Camping & Cooking - Hamburger Stew

One really simple way to have some yummy, healthy food is to freeze leftovers at home, take them with you (use the frozen food in your cooler to save on ice and keep other things cool), and heat it back up when you're ready for it. We did that this time with Hamburger Stew.


~Cooking on the campfire~

HAMBURGER STEW - recipe from http://www.recipezaar.com/Hamburger-Stew-195266

Ingredients:
1 1/2 lbs hamburger meat - I used two pounds of local, pasture-raised hamburger
1/2 tablespoon instant minced garlic - I minced up at least 5 cloves myself
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon oregano
1 tablespoon worcestershire sauce
4 potatoes, cubed
1/2 yellow onion, chopped
1 (14 ounce) can carrots, undrained - I used fresh, organic carrots here (NOT canned!)
1 (14 ounce) can green beans, undrained - I drained mine
1 (14 ounce) can corn, undrained
1 (14 ounce) can peas, undrained
1 (4 ounce) can tomato sauce
2 (14 1/2 ounce) cans diced tomatoes, undrained -- For these last two ingredients, I didn't have them on hand. Instead I used up a couple cups worth of homemade ketchup (it is NOT like store-bought!!). It was a wonderful substitution.

~Since I was lacking all things fresh on hand, I did use canned goods when making this. If you wanted to use all fresh veggies from your garden or farmer's market I would say "go for it!". Just make yourself up some nice beef stock, and add some of that in to substitute for the lack of water from the cans.

To Cook -- Starting at Home!:
Brown your beef in a skillet, along with the the other first four ingredients. When it's browned, combine it along with the remaining ingredients in a nice stock-pot. Over a medium-high heat, bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low, cover, and let simmer for about 45 minutes, stirring occaisionally.
Obviously, you could make this while camping. If you were going to do so, I would definitely use fresh ingredients (picked up at the Farmer's Market on your way out!), and take along some pre-made frozen beef stock to add to the mix. If you're going to do it this way, you already know what you need to bring, so I don't feel a need to go through the steps.

We ate this for dinner one night at home, then I froze the leftovers. I find old yogurt containers really wonderful for freezing stuff for camping. Not the tiny ones mind you, no I'm talking about the 32oz (2 lb) containers. Freeze and label!
We take a small saucepan with us camping. This is one reason I like the yogurt containers - they're round and taller than they are wide. This allows the food to slide out fairly easily, and you don't have to worry about frozen, square edges that don't fit in your saucepan. If it's taller than your saucepan, it'll "melt" down as it cooks without making a mess.

To reheat for camping:
Get your coals going nice and hot. If you will notice in the photo above, we didn't use a grill over our fire for this. We often don't. We were able to balance this nicely on the logs, over the flames. Since this was a dinner meal, we had the bigger logs in there for to start building the fire for the night. Morning times you don't want as big a fire, it would be a waste of wood. Here it is all good.
You'll need to let this cook for about 15 minutes or so. I didn't have a watch (I was camping and relaxing, give me a break!), so I can't be precise. It will boil and sizzle, so stir it. It will take a little longer than you think to reheat this nicely. Do taste tests every time you stir it up. You don't want the bottom to burn before everything has had a chance to thaw.

This was definitely a nice dinner to have. Lots of veggies, great hamburger flavor too. I really liked the use of the homemade ketchup, but wouldn't dare substitute store-bought!! You can add extra veggies to this as you would like. To be honest, I wasn't too sure about the addition of green beans, but really liked them.
Try it and see what you think.

Camping & Cooking ~ Bacon Hash

For a lot of people, cooking while you're camping in the woods is a no-brainer but, for a lot of other people it seems you're limited to hotdogs, chips, and soda. Not necessarily bad things when you're camping, but not really GOOD things either.
I didn't grow up camping, and to my knowledge, never tent camped till I was in high-school or college (probably the latter). You can imagine my cooking skills DEFINITELY fell into the latter of the two sets mentioned above. So, here is my attempt to, very honestly, share some "Cooking While Camping" knowledge.
This is, hopefully, the start of a new special segment here. For this, I'm going to assume you're camping like we do. We usually camp fairly near our car, though without electricity or water hook-ups. We go to tent-camping sites, usually in local National Forests (we love Arcadia in VA). We're able to bring coolers and therefore prepare some things ahead of time. We ALWAYS strive to be as eco-minded as possible when camping, leaving the site the same or better than we we found it!!! You won't find paper plates here!
Now that we've got that cleared up, down to cooking. Let's start with the morning, because it is a good place to start. I found this recipe thanks to the ever-wise & inspiring Nick from Macheesmo. Here is the link for cooking this in the kitchen: http://www.macheesmo.com/2009/06/bacon-hash/?3c89ce38. This recipe was a perfect one for camping since Nick describes it as "There are some meals that were made to be eaten after a night out. This is most definitely one of them." I take Nick's word on things, and we definitely were going to be drinking the night before we would eat this.

