Substitute Honey for Sugar in Recipes

Posted By admin on March 9, 2010

You can substitute honey for sugar in most recipes. Honey is sweeter and stronger than sugar so replace half the quantity of sugar with honey. Honey can get cloudy and thick making it difficult to get out of the bottle. Put the honey jar in a bowl of very hot water for a few minutes and it will be clearer and easier to pour.

Review Knorr Asian Sides Teriyaki Noodles Flavor

Posted By admin on February 7, 2010

New product review on Knorr Asian Sides just added www.simplifymyfoodchoices.com/knorr-asian-sides-review.html this product review has some ingredients you shoould know about especially if you have young children. To read more please visit the link above. We’ll be adding more product reviews shortly so make sure you bookmark the site.

Knorr Asian Sides Product Review

Food Ingredients and Chemicals List

Posted By admin on January 8, 2010

Have you ever been at the grocery store and turned your favorite product over to look at the ingredient label and had no idea what the ingredients were. I had no idea that the word hydrolized was a masked word that meant monosodium glutimate (MSG). Labels are pretty confusing if you dont know what the chemical names are, it’s all greek. For instance Calciferol is actually vitamin D, niacin is vitamin B3 and Thiamin Mononitrate is vitamin B1. For a list of food ingredients that can help demystify food labels go to: this food ingredients and chemicals list www.simplifymyfoodchoices.com/food-ingredients.html

Good things do come in cans… Chili Soup Recipe

Posted By admin on January 8, 2010

It was later than usual as I started to look in the closets for something to make for dinner. Everyone was hungry so dinner had to be quick. It was cold outside so I was looking for hot comfort food. I grabbed a can of Hormel chili and a can of organic kidney beans. With a few spices and a dash of red wine vinegar I made the most delicious chili soup. We had about a ½ cup of chili soup for leftovers which I poured over some elbow macaroni with a little cheese sprinkled on top to make a very yummy lunch the next day.

To check out my latest chili soup recipe go to www.simplifymyfoodchoices.com/chili-soup-recipe.html

Easy Basic Stir Fry Recipe

Posted By admin on December 21, 2009

Stir Fry vegtables

Stir Fry vegtables

I have just whipped up a new stir fry recipe. Since I cook mostly by flavor everytime I cook it tastes a little different. When friends say “can I have the recipe for your stir fry?” I usually say toss in a little of this and a little of that and they all look terrified to try cooking by taste. I made a stir fry last night and actually wrote down the recipe while I cooked. This stir fry recipe can be changed just by adding different vegtables. The stir fry sauce can also be changed just by mixing different ingredients in a small bowl then tasting them. If you make a boo boo in the sauce just dump it out and start again. You won’t ruin the whole dish if you mix the sauce in a seperate bowl and then taste it as you add spices and different things.

http://www.simplifymyfoodchoices.com/stirfry-recipe.html

Saffron Rice Recipe

Posted By admin on December 9, 2009

A little saffron spice goes a long way. Adding saffron to rice releases golden color and a fragrant flavor. This low cost, delicious Saffron Rice Recipe serves 4 and only takes 25 minutes to cook. Saffron rice dish is excellent served with indian dishes, stir-fries and asian dishes.

Saffron Rice
Ingrediants:
1 cup long grain white rice
2 cups water or chicken stock
1 Tbsp butter
1 Tbsp finely minced onion (optional)
1/2 Tsp salt
1 small pinch of saffron crumbled
Directions:
Place butter and minced onion in a quart saucepan. Saute over medium heat until onion is transparent. Add rice, saffron, water or chicken stock and salt. Cover, reduce heat to simmer, cook until rice is tender and liquid is absorbed (about 18 minutes).

How to Freeze Broccoli or Cauliflower

Posted By admin on September 7, 2009

Our garden is overflowing with broccoli and cauliflower and there is just so much you can eat before looking for ways to preserve it for later use. One of those ways is to freeze cauliflower or broccoli and store it up to 9 months in the freezer. You’ll want to pick only just ripened vegetables to freeze, any vegetables that are past have black spots and are not suitable for freezing.

