Recipe of the Week-Gumbo

As I said before, I am trying a new recipe every week. This weeks recipe was for homemade Gumbo. I thought it would be a very hearty dinner one night, combining meat with veggies.

Turns out the gumbo I made was pretty expensive. I used about 10 chicken legs and a pack of smoked sausage. I am sure you could use leftover chicken, but in a family of 6 we don't have meet left over very often.

Here is the recipe I used, I found on on the web and like usual, tweaked it to suit our tastes.

10 chicken legs
salt and pepper
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 pound of smoked sausage, cut into 1/4 inch slices
1/2 cup flour
5 tablespoons margerine
1 large onion, chopped
8 cloves garlic
1 green bell pepper, chopped
1 cup celergy chopped
1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
4 cups water
5 beef boillon cubes
1 can diced tomatoes

Cook the chicken with the oil. When that is finished, remove and cook the sausage. Remove when finished. Add 3 tablespoons of the butter and the veggies and saute them until soft. Add the rest of the margerine and the flour and stir all together, this will thicken it. You get kind of a big glop of veggies. Add the rest of the ingredients and stir, stir, stir to loosen up the glop! Add the meat back in and simmer on low for about 2 hours.

This was pretty good but the taste of Worcestershire sauce was very overpowering. I love that stuff, but it didn't seem right. So while we ate it, I would not make it again.

This is linked to Tasty Tuesday.

Tip of the Week!

Sign up for freebies! I usually sign up for freebies.

I love getting things in the mail. Always have. Except for bills, who likes getting those?

I usually get my freebie information from Money Saving Mom, I go to her web site a few times a day if I can and check to see what they have. Sometimes I can't check for day and sadly the really good freebies are already gone.

Here is what I got in the mail the other day. A free Aveeno sample and a pair of free running socks! All for nothing!

It does take a few minutes, but I signed up for Roboform and they do the work for me! Roboform is a website that keeps this information on hand as well as user names and passwords (I only use the password feature on non private sites I hit). Then I simply click a button in my menu bar while I have the form open and it fills out my information into the fields. I simply hit send and done! I have filled out my form for a freebie.

This post is linked to Frugal Fridays.

New Fall Decorations for Under $7

The other day my daughter was home sick. So since I couldn't run the errands that I had originally planned for that day, I decided to make good use of my time at home.

I had some projects that I had been wanting to do.

The above photo is my mantel above my fireplace. This is what I have up currently for Fall.

This wreath was made with coffee filters and a dollar store wreath. Total cost was $2.50 and I have half the filters leftover for another project.

This red/burgandy charger was from Target. I got the two pack for $2.50. The candle and candle holder was a gift from mother-in-law. The pumpkin my daughter made in her current pottery class.

Dollar store ceramic pumpkin. $1.

Dollar store ceramic pumpkin. $1.

I already had these frames and they were currently in storage. I simply printed out the word "Fall" and put them in the frames. I printed out a bird and put two of my little bird decorations with it. I think it turned out really cute. My husband thinks it spells FAEL. But that is a cursive "l".  Total cost of this was free. 

I love that decorating does not have to cost a lot of money.

This post is linked to Frugal Friday.

Where Have I Been?

I took a little unplanned hiatus . . . again. I know I have been doing that a lot lately. But bare with me, I have been a little overwhelmed with . . . well, everything. With life.
I can’t promise that I will be back every day, but I will promise to do my best to post. For all five of you that read my blog!

I do have some planned weekly posts that I am excited to get up and running.

Egg and Dairy Free Brownies

I have been struggling for ever to find a egg and dairy free brownie recipe that was moist. They are always too dry or worse, they don't set at all and remain liquid.  I think on those I have the ratio of wet and dry ingredients off.

In addition to tasting great, I needed the recipe to be quick, not have too many steps and be frugal as well. Especially since brownies only last a day or two in my house!

I came across a recipe on the internet the other day that was labeled as a "vegan" brownie recipe. I altered it a slight bit so that it fit our needs.

I can honestly say this is the best one to date. It is pretty moist and doesn't have a horribly sweet chocolaty flavor. So they are very light. My daughter that doesn't like chocolate even liked them. So that is a plus. These brownies barely last a day when I make these.

This recipe is definitely a keeper. Tasty, fast and frugal!

2 cups flour
2 cups white sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 cup water
1 cup vegetable oil
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Stir the dry ingredients together then add the wet. Mix until blended. Pour into a 9 x 13 inch pan. Bake for 25-30 minutes.

Cool and enjoy! I thought these tasted better the next day because I do not like my brownies warm. But that is a personal preference.

This post is linked to Tasty Tuesday.