As I sit here…I am having one of those “I hate it when I do that” moments!  This morning, as I was getting myself and my family out the door for the day, I put on the kitchen counter all the ingredients I would need to make a quick pot of Bonnie’s Blue Ribbon chili for dinner tonight.  It’s Wednesday night and since we all head straight to  church activities after work, I like to bring something to the office that I can cook for dinner.  Well I’m sure you have figured it out by now that my dinner is still sitting on the kitchen counter!  I had pulled enough to make a double batch and share it with my fellow late night staffers, so that means I have my last 4 pounds of precooked ground beef going bad on my kitchen counter~ I hate it when I do that!   

That said…it has been a good week for meals otherwise! Monday night we came home to Chinese Pepper Steak in the slow cooker (page 30 in our slow cooker cookbook) and served it with a side of HG Easy Fried Rice.  I only made a single batch and my kids were quick to let me know I should have made 2!  We had not had that rice in a while…I forgot how fabulous it is!  I am craving it right now!! 

What are you having for dinner this week?  I’d love some ideas from our families up north!  We have a major cold snap coming our way….what should I make for my Texas family that doesn’t get many opportunities to enjoy a ’warm your chilled bones’ meal? 

 God Bless and Keep You,

Tami  

The last 2 weeks have been a whirlwind!  Thank goodness for Homemade Gourmet!  Even in all the chaos…we have had time for meals together.  They were often fast ~ but they were not fast food! 

While I was in Tennessee…meals in the freezer like spaghetti and meat sauce and meatloaf kept my family fed and thinking of me as they enjoyed meals I had prepared in advance of my trip.  Speaking of Tennessee ~ hello to Cayden, Camden and Caysen!  I want you all to know that Caysen makes a great Maria’s Hot Sauce all by himself! And Camden…your truck picture looks great on my office wall!

Upon returning…we had company waiting for me!  Thank goodness for Homemade Gourmet 4 meals in 4 minutes!  Garlic Lemon Chicken with HG Easy Fried Rice and a side salad of HG orange vinaigrette dressing over field greens, purple onions, mandarine oranges and walnuts made it look like I had prepared for hours!  (slow cookers are a God send!) 

This week has been one of several 12 hour work days…getting me home around 8 pm.  Thank goodness for kids raised in the kitchen the HG way!  A call home from the office at 7:00 to pull out an HG mix and a few pantry/freezer items and dinner was waiting when I got there!  I even had the bonus moment when my almost 19 year old son asked “Mom…can we have a family night tonight and play some games?”  That’s a memorable moment for sure! 

It doesn’t look like it is going to slow down anytime soon!  But I can be sure that dinner is not something I will have to stress about.  What are you having for dinner tonight?  (I may want to try it!)

God Bless,

Tami

My daughter just turned 10 this past week and now that she is in “double digits” she feels VERY grown up! She and her cat Lucky Lou are always very interested in what’s cooking in the kitchen and love to help. It’s really kind of funny… Lucky just wants to smell everything, not taste it. Once he is given a sniff he is satisfied and happy to curl up on the floor and watch the goings on. Brittany is a great helper and loves to pour in the ingredients and stir things. Our contribution to the family Thanksgiving feast this year is dessert. Pumpkin Pie Cheesecake has specifically been requested. No Problem! My 10 year old is ready to make it “all by herself”, and the great thing is that she can! I can just see the light in her face when she gets to tell the family (all of those older cousins) that she made the dessert this year! These are moments that Homemade Gourmet makes possible for my family. How about yours?

While my husband and boys have been making plans for the football game schedule on Thanksgiving day, my mom has been emailing me back and forth on the topic of our Thanksgiving Dinner Menu.  To be honest…I haven’t even thought about it yet!  Not that I shouldn’t and not that mom’s emails weren’t just what I needed to get on the ball!  Thanks mom!

So what are some things we can be doing now to make Thanksgiving stress free and easy…the HG way?  The first place to start is to plan the menu…which mom has seen to for our family already.  Now that we know what we are going to need to cook…we can do the next steps…looking for anything we can do now and put in the freezer for the actual day!

