Dairy Free "Frog Eye" Salad

We love this salad for picnics because so little in ingredients can make SO much. My kids love it because it has a cool "gross" name. ;) I love it because it includes healthy fruits and can be made in advance and refrigerated. My hubby loves it, but had trouble with the dairy in the original version. We found a way to switch it up and give it a nice tropical boost.

Dairy Free "Frog Eye" Salad

• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 Tbs. flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2/3 cup pineapple juice
• 1 egg (beaten)

Stir dry ingredients together,in a small sauce pan then add the juice and egg.  heat over medium heat until thickened. Remove from heat and add:

• 1 tsp. lemon juice

Let cool. In the mean while, cook:

• 1 box of Acini Di Pepe pasta (16oz). 

When done, rinse with cool water and drain. Stir in the juice sauce and:

• 1 can of coconut milk
• 2 (11oz) cans of mandarin oranges
• 2 (20 oz.) cans of crushed pinapple
• 2 cups mini marshmallows

Mix and Chill. Will fill a large salad bowl. Optional stir-ins include:

• 1 cup flaked coconut
• maraschino cherries
• nuts

Linked:

 

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Review: Simplified Pantry

Over the past several weeks I've had a fun time reviewing three products from Simplified Pantry:

• Simplified Dinners, a PDF download that sells for $12.99. Here is a FREE SAMPLE
• Simplified Dinners Gluten Free/Dairy Free, a PDF Download that sells for $12.99, Click here for a FREE SAMPLE.
• Paperless Home Organization, also a PDF Download (or for Kindle) that sells for $3.99. Again, here is a FREE SAMPLE

Be sure to read this whole review, as I've got a great coupon code to share. :)

I encourage you to read all of the other reviews (see the banner link below) to get a better picture of the Paperless Home Organization. I have not had the opportunity to try it out yet, but I have been hearing great things from the rest of the crew. If you have a tablet or a smartphone, you can begin organizing your life without another scratch paper list to lose!

I loved the opportunity to get a free copy of the two cookbooks, Simplified Pantry and Simplified Dinners: GF/DF. While no one in my house is gluten free, my hubby is dairy intolerant. We try and limit or avoid the dairy. My hubby usually has to suffer through, because cooking without dairy is so foreign to me. You can then see that having a list of simple and basic dairy free recipes was a wonderful resource.  Also my niece and nephew are gluten free, and we eat together as families regularly. I knew it would be wonderful to be able to plan meals that are "normal" but allergy friendly for the whole crowd. The gluten free and dairy free version of the Simplified Dinners was very similar to the regular version, but with more gluten free and dairy free options on the same menu items. Also some of the desserts were completely different, like the Coconut Milk Chocolate Mousse. YUM! Of course, the shopping list of GF/DF ingredients was a big help, as well as the tips about hidden allergens.

The premise of the book is that the meals are gluten free by their basic design rather than by specialty flours and attempts to replicate gluten-full meals. Keeping the menu simple, focusing on good proteins and lots of great veggies and fruits, made gluten free grocery shopping easy to stay on budget. The regular simplified dinners cookbook was very similar to the gluten free and dairy free version, as these were very easy and basic meals with lots of flavor variation.

I used the cookbooks for two weeks each. As you know, I like to meal plan, and to shop only once every two weeks. To really try these out, I took the basic pantry list from the front of the book, and shopped my way through it. We then knew we would have all the ingredients to make whatever was in the book. Having used it now, I can put better quantities on the ingredients on the shopping list. For example, I didn't buy soy sauce because I knew I still had some. I didn't realize that it was in SO many of the recipes! Aside from that, I really liked the shopping list for both books, and I had an easy time getting everything.

