Minestone Soup

I found this soup on Pinterest, of course. I should've taken pictures because it was super tasty. I followed the recipe almost exact, except added smoked sausage and didn't garnish with Parmesan cheese.

I would definitely recommend it! I put the sausage in because the hubster "needs" meat. Such a carnivore. I liked it because it had SO many veggies. It has carrots, onion, celery, spinach, zucchini, squash, and diced tomato. I mention all these veggies because I really don't eat them as much as I should. Veggies are rabbit food and don't taste that great. Not the case in this soup.

This picture is from GimmeSomeOven and since I copied the recipe, I had to give it credit. Thank you GimmeSomeOven for the awesome soup recipe.

Meal Planning

I don't know if you have figured it out yet, but Jason and I are pretty frugal. And yes...there is a difference between being cheap and being frugal. Anyways, one of the ways we try to save money is by meal planning. It helps us shopping because we go there to get what we need and not buy on impulse. That does not mean we don't splurge every once and awhile. We are sometimes lazy with our meals and sometimes see something on the shelf that catches our eyes without it being on the list. But for the most part we stick to it. We even have a route we use...maybe that's a little weird.

Before we go shopping we go to our favorite sites to figure out what we want to make for the next week or two. I usually go to Pinterest and Jason usually goes to Gojee. We have also been going to Budgetbytes. All three are super awesome websites with amazing recipes. We also try to eat before we go shopping so we aren't hungry and every single thing including toilet paper sounds delicious. So we figure out what we want to make and start a list. We even put how much of something we need so we don't under or over buy, for example, putting 32oz of pasta sauce or 2 onions.

After we shop and are home, the unpacking begins. We take out the meat we need for the next day and put everything else in its place. I re-write our meals on our menu board. Here are a couple examples of previous weeks.

 

Some days do get hectic or we get lazy and we pop in a frozen pizza instead of what's on the menu. Most of the time we are good about following it.

Do you plans meals ahead of time? If so, how? 

PA: Pumpkin Anonymous

Hi, my name is Jennifer, and I am addicted to pumpkin. Seriously. So serious I googled if there was a PA group: Pumpkin Anonymous. Nothing I found was a legit group, except a Pumpkin Lovers Anonymous Facebook page (yes, of course, I "liked" them). I don't think the goal is to stop the addiction in this group...it is to fuel it. Did you know there were pumpkin spice Hershey kisses!? NEED them!
https://www.facebook.com/?ref=tn_tnmn#!/PumpkinLoversAnonymous

As I drink my pumpkin spice coffee this morning, I am thinking about my mid-day snack...Pumpkin Pie Roasted almonds, which I made yesterday (recipe will come later, calm down my fellow pumpkin addicts) and I am thinking about dinner tonight. The hubster is making pumpkin chili. I know, just blew your mind, right!? I'll let you know if it is worth the time, effort, and taste in another post.

Some may be thinking, oh you're just pregnant and craving it...no big deal. But to be honest, I loved pumpkin flavored items before, so scratch that idea you theorists out there. I wait until Starbucks has pumpkin spice lattes and I can eat a whole pumpkin pie. By myself. In one sitting. And now that I really think about when my addiction started, I think my mom working at CoCo's is when it aaalllll began. CoCo's is a restaurant and bakery for those not knowing. Well at Thanksgiving/Fall/Halloween/Christmas time they make pumpkin pies and a Harvest Pie. OMG...I LOVE Harvest pie. It is pumpkin pie with a pumpkin chiffon layer on top.

My mom is coming the day after Thanksgiving to help out with lil' Nate Dogg so maybe she can bring me one, hmmm....

Anyhoo...yesterday, Sunday football was on, of course, and I wanted a snack. And yes you guessed it, a pumpkin snack. I searched on my other addiction (Pinterest) to see what I could make happen. As soon as I saw the title and that you only needed about 5 ingredients it was meant to be. Here is the link to the original recipe...
http://kneadtocook.com/?p=2151

She used 2lbs of almonds and I only had 1 on hand, so I just halved the recipe.

 

The ingredients: almonds (1 lb), pumpkin pie spice (2 tsp), cinnamon (2 tsp), vanilla extract (1/2 tsp), and honey (3 TBSP). It's a little more than half, but it needed more spice than called for, in my opinion and the hubsters. She also called for sea salt, but I didn't have any.

 

Preheat oven to 325' and line cookie sheet with wax paper.

Next, mix all ingredients in a bowl and make sure all almonds are coated. After coated, spread evenly on cookie sheet.

 

 

 

Bake for 18-20 minutes, then let cool. Easy peasy, pumpkin pleasy. Eh, my made up saying doesn't quite work as well as lemon squeezy. Just go with it.

 

 

This was only about half, I just wanted a cute presentation for the picture. After they cooled, I put them in a mason jar. They are a pretty good snack and healthy! They would make great gifts for people this holiday season and you could also try to make it with pecans, walnuts, or make a mixture.

 

Time to finish my pumpkin coffee and search for the next pumpkin recipe! Have a wonderful Columbus Day and in honor of good of Christopher...go out and discover something! :)