Busy, but still cooking!

To my 9 loyal followers (LOL) please know that I have still been cooking and feeding my family and taking pictures of the meals I have made. I just haven't made the time to sit down and type them up yet.

Never fear, they will be here at some point!

Last week was an improvised week. Busy at the beginning, so I ended up skipping a grocery trip and making do with what we had. One night we had BBQ hotdog cups. Sounds pretty gross, but they were actually pretty tasty! Guess the inventive cooking gene doesn't fall far from the tree. Grandma Betty would have been proud!

This week's menu includes Chicken Pot Pie, Chili, Chili Dogs, Meatball Subs & Cheeseburger Pie. 9 packs worth of Handy Hamburger are already in the freezer just waiting to be used in these meals!

When I catch up I'll have pictures and recipes for Chicken Bundles too! Mmmmmmm!

Walking Tacos

You've probably seen Walking Tacos at some sort of fair or festival. Kind of like a taco in a bag. Meat, cheese, etc put into a bag of Fritos or Doritos. Perfect for festivals because you can walk around while you eat them.

We've made these when we camped before. It's the perfect "opening night" meal. We had a crockpot of meat already cooked and just kept it hot all evening. Everyone arrived at different times and when they did, they could easily make up their own dinner.

We joked that tonight's version was more like "Sitting Tacos" because I was too cheap to buy the individual bags of Fritos. I bought one big bag and we ate them on a plate. No rocket science behind this recipe. Just easy and yummy. Great for a crowd!

Walking Tacos

Small bags of Fritos, Doritos or Tortilla chips

OR a large bag of the same chips, placed on a plate

Hamburger meat

Taco seasoning

shredded cheese

sour cream

salsa

shredded lettuce

tomatoes, olives, jalapenos, etc for toppings

Brown hamburger meat & drain. Add taco seasoning according to package directions.

To assemble - open chip bag and squeeze the bag to break up the chips into bite size pieces. Add a spoonful of meat and a sprinkle of cheese. Add other toppings as desired. Eat straight out of the bag or on a plate. Yum-Yum!!

I think these would also be good with a chili type meat sauce. Or even left over chili if it was thick enough. My kids love this either way but especially think it's cool to eat it out of the bag.

Sausage Gravy & Biscuits

No pretty picture tonight. Actually, not even a unique recipe. And the recipe that I will list is quite vague because I never measure my flour or milk. But, at the mild insistence of my friend Jenni, blog it I shall! Since this may just be one of my most frequently cooked meals, I guess blogging it is appropriate anyhow. My family LOVES sausage gravy and biscuits. More importantly, they love MY sausage gravy and biscuits. Everyone's comes out just a little different. I'm convinced it has something to do with the pan. My favorite - a cast iron skillet. Some kind of gravy-making magic happens on the bottom of a cast iron skillet that doesn't happen in a regular skillet. I'm not saying that gravy can't be made in a regular skillet. But somehow it just doesn't end up the same for me.

It took me several tries to get gravy figured out. I had some attempts where I'd put too much or too little flour or milk and it would end up like sausage soup or sausage glop. Once I didn't cook the flour long enough and it tasted really strange and floury. I've walked away at the wrong time and overcooked, even burnt the flour. I've put so much salt that it was barely edible. And I've burnt the whole mess. So, actually I think "several attempts" may be an understatement. Lots and lots of attempts would be more accurate.

So, here are the tricks that I've found through my many attempts.

1 - sausage - I like Bob Evans best, but will also use Tennessee Pride or Jimmy Dean if it's on sale. I don't care for Kroger brand (and most Kroger brand stuff I do like). Basically, you want a sausage that you like the flavor of and that cooks well, rendering a decent amount of grease without overdoing it. Brown the sausage until it is cooked through. Some people crumble their sausage. I use the back of a sturdy spatula to smoosh it onto the pan as I cook it, which makes the sausage really tiny.

