mmmmmm…. food
Since we started buying spices in bulk at open harvest, we have looked for good spice containers. We have bought jars and other things but none seem to work out as good as we hoped. Alton Brown uses metal canisters which he attaches them with velcro. We saw similar ones at BB&B and decided to go for it. Did an uber clean on the pantry and picked out our 10 favorite spices for the jars. I hope they are air tight enough.
Your basic bean dip. Theresa thinks pinto’s are gross, but loves garbonzo mush. We had a jar of garlic in a jar of liquid and I used a ton of it in this hummus. It was too weak, Added some fresh and it became garlic napalm. Toasted some sesame seeds, lightly toasted the garbonzo beans, added a bit of olive oil.
Had a potluck over at a friends Friday night. There was corned beef with new potatoes, flank steak for burritos, and the kids made these awesome cupcakes. Lemon skittles make up the corn kernels and the butter is a melted lemon starburst. Too cute.
Then how do you feed 50 people at a cabin on the lake? 3 rocking charcoal grills. Those are bacon wrapped deer fillets. They were delicious. Tons of dogs and burgers left everybody stuffed.
The wind kept the smoke away most of the time, but every now and then we got smoked out big time.
These showed up in the mail today. What an amazing deal. 1/2 pound or around 60 Grade A Gourmet Tahitian Vanilla Beans for $16.49 including shipping. From vanilla products USA through their ebay store
The jar next to the beans contained 2 beans and was $9.00
I went with Tahitian just cuz they sounded cooler. What is the difference you ask?
Planifolia beans, commonly known as Madagascar Bourbon, is the taste most people are familiar with. Vanilla Extract that you would normally buy at the supermarket is usually made with Madagascar beans.Tahitian beans also contain heliotropin, an organic compound that imparts a sweet, floral, fruity flavor.
Gonna make some extract, uber ice cream, and some sugar.
Really strange I found this clone of my main site template. I plan on working to customize it here soon. The green banner will be replaced. I want this site to shine like Giada’s teeth 
I could not take the dark background anymore. And the template made it hard to edit. many other issues as well.
Thanks for visiting.
Theresa has been making treats for a long time. one two. As with the animal soup they are only an addition to regular food. Sure the stuff we make is full of nutrients, but bought food has nutrients worked in that might not be met by the ingredients from the homemade stuff.
If you plan to feed your animal only food you make you need to pick up supplements and mix them into your food. Also the formula Theresa follows is pretty specific. Animals differ in their nutritional needs. One book that goes into great detail has three weight classes and 4 recipes each. You are not supposed to try and size up a recipe cuz it throws off the nutritional balance. Food we make is 1/4 of their intake.
With the treats, a usual ingredient is the dry food to bulk them up. We mix in dry when they get soup in their bowls. I would think you could mix in dry stuff earlier to make it more palatable for finicky eaters.
Veg is cheap, meat and some of the ingredients used make it will be more expensive than what you would get out of dry food, but not too much. Bulk bins for grains and beans, cheap meat, left overs appropriate for the pets, it is not too much more of an expense when compared to the well being and actually happiness of our pets. Plus Theresa loves to cook for them. If all her baking was for just us we would be in trouble
With the whole pet food scare last year and knowing what really goes into dog food and bought treats Theresa decided to start making her own to supplement the bought stuff. She saw Rachel Ray do a show on dog food, got a few books, and now makes huge batches once a month or so. They are balanced with the nutrition the dogs need. We have lots of tupperware and two freezers. The animals get dry food in the mornings, and a mixture of dry and doggie soup in the evenings.
Not gonna splain it all since she took these pics and she mixes the recipes up often, but it is usually something like this:
Meat is not uber lean and is usually a mix of pork, chicken, beef, turkey, or trimmings, and leftover cooked meat.
Veg of some sort and lots of them (some mixed in the meatballs others in the soup)
protien from beans, sunflower seeds
bread crumbs, egg, rice, and pasta.
Chicken broth watered down for the base.
Of course seasoning is not really used and bad stuff avoided. It is more of a thick stew actually.
The pups get berry muffins, chese biscuts, pupsicles, and doggie biscotti. The kitty food is lentils, chicken, veg, and broth. A dog will eat anything, but they love the soup. If you watch them eat they go for the good stuff and finish off the dry food last. They have a shine to their fur and seem healthy.
