Those Expensive Yogurt Drinks - Homemade!

So, I tried my hand at crock pot yogurt yesterday. Somebody commented on Crystal's blog that you can make yogurt in your crock pot and I was more than curious so I did a little research. I looked into what worked for who and what ingredients worked the best. I tweaked a recipe and created my own after learning the ins and outs of yogurt making.

What resulted was better than I had expected, although not quite what I had hoped for. I am more than pleased. (variations and tips are at the bottom of the post)


You will want to start this project first thing when you wake up, or late afternoon.

• 1/2 gallon whole milk (8 cups)
• 1/2 cup vanilla yogurt
• 1 small package flavored Gelatin, sugar free or sugary (I used strawberry)
• Sugar or sugar substitute to taste

Step 1: Clean your crock pot well, add the milk and put the lid on it. Turn it on low and let it cook for 2.5 hours. Then turn it off and let the milk sit for 3 hours.

Step 2: Take out a few cups of milk and put it in a bowl. Mix this with the yogurt and gelatin and then pour the milk mixture back into the crock pot, stirring until combined.

Step 3: Place the lid back on the crock pot and heat on low for only about 5 minutes. Turn it off and wrap a thick bath towel over and around it for insulation. Double check that the crock pot is off and leave it alone for 8 hours.

Don't peek.

If yours turns out like mine you will have a thickish mixture when you are finished but it won't be nearly as thick as store bought yogurt. This is okay - there are many delicious uses for this mildly sweet yogurt goop. Go ahead and refrigerate the goop until it is nice and cold. I let mine refrigerate overnight.

I am not one to waste anything so here is what I did with it after I got over my disappointment that it wasn't as thick as your typical yogurt.
I mixed it again in the bowl with a spoon and then put a few cup fulls in my blender along with a couple tablespoons of sugar. This made a delicious yogurt drink that my kids loved. They adore those expensive Yoplait yogurt drinks that cost 3 or 4 bucks at the store. I never buy them but did get some for free once and they loved them.

They told me that my concoction was way better.

Then, I took what was left, blended it up well, and put it in the Gelataio Ice Cream Boy we got at a garage sale a few years ago.

This is an easy machine - just dump in your mix and turn on . It makes the ice cream, or in my case, frozen yogurt without any work on my part. However, you should be able to use any ice cream maker for this. I made sure to add in enough sugar to sweeten it up nicely and what resulted was a very smooth frozen yogurt with a yummy strawberry flavor. It made a lot, too.

The cost breakdown for this was:
$1.55 for the half gallon of whole milk
$.20 for the Gelatin (on sale)
$.25 for the Yogurt (with coupons)

To buy these treats premade at the grocery the store will cost around $15. Those yogurt drinks are expensive and your really don't get that much for your dollar.

This cost me around $2 plus the cost of the sugar I added (maybe about 1/2 cup total or less). I got about a quart of yogurt drink and a little more than that in frozen yogurt. The yogurt drink is gone but will be rationed better next time - it will last in the fridge for about a week or so. The frozen yogurt is in the freezer for dessert tonight and will provide for a yummy dessert on another night, too. You can't beat that for a family of 8!

Tips
**Blend your yogurt drink with fresh or frozen fruit to make a yummy fruit shake.
**Use unflavored gelatin and yogurt in the initial recipe and then sweeten as you desire afterwards for a healthier treat. Or skip the gelatin altogether if aren't concerned about thickening as much.
**Change up the gelatin flavor as your little heart pleases for a variety of possibilities.
**When flavoring plain yogurt try unsweetened Kool-ade. This is very cheap and will allow you to control the flavor and sweetness separately.
**If making frozen yogurt out of it try using flavored coffee creamer and/or brewed coffee for a cappuccino flavor.

I could go on and on with the tips. There are so many possibilities here. Just play around with it.

A Week Of Beans challenge - recipe 3

Tonight we had homemade bean burritos. These were really, really good even though I about ripped my hair out with the tortillas. Although they were quite easy to make they just weren't turning out right. However, they ended up tasting so good that I decided to keep the recipe and will definitely use it again.

