Homemade Cajun Seasoning Mix

Making your own Seasoning Mixes are easy to make and you get to control the SALT intake!! 

They make great gifts for Christmas. Package them in pretty little jars with a ribbon, a list of ingredients and lots of love.  

INGREDIENTS
1 tbsp onion powder
1 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp dried oregano
1 tbsp dried basil
1/2 tbsp dried thyme
1/2 tbsp black pepper
3 tbsp sweet paprika
1/4-1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp celery salt
1 tbsp salt

DIRECTIONS

Mix together well.

Pour into a small jar and attach with a ribbon a gift card.
Use Cajun Seasoning Mix with Chicken, Pork, Seafood, Steak and Veggies.

Sourdough Bread

 

Ingredients

1 cup Sourdough Starter (see below)

5 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 pac kage active dry yeast

1 1/2cups water

3 tablespoons sugar

3 tablespoons butter

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

 

Directions

1. Measure Sourdough Starter; let stand at room temperature for 30 minutes. Combine 2-1/2 cups of the flour and the yeast; set aside. Heat and stir water, sugar, butter, and salt just until warm (120 degree F to 130 degree F) and butter almost melts. Add water mixture to dry mixture. Add Sourdough Starter. Beat with an electric mixer on low to medium speed for 30 seconds, scraping bowl. Beat on high speed for 3 minutes.
2. Combine 2-1/2 cups of the remaining flour and the baking soda. Add to yeast mixture. Stir until combined. Stir in as much remaining flour as you can.
3. Turn dough onto a lightly floured surface. Knead in enough remaining flour to make a moderately stiff dough (6 to 8 minutes total). Shape dough into a ball. Place dough in a greased bowl; turn once. Cover and let rise in warm place until double in size (for 45 to 60 minutes).
4. Punch dough down. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Divide dough in half. Cover and let rest for 10 minutes. Lightly grease baking sheet.
5. Shape by gently pulling each portion into a ball, tucking edges beneath. Place on prepared baking sheet. Flatten each ball slightly to 6 inches in diameter. Using a sharp knife, make crisscross slashes across tops of loaves. Cover and let rise in a warm place until nearly double in size (about 30 minutes).
6. Bake in a 375 degree F oven for 30 to 35 minutes or until bread sounds hollow when you tap the top. (If necessary, cover loosely with foil the last 10 minutes of baking to prevent overbrowning.) Immediately remove bread from baking sheet. Cool on wire racks. Makes 2 loaves (24 to 36 servings).

 

Sourdough Starter

Ingredients

1 package of active dry yeast                                    

2 1/2 cups of warm water                                    

2 cups of all-purpose flour                                    

1 tablespoon of sugar or honey                                    

100% cotton cheesecloth                                    

 

Directions

1. In mixing bowl dissolve 1 package active dry yeast in 1/2 cup warm water (105 degree F to 115 degree F). Stir in 2 cups warm water (105 degree F to 115 degree F), 2 cups all-purpose flour, and 1 tablespoon sugar or honey. Beat until smooth. Cover with 100 percent cotton cheesecloth. Let stand in at room temperature (75 degree F to 85 degree F) for 5 to 10 days or until mixture has a fermented aroma and vigorous bubbling stops, stirring 2 or 3 times a day. (Fermentation time depends on room temperature; a warmer room will hasten the fermentation process.)

 

This recipe comes from the Better Homes & Garden Magazine

 

Sparkle Princess Playdough

Strawberry-Scented

We’re big fans of playdough around here. It’s a terrific tool for creative play that allows your child to explore textures, visual reasoning, spacial concepts – it’s just an all-around brain builder. And we’re especially fond of scented playdough. We created a batch of sparkly princess playdough for our Abby’s third birthday party. This recipe is so simple, you can whip up a batch in just a few minutes.

Abby requested a pink princess party for her birthday. We happily obliged with pink decorations and sparkly nonsense all over the house. She’s the ultimate girly-girl, with no prompting on my part. I am more of a mud-pie kind of gal. But she’s into all things princess right now and that’s cool with me. The majority of her friends are little boys, so they were invited to be warriors or superheroes if they were costume-inclined. We made a blue batch for anyone who wasn’t totally into pink.

These two batches of playdough made perfect, inexpensive, party favors.

We’ve used this easy playdough recipe in the past and it just works great every time. It’s very easy to make a few simple changes to customize your playdough with added scents, food colors, and other fun things… like glitter.

