It is the berry season and nothing says summer to me like a big blueberry muffin. I am hoping to make it over to do a little berry picking with the kids this summer. This batch of berries was bought at our supermarket for only $.99 a pint. When berries are in season, they make a budget-friendly addition to the grocery cart.

I wanted to share with you my favorite little recipe for Blueberry Muffins. Growing up, my mom bought the Jiffy Blueberry Muffin Mixes. Did anyone else grow up on these? We always thought my grandmother’s blueberry muffins were so fancy because they were homemade. It is times like these when I reflect on how far I have come in the kitchen and the ease and pride I feel when making things myself. I will say though, those Jiffy mixes aren’t too bad, but to have the fresh blueberries makes all the difference in a muffin!

Lemony Blueberry Muffins

3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2/3 cups sugar
4 t baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 beaten egg
1 1/2 cups milk
1/2 cup cooking oil (I like canola oil)
1 lemon (zest & juice)
1 pint blueberries (two cups)
Sugar for dusting

Mix together all dry ingredients. In a separate bowl mix together beaten egg, milk, and oil, lemon zest, and squeeze in the juice from one lemon. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix until just moistened. Try not to over mix your batter- I know it’s hard! Fold in blueberries. Place in prepared muffin pan and sprinkle the tops with a little sugar. Bake at 400 degrees for about 22 minutes, or until tops are golden brown. Be careful not to overcook these- they cook quickly!

What is your favorite berry recipe? I would love to get your favorite recipes!

If you would have asked me I thought I could whip up some pitas for my family a few years ago, I would have told you no. I have had this recipe in my collection for so long that I don’t even know where it originated from, but I decided to dust off the old recipe collection and see if these could come together for me. After all, if it was a complete failure…well, at least I tried!

This dough is incredibly easy to work with, especially for a novice! It is not too dry and it is not too wet so you don’t have to use a lot of flour to roll these out.

These pitas are so yummy and the whole wheat flour adds a yummy dimension to the flavors. The kids loved these and my husband could not get over that I had made them because they looked just like the store-bought variety.

Now that I have made them though, there is no turning back. I will never buy these at the store again. In fact, I am whipping up my second batch for the week today! I hope your family will enjoy these as much as we have!

Pita Bread (for the Bread Machine)

1 1/3 cup water
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
3 cups bread flour
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 teaspoons yeast

Put ingredients into the bread machine in order listed. Run the dough cycle on your machine. When the bread machine beeps, pull the dough out of the bread machine and divide the dough into ten pieces. Roll each piece into a six inch circle. Place these on a baking sheet (or your pizza stones) and let them rise for twenty minutes (I can fit about four rounds per pizza stone or three pitas per baking sheet). Bake at 500 degrees for three minutes. Using a spatula, flip the pitas and cook for another three to four minutes on the flip side.

Amy’s Side Notes:

– When you pull the pitas off of your baking sheet, wrap them into a damp kitchen towel for a few minutes. This helps keep them from drying out. Once they are cool, you can store them in a food storage bag.

– Freeze extras for a rainy day! After the pitas have cooled, slip a piece of wax paper between them and store in a freezer bag. You can take out what you need…when you need it!

In my opinion, there is nothing that says summer more than all of the delicious fresh berries you can be snacking on. I happened upon this fantastic recipe for a Strawberry Romaine Salad in my AllRecipes Dinner Tonight cookbook and could not wait to make it.

You will have to envision the poppy seed dressing coating the romaine blend though as it is not pictured here. I took this dish to a carry-in and put the dressing on just before we ate it so the lettuce stayed nice and crisp.

This salad would make a perfect accompaniment for a night of grilling out or a perfect side for an elegant brunch. The salad is sweet, but not too sweet, with a perfect merriment of yummy flavors from the burst of strawberries to the bit of bitterness from the spinach. I plan to make this often this summer and hope you can try it too!

Strawberry Romaine Salad (courtesy of AllRecipes Dinner Tonight Cookbook)

Salad Mix (1 head romaine lettuce, 2 bunches of fresh spinach)
1 pint fresh strawberries, sliced
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1/3 cup white sugar
2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
1/4 cup milk
2 tablespoons poppy seeds

In a large salad bowl, combine the romaine, spinach, and strawberries. In a jar with a tight fitting lid, combine mayonnaise, vinegar, sugar, milk, and poppy seeds. Shake well and pour the dressing over the salad. Toss until evenly coated.

My kids love rice as a side dish and I have been looking for recipes that can add a little sparkle to our typical side dish. When hosting my Chari-Tea Bunco night, I bought a large jar of pesto at Sam’s Club for a Pesto Pasta Salad that I served. Since I had plenty leftover, we have been working it into other dishes throughout the week. One night I smeared bread with pesto and Italian cheese and let it sit under the broiler for a couple of minutes as a side with an afternoon salad. Another night, we feasted on paninis with pesto, turkey, and swiss on sourdough.

