A Different Style Butternut Squash Soup

Fall is here ALREADY! Boy this year has gone by fast.....No big suprise but i cant wait for this year to be done with and start over fresh! It has not been my year... Anyway Fall is my most fav time of year?!?! Why? The leaves change colours, the weather gets cooler, LOTS of things to do with apples! Apple cider, apple donuts, apple cheese fritters and so on! Not to mention the gorgeous decorations for fall! I love it! Unfortunately i will not be decorating this year... I do have some good news to share i supose! I PASSED my US Citizenship test! Woohoo! I have not had my ceremony yet though i will have pictures when that happens! So it has been pretty busy around here lately though! We had our first family camping trip! I will post about that but lets just say the tent was NOT water proof and we sorta had a few soggy days! 

We have been catching up and spending time with friends and family! Lochlan played soccer this season and Hubby helped coach the team so we have been busy with that also! We planned for a bonfire with friends and family but the rain seems to like to fall on our parade...lol first camping...then the bonfire! BUT we had a great time (inside) either way! I have been busy cooking like crazy YES i have been taking photos! I am ready to take the plunge back into bloggy land! 

Although i have about 30 posts that i have started (up loaded pics to each post and jotted down the ingredients to said recipes!) but i just havent had the get up n go to finish them off and publish them! 

In between all of this stuff i have been doing lots of researching concerning what to and what not to put into mine and my families bodies food wise! I have also decided that this is the FIRST year since arriving in the US that we will NOT be par taking in getting flu shots this year! I am proud to annouce this! I am taking a natural route to staying healthy for what part of the flu season we will be around for! Also i have to admit the only chemical medicine wise that i am currently taking is benadryl and thats only when my psoriasis is driving me crazy! Im using all organic and natural lotions and soaps to help sooth my skin also and i have to admit i am shocked at how well i am doing! I also think trying to be stress free helps too! I have rid my pantry of some of the nasty things i use to use! Like white flour, white sugar, vegetable oil, shortening(YUCK)! and store baught meats! I will get into more of why the overhaul in the next few posts. Doing this has not made our budget change much at all really it can be done and done on an everyday budget!

Now onto this most delish soup! I grew up HATING butternut squash soup... I HATED it.... it was awful in my eyes... but as i got older my taste buds have most definately changed! I must admit foods i absolutely hated growing up have now become foods i enjoy! I guess my taste buds grew up :P lol Anyway you can find a different version of the same style soup here.

What i used!

1 medium sized butternut squash

3 sweet potato squash(click link to see what these beauties look like)

1 teaspoon of ginger powder

2 Tablespoons of garlic powder

2 cups of chicken stock

1 can of coconut milk (i used light coconut milk)

1 Tablespoon of dried cilantro

1 Tablespoon of dried parsley

1 teaspoon of salt

Olive Oil

Preheat the oven to 350

What i did!

First i washed all of my squashes as they were frommy garden and kinda muddy LOL. then i peeled them and sliced them in chunks! Placed them in a large ziplock baggie. Once the bag was full i added enough olive oil to caot these lovely pieces! Then i added the ginger, garlic and salt, tossed it all around then emptyed out the entire contents of the baggie into a large glass baking dish! I placed it in the preheated oven and checked on them every once in a while. When the squash was tender enough to smash it with spoon i knew it was done! (sorry no exact time i was busy doing other things) i smashed the squash with a fork made sure it was nice and smooth. In the pot on the stove i poured in the chicken stock, dried cilantro and parsely, bringin the stock up to bubbling then turning it to a simmer i slowly started adding the coconut milk making sure it wasnt to hot when added as you dont want the coconut milk to curdle. Once the liquids ahd simmered a good 15mins i then added in the smashed squash bringin up the temp slowly once everything was good and hot i turned off the burned and placed the lid on and let it sit a good 10mins. After 10mins i used my hand held blender and wizzed it threw the soup to make it thick and creamy! 

