Our First Cooking PARTY!!
Happy National Canning month! 🙂 We will be doing canning parties all month! Join the fun on August 12 for a kid freezer jam party.
Homemade Potstickers with Bethany!
Back when I did the LIVE meet up for How to Batch Prep Ground Beef Bethany said she used her ground beef for Potstickers. I was intrigued, I always buy Potstickers for Costco, but also know that when you make them from scratch, they taste about a billion times better! So you can only guess my surprise when she offered to join up for a LIVE meet up and teach all of us how to do it. And now…I’m TOTALLY hooked!!
Super Easy, Blender Crepes
Just wondering….do you love crepes? Because I most certainly do! Unfortunately, a lot of people are scared to make them (I mean why wouldn’t you…they sell all sorts of separate contraptions to make them!) But really, they are quite easy to make with just a few tricks!
How to Batch Prep your Ground Beef in 3 Easy Steps
Let’s do a quick thought exercise…which feels easier to use for dinner tonight? Just imagine you open your freezer to pull out some meat for tonight’s dinner. Are you more likely to choose the prepped taco meat or a frozen 3lb chub of ground beef? I’m gonna go out on a limb and guess that you chose the prepped taco meat, and you would be RIGHT!! One of the biggest mistakes people make while trying to stock their freezer is coming home and sticking their fresh meat straight into the freezer. WHY? Because while it’s easier on the front end of grocery shopping, it’s infinitely harder when you go to actually use it! Now you have to thaw the meat (which, let’s be honest, is where most dinner plans go awry), but you also have to season, shape, and cook it. (Which feels like a lot of work at the end of the day, am I right?!) It’s actually much easier to come home from grocery shopping and assign it a job, then you’ll know just how to use it (which gives it a better shot of not collecting freezer burn in the back of your freezer) but it also helps you feel like dinner is EASY…which is the ultimate goal we’re all going for here.
HOW TO MAKE RESTAURANT-STYLE REFRIED BEANS (CHEATER STYLE)
Here’s the deal…if you had to choose between a can of refried beans sliding slowly into a bowl or delicious, cheesy, restaurant-style refried beans which would you choose? RIGHT? The restaurant-style beans hands-down. But I get it, the can o’ beans SEEMS easier. That’s why I want to show you how you can cheat the system. Get those beans you love with little effort and mess. This recipe is actually in the Outsmart Dinner Meal Planner in the Mexican Food Section but here’s the quick scoop on how you can do it….
How to Shape Hamburger & Hot Dog Buns…the Easy Way!
Let’s talk for a quick second why you’d want to make your own hamburger and hot dog buns…because I totally get it…it feels like a lot of work when you can buy super cheap $0.89 cents. AND…I’m totally with you. I don’t always make my own hamburger and hot dog buns, but when I do, they’re about a billion times better.
TWO SUPER EASY HOMEMADE PASTA SAUCES
Okay, I’m just going to say it….bottled Alfredo sauce just isn’t good and did I mention it’s also expensive? Bottled spaghetti sauce is great (especially when you catch it on sale…like 99-cents is a great price!) But sometimes you’re caught without it or you need more of a chunky marinara sauce, not just the run-of-the-mill Ragu stuff.
PERFECT ONE BOWL CHOCOLATE CAKE & MIX RECIPE
So in our house, we have a little tradition where the kids help me make their birthday cake and this week we have a birthday!
HOW TO MAKE DONUTS THAT TASTE JUST LIKE KRISPY KREME
Here we are in quarantine week #1,482,398. Am I right? It’s feeling a little like Groundhog Day over here. However, these LIVE meet ups have been keeping me and my kids sane because we LOVE doing these (and they love to eat what I show you how to make ;). This week we’re tackling foods that most people think are too difficult or messy to make at home and outsmarting them. Monday, Kate showed how to make biscuits super easy and today is DONUTS. I mean who can resist a warm, freshly made donut? No one…unless maybe you’re Voldemort…but he wasn’t really human…so….there’s that.