BACON HASH

For the recipe itself, I'm going to advise you to check out Nick's (see above link). Honestly, I forgot to take "prep photos" but his really kick-ass, so do yourself a BIG OLE favor and check it out.
We began prepping the ingredients Tuesday night. We cut up several small potatoes and let them sit in a bowl of water in the fridge over night. Wednesday (the day before we left for camping), I zapped them in the microwave (still in the water) for a couple minutes before draining them. Then I quickly chopped up the bacon, onions, and garlic to mix in with the potatoes. I poured a little roasted garlic olive oil over it all, to ensure cooking, and wrapped the whole shebang tightly in aluminum foil, labeled it, and tossed it into the freezer.

Some things I've found: 1)Cooking in foil is VERY convenient when camping, resulting in easy cooking and clean-up. 2)If you freeze your foil pack well enough, it will "hold it's shape" in your cooler as well as keep other items cool in there.


Here is the foil-pack of Bacon Hash, put on a small grill over the fire first thing Friday morning.


Here it is, flipped once and still cooking. It will hiss and sizzle and you will be sure you've burned it. You may blacken the edges, but fear not. Always flip your food if you can when cooking in a foil pack, and never assume it's cooked just because it sounds like it is boiling or sizzling.


Off the fire and opened up. You can see where the edges did get blackened a little, but that was the utterly delicious crispy parts. This is SO much better than Pop-Tarts in the morning!!!


The finished result. Justin had already eaten half his bowl by the time I could take this photo.

As you can see in the photo, we use some old enamel-ware bowls that were once my grandmother's, and we also bring our own utensils. It makes camping more pleasureable and clean-up really isn't that much more of a hassle. This dish came out wonderfully! The bacon didn't get dark and crispy like it would cooked in a skillet (which IS an option when camping!), but it was still yummy. It definitely hit the spot for first thing in the morning and made us very, very happy. Even if you aren't drinking the night before, this is still a yummy breakfast when camping.

Clean-Up:
1) Either put the aluminum foil in the trash, or save it for recycling when you get home. We often have two "trash" containers just for this purpose.
2) Fill up an old two-liter bottle (or something of the like) with water and a good squirt of eco-friendly dish detergent. If you want, fill up a second with just water.
3) Bring a good wash-rag from home. Put a little soapy water on it, and use it to clean off your plates, bowls, and utensils. If you brought clean water, feel free to rinse and repeat, but honestly, we skipped that the last couple of times with no ill side-effects.
4) Put your dishes away. We bring a "kitchen box" along, stocked with plates, bowls, utensils, etc. After we're done, they go back in there. If we're near the car we keep them in the car to keep any bugs out. This may evolve over time.

Inside & Outside Cheeseburgers

My mother claims to not be a cook at all, but this is one of my earliest memories of her cooking. The earliest is cookies cooling on the chopping block in our kitchen - but what kid doesn't remember that first?? I think she made these about the time I was in first grade. They were awesome then, and they're just as awesome now.


the burger, ready for cheese

"Inside & Outside" Cheeseburgers:

We started with 1/4 lb (roughly) of hamburger per burger. Our meat comes from a local farm and is organically, pasture-raised. This is real meat.
For these burgers, I first mixed in some spices with the meat. For the kids and myself, I used some organic garlic powder (although some freshly roasted garlic, or just garlic cloves would've rocked even more). For Justin, I made one burger with chili powder, garlic powder, and chipotle pepper; and then the second one with garlic powder and some HOT! HOT!! Pepper Flakes.
The Inside: make a well in the center of the burger, and fill it with cheese. I used just some general marble, shredded cheese here. You could go fancy and use blue cheese, feta cheese, or grate yourself up some homemade raw milk cheese. But the general shredded stuff works well too. ~ For extra flavors: add some spices to the center with the cheese. I also added a little bit of ketchup to the boys' burgers.


filled with cheese, ready to be closed-up

Next: close-up the burger around the cheese. This really isn't that difficult at all. If you do have trouble at first, don't fret. By the second or third burger, you should easily have the hang of it.
Cook Em: We grilled ours on a nice hot grill outside. It's the essence of summer cooking isn't it?? No grill, don't worry, you can pan-cook these babies and still get delicious results. ~ Here's the trick to making sure they don't shrink up on you: before you put them on the grill, indent the center with your thumb a little bit. This is a little tricky because the cheese is inside, so make sure not to mess that up. Just a nice, small indention will do.
A second or two before you're ready to pull them off the grill, add a slice or two of cheese on top. American cheese is perfect because of how well it melts, but again, you can make it personal and use another type. Just beware that some cheeses don't melt so well.
Have your buns, extra toppings, and a big appetite ready. These are destined to be crowd pleasers, and are sure to be remembered!!

