Friday Food Frolic! The Fizzy MeMo

Our family's take on homemade soda.

The little ladies love that it's sweet and fizzy.

It's so easy to make that they can practically do it themselves!

The Fizzy MeMo

Ingredients:

(try to find organic versions)
2 cups grape juice
2 cups cranberry juice
2 ¼ cups cold sparkling water

Directions:
1. Mix the cranberry, grape juice

and sparkling water in a pitcher.
2. Add ice cubes.

3. Cheers!

Friday Food Frolic! Garden Pasta Salad

In a good year, we can successfully grow most of the veggies in our own garden.  My girls like to pick the veggies and help make the salad.  In a year that the deer help themselves, our local market supplies all the organic veggies we need for this salad.

I like to use Newman's Oil & Vinegar dressing. It's all natural and tastes homemade, so while not organic, it's a great time saver.  Sometimes Meira will want cheese in it and sometimes not, so I left that optional in the recipe.  It makes a great school lunch - filled with protein and veggies and grains - and doesn't need to be heated, so it sits well all morning in a thermos.

Garden Pasta Salad

Ingredients:

1 box of tri-color pasta

1/4 cup chopped red pepper

1/4 cup chopped green pepper

1/4 cup chopped yellow pepper

1/2 cup thinly sliced & peeled cucumber

1/2 cup sliced green olives

1 cup cherry tomatoes, sliced

1 stalk chopped celery

shredded parmesan or mozzarella cheese (optional)

1 bottle Newman's Own Olive Oil & Vinegar dressing

Directions:

1) Boil pasta according to directions on box. 
Rinse & drain under cold water.

2) Mix all veggies in a large bowl.

3) Pour dressing over mixture,
add cold pasta and mix well.

4) Chill (and add cheese, if using) before serving.

Friday Food Frolic! Pancakes

The little ladies don't always eat a big breakfast. We are always on the go in the mornings and breakfast usually consists of berries & a granola bar or a homemade biscuit & milk.

So on the weekends,  we sometimes like to do a big breakfast and a popular request is Pancakes! My base recipe comes from the Better Homes & Gardens cookbook.  I tweak it to make it a little healthier for the little ladies and this is one recipe that they barely notice the difference!

Weekend Pancakes

Ingredients:

1/3 cup flour

2/3 whole wheat flour

1 Tbsp sugar

2 Tbsp wheat germ

2 tsps baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1 egg, beaten (or replacement equivalent)

1 cup liquid (organic milk/soy milk/almond milk or water)

2 Tbsp melted butter (or any kind of oil substitution - applesauce works really well)
(I always try to use organic ingredients when possible)

Directions:

1) In a large mixing bowl, stir all dry ingredients together.

2) In a small bowl, mix liquid ingredients until well blended.

3) Pour liquid mixture into the bowl with the dry ingredients.

4) Stir until blended, but slightly lumpy.

5) Pour about 1/4 cup of batter into your lightly greased frying pan or griddle. 

I keep mine at about medium-hot.

6) When pancakes have bubbly surfaces, flip over to cook the second side.

7) Serve with maple syrup and enjoy!

This is a great base recipe and can be easily changed by adding blueberries or bananas. If you use "purple" all natural applesauce, you'll get purply pancakes!

Friday Food Frolic! Jerk Chicken Veggie Soup

This one is a favorite of mine and if the jerk seasoning wasn't so hot, I would eat it for every meal!  For the girls, I omit the jerk seasoning and tone down the spicy peppers. This is a great wintertime soup and with all it's peppers and garlic, it's a great immunity boost!

Jerk Chicken Veggie Soup

Ingredients:

16 oz organic vegetable stock

2 cans diced tomatoes with onion

½ can diced tomatoes with chilies

1 small can tomato paste with garlic

1 tbsp. diced garlic

1 tsp. chili powder

½ tsp. cayenne powder

1 green pepper diced

1 red pepper diced

10 red potatoes diced

3 organic, free range chicken breasts

Rasta Rub seasoning

Organic shredded cheddar cheese

Blue corn tortilla chips or rolls

(I try to buy organic when possible for all the ingredients)

Directions:

1. Almost puree the diced tomatoes, garlic, and 1/3 of the diced green & red peppers in a food processor.

2. Add the tomato/pepper mixture to crock pot, adding: the tomato paste, chili powder, cayenne powder, remaining peppers and diced red potatoes. Mix well.

3. Stir in vegetable broth to desired consistency.
You may not need all 16 oz.

4. Cut chicken breasts into 1 inch cubes. Coat with Rasta Rub (or any jerk seasoning). Toss in frying pan with a little oil until thoroughly cooked. Dice and add to crock pot.

5. Cook on high 5 hours or until potatoes are done.

6. Top with shredded cheddar cheese and serve with tortilla chips/rolls. Enjoy!

Friday Food Frolic! Breakfast Biscuits

One of the things we've been doing at home, is taking our favorite store bought foods and making them from scratch. My oldest likes to compare the ingredients in the store bought to the ones in our recipe. For example, canned biscuits have some 20 ingredients, from scratch only 7. She is amazed at how much better it tastes and takes pride in creating healthy-for-you foods. It makes for fun Saturday mornings and is something I look forward to each week.
So, our first recipe of this blog will be for breakfast biscuits. If I tweak too far from what the girls are used to, they won't eat it, hence the butter stays. During the week, my youngest will eat breakfast, but my oldest doesn't like to eat that early, so these are great for before school.

Breakfast Biscuits

Ingredients:

1 1/4 cups organic unbleached flour

3/4 cup organic whole wheat flour

1 tablespoon rice protein powder (can be omitted)

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup organic butter (we like Horizon)

3/4 cup organic milk (we like Horizon or Organic Valley)

Directions:

~Pre-heat over to 450 degrees~

1) Mix all dry ingredients in a bowl.

2) Cut butter into chunks and use a fork to blend until crumbly.

3) Add the milk and stir until dough forms.

4) Knead dough until smooth (5-10 times).

Tip ~ the less handled, the better.

5) Two choices here: roll the dough out and cut into 3 inch circles

or drop by tablespoonful onto a cookie sheet.

6) Bake for 10-14 minutes on a cookie sheet in the preheated oven,

until golden on the bottom. 

The less time baked, the softer the biscuit.

This recipe is really versatile!

Switch it up by adding cheese or garlic or your own herbs.

Bon Appetit!

**vintage clip-art taken from Karen's Whimsy