Pioneer Woman at Heart

Last fall, I roasted the last of the mashed potato squash we grew in the garden, and froze them.  I thawed a container for a dinner, and it thawed very nicely.  Hardly any water in it, and I just gave it a good stir before reheating. Reheated with some salt and butter, and it tasted as good as freshly roasted mashed potato squash.  Yum!  I'm happy to report it worked out very nicely to roast, freeze, thaw and reheat.   We will be growing mashed potato squash again this year.  I'm so glad we discovered this squash. Mashed Potato Squash ~ Does it Freeze Well?   ©  May 2025 by  Kristina  at  Pioneer  Woman at Heart

  We have been having some beautiful weather here lately.  I however, have not put laundry out on the line, as we call this "bird" season.  Flocks of them are in the area, so as soon as they move on out, I will be able to enjoy the clothesline once again. We purchased a "blind date" with a puzzle back on January 31st, from an area local store, while out on a getaway.  However, we paid $18.00 for this puzzle, and when we got it home, it was a used puzzle (box was falling apart).  I never saw any signage that stated the puzzles were used, so my husband insisted we purchase a 1,000 piece one.   Well, we finished the puzzle finally.  (puzzle is a portrait by a famous artist) There were two puzzle pieces in the box that did not even go to the puzzle. As we predicted, there were pieces missing from the puzzle.  We plan to donate the puzzle pieces to a place that recycles them with art/crafts.  Very disappointed.  We won't make this mistak...

Grab a cup of java.  I apologize, this post ended up too long.   October was a busy month for us.  We had so many plans, our plans had plans.  Whew!   Three weddings - one in another state up on a hill (they drove us up with a tractor and wagon) over looking a river, the other on a hill at a castle, and the third we didn't make it to. There were car shows, trunk or treats for the littles, a long distance trip to re-stock baking/cooking supplies (it's hard to find organic non-gmo in our area), garden work,  yard work and more.   One thing that did not happen, was our last camping trip, and it's probably a good thing considering.  The state put a burn ban on the campground, and the nights were down to the 40's.  The whole point to go camping (for us anyway) is to go off grid, enjoy nature, campfire cook, and enjoy an evening campire.  No being allowed to have a campfire, was the ticker that crossed the last camping trip off the c...

  I have not baked an angel food cake in a few years.  There were just not enough eggs.  However, with my foot fracture, the eggs multiplied here at the homestead.  I decided to bake us one, and it is delicous!  I also now have a recipe for a frosting for the future (family recipe).  We are enjoying this one as it is, but a drizzle of fruit or whipped cream will be nice too. On a side note, I checked my blog, and I last baked one in 2022, and guess what?  It was raining, ha ha!  Well, it wasn't raining yesterday, but it is today. I saved all of the yolks, as I was already making us a breakfast scramble, and added them to the scramble. You can save the yolks for pretty much anything. I used another dozen eggs for the breakfast. From the freezer - garden green bell pepper, diced ham from the last holiday, and I thawed some dandelion greens and added those too. In the end, I tossed in some chives from the herb garden, and some tomatoes. I saved the e...

  First, here is the link for the Pumpkin baked oatmeal with toasted pecans (The Real Dietitians).  One of my biggest challenges has been to cook and bake without white flour, sugar and pasta.  Per my husband's doctor's strict instructions (for the last 7 years), I am trying my best, but as a baker and cook from scratch gal, it's been a huge challenge.  Hence, the new recipe trials. I found this recipe on social media, but have no source for it.  I'm thinking someone just tossed stuff together.  Anyway...   1st - I added cinnamon and nutmeg, and I'm glad I did. 2nd - they are a bit on the "dry" side, any ideas on what to add that is healthy? 3rd - they need more blueberries Notes:  I used 1/3 cup monkfruit (I feel monkfruit is sweeter than real sugar), and used homemade vanilla. I tried this recipe first, as I had frozen (vs. fresh) blueberries, and plain greek yogurt.  Oven bake times may vary, as you see mine are a bit toasty on top. Mix ...