PS ~ thanks Mom!

Homemade Conditioner for Your Hair

I've been making our own conditioner for over a year now. While I played around with the "recipe" for a bit, I've finally figured out a good base recipe. I decided to post this here, as it is something you make in your kitchen; kitchens and cooking aren't just for food!
So here is my recipe for Homemade Conditioner:

I use a 1/2 gallon glass milk jug to hold the conditioner. The first thing I add is some apple cider.

As you can see, I fill it up to that base line. If you're using a different type of glass jar, you can guess-timate, or add about a cup worth of apple cider vinegar (err on the less side).
Depending on the season, I will also add up to a 1/2 cup of lemon juice to help lighten up my hair some. I didn't do it this time as I am currently plenty blonde. This would be where you could add other herbs or juices to help infuse your hair with extra color if you wished.

This next step is optional. As you can see in the above photo, I add one tea bag each of Chamomile & Lavender tea and Nettle tea. Chamomile tea is a good herbal conditioner in and of itself ~ I chose the blend just because I liked the scent. I use Nettle tea as nettles are also very good for your hair and scalp. You don't have to use any tea, you can just use plain water if you'd like - it's your choice. However, if you DO use tea, heed this: "warm up" your glass jar first by swirling some hot water inside it and also on the outside (it will feel warm to the touch, just as a nice mug would) -- if not, you run the risk of the glass breaking when you pour boiling water in! I put my tea bags directly in the glass jar and get some water boiling. I will pour the water in after the next step.

Yes, that is beer. Preferably, you want the beer flat. Mainly because then you don't have to worry about waiting for the head to die down. Drink half the beer, pour the other half into the jar. Although you don't have to use beer, this is the ingredient I consider the *key* ingredient. Beer is wonderful at conditioning your hair and I've noticed a great change in my hair since I started adding the beer. Any beer will do. We homebrew, so I use beer I like (you might as well). This was a brown ale, and it has worked quite well. Last time I made conditioner I used some of our Stout beer. It was pure heaven!! The scent was stronger (though it does NOT stay in your hair - you can just smell it while you're in the shower, then it is gone) and this was something I really liked, but that was more thanks to the stout beer than anything else. I wouldn't use miller lite or budweiser, but then again I wouldn't drink that stuff either - I'm a beer snob. But you can use any type of beer. I have a feeling that the heavier beers condition your hair better, but no proof yet to back that up.
After I add the beer, I add the hot/boiling water. I do this over the sink, somewhere where I don't have to have my hands on the jar. I tend to burn myself otherwise. Fill up the jar with the water. You're pretty much done now.

The bottle beside the glass jug is what actually stays in the shower. It isn't anything special, but the top works great for dispensing the conditioner. You could use an old shampoo or conditioner bottle, or even an old sport drink/water bottle. That little pull-up top is what I like, it keeps it all from coming out too fast (this isn't cream rinse!) for me. The bottle is a different color in the photo only because I didn't need to actually fill it up, but took it out of the shower so I could have it in the photo - I had used a different beer last time, hence the different color. You can fill up your bottle right then, or wait till it cools down some. I store the glass jug in the fridge and just fill the bottle up as needed. It has never "gone bad" and is extremely economical!! This is some really good stuff here, we have great hair and no complaints. The only difference I've noticed is that my hair doesn't feel as "instantly" silky as it did with the store-bought stuff, but after my hair dries that goes away. I think I can live with that.

Crock-Pot Sloppy Joe's

Above is a photo I snapped of the finish product, after we had already eaten it down quite a bit (two sandwiches per person if I remember correctly!). I can't remember the last time I made homemade sloppy joes, but I do know it will be a summer staple now. And, as usual, there is NO GOING BACK to store-bought cans of sloppy joe stuff. blech.
If you aren't completely in love with your Crock-Pot (aka - slow cooker) yet, you're really missing out on a wonderful and lifelong relationship opportunity! I made this dish up on March 7th. Even though we had snow on the 2nd, by the 7th the temperatures were up in the upper 70's here and so that Saturday we were busy bees out in the yard. Cooking dinner wasn't high on my list. Viola - my Crock-Pot to the rescue!!
This recipe comes from a wonderful cookbook: Crock-Pot ~ Best-Loved Slow Cooker Recipes. It was given to me as a gift and is definitely one of my staples now!