HOW TO MAKE BISCUITS SO EASY YOUR KID CAN MAKE THEM!
If you’re like most people, you’ve afraid to make biscuits. After all, they take a long time to make, make a HUGE mess on your counter….and let’s be real…are they really that much better than the canned biscuits? If that’s you, it’s not your fault. Biscuits CAN be very hard to make, but as Kate showed in the LIVE meet up (if you missed it click HERE) with these tips, biscuits are super easy! Plus, you can also make one/freeze one (you know how I love that) and keep some in the freezer for next time.
TURN YOUR OWN RECIPES INTO FREEZER MEALS
Who doesn’t love the idea of freezer meals? It makes dinner seem SO easy and effortless. However, if you’ve tried doing freezer meals, you’ve probably met up with some frustration as well. Either you didn’t really like the recipe after you made it, or your frozen-flat meal didn’t fit in your slow cooker when it came time to make, or if you’re like me it took so much effort to fill the freezer with freezer meals, you never wanted to eat them!
HOMEMADE PRETZELS WITH KIDS
I have to admit, I LOVE pretzels. Maybe it’s the salt, maybe it’s that melt-in-your-mouth middle with the chewy outside…or maybe it’s how much fun it is to make these with kids, but whatever it is, these are amazing.
HOMEMADE SEASONINGS
This post is based on a LIVE meet up on Instagram, if you missed it, you can rewatch it in our Facebook Group HERE. Homemade
NO-CHURN ICE CREAM KID PARTY (FROM STUFF YOU’VE GOT AROUND THE PANTRY!)
The beauty of no-churn ice cream is that it calls for just 3 basic ingredients (sweetened condensed milk, whipped cream, and vanilla) and doesn’t need an ice cream maker to make it. But if you’re like me, you don’t always have cream in the fridge or sweetened condensed milk in the pantry, which makes this simple recipe super annoying to make because if you have to make a trip to the store to buy ingredients for it, you might as well just buy some ice cream…ya know what I mean?
QUICK & EASY HOMEMADE GNOCCHI
*This post is based on a LIVE Instagram Meet Up I did on April 8, 2020, you can catch the video HERE in the private Outsmart Dinner Facebook group*
Looking for a fun dinner party idea, something to do with your kids while you’re on quarantine, or just a quick 4-ingredient substitute for pasta, this quick and easy gnocchi will knock your socks off.
SUPER EASY BRAIDED BREAD
Okay, if there’s one thing I love, it’s finding simple recipes (that are actually super easy to make) but look like you spent all day…because who doesn’t want to impress someone, or feel like the bomb dot com every once in awhile?! This simple technique can be used with your favorite dough recipe (French bread, cinnamon roll dough, wheat bread…seriously if it’s bread dough you can use it) and any filling you’d like. Personally, I like the 30-minute dough from the Outsmart Dinner Meal Planner because it’s pretty much the best dough to use for absolutely everything (think pizza, breadsticks, rolls, etc.)
COOKING WITH KIDS & HOMEMADE GRAHAM CRACKERS
Corona virus got you down? Are your kids bouncing off the walls? Looking for something fun to do? (I sure hope I’m not the only one that answered ‘yes’ to all of those questions!) With all the baking that’s going on while we’re all cooped up in our homes, it’s a great time to involve your kids! After all cooking with kids is a great way to teach them math, science, reading, and how to follow instructions.
4 SUPER EASY NO-YEAST BREADS
Today, I’m answering my top asked question: HOW DO YOU MAKE BREAD WITHOUT YEAST?! You see, with all the panic buying going on, a lot of people have been buying yeast with the hope of making bread, which means there are a lot of you wondering how you can make bread without yeast.
