Fantastic Fungi; Keeping it Fresh

With the rising price of food it is not enough to just to shop frugally, you must also protect that investment. Produce seems to be one of the harder areas to protect and one of the ones we enjoy the most. One of my favorite items are mushrooms!Contrary to what some say they do have nutritional value and can made into so many yummy dishes or eaten raw like I am doing now. Edible varieties include button, cremini, portobello, shiitake, oyster, and chanterelle.

Choosing: Mushrooms should be dry and firm, never slimy! Specialty mushrooms should smell woodsy, not moldy or sharp.

Storage and handling: This is the tricky part. Never leave them in the plastic container covered with plastic wrap. Blot excess moisture with paper towels. Place mushrooms in a paper lunch bag (never plastic) and refrigerated for several days or even weeks. When ready to eat, use a damp paper towel to remove any dirt or brush gently with a vegetable brush. Only wash especially dirty mushrooms, since they absorb water and will become soft quickly.

Grilled-Portobello-Mushrooms

Do you have a favorite mushroom recipe or have you found a way to keep your produce fresh longer? Please share it here.

My New Toy

After hearing so much positive talk about this product on several e-mail list and blogs I decided to go ahead and give it a try. It was $9.95 at Kroger and I had a $3.00 coupon so I figured I would splurge and consider it a possible investment if it really works well.

I enjoy bulk cooking and we have a garden so My hopes are high this will come in handy. Right now I use freezer containers and regular zipper freezer bags.

Well like a kid with a new toy as soon as I got my groceries put away I had to try it out! I buy shredded cheese in bulk and then dived it up so I thought that would be a good item to try it out on. Guess what? It worked great! I can not believe how much air it got out. I feel victorious!

Any of you use one? How about the foodsaver? Can you compare these two items? How about saving money on the bags?

Frugal Foam Soap

Foaming soap, its great stuff but so expensive to buy on a regular basis; what's a frugal mom to do? My first thought was we will enjoy when it's on sale however my family enjoys using the foaming hand so much that one family member who requested to remain anonymous said "I can't stop washing my hands I love this stuff." As wife and mom that was incentive enough to find a way to keep this stuff in the house even when CVS is not running a special.

First I gathered the necessary equipment: 1 foaming soap dispenser, a measuring cup, liquid hand soap and warm water. I began by diluting a bottle of regular liquid soap we had with warm water and mixing it. A word of caution here DO NOT SHAKE to mix! Trust me on this one. If you use warm water you will only have gently stir it. My first few ratios were too thick and could not make there way up the tube, then I was too thin and my foam was limp and ran out of my palm. Finally after 4-5 attempts a ratio of 1 part soap to three parts water worked great! I had firm foam that came out of the dispenser easily!

We can now have foaming soap when ever we want and it does not bust the budget!

Looking for other tips visit Rocks in My Dryer

New Home

I am at my new address! I am so excited! After a lot work we were able to get my site moved over to my domain yesterday.

Whats changed:
My blog name
Layout and colors

What has not changed:
My desire to have an uplifting blog that is fun to visit
Lots of recipes and helpful hints
Hopefuly some thought provoking devotions
A place where you feel at home when you visit

Only draw back:
After all the work I found out there is no way to move my old post. So I am starting anew! Kinda cool but I do feel a loss for all the old post.

As always please feel free to leave comments!