Not kidding. The weather did a full 180. The air is cleared out of the smoke. The temperatures are 30 degrees cooler. Here's the rub though, now that's it is so much cooler we can't open the doors and windows without the furnace kicking on. LOL. Good grief. Speaking of Good Grief (I can hear Beethoven playing in the background) this week's menus owe a lot to the comic strip that made that idiom more well known. Thanks Charles Shulz. You made my week. Here's the menus: Gnom

With the prices of everything going up and up I am getting even more budget conscious. I am sticking with what I know I like so there is less food waste and sticking with what I know is affordable at the same time. Sezme Chicken with Ali Baba Cuban Chickadee with Pellets Silver Darlings with Smoky Mountains Pasta Tamahtah with Leafy Delights Grilled Melty Memoirs with THE WORKS No dictionary for you this time. You are on your own. hee hee hee hee What is red and smells

The point to making your own seasonings is to avoid the salt and sodium that is put into the premade mixes. Sometimes there is also anti-caking or coloring additives in the premade mixes. I know that corn starch is often included from reading the ingredients on the packets. Nothing wrong with corn starch, just it's another thing that maybe does not need to be in there. That's up to you. For the butter chicken seasoning packet, there is maltodextrin added. Actually, the first

I've had a busy week and I've been putting a lot of energy (focused energy) into creating what is now being called "BoyBunny". Well, something that sounds like that anyway. So a day late in posting the menu list for this week (which starts today). Oh well. With no further ado, here it be: BB Braggers and Air-Fries Round Browns Stew and Buskicks Butter Chicken and Burley-Bobs Fish and Tater Salad COTF Fancy Foo Foo Had a lot of leftovers that needed to be used before turn

I stepped back from working on my painting and my drawing recently. I had already stepped back from decorating bottles and jars. And a host of other crafts I like to do, or used to like to do. They say that losing interest in things like hobbies, or things you used to do often is a sign of early onset dementia and/or depression. Gosh I hope not. I'm so tired all of the time that I find it hard to turn to my hobbies when I get done with chore. All I seem to want to do is sit

Okee Dokee, here's this week's menu list. Enjoy. As an aside, have you ever heard of Chicken Paprikash? No? hee hee hee Purple Parm with Caesar Peppers SezME Chicken with Cuckoos Bok Choy and Pearls Chickencatchatoady with Mashed Taters and Broccoli Salmon, Kale, Smashed Cannellini with Sauce Dictionary: Purple Parm = Eggplant Parmesan Caesar Peppers = Caesar Salad with Roasted Red Pepper Dressing SezME Chicken = Sesame Chicken Cuckoos = Couscous Chickencatchat

I am a big fan of Nora Robert and Heather Graham - for fun reads. Nora often writes about magic and the supernatural. Heather writes about a band of psychic people who solve crimes. That's the kind of thing I like for light reading. I also like reading James Patterson, Stephen King, Michael Chrichton who's writing is often cautionary tales. Intriguing. Sometimes scary. So right now I am reading books by Heather Graham entitled the Unseen, the Unholy and the Unspoken. I finis

So, here is this week's menu list. Every dinner except one is made with canned chicken. Don't tell me you didn't see that one coming. LOL. The one exception is of course, the Friday fish thing. Not salmon this week. Doing something different. Surprise!! Hash-Tastic Medley Pasta LaVista Nemo Burgers Cozy Chicka-Little Stew Cluckin' Good Stirrups To repeat that in the yerk version: Sweet Potato Chicken Hash Chicken Pasta Tuna Burgers Chicken Lentil Stew Chicken Stir

I do not eat red met (ie: lamb, beef, pork, rabbit, deer, bison, moose, etc.) What I DO eat is fish and fowl. Fridays are for fish, which is usually salmon, but sometimes mackerel or herring. That's for the Omega3's of course. Only once a week because of the concerns over mercury content, which are pretty low for that type of fish. Overcautious? Probably. Anyway - mostly I eat fowl. Which means chicken for me, because turkey only happens once or twice a year in my house. And