2 - flour - sprinkle flour over the cooked sausage. Now, here's where I don't have an amount. I don't even have a guess at an amount. Start by lightly sprinkling flour over the sausage. Stir it up. If there's still "free" grease - the sausage or pan is still shiny with it - then add more flour. Cook the flour and sausage for a minute or so until it starts to brown lightly. This is part of the cast iron magic - the browned sausage and flour bits get stuck to the bottom and will later unglue themselves and make the gravy happen.

3 - milk - again, no measurement, but it depends on how much flour you added. As a general rule, I start by adding milk until it's just up to the underside of the sausage. The little sausage tops are still sticking up out of the milk. Start stirring, being sure to scrape the bottom of the pan well. This is where I also think that cast iron comes in handy. You don't have to be worried about scratching your pan or a special coating that is on it. Nothing worse than bits of teflon in your gravy!!! One rule with milk is that you can always add more to thin it out, but it's a lot harder to thicken it up if you add too much milk. Bring the gravy to a boil and boil for one minute. Remove from heat. If your amounts were right then you're good to go. If it's too thick then add some more milk, stir and reheat. If it's too thin then try cooking it longer...or call it sausage soup instead of gravy and pretend you made a new recipe.

4 - salt and pepper - sometimes I add this at the same time as the flour. Other times I add it at the end. You would think that the sausage would add plenty of flavor, but the flour and milk sort of wipe that out and more salt is needed.

That's how I make sausage gravy. As for the biscuits, I either use canned refrigerator biscuits, bisquick or I make these:

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/JPs-Big-Daddy-/Detail.aspx

Only one tiny alteration - I don't do circle biscuits. I make one large rectangle out of the dough, then cut it into squares. One roll out, no leftover dough, tastes the same.

99% of the time at our house sausage gravy and biscuits is accompanied by scrambled eggs. One night I made this meal without the eggs - I think we were out - and the kids, Garret especially, were very upset. My kids usually put their eggs on top of their gravy, which is over a crumbled biscuit. Sometimes they make a little sandwich with it all. And we always bring the butter, jelly and honey to the table to enjoy on the extra biscuits. Without fail, when I make this meal the kids pour on the compliments!

Crab Salad

My Grandma Betty (my mom's mom) was an "inventive" cook. That's putting it nicely. To give you an idea of her inventiveness, one Christmas dinner she dyed pineapple rings red...which wouldn't be too bad in itself...but to up the festiveness of the dish, she added cottage cheese that she had dyed GREEN! Yes, she served us green cottage cheese. Ew! I've always joked that while some people subscribe to the theory of "less is more", my Grandma Betty wasn't buying it. To her it was always "MORE is MORE"! So, if you had a dish that was tasty, there just had to be something that you could add to it to make it even MORE tasty. For example, knowing her tendency toward strange dishes, yet also being sensitive to her desire to contribute to our holiday meals, one Thanksgiving that I was hosting I asked her to bring good old Macaroni and Cheese. You can't mess up mac-n-cheese, right? You take some mac, you take some cheese - viola! Mac-N-Cheese! Simple, delicious, always a hit - right up there with mashed potatoes in my book. Well, Grandma Betty, being who she is, KNEW that she could improve on this dish that has stood the test of time. And the best way to improve on plain, old, boring (delicious) macaroni and cheese was to add mixed vegetables to the mac and the cheese. Yes, I said mixed vegetables! And not just peas, corn and carrots, which would have been gross enough. She added what I think is called "winter blend" - cauliflower, broccoli and carrots. To macaroni and cheese! Eww!!!! Take this stuff back and give me some green cottage cheese!! I think my dad (being one not to want food to go to waste) ate some of it. The rest of us put some on our plates, pushed it around and threw it out.

All that being said, Grandma Betty's inventive cooking did occasionally result in something that tasted really good. The problem was that she would never make this good dish a second time. She always had to up the ante and good often turned into not-so-good. One of the dishes that she invented that we all really loved was crab salad. Greg hovered over the bowl and inhaled it as quickly as he could. If you are wondering whether or not this dish got changed (and therefor ruined) the answer, to me and Greg anyhow, is YES! One time she added chopped celery. YICK! We'll eat celery by itself or dipped in ranch or with peanut butter on it, but please do not chop it up small and put it in anything, cooked or raw, but especially raw. I think Greg took it a little personally and was almost insulted when that celery invaded his beloved crab salad. He saw it on the counter and was anxious for that first bite, only to have it ruined by the crunch of celery. I sympathized and was determined to recreate the GOOD version of crab salad.

