Hop on...

You know you want to! Get on the sugar free train. My sister told me she'd join me if I made her some sugar free brownies, so I did.  I've lost 3 pounds since cutting out sugar.  Pretty good, I'd say!  Now, if I'd just add in some exercise... ;) I will, SOON.

Since becoming a mom, I've gradually started learning more about food.  The things I've grown up loving to eat are really bad for us! Sugar, white flour, McDonalds (any fast food, really)...ALL VERY UNHEALTHY.  I want my kids to learn to love food from scratch and grow up eating it.  Unfortunately, cooking from scratch takes time, and a lot of it.  Thus, I've made goals to stock our freezer full of home made meals so we don't feel the need to "grab a pizza" or go through a drive thru for dinner.  One stop shop in our freezer makes live easier!  Kinda rhymes, doesn't it?

Last week was great for my freezer cooking goals.  On lasagna night, I made two lasagnas, one for dinner and one for the freezer.

Another day, I took out some leftover, frozen taco meat and some leftover taco soup, and  mixed it together with some sour cream and cheese. I filled tortillas with the mixture to make burritos to freeze for lunches.

So easy to pull one of these out and microwave it for a quick lunch and even easier to send in my husband's lunch for him to heat up and eat at work!

 I also made meatloaf on another night (4 small loaves) and I froze two of those and we ate the other two for dinner.  The green stuff?  Not pickles...frozen broccoli.  My family ate it without commenting on the broccoli..Darrell didn't even notice!
Our freezer is getting stocked up with meals and it feels good!  The best part is that it is all home-cooked.

Last night, I made vegetable beef soup, almost all from leftovers from dinner the night before.  I shredded the pot roast, added in leftover noodles and broccoli, chopped up carrots and onion, put it all in a pot of water and tossed in a beef bullion cube and some spices and there was dinner! I also made italian bread sticks and froze some of the dough from the batch so we'd have some to pull out and bake for other meals. I'm getting better and better at this!

I find that if I take a few extra minutes in the kitchen, I can always find a way to make something to throw in the freezer for the days that are too crazy to make dinner.  This was the best New Year resolution I've made.  Now my biggest debate is whether or not to keep up the no sugar thing after January 31st passes.  I'm not going to lie, I miss having a cinnamon roll for breakfast once in a while. :)

Today I tried a new sugar free recipe--it's for oatmeal cookies.  The verdict? Pretty good! My kids have been asking for cookies, and because I haven't been eating sugar, neither have they.  So, today I told them I'd have cookies for them after nap.
The recipe below is what I used, but I altered it a little.  I used closer to a cup of honey rather than just a 1/2 cup, I added extra cinnamon, a dash of ground cloves, and about a 1/2 teaspoon of molasses.  Enjoy!
New no sugar recipe (uses honey instead of sugar)

Raisin Oatmeal Cookies (makes 3 dozen)

1/2 Cup Unsalted Butter, room temperature
1/2 Cup Honey
1 Large Egg, room temperature
2 Tsp Vanilla Extract
1 Cup All Purpose Flour
2 Cups Old Fashioned Oats
1/2 Tsp Baking Soda
1/2 Tsp Salt
1 Tsp Ground Cinnamon
1 Cup Dried Raisins

1. Preheat oven to 350 F.
2. Place the butter and honey in a bowl or standing mixer and beat for 1 minute.
3. Add the eggs and vanilla extract and beat for another minute on medium speed or until smooth.
4. In a separate bowl, mix to combine the flour, oats, baking soda, salt and cinnamon.
5. Slowly add the dry ingredients into the wet and mix to incorporate.
6. Stir in the raisins then drop 1 tbsp of dough for each cookie onto a Silpat or parchment-lined baking sheet.
7. Bake for 12-14 minutes.
8. Cool and serve.