On a budget? Only feeding 1, 2 or 3 people? Wondering whether you should go for canned chicken or fresh? The simple answer to this question is: Yes, canned chicken is generally cheaper than its fresh counterpart. Canned chicken offers cost savings due to its longer shelf life and ease of storage, making it an affordable option for those on a tight grocery budget. Dr. Google says that if you buy the white chicken in a can that is packed in water, and then rinse it, that you ar

I use to think I was being a little more healthy by buying the "Lightly Salted" potato chips but those apps disagree. Dang. So, now the plan is to make my own French fries in the air-fryer and forego the potato chips altogether. Of course I will make my own dip using non-fat, plain, Greek yogurt. I will try to make it taste like tartar sauce because I use to love fries and tartar sauce. It will be good. I use to think I was being a little more healthy by buying the 'better'

This week's menus are based on leftovers in my fridge and the fact that it's too hot in my kitchen to entertain the notion of spending more than an hour in front of a hot stove. And no, I do not use my oven at all in the summer. However, I do use the microwave for things you might not suspect. (Example, corn bread muffins). And I use the Air Fryer. Then there is the crockpot too. Here's the menu list: Spaghetti with Veggie Marinara and Romaine Salad Salisbury Bean Steaks wi

What do I mean by economizing? In this case, I am talking about using up what I have in order to save a few bucks and not waste any food. So this week's menus include things left from last week's recipes and snacks and desserts, etc. I really do not like to waste food, but I dislike wasting money even more and food costs money. (More money recently than before, even.) So as I go through posting the menu items, I will explain a little bit so that you can supplement if needed.

I do not mean that in the sense of "wow, watch me blog the internet to a standstill". I mean in the more literal sense of "oh my heavens, the Northwest portion of the USA is burning down". The smoke has been awful, in the unhealthy or hazardous zones for days and days. The fires are just raging due to all the dry stuff. There has been a drought they say, which has dried everything out pretty bad and so the danger of fire is really high. They say the fire is jumping natural ba

So, haven't been blogging much of late. It's so HOT in my office that it's uncomfortable to spend any time in there. I have ordered a portable evaporative cooler to help cool off the kitchen and if it works out I may order another for the bedroom. It's crazy. But I have been trying to keep up with posting the menus each week. Here you go: Macaroni Salad (using Greek Yogurt) and Chicken Patties Pizza (homemade) Greek Lemon Orzo Soup Lemony Salmon with Baked Potatoes and al

Mercy me. It's been so hot here. I mean really hot here. Triple digits hot. When it's this hot (and mind you I do not have central a/c) it is hard to think about cooking. Yet, I still want to eat. Of course I do. I want ice-cream, ice-cream bars, hot fudge sundaes, and that sort of thing. I want salads for dinner - BUT - the parasite scare is keeping me away from doing that. Cold noodle salads maybe? Cold bean salads? Somehow, none of that is grabbing me at the moment. Geez.

I neglected to post the menus and I didn't even make a grocery list from the menus because I knew what I wanted and how I planned to make the meals, and then realized that sure wasn't helpful. So, here's the menus for this week: Triple C Soup (Cabbage, Carrots + Cannellini) Ocean SOS (Shrimp On Seashells) in a Lemon Dill Sauce w/ Sprouts Chickpea Casserole (Chickpeas, Carrots and Spinach with Chicken) Sweet Potato and Black Bean Enchiladas (using Egg Wraps instead of Tort

Those of you who were brought up on the notion that you had to 'count calories' in order to keep a healthy weight and to stay healthy, this blog is for you. For those of you that transitioned from counting calories to 'counting carbs' in order to lose weight and avoid diabetes, this blog is for you also. Some of you have been diagnosed with high blood pressure (or hypertension) and were told to count how many grams of sodium you were ingesting each day in order to keep your c

When you have nothing to say for your blog except how stinking hot it is, then you don't blog. That's what happens. Will glass coffins be a success? Remains to be seen.

I am making a pledge to myself to make the effort to try and eat more fruit. I know I should eat more fruit, I just have trouble making myself do it. If I eat too much fruit my body reacts in unpleasant ways, so I am not pledging to eat lots, just more. Every diet list of menus (the healthy ones) stick fruit in the plan as part of a meal or as the main part of a snack if not the snack all by itself. For day one you'd be eating a pear, an apple and a banana. All three in one d