Sparkle Princess Playdough

Ingredients:

• 2 cups flour
• 1 cup salt
• 2 tablespoons cream of tarter
• 2 tablespoons – or more – ultra fine glitter
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 1 1/2 cup boiling water
• 1 tablespoon strawberry extract
• about 10 drops red food coloring
• plastic bags for storing

Heat water to a very low boil (just starting to see bubbles). I popped mine into the microwave for about three minutes.

While the water is heating, combine flour, salt, cream of tarter, and glitter in a large bowl.

Stir to mix well. Add vegetable oil. No need to mix just yet.

Next add hot water and food coloring drops.

Stir, stir, stir until a dough ball begins to form.

You may need to use your hands to form the dough, once it’s cooled enough to handle.

And it’s just a matter of smooshing and mooshing until you have a nice big ball of playdough.

It’s best to store this playdough in a ziplock plastic baggie after play time to keep it from drying out. Your little princess (or prince) will enjoy this fun sparkly, strawberry-scented playdough.

Posted by Amanda Coers

Homemade Granola Bars

I found this awesome homemade Granola Bars off of Pioneer Woman website... Delicious!

Granola Bars

 by Pioneer Woman

Granola bars are my life. I never knew that until just now.
It’s fun to make granola bars. It’s so fun, I made them on one of my recent Food Network episodes. It’s so fun, I could make granola bars every week for the rest of my life. It’s so fun, I’d rather make granola bars than go to Disneyland!
Of course, my not wanting to leave my house probably contributes to this somewhat.
Here’s the basic recipe, but note that you can change it up however you’d like! Add different nuts, different grains, different cereals. This is the beauty of making your own granola bars: You can totally customize them according to what you like.
Let’s DO this thang.


The Cast of Characters: Oats, canola oil (not pictured because I’m an airhead), butter, salt, brown sugar, honey, apple juice, molasses, vanilla, Rice Krispies, wheat germ, pecans, and almonds.




Throw some butter into a bowl…




And nuke it in the microwave.




Measure some oats, spilling them all over your counter-top in the process.




Pour the oats into a bowl.




Next, grab the spottiest measuring cup you can find because you’re impressive that way, and measure a little bit of canola oil…




And pour in the melted buttah.




Stir it together and drizzle it into the bowl of oats…




And stir it as you drizzle.




Then just toss it around until the oats are all coated.




Sprinkle in a good teaspoon of salt. You’ll be glad you did.




Then stir it around…




And pour the oats onto two rimmed baking sheets.




Shake ‘em to evenly distribute them in the pans, then throw ‘em into a 350 degree oven for about 15 to 20 minutes—and reach in and shake the pan two or three times while they toast.




After they’re toasted, let ‘em cool for a bit then throw ‘em into a big bowl.




Then measure some brown sugar…




And throw it into a medium saucepan.




Grab a half-cup measure…




And drizzle in some honey, baby.




Sorry I called you honey baby. I get carried away sometimes.




Then pour it into the pan.




I want to take a bath in this and use it as a body scrub.
Would that be weird?




Then grab a fourth-cup measure…




And pour in some molasses.




Ooooh. Talk about tempting fate! I like to walk on the edge. I like to walk on the wild side. I like to play with fire. I like to worry so much about taking a photo of molasses going into a measuring cup that I almost pour too much molasses into the measuring cup.




Pour it into the saucepan with all the other goodness.




I want to publish a coffee table book filled with nothing but photos of molasses being poured.




I’m going to call the book “Molasses.” Look for it on bookshelves in the year 2079.




Finally, measure some apple juice…




And pour that in. Basically, I’m looking to create as sticky a substance as I can.




Stir it around over medium heat…




Let it heat until it just barely starts to bubble, then turn off the heat.




Stir in plenty of vanilla extract, then set the mixture aside for a minute.




Grab some pecans…




And some almonds.




Then chop up the pecans…




Until they’re nice and fine.




Then chop the pecans until they’re…well, not so fine. Big, crunchy chunks of almonds make the granola bars worth living for. Worth fighting for, worth DYING for! Because it’s the only thing that lasts. Wait. Sorry. That was land. Gone with the Wind. Tara. Mr. O’Hara. Ignore me, please.




Now add the chopped pecans to the toasted oats. Your kitchen smells really good right now, by the way.




