Mommies Magazine

Crock Pot Cooking Saves Cash

Posted on 05. Dec, 2008 by The Mommy Circle.

First introduced in 1971, the Crock-Pot revolutionized the way we cook meals. The word Crock-Pot is actually trademarked by Rival Industries, but is used in every day conversations instead of the term slow cooker. Many

recipes for the crock-pot require little preparation. The slow cooker can then safely be left to run unattended, making it a convenient cooking method.

Crock-pot meals can not only save you time in the kitchen, but they can also save you money as well. The reasons are as follows:

1. It keeps you out of the fast food line. If you had not loading up the crock-pot with the ingredients this morning you’d likely be in the drive through line at the local fast food restaurant this afternoon after work, grabbing a meal for your family. The average fast food meal for a family of four rings up over $20.

2. Stretches your dollar. Most crock-pot recipes and meals can truly stretch your food dollar. Because you can put a whole chicken in the crock-pot to cook then cut it up for several meals, you can stretch your budget with the use your leftovers.

3. Cuts your grocery budget. You can save money at the butcher since the slow cooking process is especially useful to tenderize cheaper cuts of meat.

4. Saves on your energy bill. Instead of running a larger appliance like the stove you are running one small energy conservative appliance, the crock-pot, saving on your energy costs.

The convenience of the slow cooker not only saves you time, but will also save you money. Don’t you think it’s time to take it out of your closet (or wherever you have it packed away collecting dust) and make a Crock-Pot meal today?

Cara Mirabella is a WAHM with one toddler from New Jersey. She owns and manages TheHouseholdHelper.com - a site dedicated to saving your time, money and sanity when managing your household. She has written several articles, reports and e-books including “Recipes For Every Occassion: 470 Crock Pot Recipes”

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Healthy Reasons For Eating at Home

Posted on 22. Nov, 2008 by The Mommy Circle.

If you are looking for an easy way to achieve a healthy life for you and your family, one of the most effective ways is to eat in. Here are some useful tricks.

With our busy lifestyles, preparing your own meals is often exchanged with quick meals at fast food or casual dining dining establishments. Not only are these choices usually more cost prohibited than eating in, but also less healthy. You can dramatically improve the health benefits by staying in to eat.

Eating at Home Puts You in Control
Eating at home has many health benefits, but more importantly it gives you the options of what ingredients you decide to include or not include in your meals. Have you ever glanced at what a hamburger at a casual dining restaurant is made from- there can be tons of ingredients, some with names you haven’t heard of or are unable to pronounce. When you prepare home-cooked meals, you can keep your foods natural and basic.

Do You Have Special Dietary Needs?
Another health benefit of eating in is that if you have special dietary restrictions such as limitations on fat in your foods, you can conveniently fix dishes that accommodate your guidelines. No need to fret if the restaurant has a low salt dish or if there is any extra sugar added to a dish.

Portion Control
One of the reasons that many people have gained weight is due to the portions that many fast food restaurants give you. They are much larger than recommended. If you eat at home, you can choose the appropriate portions for you and your family members, eliminating unnecessary food intake.

Food Allergens
When you eat at home, you can be more mindful in preparing foods, especially if you or a family member has a food allergy. Food allergies many times can be serious and possibly even deadly. Preparing food at home can eliminate the risk of an allergic reaction to allergic food reaction.

Quality Time
Another benefit to preparing meals at home is the quality of time spent with each other. Everyone likes to be pampered at times so it’s okay to eat out once in a while. However, eating at home allows you to spend quality time with loved ones. Each person can take part in meal preparation so it’s a shared event. By allowing children to participate in meal planning and cooking you are teaching them valuable self-sufficiency skills. The atmosphere is more conducive to sharing stories.

Make a pledge to prepare more home-cooked meals. The benefits of eating in exceed the time it takes to prepare a home-cooked meal. Your family will thank you in the end.

Dine Without Whine is a great menu planning service for active families. Go to http://www.dinewithoutwhine.com to discover even more rewards to menu planning.

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Reduce Mealtime Stress

Posted on 15. Nov, 2008 by The Mommy Circle.

Mealtimes should be a time for the entire family to sit, relax and enjoy some family time together at the end of the day but this isn’t usually the case is it?  Kids are hiding their unwanted veggies in a napkin or feeding most of their unwanted main course to the dog. Not exactly what you had in mind while slaving over the hot stove after a long day of work or a day of totting the kids around huh?

