Pumpkin Brownies

I know I said "no baking" due to an egg and milk shortage...but...I forgot about this pumpkin brownie recipe I've been meaning to try. I had a brownie mix that desperately needed to be used, so I gave it a shot! The brownie recipe is not so much of a recipe as it is a brownie mix and a can of pumpkin. It's basically the same principle as substituting applesauce for oil, but when you sub pumpkin, that's all you need! The health benefits are even better as the pumpkin provides more fiber and is a good source of vitamins A and C, among others.

I was a little bummed because I thought we were out of ice cream. Alas, I found two Klondike bars shoved in the back of the freezer. We dined on big ol' brownie sundaes for dessert, and we didn't even feel bad about it because we were using stuff up!

And, just in case you are thinking eating from the pantry week is looking not so healthy, here's what we had for dinner:



We haven't had tuna noodles in a LONG time, but boy was my hubby happy! Plus, I am always happy to feed my girls a good dose of omega 3s AND greens (brain foods!) This is a great recipe for making sure some essential nutrients find their way in to your kid's diet. To make this, I just mixed a family pack of tuna, about 1/2 cup of light mayo, 1/4 cup of sweet pickle relish, some chopped celery and peas and salt and pepper. Then, I stirred cooled Ronzoni Smart Taste noodles in to it, and voila! Super easy and just like my mom used to make for me!

Thanksgiving Edition -- Sort Of...

This was somewhat of a frustrating trip. First of all, by the time we finally made it to the grocery store, it was 9 o'clock. I had been going strong since roughly 5:15. I didn't realize how tired I REALLY was until we got there. Thankfully, my husband got off work early and was able to take the baby for me. I probably would have had to turn around and head back home had that not worked out in my favor. My only other real frustration is that I just did not have as many coupons to match with the sales as I would have liked. As a result, I ended up spending more than I really wanted to, so I could pick up more than 1 of the things that were on a super good sale.

Here is what we got --

1 dozen eggs
1 bag of Reames noodles (which appear to have not rung up correctly)
2 bags of broccoli steamers
1 bag of C&H brown sugar
4 Chex seasoning mix (free, will donate)
1 Hy-Vee taco seasoning
1 can of Hy-Vee pumpkin
1 lb of Hy-Vee walnuts (more DHA love)
3 boxes of Jello pudding
2 boxes of Jello
1 box of Keebler grahams
1 box of brown Minute rice
1 loaf of 110% whole wheat bread
1 really big jar of Musselman's unsweetened applesauce
2 cans of whole berry cranberry sauce
5 bags of Hy-Vee cheese
2 1/2 gallons of organic whole milk
2 Kraft cheddar cheese bricks
3 bricks of Philadelphia cream cheese
1 pineapple

My pre-tax total was $38.00. I saved around $7.00 with coupons -- not so impressive!

Plus, the bad news is that I still hadn't been able to nail down what I was taking for sure for Thanskgiving dinner. I am in fact taking apple crisp, double-spiced pumpkin pie and green bean casserole. If I have enough time, I may treat everyone to the Maple Pear Upside-Down Cake too. I'm short some (more like SEVERAL) ingredients for the pumpkin pie and green bean casserole, so I will have to make yet another trip, which will put me even further over budget. I may not cover that trip due to time purposes, but you can be sure it will have to happen! I've been trying to wonder what I did for Thanksgiving last year. I'm pretty sure last year I took a $50.00 bonus for Thanksgiving. I didn't really want to do that last year, but I think if I am going to plan to take advantage of the sales and buy staples like cream cheese, cranberry sauce, pumpkin, etc. when it's dirt cheap, I am going to have to that again.

I did not really end up with the things to make a single complete meal from either of these trips. What a bummer! I'm going to make a cavatini for dinner and red hot Jello for dessert tonight. Those leftovers will serve us well. We had baked potato bowls for lunch, and we will be able to have sweet potato bowls later this week for lunch. We'll be able to make it through to Thanksgiving easily on things like grilled cheese, frozen chicken Anytizers, breakfast for dinner, etc. I think I'll trade my leftover Thanksgiving desserts for turkey and stuffing, which will get us through until NEXT Friday. Thankfully, Friday always seems to roll around pretty quickly!

See this week's other shopping trip here.

See also beingfrugal.net, www.orgjunkie.com and chachingonashoestring.com.

Breakfast Cookies

Didn't these bake up beautifully???

My oldest daughter and I watched Ellie Krieger makes these on the Food Network a few weeks ago, and my daughter thought breakfast cookies sounded no less than brilliant. I was willing to try them out. We'd made a very similar kitchen sink cookie recipe of Ellie Krieger's before, and it was pretty good. I figured these would be a good, fun breakfast for all of us.

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup whole-wheat pastry flour
• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 1/4 cup dark brown sugar
• 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/4 cup (1 small jar) strained carrot baby food
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup rolled oats
• 1/2 cup bran cereal flakes
• 1/3 cup raisins
• 1/3 cup walnut pieces, lightly toasted in a dry skillet for 2 minutes, until fragrant and chopped

Directions

Place rack in center of oven and preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Whisk together flours, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt in a medium-sized bowl. Combine butter, oil and sugars in the bowl of a stand mixer and mix on high speed, scraping down sides if necessary, until sugars have dissolved and mixture is light in color, about 1 minute. Add egg, carrot puree and vanilla and beat an additional 30 seconds. Add flour mixture and beat an additional 30 seconds. Add oats, flakes, raisins and walnuts and mix over low speed just until incorporated. Dough will be slightly sticky and less cohesive than traditional cookie dough. Line a large cookie sheet with parchment paper. Using between 3 to 4 tablespoons of batter, form a ball and place on cookie sheet. Repeat with remaining batter, leaving about 3 inches between cookies. Wet hands and use palm of hand to flatten cookies until about 1/4-inch thick. Bake for 12 minutes, until cookies are fragrant but still soft. Let cookies cool slightly, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

***

We had a really good time making these, but I will admit that I struggled a little bit with following the recipe. Since I don't have a printer, I wrote down the ingredients and just tried to remember the order in which to put things in. I ended up throwing my first butter, oil and egg mixture away. (Bummer because that Crisco Omega 3 oil sure isn't cheap!) I just COULDN'T get my softened butter to cream when adding the oil and egg at the same time. When I tried it a second time and had the same problem, I realized I was putting the egg in too soon. Next time I would cream the butter and sugar THEN add the oil and egg. Regardless, we had to get on with it, even though our mixture looked a little funny. I also had forgotten to buy carrot baby food, so we used unsweetened applesauce instead. AND, I didn't have DARK brown sugar, so I added like 1/2 teaspoon of molasses. Thankfully, they turned out just fine.

These did turn out really tender and almost caked like, which I expected as a result of our previous experience with the kitchen sink cookies. I'm sure it is a result of the reduced butter. They are pretty good and will make a great breakfast! However, I think if I were going to make these again, I would alter the recipe a little. I think with the applesauce change, these would have been super great with dried cherries (which we love and are super great for you) and raisins. With the original recipe that calls for carrots, I think I would add some more cinnamon. These were just a tiny bit bland for me.

Regardless, we will love warming these up and eating them this week! It will be hard to eat just one! And, I'm thinking next time I won't go to all the work without at least tripling the batch. 12 (or 11 in my case) breakfast cookies doesn't get 4 people very far!

Don't forget to share in the recipe sharing fun at A Few Shortcuts, Balancing Beauty and Bedlam, Tempt My Tummy Tuesdays, Tuesdays at the Table and Mouthwatering Monday.