I recently came across a post outlining some of the benefits of honey when mixed with cinnamon.  I found this to be of great interest, as I have been consuming a bit more honey as of late due to it being the cold season.

Whenever I have a sore throat (or one of the girls does) I make a “tea” of the juice of one lemon, 1/2 cup honey and as much boiling water as I can fit into the teapot.  I will occasionally add some dried black currants, as they make it taste even better and give it a pretty pink color.

This post, however, outlines some other ways that honey is a great health food.  Combined with cinnamon powder and eaten daily seems to be a great cure for many different ailments.  This is good news!  Especially in these hard economic times.  Some examples are:

~ Make a paste of honey and cinnamon – eat it on your toast in the mornings to help with heart disease and lower your cholesterol.  I will be sharing this little tidbit with my husband!

~ Make a paste of honey and cinnamon and put it onto a pimple each night (washing it off in the morning) to extract the rot of the pimple.

~ 2 Tbsp. cinnamon and 1 tsp honey in a glass of lukewarm water will help remove infection from the bladder.

These are just a few of the great tips that are over at About Food 2 on the use of honey and cinnamon.  Check it out!

curious? This is a post on eating your lawn… No, I’m not suggesting that you turn into a goat and eat your grass, I’m suggesting that you replace your lawn with home-grown produce!

I was recently browsing around over at Chow.com and read a post on people turning their suburban front yards into mini farms – and with great success!

So, I thought I’d do a little bit of research…

Some of the tips that I found were great reminders of our tendency to be over-achievers… what can we say, we are only human!

1 – start small!
Just because you have decided to take the plunge into mini-farming, doesn’t mean that you need to tear out the entire lawn in the first week! Take your time and learn as you go. Start with a raised bed – build the bed, fill it with good soil, and start out planting your favorite fruit or veggies in it. Don’t get too carried away the first season either! You need to grow just as your garden does!

Another thought in this front – make sure that you remove the grass UNDER the raised bed before filling it with dirt! My first attempt at this was a failure due to my being too lazy to till or dig up the grass. All I grew were grass and weeds that first year – the carrots & onions I planted just didn’t have anywhere to go because the grass under them was waaaaay too lush and thick.

On a personal side note… if you are planning to eat the things growing in your yard, I recommend NOT using herbicides and pesticides on them. If it is designed to kill organisms, do you really want to chance it? Keep in mind that YOU ARE AN ORGANISM TOO!

Decide what fruits and vegetables you are wanting to grow. This will determine the height of your finished beds. If you are planting root vegetables, you may want to go a little taller, but if you are planting tomatoes, you need to make sure that they will have some sort of support to climb, but they don’t necessarily need the depth of soil that root vegetables do.

Check with your local garden center for tips on your area – some plants will do really well, while others may need a bit more coaxing to grow. Their livelihood is plants and how to grow them, so utilize their knowledge!

2 – Plan out your garden before you start digging anything up.
Knowing what produce you want to grow will help you choose where to put your bed – do your chosen plants need full sun? Do they need partial shade? Are they dry soil plants or wet? All of these things need to be thought of before you dig in and built a bed. Plant the full sun starts in one area that is in full sun. Make sure that they also have the same water requirements. If you are wanting some partial shade plants, group them together as well. It is also good to keep in mind that some of your newly planted goodies will provide shade for some others.

3 – Choose the right spot
Once you have chosen the plants you want and figured out the water/light needs that they have, take a hard look at your lot and find the perfect place to build your raised bed. Mark out the area that you are planning to use with string and make sure that it looks right. If you are using seedlings, it is a good idea to set them out in the portioned off area (still in their pots) to make sure you like the look of it. Keep in mind that they will get bigger!

4 – Build your bed
There are lots of ways to build raised beds – you can use pre-treated wood, cinder block, brick, railroad ties… you name it! Keep in mind that anything that is coming in contact with the dirt will come in contact with your food, so if you choose used railroad ties, make sure you line them in the inside to keep the chemicals out of your produce.

Dig up the grass or till it down in to remove it, and add it to your compost pile or yard waste bin. Dig down a bit further around the edges to create a good foundation for your retaining walls. Tamp this down, and if you want, you can add in some sand or gravel for good measure. Build the walls of your bed, and fill it with good quality soil.

If your plantings will need support, now is the time to put that in as well. Add in some trellis or wire if they need to climb, and keep in mind that since you are replacing part of your yard, your neighbors would appreciate if it looked good!

Follow the planting instructions for each individual plant – some need to start in cold weather, other need to wait until it warms up. If you have room inside, you can start many warm weather plants in peat pots indoors and move them out as the danger of frost passes.

Mulch is a good idea too. It helps keep the moisture in the soil and can keep some of the weeds at bay. Choose your mulch carefully though – some wood chips are highly acidic, and not all plants like that. Grass clippings can make a good mulch as well, and compost is always good!

Make sure you keep the weeds down and the slugs out (if you have them) and enjoy the bounty of your mini farm! If you are like most backyard farmers, you will have some excess produce that many friends and neighbors will gladly take off of your hands!

After the growing season is over, plant a cover crop to keep it looking nice, and start planning what to grow next year…

Breakfast may be the most important meal of the day, but lunch is what gets you through until dinner time. The price of school lunches rises each year and it is hard for some parents to keep up. This is besides the fact that many lunch menus – not just in schools either – are not as nutritious as they could be. Here are some money saving lunch ideas for frugal families.