We love this Crab Salad. I never thought it was anything special until my friend, Angi, was over with 2 of her kids (Hi Zander and Ava!!!) and they all loved it enough that she wanted the recipe and made it for her family the next night. I had always made it as a snack type thing where the kids and I would have a small portion of it and then Greg would make several trips to the fridge until it was gone. But recently I decided that it was dinner worthy. Add some crackers and it's a meal. Maybe not a super well rounded meal, but a meal that fills your tummy and tastes good! You got plenty of protein and pickles count as a veggie, right? Ether way we enjoyed it tonight and are still quite full 3 hours later.

Crab Salad

(can be doubled)

1 8oz pack of imitation crab - chunk or "leg", chopped into small chunks (this is the stuff that sold in a flat plastic package - at Kroger it's in the bins that are in front of the real seafood display)

6 hard boiled eggs, peeled and diced

3 large dill pickle spears (I prefer Mt. Olive), diced

- keep the jar out to add some pickle juice

1/4 onion, finely chopped

1/2 cup mayonnaise (I prefer Hellmans)

1 tsp prepared yellow mustard

1 tsp dill - dried

salt, pepper, garlic powder and onion powder to taste

Dash (about 2tsp or so) lemon juice

Mix all ingredients. Taste and adjust spices as needed. I usually add some extra pickle juice to give more dill flavor and loosen up the "sauce". Cover and chill. You can eat it right away but it's one of those that tastes different after the flavors blend together overnight. Serve alone or with crackers (I like Club crackers).

This is pretty much the exact same recipe that I use for tuna salad, egg salad, chicken salad, potato salad, etc, minus the lemon juice. Once I tried making an egg salad recipe that I found online. It was similar, but didn't have any dill pickles. After we ate it I asked Greg what he thought. He said, "It's good, but it's missing something." Knowing what it was, I asked, "Pickles?" and he agreed right away. We like us some dill pickles in the Fraley household! Greg had the kids drinking dill pickle juice from the jar before they were 2 years old. They fight over who gets to drink it now! Our vacation to Florida at spring break was almost ruined when I opened the back hatch of my truck after going to the grocery and the economy size jar of dill pickles fell and shattered on the ground. Greg was very upset with me and I know it was not because of the mess or the waste of money - it was because he had plans to eat those pickles one by one, throughout our vacation. We still had a nice vacation, but it was definitely tainted by the lack of pickle! :P

Little Cheddar Loafs & Mashed Potatoes

Yes, that is a carb with a carb. We had leftover peas and rice from Sunday and I wanted to use them up. Actually, peas, rice and mashed potatoes mixed together is pretty tasty!

This recipe is from a cookbook that my mother-in-law has. While we were building our house, for a little over a year, we lived with my in-laws. Sometimes she would make a big dinner for all of us. One night she decided to try a new recipe and we all loved it. After we moved out I called up to get a copy of this one and have made it several times since.

These freeze very well...just leave off the sauce. You can put layers of waxed paper in between them, place in a large freezer baggie and using a straw, suck out as much of the air as you can. You can thaw them before cooking or you can cook the frozen meatloafs a little longer. They are also good on the grill!

Little Cheddar Loafs

1 egg

3/4 cup milk

1 cup shredded cheddar

1/2 cup cooking oats

1/2 cup chopping onion

1 tsp salt

1 lb lean ground beef

Sauce:

2/3 cup ketchup

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 tsp prepared yellow mustard

Place all ingredients, except sauce ingredients, in a bowl and mix well. You might as well use your hands because they are gonna get messy making the loafs anyway. Shape mixture into 8 little loafs and place in 9x13 pan. Stir together sauce ingredients. Spoon over meatloafs. Bake uncovered at 350 for 45 minutes.

You can leave the sauce off if you don't like it. Or you could use plain ketchup. The sauce tastes like a sweet BBQ. I think it's good and my kids LOVE it.