 If your favorite Thanksgiving dishes call for things like chopped onion, chopped bell pepper, or diced and chopped vegetables of any kind ~ go ahead and do that now.  Find a time when you could pull a stool up to the counter with a friend or the kids and get the veggies chopped and labeld in freezer bags.  On the day that all the cooking needs to take place…you just have to scoop out the measured amount and cook.  Afterall..preparation time is usually the most time intensive part of a casserole or stuffing dish. 

 Speaking of stuffing (or dressing as we call it here in Texas!)…we make ours with day old cornbread and white bread.  Early this month I can make a double batch of HG Texas Cornbread and a double batch of HG Basic Bread, using one of each as a side to a meal and the second to put in the freezer.  Then the day before I make my dressing…all I have to do is pull it out of the freezer and let it set out for the next 24 hours.  This is much easier than making the bread the day before so that it can sit for a day.  Of course…not as easy as having mom just make the whole thing!  Thanks again mom!!

 Another thing we can do with our selection of vegetable dishes needed for Thanksgiving is determine what can be made the days leading up to Thanksgiving.  For example…the traditional greenbean casserole can be made several days ahead and kept in the fridge.  Thanksgiving day…toss some of those fried onions on top and throw in the oven with a few other vegetable casseroles you also made ahead and reheat them altogether real quick.  

 Now lets look at that dessert menu.  What can you make ahead and freeze?  One of our family favorite pies to serve is the Brownie Pie…and it freezes beautifully.  How about a Gingerbread Trifle?  Bake an HG Gingerbread Mix and put it in the freezer.  The day before Thanksgiving…make an HG Pumpkin Pie Cheesecake mix…but don’t put it into a pie shell.  Instead…take that frozen gingerbread, cut it into cubes and begin layering the cubes and the pie filling in a clear glass bowl.  Top the last layer with cool whip, sprinkle with nutmeg and you have a great dessert made fresh and easy.  I mentioned a tip for cookies on a previous blog…that would work here as well. 

If you want more specific tips and recipes….even a day by day prepare ahead plan, menu and grocery list, check out our October Newsletter.  You can see a copy of it by hitting the link on this blog site that says view and example of our free newsletter.  In the October edition, in the article titled “Featured Product for this Month”, there is a link to a flier you can print that will give you lots of great ideas and help. 

Speaking of help…what are you doing to get things ready ahead of time so you can enjoy the day with your family?  Mom???  You are the queen of being ready for Thanksgiving before the leaves fall from the trees!  Any tips?

God Bless and Keep You,

Tami

Some of you may have noticed that I was a little remiss in posting last week.  Well…there was an issue with my computer that involved the company parking lot, a gentlemanly intended hubby and a Yukon Truck.  Hubby’s itentions were to relieve me of a very heavy brief case, but somehow in the chaos of getting kids and cases in the car…the case never made it.  We realized this as we backed out of our parking spot and felt the thump ~ thump of the front and back tires going over something….you guessed it! 

Now if I am going to tell that story…I have to follow it with one of my favorite stories that show what an amazing hubby he truly is.  About a year ago I was on one of my trips away from home and received a call at about 10:00 at night.  It was my hubby, Darius, frantic about the fact that our electricity had been off all day due to a storm and the freezer (which sits outside in the heat) was full of meat that was now defrosted.  Now, I am not talking a small amount of meat.  The week before our local store had one of those blow out sales on beef….buy one of anything and get one for free!  Well my freezer was packed full of roasts, ground beef and round steaks.   My husband knew from experience that he could not refreeze the thawed meat…but throwing it out wasn’t an option for him either!  I directed him to our slow cooker cookbook and pointed out the pages to refer to.  I won’t go into the details, but I will tell you that I came home from that trip to a freezer full of cooked and shredded bags of roast, cooked and frozen bags of cooked Italian Mozarella Round Steak and many pounds of cooked ground beef bagged in 1 pound portions.  All this on the same weekend that he had a car accident in the Walmart parking lot and the stray dog from the area had puppies in our yard that did not survive and were found by our youngest and strongest pet lover (very emotional time).  In my book…he is a hero! 

So the next time a loved one says “I can’t cook”…just hand them some HG mixes and one of our easy to follow cookbooks and let them find out just how easy it is and how good they really can be! 

How about you….any stories of loved ones being the hero in the kitchen? 

God Bless and Keep You,

Tami