Then add the almonds…




Measure some Rice Krispies…




And pour them in. This won’t cause your granola bars to snap, crackle, and pop…but it will give them extra flavor and crunch.




Then grab this weird, yummy substance. Growing up, my mom always had wheat germ in the cabinet. I’m glad we had this talk.




Measure a nice, big cupful…




Then pour it right on in.




Stir all these crunchy, crispy dry ingredients together…




Then grab the saucepan of sweet, warm liquid…




And pour it right on in! Drizzle it slowly, though, so that you can slowly stir it the whole time.




Yummy!




Grab a foil-lined baking sheet (it’s best if you can do this ahead of time so that it’s ready when the mixture is…well, mixed.)




And pour on the the mixture.














                                                                                                                                    

Get it all into a uniform layer…




Then you can spray your hands with cooking spray…















                                                     


And pat it gently so that it’s lightly pressed into the pan. Speaking of which: In my haste,  I completely neglected to spray the foil with cooking spray, which is an important step. You’ll find out why in a minute. Don’t be like me.



Next up, just bake it in a 325 degree oven for about 20-25 minutes until it’s nice and golden brown and your kitchen smells like home.




Let it cool completely (the granola will seem soft when you first pull it out of the oven, but will crisp up as it cools) then carefully lift the foil out of the pan in one piece.




If you sprayed the foil with cooking spray, the granola should easily separate from the foil. If you did not, you’ll have to do some careful peeling. I repeat: Don’t be like me. This has been a public service announcement.




Got most of it…




Got all of it!




Then I flipped it over so that the top was on top again…




And with a very sharp knife, I cut the granola into large strips.




From there…




You can cut them into bars…




Or squares! Sometimes I like the more bite-sized pieces, because then you’re not committing to a whole bar. Also, then you can eat twenty. Ha.



I kinda like this size.




Yum, yum. These are really so good. And what I love about making granola bars is, you can change up the things you add: sunflower seeds, walnuts, Grape Nuts, different cereals, different grains.




You can also break them into clusters. And if, when you break them up, they don’t seem quite as crazy crisp as you’d like, just pop ‘em on the baking sheet and throw ‘em back into the oven for five to ten minutes. Then let ‘em cool and they’re good to go.




And here’s another thing you can do.




Dunk ‘em in chocolate.




Then just set ‘em aside on parchment (or a baking mat) till the chocolate sets.
I could go on and on, but I need to go have a granola bar for breakfast!
Here’s the handy dandy printable. Makes a bunch!

Recipe

Granola Bars

Prep Time:

15 Minutes

Cook Time:

1 Hour

Difficulty:

Easy

Servings:

16

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ingredients

• 6 cups Rolled Oats (not Quick Oats)
• 4 Tablespoons Butter, Melted, Plus More For Greasing
• 1/4 cup Vegetable Or Canola Oil
• 1 teaspoon Salt
• 1 cup Brown Sugar
• 1/2 cup Honey
• 1/4 cup Apple Juice
• 1/4 cup Molasses
• 3 teaspoons Vanilla Extract
• 1-1/2 cup Rice Krispies
• 1 cup Wheat Germ
• 1/2 cup Finely Chopped Pecans
• 1/4 cup Roughly Chopped Almonds
• 8 ounces, weight Milk Chocolate Or Chocolate Almond Bark, Melted (optional)

Preparation Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
In a bowl, toss the oats with the canola oil, melted butter and salt. Spread the mixture out on 2 baking sheets and toast in the oven for 15 to 20 minutes, shaking the pan twice and making sure they don't burn. Remove from the oven and set aside.
Reduce the heat to 325 degrees F.
In a medium saucepan, combine the brown sugar, honey, apple juice and molasses. Heat the mixture slowly, stirring until all combined. Stir in the vanilla.
Toss together the toasted oats, rice cereal, wheat germ, pecans and almonds. Pour in the sugar mixture, stirring as you pour. Toss to combine; it will be sticky!
Press into 1 baking sheet (thoroughly greased with butter, or line pan with foil and grease foil) and bake until golden, about 20-25 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool. Cut pieces with a sharp knife and remove from the pan.
OPTIONAL
Dip the cooled granola bars straight into the melted chocolate so that the top is plain and the bottom is chocolate-covered. Set on parchment until set, sticking in the fridge to hasten this along if necessary.
Yum yum!