My sweet Mother-in-law sent home with me a bag full of fresh veggies straight from her garden. This included a nice Zucchini. Normally, we don’t eat much zucchini, so I decided that I will make a bread with it to give the kids for a snack. I started searching for a good zucchini bread recipe, but all of the recipes call for a ton of sugar! So, I started searching for a “healthy” recipe for the bread and I came across this blog. Not only did she have a recipe with less sugar, but she also had some great tips for modifying your favorite recipes to make them healthier. If you get a minute, you should check it out!

This is THE BEST recipe I have ever used for making pancakes. Every one came out perfectly. They were fluffy and thick, and kept a nice round shape. Quick and easy, using simple ingredients. This is my new favorite pancake mix recipe! To view the original recipe and all of the comments check it out at Recipezaar, one of my favorite recipe search engines.

I don’t remember where I found this recipe; I’ve been using it for years and we love it! It’s so easy to make, and really kicks plain old carrots up a notch! Thought I’d share it with ya, since I’ll be adding it to my Angel Food Menu coming up soon!

(serves 6)

2 bags (12 oz each) baby carrots, trimmed (or peeled, sliced carrots)

2 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened

2-3 tsp. lemon juice

2 Tbsp. fresh dill, or 1 ½ tsp dried

¼ tsp salt

1/8 tsp pepper

Cook carrots in steamer basket over simmering water in covered saucepan for 8-10 min or until tender. Transfer carrots to a bowl. Toss with butter, lemon juice, dill, salt and pepper. Serve immediately.

This past weekend I stocked up on some Arrowhead Mills organic pastry flour that was on sale. I decided to go ahead and try to use it up now since the flour will soon go out of date.

My husband loves, I mean, LOVES pies, and since the package of pastry flour had a good pie crust recipe on the back, I went ahead and made a bunch of pie crust dough to put in the freezer for future use

Here is the recipe that I used:

Pastry Pie Crust
1 Cup Pastry Flour
6 Tbsp. Vegetable Oil (optional)
3 Tbsp. Cold Water

Blend all ingredients. Press evenly into 9” pie pan. Prick bottom of crust a few times with a fork. Bake at 375 degrees F for 12-15 minutes until done.

If you don’t have pastry flour, you could use this recipe.

I put the raw dough into the freezer for now and will bake it later when my husband gets a pie craving. Now, if you’ve ever wondered how to freeze pie crusts (pie crusts freeze wonderfully!), here are some good tips:

Already Baked Pie Crust:

• Will break less if you wrap the crust and freeze it in the pie plate
• Wrap the crust in aluminum foil and a freezer bag
• The pie crust can stay in the freezer for up to 6 months

Unbaked Pie Crust (dough):

• You can either freeze the dough by itself or freeze it in a pan for extra convenience
• If you freeze the dough by itself, do the following:
• Roll out the dough to desired size
• Stack on a piece of cardboard that is cut to the same size of the crust
• Stack multiple crusts in between the pieces of cardboard by separating each crust with two pieces of wax paper
• Wrap entire stack with aluminum foil and a freezer bag
• The dough can stay in the freezer for up to 6 months
• When you are ready to bake it, pull a pie crust from the stack, allow it to thaw, line the pie plate and you are ready to go!

Here are a few other things that I baked (and put in the freezer for later) using the rest of the pastry flour (check out these recipes):

Lunch Box Brownies

Whole Grain Morning Glory Muffins

Whole Wheat Waffles and Pancakes

I’m trying a new recipe today…meatless macaroni. I’ll post pictures later today of how it turned out, and we’ll see if it’s a “hit” this evening!

Here’s the recipe (from cooks.com):

• 2 c. macaroni
• 1 lg. onion
• 3 tbsp. butter
• 2 c. chopped green peppers
• 1 1/2 c. tomatoes
• 1 c. grated cheese
• 1 tsp. sage
• 1 tsp. salt
• Dash of pepper

Cook macaroni until tender. Prepare the sauce from the following: partly cook onion in butter. Add green pepper and tomatoes. Cook for 15 minutes. Add cheese, sage, salt, and pepper. Blend sauce into macaroni. Bake in casserole dish for 30 minutes. More juice may be added if desired

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Well, here’s how it turned out (and my husband said it was “fabulous”!):