Now, here's a little trick I figured out. Use the leanest beef you can afford. I usually buy ground chuck for everything, especially for this. But not matter what, when you pull the pan out of the oven, there will be grease on the bottom. Rather than letting the little fellas sit in the grease, move all the loafs to one side of the pan and prop that end up with something (a wooden spoon, a trivet, anything that can handle the heat). All the grease will drain to the other end and your meatloafs will be safe at the top! That's about as healthy as my cooking gets folks! :)

See all the grease pooled at the bottom side

Definitely in my top 10 and probably top 5 favorite foods is mashed potatoes. So yummy!!! Greg's Mamaw made mashed potatoes with almost every meal. I think we even had mashed potatoes with lasagna. You didn't find me complaining though! But I did complain about the onions. Fraley men eat onions like some people eat apples. They slice them into wedges and eat them raw. Ewwww!!!! I like onions, but raw onions, by themselves, as a treat?!?! Glleeeeeech! And you can imagine the breath afterwards.

But back to the yummy potatoes! Mamaw always made mashed potatoes in a pressure cooker. The only pressure cooker that my mom ever used was for canning and I did not know the wonders of the pressure cooker at that point. But, Mamaw, being the wonderful, caring woman that she was, decided that I needed a pressure cooker so that I could make mashed potatoes too. And when Mamaw decided that you needed something, you got it! So, next thing I knew, I was the proud owner of a pressure cooker and she was teaching me how to make my beloved mashed potatoes!

If you've never made mashed potatoes in a pressure cooker, then you're missing out! Or, if you're like my dear friend, Amanda, and have a pressure cooker that you've never used because you weren't sure how, well, now's the time to break it out!!! The biggest benefit to pressure cooking potatoes - TIME!!!! Other benefits are that you can easily make a HUGE batch at once, all the potatoes cook evenly without burning or sticking to the bottom, you don't have to cut the potatoes into tiny chunks and you don't waste any of their yummy goodness in the water that has to be poured off when you boil them in a regular pot.

My other secret to the yummiest mashed potatoes every is CREAM CHEESE!!!! Mmmmm...don't they already sound yummy?!?! Show me a recipe with cream cheese in it and I'll show you a recipe that I love!!! My Aunt Melanie turned me on to this trick and I've never turned back. Along with the cream cheese is butter and salt. So basically you take a naturally fat free (I think) food and add a bunch of fat to it so it tastes delicious (note how I used a descriptor other than "yummy", even though yummy pretty much sums it up)!!!

I'll write this recipe as if you have a pressure cooker, but have never used it. If you know how to use a pressure cooker then just pick out the good parts. If you don't have a pressure cooker, then just use the cream cheese trick for the yummiest mashed potatoes EVER!!! You can even add it to instant potatoes - would Sandra Lee qualify that as "semi-homemade"?

Mashed Potatoes

Potatoes - as many as your pressure cooker will hold - mine holds 8 lbs

Water

Salt

Pepper

Butter

Cream Cheese

Milk

Most/All pressure cookers have some type of disk that fits into the bottom of the pan. This is to keep the food from burning on the bottom of the pan. Place the disk in the bottom of the pan and fill with about 1" of water. You can use more water if you want, but you don't have to. Peel and slice the potatoes. Here's awesome thing #1 - all you have to do is cut the potatoes into slices about 1/4" thick. No tiny little even chunks. Just quick slices. Some pressure cookers have a "max fill" line, others like mine can be filled right up to the brim. If you are going to go to the trouble of making potatoes, why not make as many as you can, right?

After the pan is full of sliced potatoes add a generous amount of salt and pepper right on top. Close the lid - it will have a seal and somehow lock into place. Mine has an arrow that you line up and then twist the lid onto the pan. There is also the valve cover thing - make sure this is in place properly. Most/All of them sit on top of the valve and are just held in place by weight.

Cook the potatoes over high heat, with the lid sealed shut. As pressure builds, many cookers have a locking mechanism so that you cannot open them and get hurt. If water is boiling out the sides then you do not have it sealed properly. Let it cook until it's unlocked (or run under cold water), fix the seal and try it again.