I served this DELISH soup with garlic naan! The boys absolutely LOVED it! How do i know? They didnt have much to say other then mmmmm's and yummmms! And they ate dinner quickly! It was definately a hit!

So i have some pictures of recipes to come! I can not wait to share some of the things i have been up to!

Quick and easy Beef, CousCous and BokChoy 

Super simple left over Potatos, Chicken, Homemade Salsa Melt!

Best ChocChip Cookies EVA!

Nourishing Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup

Baked Apple Cheese Muffins

The BEST ever oven fried chicken you will ever have!

(you know its GOOD when you can take a bite out of it cold and its STILL crunchy!)

Mouth watering Pulled Bbq Beef

Homemade Buns!

Homemade Granola Bars

Ok so today my son had a mate over and it was last minute so i wanted them to have something healthy to snack on! Being that i didnt want to make and bake cookies....as i was already going to be making bread i decided granola bars it is! Now lets just say i have NEVER made granola bars before but i knew pretty much what they were made up with in my mind? That make sense to you? It does to me lol... So headed to the cupboards and pantry and away i went! I came back with;

Oats

Sucanat

Honey

Wheat Germ

Flaxseed Meal

Crasins

Homemade Butter

Dark ChocChips

Vanilla Extract

Crushed Raw Almonds

Homemade Peanut Butter

And there you have it! Those are the ingredients to these DELISH granola bars! Now for the recipe!

~Kira's Homemade Granola Bars~

1/3 cup peanut butter

1/4 cup of honey

1/4 butter (melted)

1/2 of sucanat

1 1/2 cups of oats

1/4 cup of crasins

1/3 cup of wheat germ

1/2 cups of dark/milk chocolate chips

1 tablespoon of vanilla extract

1/4 cup crush raw almonds

In a mixing bowl combine the sucanat, peanut butter, honey, melted butter and vanilla. Stir remainder of your ingredients into the wet mixture. Press the mixture into your baking dish that has been sprayed with non stick cooking spray :) Bake these beauties in a preheated oven at 360'F for 15-20mins or until the edges are browned. When done you will want to let them cool completely on a wire rack, when cooled the them into bars.

Depending how chunky you want these babies depends on the size of the baking dish you use. As you can see i used a deeper dish so my first batch are thicker then i had expected! But this recipe would work well spread out very thinly and baked till crispy! When cooled break into pieces and serve in a bowl with cold milk for breakfast! This recipe will most definately make some chewy lace style cookies!

Next time i will add different nuts maybe pretzel bits and different dried fruits :)

~Homemade Butter and a Great Big Thank You!~

Ok so before we get to the butter making :) i just wanted to say THANK YOU to a wonderful lady and her dad over at Green Bag Lady they are wonderful ppl let me tell you! I came across her blog a couple of months ago and won a give away! She sent me an awesome hand made reuseable shopping bag that she made herself! Here is what she is all about!

"Green Bag Lady"

I am an artist. I make bags. I will give you a FREE handmade fabric shopping bag at Green Bag Lady Events if you promise to use it instead of paper or plastic. Your name, city, country and bag number will be recorded on this site. The use of these bags worldwide is documented here. Send me our pictures, your stories, and your extra fabric. Let's start a revolution... one bag at a time!

I also won a bag for my hubby! And a gift card! Thank you so much Teresa and Dave your both wonderful and i am so happy to spread the word of what you all are doing! I have baught material and plan on making my own now as well! Please check out the site and see how many bags she has given away! Also she has the pattern up how to make your own reuseable shopping bags!

~Homemade Butter~

What you will need!

A clean glass jar with a lid!

Some heavy whipping cream!

heres the heavy whipping cream in the jar with lid waiting to be shaken!

Shimmy and shake the jar! Its a great arm work out let me tell you! You will feel the change in the cream after about 10mins as it turns to whipped cream its nice and thick :)

You need to continue to shake it even though it doesnt feel like its moving! It will slowly start to get so thick that it starts collecting all the bits of whipped cream spread all over the jar! The picture below shows you what i mean!