Why let meals be another stress when you can have someone else take care of all the planning for you?  Yes, you can have someone else plan out your families meals making one less task you need to stress about.  I’m talking about menu planning services.  Not only do you get your meals planned out but you also get your grocery lists prepared for you so you only get what you need which saves you from having to run around the grocery store trying to figure out what you need for the week or even month.  With your grocery list already prepared you can check out the deals and look for some coupons and save.  Some services also offer tips to keep your organized for meal preparation time which makes life much easier for you when it comes to dinner time. One such services is www.MenuPlanningCentral.com Make sure you check it out.

Another option would be to pull out that crock pot and begin using it to your advantage.  Crock pot cooking can be a tremendous time saver.  Simply add all your ingredients in the morning, set it to low and off you go.  By the time you get back from work or just in time for dinner your meal is already and waiting.  Even better you only have one pot to clean. Woohoo! Who doesn’t love fewer dishes to wash?

Why not make it a fun thing?  Grab a couple of girlfriends, set aside a day to get together and bulk cook.  Work together, make larger than normal size batches of your favorite meals and then split the portions up.  Everyone will get to take some meals home, and you’ve gotten a little girl talk in with some friends at the same time.  Doing this, will give you some “girl time”, save you some money and save you some time as well as get you some great meals. 

Try freezer meals too.  Prepare large quantities of foods your family likes, divide them into meal size portions and place them in the freezer for easy preparation later.  All you’ll need to do is pull themout of the freezer, heat and serve.

With a little preparation and a little help you can make dinnertime pleasant for your family and for you.

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What to Look for When Choosing Pots & Pans

Posted on 13. Nov, 2008 by The Mommy Circle.

Just as any good carpenter requires the exact tools to get the job done, so does a cook require the right tools - in this case pots and pans. We don’t realize it, but pots and pans have a lot to do with the type of foods we cook and the quality and ease of creating such meals. If you are seeking to maximize your meals and cooking experience, here are some tips on the precise pots and pans to use.

Every Family Can Benefit from a High Quality Pot and Pan Set
Today’s pots and pans can easily last numerous years even with constant use, so it is definitely worth the extra dough to buy a high quality pot and pan set that won’t give you issues for several years, instead of a set that can save a couple of hundred dollars at this moment in time but will lose their value in half the time. While you don’t need a signature pot and pan set, do your homework and comparison shop. You will be pleasantly at how affordable a high quality pot and pan set can be.

Essential Pots and Pans
You don’t have to be a master chef to use a wide variety of pots and pans in your home. Whether you are an occasional chef or cook meals each day, a wide variety of pots and pans is a great idea. Every good set should have a minimum of two types of sauce pans, usually 1 quart or 1.5/2 quart with lids, two varieties of skillets and baking casserole dishes. While each pot and pan set can vary, choose the one that most closely fits your cooking style.

Non-Stick is a Time Saver
Definitely, one of the greatest inventions in cooking has been the non stick pan and while there are a couple varieties of non stick surface types, they all are often great at saving you time and energy cleaning off the mess. One of the ways to maximize your cooking surface, especially if it is a non stick pot or pan is to use plastic or soft edged wooden utensils. Never scratch the non stick surface and never use any kind of metal to scrape at the pot or pan. This will significantly decrease the life and effectiveness of the non stick pot or pan.

Add Some Style to Your Kitchen
One of the best reasons to buy a new set of pots and pans is if you are redesigning your kitchen. There are so many varieties for pots and pans and with so many types of colors, finishes, materials and designs available, you can simply accent your kitchen with a beautiful set of pots and pans.

While usually neglected, pots and pans are one of the most crucial tools in your house. Whether you cook a one day a week or several, the better the tools of the trade, the higher quality and easy your meals will be to create.

Dine Without Whine is a great menu planning service for active families. Go to http://www.dinewithoutwhine.com to discover even more rewards to menu planning.

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Healthful Snacks For Kids

Posted on 05. Nov, 2008 by The Mommy Circle.

Now days, more than ever children should be eating healthier. For millions of children in America consuming junk food and increased inactivity has led to obesity and an increasing number of children being above ideal weight. Not only is it important to teach your child which snacks they should eat, but educating them during the early, formidable years may help them sidestep obesity and becoming overweight in the future when they are adults. Here are some tricks on tasty healthy snacks for children.