Burrito mix

• 2 cups dry large bean mix. I used kidney, pinto, and navy beans.
• 1/2 medium sized onion diced
• salt
• 2 lbs shortening (or olive oil if you prefer)
• 1 lb ground beef
• 2 packets taco seasoning
• 1 cup shredded cheese - your favorite blend

Soften the beans by soaking them overnight. You may want to slow cook them in a crock pot the day you plan to use them, too, to soften them up nicely. I tossed mine into the blender with about 1/4 cup water to help mash them but this isn't necessary - I just like them mashed up well.
Cook onions in the shortening until they are clear in color then add your beans, mashing and mixing as they cook. Add a generous sprinkling of salt. After the bean/onion mix is heated well put them back in your blender (again, not necessary - just the way I do it). Return them to the pan and add the browned ground beef and taco seasoning. Stir until combined and heated through then add your cheese and stir until melted. Turn the stove burner off and put a lid on the mix while you fry your tortillas.

imperfect-perfect tortillas (or Made Mama Completely Crazy So Everybody Had To Walk On Egg Shells If They Came Into The Kitchen tortillas)

• 8 cups flour. I used 6 cups bread machine flour and 2 cups wheat flour.
• 2 TBS baking powder (I found out this isn't needed if you use bread machine flour but my tortillas were so good I am not changing the recipe at all)
• 2 tsp salt
• 2 TBS shortening
• not quite 3 cups warm water
• olive oil (or veggie oil)

In my mixer with the dough attachment I mixed the flour, baking powder, and salt together. Then I added the shortening and let it mix until it was cut into the flour well. I added the water a little at a time until I had a soft dough that was not yet sticky. You can also mix this on the dough setting in your bread maker - just remember not to let it cook or you will have tortilla bread instead of tortillas.

Take bits of dough and gently roll them into balls a little bigger than a golf ball. Then roll them with a rolling pin to flatten them out very thin using flour to keep them from sticking to the counter and the rolling pin. You don't need to make them a perfect circle but you will want them to be round-ish. When you are finished you'll want to fry them in a non-stick pan on medium heat with enough olive oil (or veggie oil) to almost cover the top of the tortilla. They will plump up while you cook them giving them a non-tortilla look but don't worry. This recipe makes the best tasting flour tortillas I have ever had.
Be careful not to let your tortilla brown too much. You want just a light brown color so pay attention as they will start to cook faster after the first one is done. Flip the tortilla and wait a minute or so for the other side to brown then put it on a plate with a paper towel. Do this until you have enough tortillas to satisfy your family, making sure to separate each tortilla on the plate with a paper towel. Put any remaining dough in a covered dish or baggy and into the refrigerator for later.

These tortillas turned out very soft and easy to fold up but still had that freshly fried taste. They were perfect. We filled them with our burrito mix, salsa, sour cream, and lettuce. It was such a good dinner - all my kids had seconds!

We are going to use some of the left over dough and burrito mix to make burrito pizza tomorrow or Sunday night - I haven't decided which yet. I'll post that recipe after we make it. Maybe this time I will remember to take a picture.

A Week Of Beans challenge - recipes 1 & 2

A couple of blogs I like have mentioned the Week Of Beans challenge. Beans are super cheap, bulk up a meal, and are good for you. Plus, we have a large family so I decided to see if we could eat beans every night for 7 nights and see how much money it would save. It is only night 3 and we have already deviated but, as you will learn below it wasn't really avoidable.

It helps that my husband loves beans and is happy to accept this challenge with me.

Monday night we had Italian Bean-Bean Chili. This is an recipe-by-Mel (me) and turned out really, really good.

• About 5 cups of large beans - just an estimate, I didn't measure them.
• 2 lbs ground beef
• 2 cans vegetables
• 2 cans diced tomatoes

Seasonings to taste:

• Worcestershire sauce
• Italian seasoning
• garlic powder
• steak seasoning
• chili powder
• salt and pepper

I soaked the beans over Sunday night - navy beans, kidney beans, and pinto beans.
Monday morning I poured them into the crock pot with the ground beef, a can of corn, a can of green beans, and 2 cans of diced tomatoes and the seasonings. The amounts of seasonings used really depends on how seasoned you like your food. We like our dinners very flavorful and use a generous helping of seasoning - especially the Worcestershire and steak seasoning.
I set the crock pot to high and let it cook all day long, stirring it occasionally. We had red skinned baked potatoes with it and it was delicious. We are condiment people and adding a little sour cream and shredded cheese to the chili added to the taste, too.