Turn it and shake it do what ever you have to to get it to get sticky! YOU will know when its almost done as the butter will seperate leaving you a light milky coloured liquid! see pics below!

What is that stuff? Its Butter milk baby! ( i have promised mine to pancakes for my guys!)

So once you have gotten the butter to seperate you need to fish it out and rinse it off in a strainer, then place it in a bowl to knead! You want to do this to press out anymore of the buttermilk that is trapped! I did this for a few mins mushing it around in a bowl and pouring the excess butter milk into the jar!

Then once all the liquid has been pressed out i moved it over to a clean bowl and placed in the fridge this batch has had garlic placed into it as we will be making fresh bread and having this garlic butter spread over it! YUMO!

Heres a pic of the buttermilk! The jar is full now as i made a good amount of butter last night!

~Beautiful Bread~

So have you ever made your own loaf of bread? From scratch? And realised just how delightful it is? After all the hard work you put into it and then taking the time to wait for it to rise then bake? I know it takes sometime but when i first started doing it i know that once i pulled out that piping hot loaf of bread out of the oven NOTHING else mattered! All that hard work was WORTH every minute specially once you slice of the first piece of bread when its still hot and you spread some butter on to it and it just oozes and melts across it! DIVINE i tell ya! It really is worth making your own bread these days because YOU know what goes into your bountiful bread! I have put so many things into my bread dough mixes its so much fun! And along with that its so much healthier for you when you do venture out and add goodies like grains and sometimes even cheeses and herbs!

This loaf pictured here is a whole wheat, wheat germ and steel cut oat sandwhich loaf! It made such beautiful slices of toast!

~Meatless Monday~

Yep this household has now started doing "Meatless Mondays" We didnt get here as easily as i had hoped for BUT we got here! So whats on the menu for tonite?

I served my boys as follows:

Creamy Veggies Tortilini Bake

10 Grain Whole Wheat Bread

and

Creamy Balsamic Vineagar Asparagus!

My so was very impressed with dinner, he did NOT believe me when i told him there was no meat in that meal at all! He gasped very funny to watch a very over dramatic 6 yr old reacting to that information!

~Asparagus Recipe~

Asparagus Spears

Hlf an Onion

Garlic

S&P

Olive Oil

Butter

Cream (heavy whipping cream)

Balsalmic Vinegar

* Snap the ends off your spears and wash

*finely chop your onion

*heat your oil and butter in a pan

*add the onions and garlic to the hot oil/butter

*sautee the onions and garlic till nice and tender

*add a tablespoon of the balsamic vinegar

*then add a couple tablespoons of cream and let it simmer to make a nice sauce

*now add the snapped asparagus spears and mix threw the sauce

*turn the heat off and put the lid on the saucepan and let the spears steam and sautee in the sauce.

~Tortilini Veggie Bake Recipe~

Mushrooms

Butternut Squash

Broccoli

Cauliflower

Yellow Squash

Zucchini

Onion

Garlic

Cream (heavy whipping cream)

Stock(chicken/veggie whatever u have)

S&P

Olive Oil

Fennel Powder

Dryed LimeBasil Leaves

Grated Parmesan Cheese

*Chop/slice up all your veggies to desired bite sized

*Heat pan and add oil and till hot

*Add your onions and garlic

*Add 1/2cup of stock to your onions/garlic let simmer

*Then add your fennel and basil to taste and simmer a lil longer

*When your onions have cooked down add your veggies

*Cook to your veggies to desired texture

*Add 1/2 a cup of cream and let simmer

*Preheat oven to melt cheese on the bake

*Take your cooked Tortilini and pour into a cassarole dish

*Take your veggies and pour over the pasta evenly as best you can!

*sprinkle your cheese over top and place the dish in the oven to melt the cheese!

~SERVE AND ENJOY~