Potato Skins

For this I have to thank Simply Recipes.  Without the beautiful photography on that blog, I may not have made these and that would have been a shame.  I, of course, had to put my own spin on these.

Here is what I did:

1.  Bake some potatoes - I usually use Russet potatoes, wash them, dry them and smear them with a tiny bit of butter.  I have found the easiest way to do this is take a baggie on my hand, pinch off a bit of butter and proceed to rub it all over the potato (or pan - if I need to grease a pan).  I know that many people pierce their potatoes with a fork to keep them from exploding, but I come from a potato growing family and we have never had that problem.  I bake them at 400 for about 45-60 minutes, or at 325 for as long as I feel like it.  :o)  It is completely possible to over-bake potatoes, and I have done it a few times, but the insides are fine, it is just the skins that aren't so tasty anymore. 

2.  Serve as baked potatoes.  My family doesn't usually eat the skins of their baked potatoes anyway, so this doesn't matter.  You could also cut them in half and scoop out the flesh for mashed potatoes, or hash, or a number of things.

3.  Scoop out any remaining flesh, and save for another purpose.  I scoop almost all of it out instead of leaving a 1/4 inch or so like most people because I like the skins to be crunchy.  My skins also don't look nice and neat like Simply Recipe's, but they are still very tasty! 

4.  Heat up the oven to 450 degrees.  Place skins on a rimmed cookie sheet.  Brush or spray with olive oil - or whatever oil suits you - on both sides. 

5.  Bake for 15-20 minutes or until crunchy, flipping halfway through.

6.  Take out of oven and top grated cheese and if you want, some crumbled ham, bacon, chicken, whatever you like.  Put back into oven until cheese is bubbly - a couple of minutes.

7.  Remove and serve with sour cream and BBQ sauce.  At least, that is what I like to have it with!

8.  Enjoy the oohs and ahhs from your family and friends.

Thrifty Snacks

I have to admit to some snacking. I try not to do it too often, but I have small children who are always hungry and it is hard not to snack along with them. However, I used to buy crackers and chips, and while we have those things around sometimes, we really don't eat them very quickly anymore. For one thing, they are expensive, for another, well...have you looked at most of the ingredient lists? Yuck. Anyway, one of my all-time favorite thrifty snacks is popcorn. I can buy gourmet popcorn from a local farmer around here for $1/lb. I usually buy 20 lbs in the fall, and that makes a LOT of popcorn. Between eating it and sharing it that usually lasts us all year, sometimes I get carried away and give too much of it away, but generally we don't end up short. It is yummy and thrifty and the kids love it. Our favorite is a blend of black popcorn and baby rice. It may take a bit of searching to find it for a good price, but it is possible. We buy ours from a stand out in the boonies - basically all of their business is word of mouth.

Another favorite snack around here is peanut butter. I usually buy this, but when I went shopping the other day they were out of the kind that is just peanuts and salt (what else do you need in peanut butter?). So...I have been meaning to try this for a while - I made my own. This is NOT complicated. I bought some unsalted dry roasted peanuts, put them in my food processor with some salt and pressed ON. That was about it. At first I took out a couple handfuls, when they were just lightly chopped, because I like crunchy peanut butter, and I intended to put them back in at the end, but my husband announced that it wasn't creamy enough... so I ended up making the whole batch creamy. Oh well. This was, by the way much cheaper than buying the peanut butter that I usually get, and I was able to adjust the saltiness and creaminess to what I like. That reminds me - I once heard someone say that the only right taste is the one you like. There is a lot of truth to that. There are many experts telling us what wines, foods, cheese etc are the best, but if you don't like it, it doesn't matter. Trust yourself.

Another great snack is dried fruit (or fresh fruit - in season - or stored - such as apples), I dry a lot of the fruit that I get for free, and we eat it all winter. I dry strawberries (slicing these with an egg slicer works great), apples, pears, and anything else I can get my hands on. I keep some with me in my purse for when hunger suddenly strikes the kids...or me. Healthy, yummy and very thrifty!

Bread is a fantastic snack. I love to make bread. I use the No-knead or the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day method. Usually the former, just to conserve space in my fridge. Caution: if you are using whole wheat flour, use gluten to insure a good rise. I have found 1 TBL/cup of flour to work well for me. Bread gives you a few snack options: slice and eat with butter, jam, peanut butter or whatever floats your boat. Toast. Or, one of my favorite things to do when the bread is starting to get a little stale: slice very thinly, place on a baking sheet and spray both sides with olive oil, sprinkle a little garlic salt on, bake at 350 until browned and you have little snack crackers. These are great with cheese, salsa, or even on their own. I sometimes like to break up a couple and use them like salad croutons.

There are many snack possibilities that are thrifty, local, sometimes organic and best of all - you know exactly what the ingredients are. Use your imagination!

Tonight - Hamburgers, Guac and Deviled Eggs

Hooray! I used to hate hamburgers, I now love them. Of course, tonight what we will actually be having is burgers made with ground venison and about 20% pork. There isn't enough fat in venison to keep it from drying out if we didn't add the ground pork, but they taste delicious! My dad hunts in the fall, and we reap the benefits. We have 2/3 of a deer this year (we split it with some other people) and I am very grateful. My brother and sister in-law also gave us some of the stuff that they don't want from their CSA including some avocados which I don't normally buy, but I am looking forward to some guacamole! Now most recipes call for tomatoes, but those are a little scarce in February in Wisconsin and I found this recipe: http://www.guacamolerecipe.net/ - I have plenty of salsa that I made last fall in the freezer, and I am thinking that salsa would be a good addition to the hamburger toppings as well as the tacos I am planning to make tomorrow night with the leftover ground venison/pork. And I have an in with an egg-lady so free-range eggs all around! What a feast - and thrifty too!


NOTE:  I was at my co-blogger Marty's house recently and she served guacamole in a dish with the pits on top.  She said that it stopped the guacamole from browning.  We were there for hours and it didn't brown at all!  She had made it in the morning and it still looked perfect.  Awesome tip!




Laura