To bake a perfect red skinned potato:
(you can use russet if you like but our favorite is red)

Set your oven to 350. Prepare potatoes by gently scrubbing them but not so much that you skin them. Then poke a bunch of holes all over them with a fork. Next, with your hands rub each potato with a thin layer of olive oil and sprinkle them with salt.
When your oven is preheated you will want to put your potatoes directly on the center rack. Make sure to put a cookie sheet on the bottom rack to catch any drippings. Cook them for about an hour.
Just add your favorite potato toppings for perfect baked potatoes! But be careful, potatoes stay hot for an exceptionally long time. My mom once told me that when she was growing up they used to bake potatoes in the morning and put them in their coat pockets for the walk to school to keep their hands warm on cold Maryland mornings.

Now, the bean recipe made a lot of food and we only ate half of it. The other half was refrigerated for tonight's dinner, recipe #2, and I will add a couple cups of rice to it to create a new dish, Rice Chili. Any rice will do - we buy white rice in 20 lb bags at the commissary so that is what we will use. You'd be surprised at how much just rice can change the taste of something.
Friday night we are having homemade bean burritos! I will post that yummy recipe later.

What happened to Tuesday?
Last night our neighborhood was putting on a safety night with fire trucks, a helicopter display, fun stuff for the kids, and free hot dogs and hamburgers. We were on our way out the door when we learned it was postponed due to weather. We decided to take a walk anyway and ran across some friends who were expecting to eat dinner there, too. We decided to get together to cookout - so there wouldn't have been beans last night either way.
The safety night was postponed until tomorrow night so we won't be having beans then either. Our bean week will run over by two days and that is perfectly fine with me!

Uses for Kool-Aid - #5

Kool-Aid
The Flavor Enhancer

Kool-Aid on its own isn't all that yummy but use it at as a flavor in many deserts, snacks, and drinks and you can enjoy a unique treat! Plus, it is extremely cheap which is a huge plus in my book!

Although it isn't all that great for you, it really doesn't take much of this powdered drink to add some flavor. I open a packet and just use a little sprinkle (or more if I am flavoring a large amount of desert), then I roll up the package and put it away for later use. You can even fill up a spice jar with your favorite flavor to make it easily accessable.

Here are some things I like to flavor with Kool-Aid.

• vanilla yogurt (I don't like bits of fruit in my yogurt and Kool-Aid helps keep the creamy texture while creating a different flavor)
• ice cream (homemade or store bought - but not chocolate)
• Sprite or 7-up - even Coke and Pepsi taste great with some flavors
• whipped topping
• icing for cakes (I don't recommend you flavor chocolate icing though)
• plain white or yellow cake mixes (changes the color and the flavor)
• diet drinks or flavored waters that need more umph
• Pedialyte or similar rehydrate drinks for children
• vanilla milk (milk & vanilla coffee creamer to taste - you don't need much creamer - is one of my kids favorite treats)

Pretty much anything already sweetened can be flavor enhanced with Kool-Aid. Get creative, use your imagination and have fun with it! Even better, get your kids involved and see what their childlike imaginations can come up with.

Uses For Kool-Aid - #4

Not long ago I ran across this groovy Kool Aid project.

Kool Aid Water Colors!

Mix your prefered color of Kool Aid powder with just a tad bit of water to make water color paints! Just add an old t-shirt (Kool Aid stains) and paint brushes and your children will soon have masterpieces for you to hang.
Even better, after they dry you will have scratch and sniff paintings!

This is a project done best outside or in a garage.

Uses for Cheerios #2

Chocolate-Choes

These are a Mel(that's me)-made-up-out-of-her-head treat. Surprise - they are SO good!



You'll need the following ingredients:

• 5 cups Cheerios or equivalent type of cereal
• 1 12oz bag of Chocolate chips
• Salt

1. Melt the bag of chocolate chips and one TBS of olive oil (or veggie oil) in your microwave for about 2 minutes then stir well. The bowl will be hot. Yes, use a bowl - don't melt them in the bag. Silly, I know, just thought I would clarify. You can also melt them on the stove if you are careful not to let the chocolate burn.
2. After they are melted add in 5 cups of Cheerios, sprinkle generously with salt and mix well without crunching up the Cheerios. Taste test for saltiness and add more salt if necessary.
3. Pour mixture into a square or rectangle baking dish that has been coated with Pam, butter, Crisco, or oil. A square dish will give you fatter treats while a rectangle dish will give you thinner treats.
4. Put the dish in the freezer until the chocolate has hardened (about 10 to 20 minutes), remove, slice, and enjoy. We cut ours into square bars and keep the uneaten portion in the fridge so that the chocolate doesn't get too gooey.

