This week a friend gave me a bunch of pre-cooked bacon, I decided to try the following recipe with it. It turned out some very savory and delicious biscuits. If you mill your own flour, use soft white and add baking powder and salt to this. If you use white lily as suggested in the recipe, be careful because there are several varieties. Some are self-rising and others are all-purpose. You can adjust the all-purpose in the same way as described above.
Link to the orignal recipe: http://bestamericanfood.net/259

A great biscuit recipe!
I’ve come up with a lot of biscuit recipes, and these savory biscuits are awesome! Serve them with your favorite meal, or fill them with fried eggs for a great breakfast dish. If you make the biscuits small, they could even serve as tasty party appetizers. For my biscuits, I have best results with White Lily flour, but if that’s not available, use another quality brand.

Holle’s Bacon-Cheddar Biscuits
What you’ll need:
10 slices apple wood or maple bacon, diced ***(I just used the bacon that was pre-cooked given by a friend)
1/3 cup vegetable shortening, plus more for greasing pan (Used butter in the pan, not shortening)
2 cups White Lily self-rising flour
½ teaspoon Lowry’s garlic salt ***(I used garlic powder. Did not have garlic salt)
1 tablespoon sugar ***(used Cane Juice Crystals -organic sugar)
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese ***(I used shredded four-cheese blend because that is what I had on hand.
1 cup whole milk
Melted butter

Directions: Fry bacon until crisp, then drain. While bacon is frying, preheat oven to 425 degrees and grease baking pan with shortening.

Mix together dry ingredients in a large bowl. Add the 1/3 cup of shortening and blend with a fork or pastry cutter until mixture resembles coarse meal.

Gradually add milk while blending. Add cheese and bacon. Work dough until the cheese and bacon are evenly distributed.
Place dough on floured surface and knead about four times. Do not overwork!

Using your palms, pat biscuit dough out to a half-inch thick. Cut biscuits out with a round cookie or biscuit cutter.
Place biscuits in pan, allowing them to almost touch – about ½ inch apart. Bake for about 15 minutes. Remove from oven and brush tops with melted butter. Sprinkle lightly with additional garlic salt, if desired.

***Even with all my modifications, this recipe turned out great!

I was at a friend’s house a couple of years ago and I opened the fridge to put something away and it was nearly empty. At first I was surprised, but considering my friend had a bunch of kids (like we do) and a pretty low budget for groceries, I should have expected it.

A couple of weeks later I was at another friend’s house for dinner and she opened her fridge. It was “stuffed to the gills.” Whatever that means. There was literally no place to put anything. And finding something as simple as the butter for dinner required a juggling act that made the cat in the hat to look like an amateur.

I went home and looked inside mine and realized I was somewhere in the middle, but I learned some lessons from both these ladies I want to share with you.

My first friend- the one on the tight budget-knew exactly what was in her fridge. Nothing would get shoved to the back and forgoten. It was quick and easy to clean her fridge-she could always wipe up any spills quickly and easily. She did not have money to waste on wasted groceries, so she simply had only exactly what she needed for the week- no more, and perhaps sometimes maybe a little less than she needed.

My second friend-the one with the overflowing fridge had lots of waste going on. She had so much abundance, that she, in effect had less to use in her meal prep than my friend with much, much less.

Since that realization years ago I see my fridge as one symptom of how my household is doing. When I have a bunch of stuff crammed in there, I am being wasteful. When I go to clean it and cannot even get to the spills without a great balancing act, something is wrong. A much emptier, organized fridge can be a blessing to our family.

However, too empty of a fridge can lead to inefficiencies. A good number of condiments that we use and enjoy are helpful. Keeping enough cheese, eggs, fruit and milk to feed my family without resorting to convenience or less healthy foods are helpful. When we run out of these items, I have to work harder, make extra trips to the store, or have less than satisfying meals. Also, not a good thing.

Today I cleaned out the fridge and looked around in there. There are a few things we need to use up ASAP or they will be wasted. There are also some bottles of condiments I need to discard. (Why is that certain bottle of salad dressing still sitting there- make a note not to buy it again!) And, today I am making a “Leftover list” that will be posted in the kitchen so that everyone can see which leftovers need to go FIRST, and what is in danger of being wasted. Another thing I am doing is trying to be conscience of freezing some leftovers for future meals instead of just storing them in the fridge. I am going to make a container in the freezer for holding small, single-size serving leftovers (These will also have a section on my leftover list.).

While it is so empty, I am going to line each drawer with a paper towel that will help keep the fruit and veggie drawers organized. I am also going to update the baking soda in the fridge.

