I LOVE making my snacks look pretty! Especially when they are healthy! It makes me want to eat them more!! Fruit is my favorite snack… Who am I kidding? I could eat fruit at every meal!!
Category Archives: Recipes
Italian Turkey Sausage & Penne Bake
Monday night I made up a recipe. I do that a lot! I just find ingredients in the fridge and throw something together for dinner! My husband is a little picky with what he eats and he loved this! I had it again for dinner last night and brought it for lunch today! I think I am going to freeze the rest for another day. That’s the best part about leftovers!!! You can use any brands of the ingredients below or substitute the penne with spaghetti or whatever noodle you have. Use what you have on hand! Next Time, I’ll take pictures of what I do and post along with recipe! Hoepfully the directions make sense.
INGREDIENTS:
- 1 pkg of Perdue Sweet Italian Sausage (5 sausages in container)
- 1/2 Green Pepper
- 1/2 Small Summer Squash
- 1/2 Small Zucchini
- 2 TBSP Spice World Minced Garlic
- 1/2 White Onion
- 1/2 box of Creamette Penne Pasta
- 1/2 jar of Newman’s Own Tomato & Basil Bombolina Sauce (You can use full jar if you want)
- 2-3 TBSP Olive Oil (enough to cover bottom of pan)
- A few handfuls Kroger Brand Hot Pepper Blend Cheese
- 2-4 cups of Kroger Brand Mozzarella Cheese
- 1/4 cup Kroger Brand Parmesan Cheese
- Approx. 1 TBSP Parsley
DIRECTIONS:
- Preheat oven to 425 degrees (mine was set on 400 but my oven temp is about 25 degrees hotter than typical ovens)
- Wash & Cut green pepper in half, cut out inside and get rid of seeds. Take one and put away to use in another meal. The other half of the green pepper cut into match sticks and then dice.
- Wash Squash & Zucchini. Cut each in half. Put 1/2 of each away for later use. Take the remaining halves and cut off end of each. Cut into circles. Cut circles into 4ths.
- Remove skin from onion. Cut in half. Put 1/2 away for later use. Take remaining half and dice into small pieces.
- Put diced pepper, squash & zucchini 1/4ths and diced onion into a bowl.
- Add 2 TBSP of minced garlic to bowl.
- Add 2-3 TBSP (enough to cover bottom of pan) of olive oil to a 10″-12″ skillet and turn burner on 7 or med high.
- Once oil is hot add bowl of ingredients to skillet, stirring every few minutes. Once mixture has been cooking for a few moments add a lid to pan and continue to cook until onions are see through and veggies appear to be done.
- Remove sausage from pkg and remove sausage casings. The best way to do it, is to cut a slit down the length of the sausage and then remove casing.
- Tear or cut sausage into small pieces.
- Once veggie mix looks down add sausage to pan and cover. Stir often. You may need to turn down heat depending upon your stove.
- Cook Penne noodles al dente according to the pkg directions. Drain water from noodles and leave sitting in drainer/strainer.
- When sausage is thoroughly cooked, turn off burner and drain grease from pan. Be careful not to lose garlic and onions.
- Add tomato & basil sauce to sausage & veggie mix and stir until thoroughly coated.
- Sprinkle some Parsley onto the mixture and stir.
- Put Penne noodles into 9×13 pan. I used a stoneware pan so I didn’t need to spray with cooking spray. If you use glass or metal you will need to spray with a light coating of cooking spray before you add noodles.
- Add sauce, sausage and veggie mix to noodles and stir until noodles are thoroughly coated. Add more sauce if needed or if you want. We don’t like a lot of sauce, just enough for flavor.
- Add 2-4 cups of mozzarella cheese and stir to evenly coat noodles.
- Grab a few handfuls of hot cheese and mix into noodles.
- Add Parmesan and stir in to mix thoroughly.
- I added some cheese on top so the Penne Bake would be melty and gooey.
- Add to oven and bake about 8 minutes or until cheese has melted.
- Take out and enjoy!
Rejoice & Eat Zucchini Bread!
Psalm 118:24 “This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.”
This morning when I got up it was pouring the rain. I instantly was in a bad mood. I thought about all the errands we had to do this morning. I decided that I wasn’t going to let the weather bother me because we need the rain. I also remembered the verse above and decided to be glad and rejoice because today is the Lord’s day. Every day is. If not for rain I wouldn’t have a garden. Sometimes the best thing you can for yourself is change your attitude. It can make a world of difference. I made my favorite pancakes for breakfast and drank my favorite coffee. After breakfast, we went to the Title Agency and to the License Bureau in a town over. After that we had to go to 2 different banks in 2 different towns.
Everything ended up being fine and went quickly and smoothly. I got back and used some Zucchini from our garden to make a healthier version of my Grandma Wagoner’s Zucchini Bread. I was so excited to bake and to use some Zucchini from my garden. The recipe is below. My Grandma’s recipe is also and went quickly and smoothly. I got back and used some Zucchini to make a healthier version of my Grandma Wagoner’s Zucchini Bread. I was so excited to bake and to use some Zucchini from my garden. The recipe is below. My Grandma’s recipe used white flour, vegetable oil and sugar.
HEALTHY ZUCCHINI BREAD
Ingredients:
-3 eggs
-3 tsp. vanilla
-1 cup of coconut oil or applesauce (I used coconut oil because that is what I had on hand.)
-2-2 ½ cups of truvia or sweetner of your choice (48-60 packets)
-2 cups of pureed zucchini (I used 1 large zucchini and froze what I didn’t need)
-3 cups sifted whole wheat flour
-1/2 tsp. baking powder
-1 tsp. salt
-1 tsp. baking soda
-3 heaping tsp. cinnamon
-1 cup of chopped pecans or walnuts
Directions:
Wash and cut zucchini into 1-2 inch pieces. Add about 4-6 oz of water to a blender. Turn the blender on and open top and add pieces of zucchini until all the zucchini has been pureed.
Beat together eggs, vanilla, coconut oil, and truvia.
Once it has been well blended, add in pureed zucchini.
Beat the zucchini, eggs, vanilla, coconut oil and truvia on low-med speed until well blended.
Sift together flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt & cinnamon.
Add flour mixture to zucchini mixture. Beat on low/med until all is well mixed.
Once well blended chop nuts and blend into bread mixture.
Grease 2 loaf pans.
Add bread mixture to pans and bake for approximately 1 hour or until done in the middle.
LIES FROM THE MIRROR 