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Thursday, March 11, 2010

Day 44 The Nitty Gritty

We got desperate enough to drink dried milk with our peanut butter sandwiches at noon today. I drank three glasses. It tasted great. The children tepidly finished four ounces each.

Breakfast: An attempt at a frittata - with no eggs and baked instead of fried. I browned 1/2 cup onion, added 1 cup chopped ham, 3 cups leftover cooked spaghetti, and about 1 cup of mayonnaise with 1/2 cup of Velveeta cheese, 1/2 cup flour to thicken and bind, salt and lemon pepper. I mixed this as well as I could and put in in the oven on a casserole dish. After 20 minutes my son was ready for breakfast so we pulled it from the oven. The flour and mayonnaise were not thick enough to set a "wedge" like a pie when we cut it - but it tasted great and the children liked it.

Dinner: 5:20 nothing started, the children crying and running, husband on his way home.... I threw some onions on the stove to brown. (Mom told me that the smell of good food will satisfy a hungry man for a couple of hours.) Before I could break away from helping another child with homework the onions burned - black. I quickly chopped more and started assembling a Tamale Pie: 1 cup onion, 1 cup chopped green pepper*, 1 can corn drained, 2 cups diced tomatoes, 1/3 cup ketchup instead of tomato paste, 1 TBS sugar, 1 tsp salt, 1 TBS chili powder, and 2 cups leftover chili instead of 1 pound ground beef. Mix all together over low heat. Add 1-1/2 cup Velveeta cheese instead of grated sharp cheddar. Make cornmeal by boiling 2 cups water or milk with 3/4 cup cornmeal and 1/2 tsp salt. Stir as it thickens, add 1 TBS butter and spread over the top of the tomato mixture. Bake for 40 minutes. By 7:00 dinner was served. The reviews: everyone thought it was delicious. Why haven't I made this before now? We sure seem to get stuck in our little ruts and we don't even know it. This will be another recipe to keep.

*These chopped peppers came from our garden two years ago. Banana Peppers were the only thing we harvested from our garden that year. So I chopped up all the extra peppers and put 10 small bags straight in the freezer without blanching. They freeze well, taste good, and add Vitamin C to our diet.

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