So, what state is your fridge? Do you need to clean it out or pick up some staples? Do you have a set day for cleaning out the fridge each week? How do you organize your leftovers?

After Daniel was born, but before Jonathan left for basic training we wanted to go on a vacation together while we still have our Christina in town. We packed up the van and headed for the beach.

From 2010-12-17

David was AMAZING on this road trip, and on one of our dinner stops, I ran into Walmart and got him this Buzz Lightyear toy. He played with it every minute that he was not on the beach or in water. It was worth every penny.

From 2010-12-17

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The following is a picture of David and “the roof” about which he LATER told us: “I climbed up on the roof and I didn’t even die, Dad.” Please note the roof was three stories high.

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From 2010-12-17

Duncan and David on the beach

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From 2010-12-17

Anne Mary

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Daniel – tucked inside his sling. I just pulled it back to show his face for the pic. I was afraid of him getting sunburned, so I kept him tucked inside for the most part.

From 2010-09-22

Duncan, Daniel and me. If you look closely on the right bottom edge you can see where my finger and thumb are all bandaged up from where I cut off my finger tips the day before we were to leave on vacation.

From 2010-12-17

From 2010-12-17

From 2010-12-17

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From 2010-12-17

From 2010-12-17

I would say that 90% of this vacation was simply playing on the beach, napping, swinging in the hammock, playing games, etc. We did very little in the way of sight seeing since we were pretty far off the beaten path in Corolla. It was different than the time we went to OBX before when we did more activities. Our rental home was through http://www.villagerealtyobx.com/ and we got an amazing deal- traveling off season is one of the best benefits of home education!

Last night my husband made the most delicious recipe. For years, he has made Oatmeal Scotchies. YUM. But THIS year we tried the 7 grain flake mix and sucanat in the recipe instead of oatmeal and sugar. The recipe turned out EVEN BETTER than the original recipe. If you are a 7 flake user, here is the recipe.

From 2010-12-21

7 Flake Butterscotch Cookies
1 1/4 cup plus 4 tsp pastry flour. (Made with soft wheat flour) OR Use soft white like White Lily from the store. If you use regular all purpose from the grocery, do not add the additional 4 tsp.
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp Real Salt (Sea salt)
1 Cup Butter (2 sticks, softened
3/.4 cup sucanat (can use sugar if you do not use sucanat)
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 cups 7-grain flake mix
11 oz package Nestle Butterscotch chips,

Preheat oven to 375F

Combine flour, baking soda, oats, cinnamon and salt ingredients in a small bowl.

In another bowl beat butter, sucanat, brown sugar, eggs, and vanilla extract in a large mixer bowl. Gradually stir in the dry ingredients. Stir in butterscotch morsels.

Drop by round tablespoons on ungreased cookie sheets. Bake for 7-8 minutes for chewy cookies, and 9-10 minutes for crisp ones. Cool on baking sheet for 2 minutes and remove to wire racks for cooling. Yields around 4 dozen cookies- but Duncan makes them larger and had to cook them a little longer.

My daughter, Sarah plays in chess tournaments every week. On Monday nights she goes and signs up and plays for a few hours. This is also the block of time I sit and file and clip all my coupons and make my shopping lists.

On the Monday before Thanksgiving she brought a “chess cake.” This was quite a challenge for her, but here is what she did:
We ordered chocolate molds shaped like chess pieces. She made the pieces out of dark and white chocolate. Then, she made a regular cake mix into about a half sheet sized cake. For the rest, she knew she needed some help, so we contacted Kahma, an amazing baker who made Christina’s wedding cake and with her help, Sarah cut the cake into a square. Then, Kahma lined the outside edges with brownies to make the edges nice and straight and firm.

From 2010-12-17

Then, Kahma helped her ice it, then she taught Sarah how to airbrush it. We took wax paper and cut it into a grid shape, then took the little pieces and stuck them on the cake in a chess board pattern.

From 2010-12-17

Then, Sarah airbrushed the cake.

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Kahma put on the pretty edging.

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Kahma put the letters and numbers on it like you would find on a tournament chess board.

From 2010-12-17

From 2010-12-17

From 2010-12-17

Once it dried, we sprinkled it it with cake glitter and once we arrived at chess, put the pieces on it in a checkmate pattern. Everyone in the tournament had a chance to win via drawing.

From 2010-12-17

Everyone who did not win got a cupcake with a chocolate chess piece on top as a consolation prize. Everyone loved the cake and enjoyed the cupcakes as well.