Suzie's Sloppy Joes

*3 pounds 95% lean ground beef (I used 1 lb. ground beef, 1 lb. sausage, and 1 lb. ground deer meat - all pasture raised - wonderful results!!)*1 cup chopped onion
*3 cloves garlic, minced
*1 1/4 cups ketchup (I used 1/4 cup organic store-bought ketchup, then switched to some homemade ketchup for the remainder cup)
*1 cup chopped red bell pepper (I omitted this only because I was out)
*1/4 cup + 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
*1/4 cup dark brown sugar
*3 tablespoons prepared mustard
*3 tablespoons vinegar (I left this out only because the homemade ketchup I used has a lot of vinegar in it already)*2 teaspoons chili powder

~Cook and stir the meat (really, using the blend was awesome!), onion, and garlic in a large, nonstick skillet (I used my good ole cast-iron skillet) over medium-high heat until meat is browned and onion is tender. Drain fat if needed -- since I was using pasture-raised organic meat there is never much fat to drain off, so I skipped this step (not to mention, the extra fat melded the flavors of the 3 meats like a champ). I also added several tablespoons of ketchup & a couple of the Worcestershire sauce directly to the meat, onion, and garlic mixture while it cooked.
~Combine ketchup, bell pepper, Worcestershire sauce, sugar, mustard, vinegar and chili powder in Crock-Pot slow cooker. Stir in meat mixture. Cover; cook on LOW 6-8 hours. To serve, spoon mixture onto hamburger buns. ~~ Freeze leftovers for later!! YUMMY!!




For a side, I cooked up some fresh green beans, as you can clearly see. We did add some cheese to the boys' sloppy joes, but we are a cheese-addicted family!! :) This was definitely a nice dinner to come in to after working out in the yard all day. The best part was the kitchen wasn't all heated up from cooking too! YAY!

St. Patrick's Day Pancakes

Not your most Irish of dishes, I know. But, our kids LOVE pancakes!!! If you ask Shannon what he wants for dinner there is a pretty certain chance you will get that as an answer. And, like so often happens, I had promised to make them Monday night .. and then forgot .. so, St. Patrick's Day pancakes we had!

First, if you've never made pancakes from scratch you're missing out. Now that we've been making them from scratch, I can't even begin to fathom eating them any other way!! IHOP and Denny's commercials make me sick & angry .. their pancakes (and eggs, and bacon, and so on) look plastic and fake .. not the least bit appetizing! Making them from scratch is so easy!

Here is the recipe. Like so many of my favorite recipes, it comes from my Grandmother's Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook. If you don't have one, go to a yard sale, the Goodwill, or wherever and find yourself a copy from about 1963.

Favorite Pancakes:

1 1/4 cups all purpose flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 beaten egg
1 cup milk
2 tablespoons melted butter

~ Mix all ingredients well & bake on a hot griddle.

I'm not too fancy here. I don't sift my dry ingredients in one bowl, mix my wet ingredients in another and then blend .. I mix 'em all at one together in the same bowl. The batter will be lumpy, and this is ok. I use butter in lieu of oil, although I have been known to use a little bacon fat if I happen to have it. Of course, my butter is my homemade butter, my bacon fat comes from pasture-raised bacon. Our milk is raw milk, the flour usually locally grown and at least 1/2 whole wheat, the sugar is turbinado, and the salt is Real Salt (http://www.realsalt.com).
I DO cook them (as you can see in the photo) in a cast-iron skillet, and I HIGHLY recommend this!! I pre-heat my skillet on medium or medium-high, but as I am cooking I can usually turn it down to medium-low. I LOVE being able to cook on such a low heat without sacrificing anything!! Check out the bottom of my blog for more info about cast-iron cooking and cookware.
For the green coloring I will admit to using green food coloring. I've been reading some about making your own, all-natural food coloring and am VERY interested in this, but it was dinner time, the boys were hungry, I had it on hand.
And there you go, our St. Patrick's Day dinner for 2009. We even had company (Uncle Matt), and everyone left the table happy & with a full belly.