Remove leaves and thicker stems from vegetable and cut into pieces for stir fry’s or other dish sizes. Dunk the cut broccoli or cauliflower in a bowl of warm water which will dislodge any dirt and bugs. Bugs and spiders don’t like the warm water and will crawl out of the vegetable if there are any.

Drain and then dunk the whole bunch into boiling water for 3 minutes, making sure the water covers them. At exactly 3 minutes drain them quickly and dump them into either a bowl of cold water or a bowl of ice water which stops them from cooking. Once they have thoroughly cooled strain them again and let them sit until most of the water is off of them. Before you place in freezer bags shake florets in the sink to get excess water off. The more water you get off the less ice crystals and the better they freeze. Before sealing the freezer bag squeeze out any air which will also helps to eliminate ice crystals. Immediately place bags in freezer in single layer so they freeze quickly.

The frozen broccoli or cauliflower can go from freezer to pan without thawing in stir fry’s or other dishes. Cook these the same way you would cook frozen vegetables from the store.

Save Money on Bread at Bakery Outlets

Posted By admin on August 27, 2009

You can save lots of dough on bread if you shop at the outlets. Most supermarkets order their bread from a local bakery. So what do they do with the overstock when they order too much? Thats where the outlet stores get their bread. You can find regional and national bakery outlets in the phone book. We love artisan bread and the take and bake breads that are about $4-$6 in a regular store. On average the bakery outlets sell their overstocks for 50 – 75% off.

Here are some of our favorite Bread Outlets in the Minnesota Twin Cities area:

  • Lofthouse Bakery 
  • Fridley, MN – Artisan Bread $1

  • Franklin Street Bakery
  • Minneapolis, MN – Buy one at 99 cents get one free from the overstocks

  • New French Bakery
  • Minneapolis, MN – Check daily specials

  • Hopkins Thrift Bakery Outlet
  • Hopkins, MN – 3 loaves of bread/rolls/buns for $1.50, huge boxes of donuts $2. They also have all the overstock of Atresian breads, cookies and pastry from Cub and Jerrys foods stores.

  • Country Hearth/Pan-O-Gold
  • Plymouth, MN – Check daily specials

  • Sara Lee/Tastee Bakery Outlets
  • in Blaine, Eagan, New Brighton, Richfield and White Bear Lake, MN.

  • Wonder/Hostess Bakery Outlets
  • Burnsville, Maplewood, Minnepolis, Moundsview, New Hope and St. Paul, MN

We like to ask the outlets what their specials are on each day and what their delivery schedule is so we can go early to stock up. We usually buy extra and put it in the freezer. The take and bake bread is especially good for this. If you eat lots of bread products you can save lots of dough shopping at local bakery outlets.

New Herb Recipes – herb butter – herb cheese

Posted By admin on August 5, 2009

Its time to harvest the herbs in the garden so I’ve added some fresh and dried herb recipes. If you are looking for ways to use herbs in your recipes visit: www.simplifymyfoodchoices.com/herbed-cheese-recipe.html

Warm bread tastes great with the herbed butter recipe so try some and let me know what you think.

Make Your Own Salad Dressing From Scratch

Posted By admin on June 25, 2009

If you have ever bought store brand salad dressing and looked at the ingredients? Besides the preservatives and high fat content there are artificical ingredients, artificial flavors and high fructose corn syrup. I thought the idea of eating salads is to be healthy.

Leave the store brand on the shelf and make your own healthy salad dressings. We have added 7 of our favorite homemade salad dressings to the website. After the recipes we have included a section on helping you learn to experiment making your own recipes.   http://www.simplifymyfoodchoices.com/salad-dressing-recipes.html

Try the salad dressing recipes and let us know what you think . If you have a favorite homemade sald dressing and would like to share we’d be honored to have you post it.