OK, here comes the next great thing - after the valve cover things starts to jiggle, turn down the heat to medium-low and cook for 5 minutes! That's all - just 5 minutes under pressure!!!

After the 5 minutes of cooking is done, CAREFULLY place the entire pot under cold running water until the pressure is released, the locking mechanism releases and if you tip the valve (carefully) no steam/pressure escapes.

Open the lid. Drain the potatoes - I use the lid to hold the potatoes in while the water drains.

Now, to mash - you can do this by hand in the pan or with a mixer. I use my Kitchen Aid mixer and a full load just barely fits into the bowl. Mix, on low speed, adding butter, cream cheese, milk and more salt and pepper. The amounts are up to you. For an 8lb bag of potatoes I use a full stick of butter, 8oz of cream cheese, enough milk to get the right consistency and salt and pepper to taste.

I split 8 pounds of potatoes into 3 batches...had one for dinner and froze the other 2 in gallon ziplock freezer bags.

Gallon Ziploc Bags are great for the freezer -

they lay flat, stack nicely and take up minimal space!

Spaghetti Pie

I got the original recipe for Spaghetti Pie while I was in Peru, of all places. Greg and I went on a mission trip with a group from our church. While the men went further down river, into the jungle, the women stayed at the mission compound. We helped Addie (the missionary) with different things but we also had a bit of downtime. Downtime is spent differently when you don't have any electricity! I love to look through cookbooks and Addie had several, so I killed time by searching through her cookbooks for recipes that I'd like to try. I still have them all, 14 years later, written on the same yellow legal pad paper that I originally used. It has all sorts of drips and stains on it because I am a messy cook! I've made most of the recipes that I wrote down while in Peru and some, like this, have become family favorites.

I call this spaghetti pie because that's what it was called in the recipe book that I copied it from. However, over the years I tried different pastas and decided that I liked the texture of gemelli pasta best. Sometimes it's hard to find, but Kroger carries it in their "Private Selection" line. It reminds me of the twisted pretzel sticks...only pasta. I like it because it's size and texture work well. It's large enough to hold it's shape, but still can be cut down. And it's firm enough to hold up to freezing, thawing and cooking without getting mushy. The basic ingredients and taste of Spaghetti (or should I change it to Gemelli?) Pie are just like lasagna. However, it's WAY easier to put together than lasagna is. Those big old noodles are nothing but a pain in the butt, right? And I like how the flavors blend better in this. One of my favorite things about this recipe is that it freezes so well. And it's very easy to make a double batch, then split those batches into smaller portions (what family eats an entire 9x13 pan of lasagna in one sitting, right?) and

freeze them for later. The basic recipe makes at least a 9x13 pan and probably a little extra. I split it into 6 8x8 foil pans, which usually feeds our family of 5 without any leftovers. I add garlic bread and a salad to complete the meal. Without further ado, the recipe...

Spaghetti Pie

(as with most of my recipes, the amounts can vary without ruining the end product - make adjustments to your taste - more or less meat, sauce, cheese, spice, etc.)

1 1lb package Gemelli or Spaghetti or other pasta

1 lb Hamburger (or 1 portion HH)

1 jar Pasta Sauce (I like Kroger Beef - tastes good and is cheap)

2 small containers of cottage cheese

3 cups (or more) shredded mozzarella cheese

1 cup Parmesan cheese

3 eggs

4 TBSP butter

Cook pasta according to package directions, to just barely done (if you overcook the pasta then by the time it freezes, thaws, cooks, etc. it will be very mushy = yuck!). Drain and allow to cool slightly. Add 1/2 stick (4 TBSP) butter, 2 eggs and 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese to pasta. Stir to combine.

Brown hamburger and drain. While cooking add onion, garlic, salt, pepper, etc if desired for extra flavor.

or

Thaw Handy Hamburger.

Add pasta sauce to hamburger and warm slightly. This is where you fancy people could make your own sauce. I tried it last year from fresh tomatoes and it turned out not so great. I used it up in recipes like this where I could add some jarred sauce and a bunch more flavor to cover up my sauce. Big waste of time in my opinion. But if homemade sauce is your thing, then go for it!