Jewish Penicillin

Ahh, life here in South Western Virginia. Here we are in February and the weather outside is truly frightful: one day it is in the 60's and less than a week later we're back to in the 30's, along with insane wind and flurries. It really isn't a huge mystery why we're all getting sick, is it?
Justin and I were feeling pretty beat-up last night, and I still had dinner looming ahead of me. At times, cooking is less of a pleasure and more of a chore, but when you're not feeling too good it can appear downright like torture!! But, aha, it would be food to the rescue, via some homemade chicken noodle soup.

Ok, first, some confessions. One, it wasn't chicken noodle soup. It was turkey noodle soup! When we buy turkeys from the farm (pasture raised as they ought to be), we always get at least two. I, of course, make stock with the cooked carcasses, and store that away for future uses. That second turkey though we tend to have a lot of left-overs with that get safely stored away in the freezer. Second Confession: I've NEVER made homemade chicken (or turkey) noodle soup before!! YIKES!! I was raised on Campbell's and until now that had always been good enough. Third Confession: if there had been Campbell's in the cupboard, I probably would've made it last night. I am SO glad we didn't have any!!
Here is the basic recipe:

Chicken or Turkey Noodle Soup:
I chose a regular sized stock-pan, one I would use for making chili in. Into this went frozen and canned (I canned this year!) homemade turkey stock. Don't use water!! I did this, not wanting the flavor to be too strong and I ended up adding some bouillon to it because it tasted to watery ~ bleh! But, if yours comes out watery, know to just add some bouillon to fix it. Pretty much fill up the pot with stock.
Into this I added (all organic stuff): 3 chopped up carrots, 2 diced up onions, 3 cloves of garlic (minced), and some nice amounts (tablespoon or so) of dill, tarragon, and parsley, along with salt & pepper to taste. Bring it all to a boil, reduce heat to a rolling simmer, and let cook about 20 minutes or so ~ I knew it was good to go when the carrots were soft.
We took already-cooked turkey out of the freezer, and heated it up. We then chopped up a good amount of it (small chopping board full .. let's say somewhere between 4 & 6 cups worth), and tossed it into the pot.
Finally, after we knew the veggies were cooked to where we were happy with them, we added a bag of Egg Noodles, brought it all back to a boil, reduced the heat again, and let it cook for a good 10 minutes or so. You'll know it is ready when the aroma is so intoxicating that you're ready to dunk your head in the pot!!
I have to tell you, Campbell's has NOTHING on this homemade soup! I can't wait to try this again and actually make the noodles myself. Making the soup was really nice and easy too. Just taking already put-by food out and tossing it into the pot, cutting up some veggies and tossing them in, and then resting until it was done. This is the type of cooking that, when you're sick, is DEFINITELY NOT a chore or torture!!!! We had a lot more than we could eat ~ some leftovers went into the fridge for today's lunch, the rest went into the freezer for future meals. Some we shared with relatives who are also battling the cold. If you're not already an old hand at canning, I would recommend freezing the soup.
There is a reason chicken noodle soup is affectionately known as "the Jewish penicillin." When made with pasture-raised poultry (this is KEY and I can't stress the importance of that enough!!), the fat in the skin of the chicken is chock-full of CLA. Conjugated Linoleic Acid. This is some serious sick-germ-butt-kickin' stuff!!! This is NOT a time to be scared of some fat in the soup ~ you're sick and you want it!! For more info on CLA, scroll down to the post on making stock .. or also read "Real Food; what to eat and why" by Nina Planck.
If you haven't made this before, try it. You won't regret it and you won't give a second look at canned soup in the grocery aisle. When you get a little more of an appetite, pair it with some fresh-baked, homemade bread to help fill you up some more.
~And, just for the record: yes, we have a cold, no we haven't taken any OTC, chemically-filled, medicine. We did take some homeopathic cold-care medicine from Hyland's (check out my main blog to learn more there), but we only had 3 pills left, and we'll have to order more online. So, really, no meds at all. I've been sucking on some "herbal supplement" lozenges from Hall's (yes, yes, I know - but they were in the medicine closet & I am frugal!!), trying to get this dry hack down, but they don't seem to be helping. Other than that, lots of fluids (especially some raw milk!!! Vitamin C galore there!!), warm teas, and even some hot cocoa with whiskey in it!!
A close relative has the same cold, and loaded up on the meds. She seemed to really struggle with it, but after a long weekend, seems to be back on her feet. I think it is the meds that were making her struggle so hard with the cold, meds always seem to make you feel more awful while they're supposedly making you feel better.
Colds need time. Give your body time. Rest, get fluids, make up a big batch of homemade chicken (or turkey) noodle soup. Eat, drink, rest, repeat. Feel better soon and know that you haven't added anything other than goodness (and maybe some whiskey ... we can argue the merits of that another time) to your body.