When I ran across a recipe in one of my cookbooks for rice with pesto, I knew this would make a lovely side with our herb baked tilapia. I honestly wasn’t sure if the kids would eat it though since it did have a light green color to it. They ended up gobbling it up just like those rice mixes in a box and the pesto added delicious flavor as a side to fish. It felt a little more grown-up than the Rice-A-Roni and we all enjoyed this very much.

Rice With Pesto or Herb Oil (from “How To Cook Everything“)
Serves Four

1 tablespoon canola or other neutral oil
1 1/2 cups basmati or other long-grain rice (I used white long grain rice for this)
2 1/4 cups water
Salt & freshly ground pepper to taste
1/2 cup pesto or 1 cup fresh herb of your choice: chives, parsley, chervil, or cilantro, 1/4 cup canola or other neutral oil, & 1-2 tablespoons water if needed.

Heat the tablespoon of oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add the rice and cook, stirring, until the rice is coated with oil. Add the water and season with salt and pepper. Turn the heat up a bit and bring the mixture to a boil. Cover and turn the heat to medium-low.

After 15 minutes, turn off the heat under the rice, but leave the cover on. Wait 10 minutes, then stir in the pesto or herb oil. Check the seasoning and serve immediately.

If you do not have pesto: While the rice is cooking, rinse the herb and place it in the container of a blender or small food processor. Turn the machine on and gradually add teh 1/4 cup oil. Blend or process until smooth, stopping the machine now and then to stir down the mixture. If necessary, add a tablespoon or two of water to the mixture; it should be the texture of heavy cream.

Related Links:

Yummy Mexican Rice

Lemony Rice Pilaf

When I was growing up, my mom made many varieties of bar treats for us. We ate a lot of lemon bars, brownies, and chocolate chip cookie bars as snacks. When I would go to my friend’s houses though, their moms made homemade cookies and I would come home and beg my mom to make cookies instead of bars. I never understood why she always made bars for us…until now!

Bars are so much easier than cookies and you dirty up a heck of a lot less pans. There is no cooling on racks that has to be done or switching of cookie sheets. All you have to do to make these cookies is mix and dump. Within minutes you can be snacking on a plate full of cookie bars without the mess or work that regular cookies can be.

Last week I called up my mom and told her what a genius I think she was by making these bars for us! I know my kids will probably be complaining about the lack of cookies in our house, but maybe they will figure out what a genius I am too. It might take them thirty years to figure it out though!

Want perfectly perfect bars? Try my trick and keep a plastic knife handy in your utensil drawer. You can cut them into perfect squares without the crumby mess, even when they aren’t fully cool.

The entire family devoured these and the kids loved this new addition to our snack hour. I hope you can enjoy all the cookie goodness without the work too!

Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs
1 (12 ounce) package semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease a 9×13″ pan. Combine flour, baking soda and salt in small bowl. Beat butter, both sugars and vanilla in large mixer bowl. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each. Gradually beat flour mixture into butter mixture. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts. Spread into prepared pan. Bake 30-35 minutes or until golden brown.

I have roasted a lot of vegetables during my lifetime, but I can honestly say that I had never roasted green beans before. I saw a recipe for roasting green beans and knew I would have to try it. I decided to use what I had in my produce drawer and pantry to make this great little side dish that I know you will absolutely love.

The original recipe did call for fresh green beans, but I had a bag of the fancy frozen ones from Aldi in my freezer that I wanted to use. I added an extra ten-fifteen minutes cooking time for these and they were perfect for our taste. You can roast them longer, if you like, but this amount of time seemed to fit well for me.

Below is the recipe including instructions for fresh and for frozen. This would be a wonderful side dish for your cookouts this summer and looks deliciously gourmet with very little effort.

It would also make a great side dish for your Easter dinner celebration this year. Enjoy!

Roasted Green Beans

2 pounds fresh green beans (or a bag of frozen fancy green beans)
1-2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons minced garlic (I use the bottled garlic to save a little time)
Salt & Pepper
Zest from one lemon (save the juice for later)

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Grab a jelly roll pan and dump green beans on the pan. Sprinkle seasonings, lemon zest, and garlic over the green beans. Drizzle the olive oil over the green beans and then toss with your hands until they are all coated with the seasonings and zest. Spread out in a single layer and slide your cookie sheet into the oven. Roast fresh green beans for 20-25 minutes and roast frozen green beans for an additional 10-15 minutes. When they are done, pull from the oven and put them on a serving platter. Squeeze the lemon juice over the top (from the lemon you zested) and serve.

When I feel like I have mastered a recipe, I often don’t go back and take a look at new recipes for that particular dish. After all, if you are making the best there is, why would you ever explore anything new? That is how I felt about my banana bread recipe. It was the perfect recipe and it has never failed me. It is not the most figure-friendly though and so when I ran across this recipe from Cooking Light, I knew I would have to try it. I modified the recipe to our taste and what we had in our cupboard and what came from that little experimentation resulted in this perfectly perfect absolutely amazing banana bread recipe that will be replacing my old version.

Despite using rolled oats, there is no weird texture to the bread, even without any soaking of the oats. The sprinkle of oats on top add just a little bit of chewiness and the bread is moist, but still light-tasting.

