Crest Cottage Creations

Showing posts with label home-made basics. Show all posts

Since my last post on the crockpot roast chicken, I have adapted my technique a bit. Check it out, complete with new pictures.

To start, I stack the whole chicken on top of some veggies. Onions are my favorite, but carrots are good, too. Potatoes and celery also fit the bill.

I season the chicken with salt, pepper, and whatever other flavors I am in the mood for. This one was paprika. I cook it on low for about 8 hours. Once it is done, I now crisp up the skin. To do that, I place it on a roasting rack and broil it in the oven for a few minutes.

That is it! Easy and it tastes great. Now, I like to stretch out a chicken as much as possible. The first night, we eat the legs (most recently, with onions and hyssop salad).

Then, I save the breasts for something else. I usually use it on salads or in leftover cooking.

Then, I pick apart the rest of the chicken for scraps. There is typically about a pint, sometimes more. That is best suited for stir fries, soups, salads, or leftover cooking.

Now, I put the bones, skin that wasn't eaten, and other scraps into the crockpot with all the veggie scraps I have saved in the freezer for this very occasion.

I fill it with water and apple cider vinegar and let it soak. It is said that doing this extra step helps the nutrients in the bones become more available. I'm not sure if it is true, but I figure it can't hurt. After it has soaked for a while, I cook it on high for a long time (usually until I have time to strain it).

Once it is cooked, I pour it through a mesh strainer into a big bowl and stick it in the fridge. If a thick layer of fat forms, I skim it off. Not because I don't want it, but because I can then cook with it. Free cooking fat!!

I typically end up with more than a half gallon of stock!

All in all, I get a dinner for 2 the first night, a dinner for 2 and lunch for 2 with the breasts, lunch or dinner for 2 with the scraps, cooking fat for a meal or two, and broth for a while! Not too bad for one chicken, huh!

This post was shared on Make Your Own Monday, Simple Supper, and Simple Lives Thursday!

Thanks for all the support and commiseration on my Armpit Woes. I was so inspired after sharing it with you all that I decided to experiment more with personal products... and share them with you!

Next up?: Toothpaste

Why, you ask? Why not? I don't have really strong feelings either way towards commercial toothpaste. I do have strong feelings towards putting things into my body with tons of unnecessary ingredients that were created in a lab.

Here is a list of ingredients from the toothpaste in my bathroom.

Active ingredient: sodium monofluorophosphate

Inactive ingredients:

glycerin
hydrated silica
propylene glycol
water
sodium bicarbonate
pentasodium triphosphate
tetrasodium pryophosphate
sodium lauryl sulfate
flavor
sodium hydroxide
sodium saccharin
carageenan
cellulose gum
calcium peroxide
titanium dioxide
FD&C blue no.1
D&C yellow no.10

WHEW!

Okay, so opinions on those ingredients? First of all, flouride is the only active ingredient. I'm not sold on the importance of flouride. I know, I know... dentists say we need it to keep our teeth healthy. Well, doctors and other experts have been telling us to do things for generations and then we find out that it's not so great after all. So... there's that.

Secondly, that is an awfully long list of "inactive" ingredients. If they aren't active, why are they there? To carry the active ingredient, and maybe to make it taste better, since it is going in your mouth? I'm okay with those reasons, but I find it hard to believe there is a need for THAT many. I don't really like Sodium Lauryl Sulfate...and saccharin?! I refuse to eat that in my foods, why would I rub it all over my teeth daily!?

Sigh. I started searching for a toothpaste recipe that contained ingredients I had on hand. I settled on this one. Here's how I made it.

Ingredients: Coconut Oil, baking soda, and peppermint essential oil.

Mixed...

... Used!

The verdict? A little salty, a little minty, overall a win. I've only used it twice so far, but I like the way it makes my mouth feel. I'll keep you posted as I use it more.

The biggest problem I am having now is that the coconut oil is solid. This is easily resolved by brushing my teeth after I take a hot shower, but what if I want to brush at another time? Any suggestions?

This post was featured on Simple Lives Thursday at GNOWFGLINS!

So, I had a great post about a lactofermented success ready, but that will just have to wait until tomorrow. This I HAVE to share today.

A little over a year ago I decided to stop using my traditional deodorant/antiperspirant and start making my own. I'm not sure that I believe all the negative hype about antiperspirants, but the cost of them adds up, they were leaving white caked on stains on my clothes, the smell (although delightful) wouldn't leave my clothes, and I was trying to weed out chemicals whenever I could.

I was scared. I teach dance and I sweat a lot. I did lots of research and settled on a mix of coconut oil, baking soda, and cornstarch. The first few days, I stank a little. Then, after about 3 days, I noticed that I was sweating less and didn't smell. I smelled lightly of coconut for the majority of the day. My clothes were clean, and new things I have purchased since then no longer have that caked on deodorant nor the cloying scent even after washing.