EASY HOMEMADE PIZOOKIES
So in today’s LIVE meet up on Instagram, we pulled a lot of other classes together (Freezer Cookie Dough + Other Amazing Cookie Hacks & How to Use Wheat Flour…AND LIKE IT!) to make this yummy treat happen! I mean just because COVID-19 is running around, doesn’t mean you can’t have a fun treat! But seriously, at a restaurant this would cost you close to $6 PER COOKIE. At home you can make it for under $1 a cookie and freeze any extra dough to make it even easier the next time you make it.
HOW TO USE WHEAT FLOUR & LIKE IT!
I get that using wheat flour can be scary, especially if you’re used to white flour in everything, or you were forced to eat whole wheat everything growing up like I was. But here’s the thing, chances are the wheat you ate growing up is NOT the wheat that is available now. Mostly because it used to be that only hard RED wheat was available to purchase. Red wheat is darker in color and comes with a stronger flavor. In the last 10-20 years, they’ve started offering hard WHITE wheat, which is lighter in color and milder in flavor….which means it perfect for you to use in your own baking.
4-INGREDIENT TORTILLAS THAT TASTE AUTHENTIC
Maybe you’re like me and you’ve tried to make homemade tortillas….a lot only to fail. Maybe you’ve never tried making them at home, but you do love those take and bake tortillas Costco sells. I’ve tried making tortillas several times over the last 10 years always to find that they were shaped like amoebas and didn’t taste good…until I found this recipe and watched a few YouTube videos about how to successfully roll ROUND tortillas and BINGO! 12 Delicious tortillas that taste totally authentic. But here’s why you’re going to love them…they cost under $1 to make and took about 20 minutes with no special ingredients, kitchen tools, or wait times. They are literally the simplest, best tasting tortilla around. But I’m going to give you a solid warning, when you try these you’ll vow never to buy tortillas again, that’s how good they are.
5 EMERGENCY BAKING SUBS FOR WHEN YOU CAN’T MAKE IT TO THE GROCERY STORE
Have you ever started a recipe and half way through realized you’re out of a crucial ingredient? And when that happens, are you excited to drop everything and run to the store? My guess is no. Having a back-up plan for basic baking ingredients is actually really smart and strategic…for more reasons than people panicking over a virus. So should you find yourself out of one of these ingredients, here’s a few options that will keep you from making an emergency trip to the store.
FREEZER COOKIE DOUGH + AMAZING COOKIE HACKS
BIG SORRY! Instagram hated us today and quit our live meetup in the middle, so I only have the second half of the video posted in our Facebook Group page. I’ll do my best to write out the tips I shared live below, and to make up for it, I’ll give away a Outsmart Meal Planner next week during one of the LIVE Instagram Meet ups.
POWDERED MILK THAT WON’T MAKE YOU GAG
When I sat down to write I Can’t Believe It’s Food Storage, I just knew I had to change people’s minds about powdered milk. Trust me, it’s better than you think. Of all the foods that can be stored long term powdered milk probably gets the worst rap. Most people think that it’s difficult to use and that it tastes bad. but today’s powdered milk actually tastes much better than what you probably drank as a child. Powdered milk is easy to use (it requires no special tools or cooking preparation), is an easy substitute in recipes calling for milk, and is less mess than fresh milk.
SUPER TASTY 3 MINUTE, RESTAURANT-STYLE MANGO SALSA
You know how sometimes you just get a super strong hankering for chips and salsa, like the good kind, from a restaurant? Hopefully, I’m not the only one who has that? Right? This recipe comes from my Outsmart Dinner Meal Planner and it can be made with stuff you’ve got around the house (my favorite part).
LEARN HOW TO MAKE BREAD LIKE A PRO…AND IMPRESS YOUR MOTHER-IN-LAW 😉
Bread making is becoming a lost art, but believe me when I tell you it’s not hard and that when you learn how to do it, you’ll never go back. I mean why would you? There’s literally no better smell than homemade bread and nothing that tastes better, or is more comforting, then a freshly-sliced, steaming, right-out-of-the-oven slice of bread with melted butter dripping all through it.