I then wrote out a basic list of the meals that interested me best, so I could have a bit of a meal plan to stick to, as I wanted to think ahead and defrost meat. Many of the meals were good slow-cooker recipes, so they required a little fore-thought. I also liked the variety offered. There were things on the list that I don't usually buy and cook, and my family loved  the change up. Some of the recipes we loved were:

• Slow Cooker Roasts
• Stovetop Pasta
• Foil-Packet Fish
• Taquitos

The recipe sections of both books are done a bit differently. First is a set of basic instructions, and then several recipes for ingredient variable combinations, to be applied to the instructions. For example, there was a recipe for slow cooker chicken, with every step of the process given. Then there were about 7 different recipes for the marinade or glaze for the slow cooker chicken.

The author notes in the front of the book that: "The primary purpose of these recipes is not so much to provide recipes as to give reminders of the general method of certain standard family dinners. . . . Making dinner is play. Play with what you have on hand and play with your audience." I think she accomplishes this very well with Simplified Dinners!

What I liked:

• New menu options, even in allergy free cooking. I am always stumped for "what to make for dinner."
• Easy recipes.
• Shopping Lists, so you know you will have all the ingredients.
• Yummy flavor combinations I'd never tried before.
• Allergy free cooking was not as hard as I had imagined. 

What I didn't like:

• No quantities. While I like to make it up as I go when I'm cooking, I like measurements when I'm following a recipe. It was hard to know how much of each ingredient to buy, not knowing how many of the recipes use each ingredient. 
• The format of the recipes. See the samples.
• No lunch or breakfast menu ideas, so you will need to plan that on your own and add it to the shopping list. (As you see in the photo above, we tried some GF waffles on our own!)

Bottom Line:
Overall we had a great time trying it out, and I know we will be revisiting these recipes and methods again. I would probably copy my favorite recipes off onto regular recipe cards in the "ingredients-then-instructions" format that I'm accustomed to, with quantities/measurements that I know will work for my family. To see the recipe format and the master pantry list, be sure to use the links above to download a free sample.

And for a special treat, the author, Mystie Winckler, is offering a 30% discount on all of her e-books with the code: TOS2013 from now until June 3rd, 2013. Thank you Mystie!

While I did not get a chance to review Paperless Home Organization, many others of the Crew did, as well as both cookbooks. Be sure you read about it all on the Crew Blog!


©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com

*Prices and links are accurate at the time this is published, and are subject to change.

Frugal Tip: Using Dry Beans

*This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our disclosure policy. *

When you look at ways to squeeze your grocery budget, there is hardly anything more rewarding than using dry beans. Here are some great reasons to give up on the canned stuff, and use dry beans:

• More Natural
• Lower Sodium
• No BPA (from the cans)
• Fewer calories
• More fiber

...to name a few. I also find that I can get away with half as much ground beef in many recipes if I add beans. Keep the protein and lose the fat! Yay! 

I may be biased because my dear sis-in-law works for a local dry bean producer.  Since we eat them all the time, it's handy to buy them in bulk at the local plant to save money. Plus it's a great way to support local food producers.  Last season we actually grew them ourselves! This is another reason dry beans are a good choice at our house. 

As for the money savings: using Pintos for an example: canned beans go for about 60 cents to $1 per can. One can has about 1.5 cups of beans. One pound of dry beans yields 6 cups cooked, so 1/4 a pound is the same as one can. Dry beans go for 80 cents (bulk price when I buy a 25lb bag) to $1.30 per pound at the grocery store. This means a 1/4 pound costs as little as 20 cents! Canned beans are 200% more expensive. (See, this is a homeschool post! How do you like my math?!)

Ok, on to the process. First, sort the beans. The best way to do this is to spill them on a clean counter-top, spread them out, and look them over. When they are harvested, tiny bean-sized pebbles can get into the mix. Some times you won't find any, sometimes there a several. But I will tell you, the first time you bite into one in a bowl of chili, you will wish you hadn't skipped this step!

sorting the beans into a colander

Then wash them. I put them in a bowl and cover with water, and agitate them with my hands. Pour through a strainer/colander, and we're done!