Take your lunch. This goes for parents as well as kids. We are tempted to eat out with the group everyday, too. That adds up after awhile. Those cute insulated lunch bags make it easier to carry hot and cold items. We can throw even throw out the brown bags in favor of reusable options which are more environmentally friendly. We recommend Laptop Lunchboxes – they come in a lot of colors and have small containers to keep everything separate. Having the containers makes you think creatively about a couple of extra options too! When you pack your own lunch, you know what is in it so it is easier to avoid a lot of unhealthy fats and junk food.

Make a sandwich. I’m not talking about just any sandwich. This can be a wrap, pita, crust less bread, or bun sandwich. Varying the bread each day will help you decide what ingredients to put on it. You may want turkey with alfalfa sprouts, tomato, and onion on a pita or chicken strips with barbecue sauce, lettuce, and shredded cheese in a tortilla wrap.

Many kids like bread without crust for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. This makes lunch fun and your kids are more likely to eat it if they have a creative variety. Use a large cookie cutter to cut their sandwich into fun shapes like hearts or flowers. Invest in single packs of condiments. They can be used in lunches as opposed to putting them on the sandwich and saturating the bread before lunchtime rolls around.

Bottled water and drink crystals. Water has never been the same since they came out with those handy packs of flavorings. You can find them everywhere. Best of all they have five calories or less. You can turn a bottle of water into a drink that is better than soda. Kids love them too. Keep in mind that some of them aren’t quite as healthy as others though – read the ingredients lists to find the ones that are more natural & less chemical. Get a metal water bottle to re-use day after day to cut down on plastic waste too – Sigg makes a variety of sizes, as does kleen kantene Kids love them too!

Dessert courtesy of home. Stop! Put down that candy bar and walk away from the vending machine. Instead, choose a better option. Homemade granola can be shaped into bars and used as an after lunch snack. Try our Tooty Fruity Nutty Oaty Nut Cakes!
How about dried fruit pieces? They are sweeter than candy bars and won’t spike your blood sugar. It’s okay to have a naughty treat every now and then, but even at those times you can choose a healthier option than chips or candy. Make a batch of homemade chocolate chip cookies and pack a few in your lunch.

Ice packs. These nifty items will keep lunch from spoiling. The perfect complement to an insulated bag, they allow you to take yogurt or a sandwich with meat and not have to worry about it getting warm before it’s time to eat. In the Summertime you can find lots of fun shapes that you can toss into your kids lunch boxes.

Veggie sticks. Eat them with your sandwich and add some Ranch dressing for dipping.

Lunch doesn’t have to come from the school cafeteria or the fast food joint around the corner to be good. Coming from home, it can be healthier, taste better and cost less. Now that’s a combination you can’t beat.

What do you do when a meal is finished? Most of us wash the dishes and wrap up the leftovers, but what happens to the leftover portions not eaten? Do they get consumed later or do they sit in the refrigerator until they start to smell and you finally throw them out? If you tend to do the latter, how about saving some time and money by learning how to use those leftovers in new ways to surprise your family at dinner time.

Some people like leftovers and some do not. Many will eat them one day out, but quickly get tired of eating the same thing over and over. Here’s a way to fix the problem if you or someone in your family is the same way. Let’s start with an example.

You prepare a roasted pork loin and rice for dinner one night. The family wants something else for dinner the following night so the pork loin gets pushed to the back of the refrigerator. Normally, that’s where it will stay until you clean out the fridge, right? Not anymore. Let’s do something to keep that pork loin from going to waste.

Eating leftovers the way they were originally served, is probably what’s turning family members off from wanting it again the next night. Your family doesn’t have to eat the pork loin as is. So, chop that pork loin up into bite size pieces.

Now you’re probably thinking, ok that’s great, but what do I do with it now? In a large skillet or wok, stir fry the leftover rice with a bag of frozen veggies, an egg, and some of the chopped pork loin to make pork fried rice. Add a little soy sauce and you’ve got a whole new dinner for your hungry family.

This is just one way that leftovers can be turned into a new dish with a new flavor. The same can also be done using chicken, seafood, or beef. Let’s take a look at beef.

If you have hamburgers left from dinner, chop them up until they resemble ground beef again. The meat can be combined with chili powder and taco sauce to make beef tacos. Or, add some beans, chopped peppers and tomatoes, and sauce to create a pot of chili. If you have the imagination, there are an unlimited number of possibilities of what you can do with meats and side dishes from a previous night’s dinner.

Using a little leftover magic can make one meal last for two, three, or even four more days. But, you don’t have to eat it all in the same week. Fix a new meal with the leftovers and freeze it until you are ready to have that particular meat again. On that day, dinner will already be made, all you’ll need to do is heat it up. Yes, it really can be just that simple.

Your family will be amazed at your ability to transform any meal into a new creation they will enjoy. Besides that, you will save money on your grocery bill and won’t be throwing it away in the trash can as spoiled leftovers. Try these and similar ideas to expand your family’s palate.

Would you like to Stop Feeding your Family Junk?

Finally…

A Quick and Easy Way To Get Dinner On The Table and Enjoy More Quality Time With Your Family…

Visit this site and you’ll find out…

~ Why not planning your meals ahead of time can cost you hundreds of dollars and precious hours not spent with family and friends.

~ How a regular family dinner can result in a more loving relationship with your kids, less trouble at home and even a reduced risk of school dropout and teen pregnancy.

Menu Planning Central