The forecast is expecting 6 weeks of rain in two days here (starting today).  It seems like this happened the year we had a bountiful garden, so I'm praying the Weather Gods are good to us and we get through this upcoming flood. Photo from 2016.  Just came across it and found it cute! Hubby has been taking overtime lately.  He's been leaving the house at 6:30am and not returning until after midnight. (not my photo) I don't sleep well when he works so much either.  I know we could use the extra cash (new coop, new barn roof, and on and on), but it does mess with my sleep. Making meals from the freezer and pantry has been a success.  I whipped up a zucchini and swiss chard frittata for a breakfast. By the way, freezing organic ricotta, cottage cheese, cream cheese and sour cream has been very handy for baked meals.  The texture changes when thawed, but works great for baked recipes.  I will do that again, since I have no access to ...

Thursday evening, to honor my hard work in the garden, Hubby surprised me by not working overtime.  He took me on a ride on the Harley, ate at our favorite steak house (which has special motorcycle parking), and ended the evening with adult beverages on the porch. Friday I piddle-dinked around, sucked down coffee, moaned and groaned, complained, let out heavy sighs, wished I drank the beer and not the Crown Royal the night before, and contemplated.  I won.  Even though we have weeds to pull, I decided I didn't want to poke my eye out bending over the 4 foot grass and weeding the sweet potatoes.  Hubby volunteered to weed wack it down to where I could easily see the roots, so I took the day off, in hopes for rain.    There was a 50% chance of rain at 10am, and that motivated my decision (although I'm out there at 7am and done by 10am). By the way, the rain arrived, and may arrive again today. Oh, I had inside work to do, like make a batch of turkey-zu...

Strawberry Chocolate chip muffins.  These were so delicious.  I sort of made it up.  To save on the organic milk budget, I used powdered milk, then tossed in some leftover mini-chocolate chips.  The family loved these for breakfast or snack.  It uses canola oil, so here is where my canned applesauce comes in handy to stretch that budget too.  Organic oil is not cheap either.

I had so many people tell me to "take a break" and "is it really worth the work?" while I was putting up my 530# tomato season last summer.  Honestly, I see that I didn't stock up enough green peppers (diced), nor onions, but we learn each year too.  I need to freeze more homegrown asparagus too.  I really miss it this time of year. Was the work worth it?   Absolutely. The weather is terrible today - ice, slush, high wind and snow on the way....who wants to go out to the store in this weather (unless you have to go to work of course).   Dinner prep from yesterday - pulled homemade noodles from the freezer.  I also pulled some chicken, a jar of home canned BBQ sauce, some potatoes and some frozen green beans.  All the work for the real food was worth it. I would have loved to make a beef and noodle dinner, but these vegetarians in my home had me thinking of something else. I made a mushroom sauce with leftover cream cheese and sour cr...

We are still messing around with baked macaroni and cheese recipes.   This one was required canned condensed cheddar soup, so I made some from scratch. Th e recipe I u sed was pretty simple.  It does not contain chopped onion, o r breaded topping (wh ich I prefer), and it was very creamy.  Hubby is stuck on a very old recipe that my Mom gave me using (gulp ) Velve eta.  I keep trying to tell him it's not food, so this recipe m ay be the one to con vince him to ditch the bad so-called cheese.  We'll do the reheat test today an d see if it reheats creamy.  It taste d much, much better than the cro ck pot recipe I make using ricotta.  You could play around with other cheeses with this rec i pe too.  I ma y be typing it up to sh are.

I've been flipping trough the new recipes and picking out ones I have ingredients on hand for.  The next to try was a side dish - Zippy Carrots. I you freeze carrots and green bell peppers, grow garlic, can ketchup, make your own butter, you'll like this "from storage" side dish.  I'll admit, plain carrots are boring anyway. I used all org anic ingredients.

The grocer had organic sweet potatoes in stock, so I took advantage and brought some home.  I'm freezing them for winter meals. Yesterday, I baked several, then allowed them to cool completely.   I added a bit of water and organic broth to the pan.  I pierced each sweet potato a few times before placing in the covered pan.

Our grocer sometimes sells organic russet or red potatoes.  This week they has russet on sale for $1.99/3 lb. bag. Although the grocer gal checking me out, insisted that staff on the TV show The Chew ,  verified freezing mashed potatoes was not worth it (nor freezing any potato in any form).  I am doing it anyway, and hope they are wrong. Our home grown supply has dwindled to about nothing, so this is my last resort to stock up potatoes.  Other than dehydrating, which I know works.

Just one simple vegetable from the garden can bring us a lot of help over winter.  I am making the most of what little we got this year.