One way for your children to eat healthy snacks is to get them started on naturally sweet foods. Since most kids crave sweets for snacks, naturally sweet foods such as fruits are ideal. Encourage them to enjoy a banana, orange, apple, cherries, strawberries and other berries whenever they have a sweet tooth. You can mix in yogurt or even make a fruit smoothie for them with some milk and a drop of chocolate or other natural flavors.

Another great way for your little ones to enjoy healthy snacks is to give them fresh nuts. Kids love peanuts, walnuts, sunflower seeds, almonds, etc. One of the things to recognize about children is that if they try enough types of natural and healthy snacks, they will find one that they love. The problem is that many times parents give up trying to find the snacks that their kids enjoy and settle for popular junk foods instead.

When deciding on a healthy snack, what you want to avoid are products with boatloads of sugars, unwanted preservatives and empty calories. While most kids will fight you tooth and nail if they have to eat wheat germ and tofu, most children will be more than happy to eat snacks if they have a sweet taste and are presented in the right way.

Other healthy snacks that many children like are dry cereals. For example, there are many breakfast cereals that are derived from corn, wheat, bran and include nuts and honey. These cereals when consumed at breakfast usually include milk; however, you can easily serve them without milk to your children. One of the most popular dry cereals which are healthy and nutritious for your little one at almost any age is Cheerios. Cheerios are lightly sweetened and tasty either moistened with milk or dry. If your little one craves a delicious snack for lunch or to take along for camp or little league, dry cereal is not only nutritious, but delicious.

For those children that are terribly picky and only want junk food, one strategy to use in order to get your child to eat nutritious snacks is to buy premade natural snacks. Today, there are tons of prepackaged snacks that might look like junk food, but are actually healthy and nutritious for your little one. They include certain fruit roll ups, string cheese and granola bars. Many of these snacks look like junk food, but are actually made from natural ingredients and include relatively little sugar and empty calories. If you are looking for a great way for your child to remain healthy, check out the above mentioned tricks on healthy snacks for little ones.

Dine Without Whine is a great menu planning service for active families. Go to http://www.dinewithoutwhine.com to discover even more rewards to menu planning.

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Not Again! I’m Out Of… Cooking Substitutions To Help In a Bind

Posted on 30. Oct, 2008 by The Mommy Circle.

For a lot of cooks, there are times when we don’t have the appropriate ingredients in the pantry to make our desired recipe. If you find yourself in this situation, don’t despair, you probably have a suitable substitution on hand, saving the cook a trip to the grocery store. Here are a few.

Milk
Many recipes call for milk. If you find you are out of milk or short on the amount necessary to finish a specific recipe, make sure you have a supply of evaporated milk on hand. Evaporated milk or reconstituted milk can be kept for long periods of time and once mixed with water and usually a drop of butter, can easily taste as fresh and delicious as regular milk.

Baking Powder
If you don’t have baking powder readily available, use baking soda and a drop of buttermilk. For a tablespoon of double acting baking powder, substitute 1/4 teaspoon of baking soda and a 1/2 cup of buttermilk.

Self Rising Flour
Self rising flour is convenient to create at home, just combine one cup of all purpose flour with 1/4 teaspoon of baking soda, 1/4 teaspoon of salt and 1 teaspoon of baking powder.

Butter Milk
Out of butter milk? You can easily prepare your own. You can substitute 1 cup of butter milk with 1 cup whole milk and a tablespoon of vinegar. You can also substitute 1 cup of butter milk with 2/3 cup of plain yogurt and 1/3 cup whole milk.

Garlic
Need garlic, but don’t have any? Replace it with garlic powder instead. About 1 clove of garlic equals 1/8 of a teaspoon of garlic powder.

Honey
You can simply replace honey with sugar and water. 1 cup of honey is equal to about 1 and 1/4 cup of sugar and a 1/4 cup of water.

Substituting Sugar
If you are short on sugar on hand or would like to replace it because of health concerns, here are some hints to substitute sugar:

Sugar can be exchanged with maple syrup, corn syrup, brown sugar, honey, Stevia, and molasses. However, some recipes will call for sugar or a granular sweetener instead of syrup due to baking and texture requirements.

If you would like to reduce the amount of sugar you eat because of health issues, consider the many sweeteners, sometimes called sugar alternatives at the supermarket. They include, Sweet and Low, Splenda, Equal, and plant derived Stevia.

Dine Without Whine is a great menu planning service for active families. Go to http://www.dinewithoutwhine.com to discover even more rewards to menu planning.

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