Combine cottage cheese, mozzarella cheese and 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese (save a small amount of mozzarella and parmesan for top) and 1 egg in bowl. If you like, add spices to this mixture like salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, italian blend, parsley, etc. I've made it with and without the extra spices - both are good, but I prefer the extra flavor.

Assemble in the following order:

Sauce - just to cover bottom

1/2 Noodles

1/2 Cheese

1/2 Sauce

1/2 Noodles

1/2 Cheese

1/2 Sauce

Extra Mozzarella and Parmesan

Here's what it looks like after one layer of everything.

Unlike lasagna, the whole thing should be more mixed than layers. If any of the layers are thick enough that they separate the ingredients from each other, then before topping with the last of the cheese, use a spoon to move everything around so that the sauce, cheese and noodles are mixed somewhat evenly.

Bake in a 350 oven for 45-60 minutes or until hot and bubbly. Allow to sit for 10 minutes before cutting.

NOTE: If you make smaller batches in 8x8 pans, they will cook faster. Just keep checking to see that the edges are very bubbly and the center is somewhat bubbly. The main thing is to make sure the egg cooks and sets. Everything else is precooked and just needs to be hot and melty.

Here are all 6 of mine completed. One is in the oven as I type. The other 5 I topped first with plastic wrap and then with foil and put in the freezer for later.

What a nice little pile - 1 for dinner, 5 for later!

And the best part - only ONE set of dishes to wash for SIX meals!!!

Hang up in the meal plan

So, day 1, 2 & 3 of my dinner plan went well. Day 4 Greg worked really late so the kids and I ate the leftover Taco Pizza from Day 3. Day 5 was spent helping our best friends move (closer to us - hooray!) and they bought dinner. We did have one of the meals on Sunday afternoon. After sleeping in and realizing that we had no milk or eggs to make anything remotely breakfast-y, I decided to break out the smoked sausage, rice and peas. No recipe or pretty pictures there. The sausage was just heated until done in a pan. The peas were plain, old frozen peas with salt and butter. The rice was from a packet at Kroger.

However, I still have the makings for several batches of Spaghetti Pie ready to roll. Hopefully the HH (Handy Hamburger) that I cooked on Monday is still OK, when I finally get around to making the Spaghetti Pie...hopefully tomorrow. If not, then I will have wasted TWO batches of hamburger and might just throw in the towel on this whole dinner plan thing!!! See?!?! Even "Martha Jr.", as I've affectionately been called, has her not-so-Martha-Jr. moments!!! Actually, I have a LOT of them!

This week's menu is supposed to include:

Chicken and Noodles

Southwest Chicken Soup

Meat Loaf

Crab Salad

Sausage Gravy & Biscuits

I went to the grocery today and bought everything for these meals. The only things that I bought that weren't on the list were staples, like milk, bread and butter, brownie mix, because it was on sale for a buck and some ice cream for the kids, which they earned by not getting their name on the board all week! And the total was only $70! Not bad for 5 solid meals. I'm sure people out there could do it for cheaper but I'm pretty proud. Oh yah, I got dog food too, so the total was actually $106 (can't make it out of the grocery w/o spending over $100!) but since $37 of that was the dog food, I'm sticking with the $70 total for the food.

We'll see how the week goes and which meals end up on which days. I have a feeling that the Spaghetti Pie will be tomorrow night and I'll have to make meatloaf on Wednesday so the hamburger doesn't go bad. And, oh yah, I just realized that today was Monday (Labor Day) so, I'm already getting behind on my week. Maybe we'll actually come home to eat after church next Sunday. Nah! I'll just make the sausage gravy and biscuits for Saturday brunch. :)

Recipe: Taco Pizza & Homemade Salsa & Handy Hamburger

Taco Pizza (makes 2)

2 pre-made crusts (I use Kroger brand)

olive oil

1 can refried beans

1/2 cup salsa

1 portion Handy Hamburger (HH)

taco seasoning packet

2 cups shredded cheddar cheese

shredded lettuce

sour cream

black olives

fresh salsa

Heat oven to 450. Warm Handy Hamburger until heated through. Add taco seasoning pack, a little water and heat more. (Or, do like I did - make burritos earlier in the week and double up on the meat so it's ready to go after being heated up a little.) Combine refried beans and salsa in a bowl. Heat about a minute in the microwave, just enough to be spreadable.

