Thursday, January 19, 2012

Loaded Baked Potato Soup

Cold weather makes me want soup!
So what did I do, I made some!
Here's what you need:
  • 5 lb bag of potatoes
  • 1 1/2 sticks of butter
  • 8 oz sour cream
  • 1 pkg of real bacon pieces or 1 lb of bacon
  • chives
  • cheddar cheese
optional: potato masher
might need: a little bit of milk

wash the potatoes
Cut up the potatoes into chunks. (slice potato long ways, then down middle of each 1/2, & then crossways about a 1/2 inch wide)


  


Put potatoes in pot
(I know, you could figure that out!)



  

add water to cover
 turn on burner medium high-ish







set timer for 30 minutes
let cook
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 Watch your pot or this might happen,
 not that this happened to me.......lol






 take potato piece
out and smoosh it
(checking its done-ness)







 add butter



 
add sour cream



 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
add bacon pieces

  



 

                      
add chives
2-3 tablespoons,
I did 2 palm of my handfuls
salt and pepper to taste
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Top with cheddar cheese.........
 
 

Voila, dinner is served!


Friday, January 13, 2012

Who likes saving money?

Ok, so I'm all about saving money. I mean who isn't right? Anyhow, in the interest of saving money here is my first money saving post! Oatmeal is cheap, its healthy and all that jazz, right? But why pay $2.50 (Walmart) for 10 packets of that name brand guy when all you are getting is about 2 1/2 cups of oatmeal! DON'T DO IT AGAIN! lol

Here's what you need:

  • Take a big thing of oatmeal (make sure to use the quick oats, mine was 42 oz I went and checked, haha) $3.78 at my local Wal-mart in Texas
  • a box of snack-sized Ziplocks (or whichever brand you prefer)
  • a 1/4 c or 1/2 c measuring cup (I did mine 1/2 c but my kids are 8 & 11 and then there is my hubs, the pre-made packets are only about 1/4 c so if you have itty bittys you can just do the 1/4 c)
  • a few spare minutes (probably took less than 10 minutes)

And here's how I put mine together, feel free to add in what you and your family like:

  1. I put 1/2 c oats in the baggie (could do 1/4 c if you have itty bittys, that's how much are in the name brand guys pre-made packets)
  2. Approximately 2 TBSP of brown sugar in the baggie
  3. Zip it up!

For the water or milk part you add 3/4 c - 1 c of water or milk (for the 1/2 c oatmeal size), however you prefer. Easy-peasy! Done! Kids can even help on this one! You can also add in raisins, dried fruits, cinnamon, chocolate chips, whatever else you like in your oatmeal. So for $3.78 you now have 60 - 1/4 c packets or 30 - 1/2 c packets. The name brand guy for the same amount would cost you between $15 & $30 depending how much you would eat, 1 packet or 2 packets. I'll keep that extra money thank you very much! How about you? lol