At this point I put them into the slow cooker and cover with water at least 3"-4" above the beans. I like to cook up 2+ pounds at a time in my 6 quart pot. This is for a few reasons, and none of them include me eating 12-15 cups of beans at one sitting. :)  I like the convenience of canned beans as much as the next gal, so I cook a LOT at one time and then freeze in "meal sized" portions, so they are ready to go, just as fast as canned.

I do all of this at night, and then put the pot on low and forget about them until morning.

~edit 3/11/13~ If you find they don't get done overnight, your slow cooker may by cooler on "low" than mine. I'm finding there is quite a variation. Try doing it on high if they don't turn out the first time. If your slow cooker was manufactured after 2007, it will cook at these higher temps. If it was manufactured before 2007, maybe you should buy one with all the money you're saving not buying canned beans!~

Also, as a commenter noted: if you are cooking Kidney Beans, be sure they do boil for at least 10 minutes to remove naturally occurring toxins. See this link for more information.

All that's left to do is strain them off...

Rinse well and bag them up....

and freeze!

Now wasn't that easy? I freeze them in quarts (about 3-4 cups) because my family is bigger and we like a lot of them. But you could freeze a can sized portion (1 and 1/2 cups) in a sandwich bag, fill a gallon freezer bag with those smaller bags, and freeze them that way. Another great way (sorry, no pics of this) is to spread them on a cookie sheet to freeze individually, then dump into gallon bags. Then you can use a cup measure to scoop out exactly what you need every time!

*affiliate link*

A note about, ummm, "the after-effects of beans":I am told it is the sugars in beans that produce the gas. The sugars in beans are water soluble, so many suggest soaking the beans before cooking, and draining off the water they soaked in. Cook in fresh water. To keep this a simple slow cooker routine you could soak (power off) overnight in your slow cooker.  In the morning, rinse and replace them there with fresh water, turn it on and cook on high for only a few hours. They should be done by lunch this way. Also, the fresher your beans, the less gassy they should be, so I'm told. We happened to grow these beans ourselves, so they were fresh!

Need a yummy recipe to use those beans? Try the Best Home-made Chili (scroll to end of post), that was demonstrated at our local farmer's market cooking demo. Also, our local bean producer puts out a cookbook! Be sure you try the Coffee Bean Brownies!

Here is my favorite chili recipe, using those beans:

Best Homemade Chili

(This recipe is a combination of two recipes from Taste of Home Country Ground Beef Cookbook: Three-step Chili from pg. 22 and Best Homemade Chili from pg. 23) I have adjusted it to be gluten free. 

2 lb. Grass-fed Ground Beef 

1 Large onion – diced

1 Tbs of chili powder

1 tsp dried oregano

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp paprika

1 tsp sea salt

1 clove fresh pressed garlic

3 cups cooked pinto beans (or 2 cans drained)

One large can of tomato juice (46 oz)

(or 1 qt and 1 pt of home canned)

¼ cup cornmeal

2 Tbs vinegar 

Cayenne pepper to taste

In large pot or Dutch oven, brown beef with seasonings and onions, until fully cooked. Add tomato juice and bring to a boil. Mix cornmeal and vinegar into a paste, and add a ladle of the hot tomato juice to it and then mix back into the entire pot (to avoid clumps). Return to a boil and then cook over medium heat for 15 minutes until thickened.  Add cayenne pepper to taste. 

If you like, serve it in a bread bowl!

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Loved this post? Here are a few more things that you might love as well:

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Here's a favorite recipe using dry beans:

Black Bean Chili!

Nothing can have a better start than bacon, can it? As you may know, I love cooking with beans, and I recently got a great deal on some dry black beans. So I cooked them up using my usual overnight method, and froze them in bags. Having that all done made this a quick and easy soup to assemble. My hubby declared it one of his new favorites. *score!*

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[Originally posted in March 2012, this post has recently seen a lot of traffic thanks to Pinterest! I am joining with a few friends celebrating frugal tips, and this one is one of my favorites. I've brushed it up and added a great Chili recipe!]

Linked today:

For more great posts, be sure to "follow"! 

  

And if this helped you, leave a comment! I'd love to hear from you. :)