Our annual recital is in June. It is a hot, sweaty, stressful week. I hadn't been using my recipe for too long, so I was nervous it wouldn't hold up. I switched back to my commercial deodorant for the first 2 days of rehearsals. I STANK!!!! It was horrible!!! I can't ever remember smelling that badly!!! My guess is that my body was some how adjusted to the chemicals before, and when I gave them a break and then put them back on, my body was like "NO!!" I went back to my home made one for the shows and smelled like a coconut again. WHEW!

Next hurdle: I started reacting to the baking soda. This happened around October. I had been using it with GREAT results for over 6 months at that point. It was sudden. Just one day, I started to have a rash from it, and some weird pimple like things. I stopped using it immediately (over a weekend when I was home, don't worry!). I switched to just coconut oil and hoped that would fix the problem. Not only did the rash heal (really quickly), but I still didn't smell! Yes, I was moister than usual because the baking soda and corn starch weren't absorbing it, but the smell didn't come.

Now, I just use coconut oil. In the summer, I might add some cornstarch in and see if that works, but I might not even need to. Life was good.

UNTIL TUESDAY. ::cue scary music::

I forgot to put it on! Once I got to work, I used some commercial deodorant. WORST IDEA EVER. Apparently my body was no longer used to it. Not only did I REEK, but my pits swelled up and got a rash on them. I couldn't even put my arms on themselves. I had to teach in a sweater to buffer my skin from itself. They were so swollen and painful even after I went home and took a shower. It was horrible. It subsided by mid-day Wednesday, which is great, but I have learned my lesson.

I wonder, though... how is it that something I used for years and years every day is now causing my body to practically declare war?

This posted on Simple Lives Thursday at GNOWFGLINS!

As you may have read, we were recently gifted a freezer. Since then, I have been working hard to fill it up. Hopefully, this will allow us to eat real food during busy/stressful/lazy times. We should also be able to save some $$ because we won't have to buy as many expensive premade items and we can buy in larger quantities at lower prices.

One of the newest additions to the freezer is Cream of Nothing Condensed Soup. You know all those recipes that call for a can of Cream of Chicken Soup or Cream of Mushroom Soup? Most of them work really really well with leftovers, and can be premade earlier in the day and thrown in the oven later. I always stumble upon them when I am looking for quick, easy recipes. Unfortunately, we don't really keep that in the house and I am not one to run to the store for ONE thing. Especially when that thing had ingredients I'm not all that excited about.

Ingredients in Campbell's Cream of Chicken Soup:

Chicken Stock

Chicken Fat

Modified Food Starch

Wheat Flour

Cooked Chicken Meat

Cream (Milk)

Water

Salt

Cooked Mechanically Separated Chicken

Margarine (Corn, Cottonseed, Canola , ( Soybean Oil , Water , Beta Carotene (For Color))

Contains Less Than 1% of:

Dried Whey (Milk)

Soy Protein Concentrate

Monosodium Glutamate

Yeast Extract

Flavoring

Vegetable Oil

Soy Protein Isolate

Sodium Phosphates

Autolyzed Yeast Extract

Chicken Flavor (Chicken Stock , Chicken Powder , Chicken Fat)

Spice Extract

Partially Hydrogenated Soybean and Cottonseed Oil

Butter (Milk)

WHEW! Not only is that list extensive, but what do YOU think the odds are that the Chicken products are from healthy, happy chickens? You know...chickens that ate bugs, had space to frolic in, knew what dirt and plants were? And the chicken stock, it was probably a nourishing bone broth made from said happy chicken, right?

Yeah....

My cream of nothing soups have less ingredients for a few reasons.

One- The don't need MSG to taste like meat because they have actual flavorful meat in them.

Two- I don't have most of those ingredients

Three- I didn't season them yet. Depending on the recipe they will be used for, I can season them (and add the chicken, mushroom, broccoli, whatever) when they are being used. I always have a variety of spices available, and this makes it easier to make it in large batches.

Okay. On to the recipe (and the photos, of course)!

First, I chopped up 2 T of butter and let it melt.

Then, I slowly whisked in about 6 T of whole wheat pastry flour until the butter was thick.

Next, I poured in 1 cup of my chicken broth and 1 cup of whole milk. I used the gently pasteurized un-homogenized milk as opposed to the raw milk because it was being boiled. Why waste the good stuff?

I let it gently boil until it was very thick.

When it was ready, it was poured into jars, 15.5 ounces at a time. I know that sounds like an odd number, but that is the size of the little cans.

Now I can use this in any recipe that calls for a "can of cream of whatever soup" and know that I made it and it has a grand total of 4 ingredients, all of which I enjoy.

This post was part of an awesome series called Baby Steps to A Rockin' Life, hosted at A Moderate Life. Check it out for more great ideas!