My husband likened it to a delicious oatmeal cookie and I was impressed with how clean it came out of the pans, how easy it was to cut, and the beauty of the light golden color with the dusting of oats on top.

The original recipe called for white sugar and had no spices. I substituted the white sugar with brown sugar and added cinnamon. I had half-and-half in my refrigerator and added 2 teaspoons of vinegar to it to replace the buttermilk.

Did I mention this recipe is also very frugal? No butter in the recipe and very little fat, bananas that were going to make their way into a trash can, and cheap generic oatmeal! And yet, despite all of those factors, it would make an amazing little gift packaged for a special person in your life!

The recipe that is written below is my adaptation of this bread and I hope you will enjoy it half as much as our family has!

Deliciously Light Banana Oat Bread

1 1/2 cups flour
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup rolled oats
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup mashed banana (approximately 2 1/2 per loaf)
1/3 cup buttermilk (I substituted with half & half with 2 tsp of vinegar to sour)
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs, beaten
Cooking spray

Preheat oven to 350°F and spray a 8 x 4 inch loaf pan with cooking spray. Combine dry ingredients together in a large bowl. Combine banana, buttermilk, oil, vanilla, and eggs in a small bowl or measuring cup. Pour wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir gently just until the dry ingredients are moistened. Spoon batter into the prepared pan and bake for 55 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack, in the pan, for about 15 minutes (I left mine in longer and it was fine). Remove the bread from the pan after 15 minutes and cool thoroughly on the rack.

I love to make homemade hamburger buns for our sandwiches and have been wanting to try a recipe for whole wheat buns. For my first attempt, I think these buns are absolutely delicious and fit the bill perfectly. They are not too dense, but can handle a messy sandwich like a Sloppy Joe or Chicken BBQ perfectly. You can substitute the shortening with canola oil to make these a bit more heart-healthy.

I look forward to making these again and again for our family!

Whole Wheat Hamburger & Hot Dog Buns (courtesy of Bread Machine Magic)

1 cup water
1 egg
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup shortening (can substitute with canola oil instead)
1/4 cup sugar
3 teaspoons yeast

Place all ingredients in bread pan, select Dough setting, and press Start. (Vital Wheat Gluten is optional but the bread will rise higher with it.). When dough has risen enough, the machine will beep. Remove bread pan, and turn out dough onto a floured countertop. Gently roll and shape the dough into a 12-inch rope. With a sharp knife, divide dough into 8 pieces for hamburger buns or 12 pieces for hot dog buns. Grease a baking sheet. Roll pieces of dough into balls and flatten for hamburger buns or shape into 6-inch rolls for hot dog buns. Place on prepared baking sheet. Cover and let rise in warm oven 10 to 15 minutes until almost doubled. Preheat oven to 400°F Bake 10 to 12 minutes until golden brown (be careful mine cook pretty fast). Remove from oven and cool on racks. When ready to use, split buns horizontally.

**These will keep in plastic bag in the freezer for 3 to 4 weeks.

Related Links:

Getting to Know Your Bread Machine

Storing Homemade Bread & Bread Ingredients

Buttery Bread Machine Rolls

Homemade Hamburger Buns

Do you make homemade hamburger or hot dog buns? Please feel free to share your recipe!

On our last chicken enchilada night, I decided I wanted to add a fun side dish to our meal.

What goes better with your homemade enchiladas then a little bit of Mexican Rice?

I can admit that the Mexican Rice is actually my favorite part of going out for Mexican food.

I found this little recipe and dug through our pantry for all of the ingredients.

The tomato sauce complimented the enchiladas that we dipped in that homemade enchilada sauce better than anything else and I was able to modify the spices to our taste.

I used white rice, but I may need to try my brown rice experiment and use that instead.

This is a fun and inexpensive side dish and even our rice-haters ate it with great enthusiasm.

I think this will be a repeat performer in our house!

Mexican Rice

1 cup uncooked rice (not instant rice)
2 tablespoons oil
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 medium white onion, chopped (omitted because of personal taste)
2 ripe plum tomatoes, seeded and chopped (I omitted this ingredient because I didn’t have any tomatoes)
1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
1 cup chicken broth or beef broth (we chose chicken broth)
1 tablespoon chili powder (you can reduce this- I added 1 teaspoon)
3/4 teaspoon salt

Heat the oil in a heavy skillet. Add the rice and stir over medium-high heat until rice is golden brown. Add the garlic and chopped onion, and sauté until the onion just begins to brown. Add the tomatoes, tomato sauce, chicken broth, chili powder and salt, lower heat and cover. Simmer for 20 to 25 minutes until all liquid is absorbed. Remove from heat and allow to sit, covered, for 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork and serve.

Rice is yummy and a frugal side dish! Do you have any favorite rice recipes you could share?

Don’t miss these other great posts from MomAdvice.com:

The Best Taco Meat on the Planet

Pressure Cooker Korean Tacos

Mexican Quinoa Stuffed Bell Peppers

Marinated Grilled Shrimp with Perfect Margaritas

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