This recipe took me about 4 minutes with my 3 year old assisting. My 16 month old calls Cheerios 'Cho-Choes' which is why we decided to call this treat Chocolate-Choes.

These are hard to stay away from - just a warning.

Uses For Kool-Aid - #3

Kool-Aid makes a terrific dye!

Yippee for crock pots!!!

Dying fabric in your Crock Pot is super easy!
This won't work with all fabrics. Silk works well. I have heard that wool does too. I guess you could probably try different swatches of fabric to see what works and what doesn't. If you don't have a crock pot you can use a large pot with a lid on the stove.
Also, this can only be done with the sugarless Kool-Aid packets - you can't expect the same results with the pre-sugared variety. Kind of a no-brainer, I know, but I just thought I would add that tip.

Step 1. Make sure that your fabric is clean and wet.
Step 2. Fill your Crock Pot with water and add 1 to 3 packets of your Kool-Aid dye coloring. The more you add the darker your color will turn out.
Step 3. Add your fabric and turn your Crock Pot to high.
Step 4. When your Crock Pot is nice and hot turn the heat to low and simmer for about 30 minutes.
Step 5. Rinse your fabric and wash with soap in very warm water.

All done!
You will probably want to wash your dyed fabric separately from your regular wash - but this goes for anything you dye, not just Kool-aid dyed fabrics.

Uses For Kool-Aid - #1

Kool-Aid play dough is easy, fun, and smell so good. Here are step by step instructions for this project.

What you will need:

• 1 cup flour
• 1 Tbs. vegetable oil
• 1 package Kool-Aid (or Kool-Aid equivalent)
• 1/4 cup salt
• 2 Tbs cream of tartar
• 1 cup water
• glitter - if you are brave

Step 1.
Mix your flour, salt, cream of tartar, and drink mix in a medium pot.
Step 2.
Add water and oil and stir over medium heat for about 4 minutes.
Step 3.
Remove when mixture forms a ball and immediately knead until smooth, add glitter if you are crazy and be careful because it will be very hot for a few seconds. Your kids can play with it immediately but sometimes it helps to firm it up by putting it in a container in the refrigerator for a little while, although we have never done this.
Keep fresh by storing in an air tight container.

Things we have learned while making and using Kool-Aid play dough...

• Drink mixes that are pre-sugared will cause the play dough to, well, not be dough.
• Kool-Aid play dough does NOT taste good, despite how delicious it smells.
• The fact that Kool-Aid play dough doesn't taste good will not stop many small kidlets, or the dog from eating it.
• Although it is non-toxic for people, our dog does not tolerate it well and he is a large 85 lb dog. I will not go into detail here but I recommend not letting your pets sneak the pieces that fall on the floor.
• Glitter. Enough said.

Check back later for more uses for all that Kool-Aid many of us collected in the past few months with the Kraft coupons!

Uses for Cheerios #1

We got some Cheerios yesterday for cheap but my kids won't choose to eat them, I have to tell them to. So, in order to keep forcing them to eat something they don't like to a minimum I decided to make no-bake cereal bars out of some of them.

These Peanut Butter & Caramel Cheerios bars are my original recipe and have a caramel-like taste. They are very sticky and gooey. My kids love them.

PB & C Cheerios Bars

3 tablespoons butter
1 cup peanut butter
2 or 3 tablespoons brown sugar (you can add more or less)
1/4 cup honey
4 to 5 cups Cheerios

Mix all ingredients up in your mixer adding Cheerios last. The mixture should be thick with cereal so add more if you need to.
Grease a rectangle baking pan and squish the Cheerios mixture into it with your hands pressing firmly. You may want to grease your hands before you do the squishing.
Then, place the dish in the freezer until the bars are frozen. Cut them into bars and separate them into sandwich baggies or keep them in a container with a lid in the freezer. You don't have to keep these frozen but they are really gooey if you leave them out. I prefer them cold anyway.

Eat and enjoy!