. of mozarella and a slice of pepperoni. Ball it up and make it into a filled ball. Put them into the oven and bake on 450 degrees until done. Yum :)
*Fried Pies...I'll find a recipe to post later, probably this fall when pies start to become popular again lol.

Welp, hope that helped you out some. I gotta get back to organizing school clothes and getting backpacks ready!

Dark & Delicious,
Rhiannon Mills

The Perfect Brownie Pan

My mom got this pan for me for my anniversary/Mother's Day, and I have to say, when it first came out I wanted it. My sister-in-law got one for Christmas and they said it makes the best brownies.

When I found out I was going to get the pan, I was already planning recipes. Of course the first time I used it wasn't anything spectacular. I just decided to let Betty Crocker do the work. I did add cream cheese icing to the chocolate that came with it though.

Anyway, I love the pan. The brownies were perfectly moist on the inside and a little crunchy on the edges---my favorite type of brownies. The pan stays true its name. I didn't make brownies often because the pan I used was always sticking and the brownies weren't too great. I mean they were edible but the brownie pan makes much better brownies.

I recommend that all my fellow brownie lovers get this pan.

Easy Chicken Strips

Okay, so I've been doing a lot of cooking homemade lately. Everything has to be as close to homemade as possible or I just don't feel adequate.

My kids, and probably most of everyone else's kids, would rather have chicken strips or nuggets these days than a burger in their happy meals. So, I started making chicken strips at home, all by myself.

The easiest way to do this is buy fresh boneless, skinless chicken breasts. It's cheaper than buying chicken that's already cut into strips, and all you have to do is cut them into strips yourself with a sharp knife.

Mix together the following:

2 cups of flour
season salt to taste
pepper to taste
soul seasoning to taste
onion powder to taste
garlic salt to taste
thyme to taste

Dip your chicken in either egg or buttermilk, then into the flour mix. Fry these in crisco on med to med-hi heat. Then, all you have to do is enjoy the chicken...

My Grandma's 83rd Birthday!

Last Sunday, May 23rd, was my Grandma's 83rd birthday and my family decided to throw her a surprise party for the occasion.


I'm usually the one to bake her cake. Well, okay, I have been for the past few years. She expects it of me now! So, as we planned out a menu for the surprise party that was held at Twin Falls State Park, I started cake planning, in my head first, of course.


Church members were all there. Aunts, uncles, cousins...It was nice. However, the nicest part was knowing that she already knew I was baking her a cake. When I asked how she already knew, she said, "Because you always do."


My grandma, Georgie Ellen Sizemore-Shrewsberry, taught me everything I know about working in the kitchen and baking. The least that I can do for her is bake her birthday cake, right?

Anyhow, the party was a hit, and the cake was gone practically before I even sat it on the table.



Moral of this story? Well, when your grandmother teaches you how to be a baking whiz (yes, I'm bragging), you bake her a cake anytime she wants one!

Homemade Blueberry Muffins, Kelly style...

I got a great recipe for blueberry muffins from my grandma and changed it a bit...as I do most recipes that I get my hands on. I change them to suit my own need and make them better, which is the ultimate goal in feeding your family, right?

Anyhow, I fixed a dozen this morning, and here is the recipe:

1 3/4 cup self rising flour
2 eggs
dash salt
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 1/3 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter
About 2 cups of blueberries

Cream butter and sugar with salt until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time and beat together with sugar mixture. Alternate adding flour and buttermilk until it's all mixed thoroughly. Add in berries. Bake in muffin wrappers on 375 degrees until done...

Peanut Butter Cookie Drops

This recipe is one that I made up while rummaging through my cabinets one night in a frantic search for sweets. I didn't have all of the ingredients needed for traditional peanut butter cookies, so I made do. To be quite honest, it's a favorite in my house and I never ever make peanut butter cookies from a regular recipe anymore. These are much better!

Ingredients:

1 Cup Creamy Peanut Butter
1 Cup Flour
1 Cup Sugar
1 Egg
1 tsp. vanilla (although not necessary, but better if you use it)

Start with egg and vanilla. Mix well. Add bits of flour and peanut butter gradually, alternating, until the mix is well blended.

Drop rounded teaspoonfuls of mixture onto lightly greased or ungreased cookie sheet. Bake on 350 for about ten or twelve minutes or until browned slightly.

*Cookie tip: If you take them out of the oven just a few minutes before they're done and let them sit for a minute, they'll finish baking on their own OUT of the oven. You have to time it right, but it does help to keep them soft. Also, put your cookies in an air tight container or cookie jar and leave one slice of bread in the container with them and the bread will keep them soft over night. The slice of bread will need to be changed out daily and will be nice and crisp, but your cookies will stay soft and moist!

Spring and Summer Pot Luck and Cook Out Fare Fit For a King...on a budget!

Spring and summer are full of cook outs and pot lucks. That in mind, what do you bring to the table? Well, there are simple things you can make without breaking the bank that will have everyone wowed beyond comparison.

Picture this:

You're busy. Your neighbor is on the phone trying to arrange a playdate for your children, your kids are winding toilet paper down the banister, your husband is snoring on the sofa (not helping at all) and you've just been invited to your best friend's house for a cook out the next day. No time to shop? Well, check your cabinets for odds and ends. You'll be surprised at this! Here is a recipe for a side dish and a recipe for a desert made from ingredients that everyone always has...most of the time. Easy, very little prep time, and always a crowd pleaser!

SPAGHETTI SALAD

You need:
16 oz. Italian or Zesty Italian salad dressing
16 oz. spaghetti noodles
chopped or diced green peppers and onions

optional ingredients:
chopped tomato
cheese cubes
pepperoni slices
sliced cucumbers

Directions:
Prepare noodles according to package directions. Once done, rinse with cold water until they're cool. Pour half the contents of the bottle of dressing in, stir, then add the chopped green peppers and onions. Add other optional ingredients. Refrigerate, preferably over night.When you're ready to serve this dish, add the other half bottle of dressing and stir!

QUICKY DONUTS

Ingredients:
Store bought refrigerator biscuit dough
hot hot hot cooking oil
cinnamon
powdered sugar

Directions:
Heat your oil in a saucepan on med-hi heat. When heated, get your biscuits ready by poking holes in the center. Drop biscuits in oil and deep fry until golden brown. Remove from oil with a slatted spoon and let them drain on a paper towel covered plate. When cool enough to touch, toss them in a freezer bag full of powdered sugar and/or cinnamon. Enjoy!

Easy Quesadillas

You will need:
-8-10" round flour tortillas
-boneless skinless chicken breasts (I usually do the 3lb. bags of the frozen kind--thawed of course)
-Your choice of taco sauce (chunky or not)
-Your choice of cheeses


1. Cut up the chicken in small pieces
2. Cook until done with whatever spices you want to use, set aside
3. In a mixing bowl, mix chicken, cheese, and salsa
4. In a non-stick frying pan brown your tortilla
5. Once tortilla is brown spoon filling on to one half, and fold the other side.
6. Keep over heat until cheese is melted.
7. Cut in quarters.
8. Repeat steps # 4-7 until all the mixture or tortillas are used.

*I've tried this in the oven and the tortillas didn't get golden brown. When I make this it last for at least 2 days. You can substitute any meats and add any veggies you want. I just found it's easier to please everyone if I just use chunkless taco sauce and no veggies.

Serve with Spanish Rice or whatever you choose.

**You can also use the frozen grilled chicken strips too. They work and it's easier**

Happy Cooking,
Joanna