Lightly brush crusts with olive oil. Spread bean mixture on crusts. Top with HH and shredded cheese. Bake in 450 oven until cheese is melted and all is warmed through - about 9 minutes.

Remove from oven. Top with shredded lettuce, sour cream and fresh salsa. You can use other toppings that your family likes as well, like black olives.

I made this for the first time a few months ago and Garret LOVED it. As he's shoveling his 2nd or 3rd piece into his mouth he says, "When I'm an adult and cookin', I'm gonna make this EVERY night for our food!" Makes a mama happy to hear that! :)

Fresh salsa

Tomatoes - about 4 cups worth

Jalapenos - about 4 depending on size

White Onion - 1 med to lg

Green onion - about 8 or one small bundle

Cilantro - about 1/2 a bundle

Garlic - about 3-4 cloves

Salt

Pepper

"Extras" (optional) - roasted red peppers, sun dried or roasted tomatoes

If I am making a small batch (about 1/2 the amounts above) then I chop everything by hand. If I'm making a large bath - the picture shows an 8 cup container, mostly full - then I use my food processor. All of the amounts are approximate. I never measure, I just throw it all in and taste it then add whatever's missing. NOTE: if you do this, make sure you save a few tomatoes for after the taste test. Anything else you can add more or less of, but once you're out of tomatoes, the salsa is ruined if everything else is overpowering.

Tomatoes - stem, lightly squeeze most of the juice and seeds out then rough chop.

Jalapenos - stem, seed (that's where the heat is) and finely chop.

White Onion - rough chop. If you don't like big chunks of onion, you could chop it more finely but we like the bigger chunks.

Green onion - clean and chop finely into rings.

Cilantro - rinse and rough chop. **Do NOT leave out cilantro! It's what makes the salsa!!!

Garlic - smash, peel and finely dice.

Salt - to taste. If your finished product tastes very "tomatoe-y" try adding a little more salt.

Pepper - to taste.

"Extras" (optional) - roasted red peppers, sun dried or roasted tomatoes - you don't have to have these, but if they are in your fridge, why not add them. The other day I made a bunch of slow-roasted tomatoes (thanks for the idea Aunt Patty) and made a puree with them, roasted garlic and olive oil. I added some of that mixture to my salsa this time - YUMMO!!!

After it sits for a while "water" will start to form at the top. You can stir it up before serving, or you can drain that water off. I like to drain it off so that my salsa is a bit thicker.

You can eat it right away, but it tastes even better after sitting overnight. This is one of those recipes that is not exact, but it's also pretty hard to mess up. I've tried freezing this and it turns out ok, but not great. The water from the tomatoes tends to separate and I don't think it tastes as good as it does fresh, but Greg still likes it.

Handy Hamburger

If you find a good deal on hamburger, buy a BUNCH and cook it up like this.

Hamburger - I prefer ground chuck so that it's less fatty

Onion - chopped

Garlic - chopped

Salt

Pepper

Other ground meats - sausage, venison, etc. - I am not a fan of venison, but we have some and I hate to waste it. So, I'll use...say 5 lbs hamburger, 1 lb pork sausage (for flavor and fat b/c the venison is so lean) and 1 lb venison. You never notice it at all when it's cooked this way and it stretches the HH even farther!

Crumble hamburger into large pot (I use my largest stock pot). Add all other ingredients and cook until completely browned. Drain fat. Allow to cool slightly. Separate into 1-2 cup portions and freeze in baggies or small containers. To use, thaw overnight or in the microwave. This can be used in so many things - Spaghetti Pie, Taco Pizza, BBQ Beef Cups, Chili, etc. As with the ESC (Easy Shredded Chicken) the whole point is one cooking time and one clean up time but several uses!