First, hang on to your seats folks because this candy is made from MASHED POTATOES!  OK before you check out, I promise it’s so yummy.  I wish I could just stuff a piece in your mouth and let it do the talking instead of trying to convince you but alas, it will have to do with a tutorial.

OK first off, the recipe is kind of sketchy.  Anal bakers are going to hate this post.  But hang with me because the good part is it’s pretty hard to mess this one up.

This is the recipe you go to when you have that last 1/2-2/3 cup of leftover mashed potatoes and it’s not enough to go around for another meal.  The other thing is it works best with real mashed potatoes.  If you’re not making The Pioneer Woman’s mashed potatoes you’re seriously missing out on life.  It’s not hard.  Really.

So if you have about 1/2 cup or so of potatoes left, put them in a mixing bowl with a teaspoon of vanilla.  Then grab a whole bunch of powdered sugar.  You’ll probably need about 5 cups for every 1/2 cup of potatoes.  Stir the powdered sugar in about a cup at a time.  It makes it really runny somehow, even if your potatoes were super thick.  So, add in a cup at a time, working it in until it turns into dough.  You’ll need to be able roll the dough out but you don’t want it crumbly.  Think about something slightly less stiff as fondant.  So once you get it to the right consistency, sprinkle your work area with powdered sugar and roll it out until it’s about 1/4” thick.  Parts of mine were a little too thick this time. 

Now get your peanut butter out and spread a thin layer across the top. 

You don’t want the peanut butter very thick because it will be messy when you roll it up.  I think I could have done this layer of peanut butter just a tad thicker.  But I can never get enough peanut butter so there’s that.  Ok.  Now carefully roll up the dough like a cinnamon roll.  

At this point, you can cut the roll in half and put it in a gallon plastic bag or wrap it in wax paper and then put it in the fridge to harden.  Once it’s set about an hour or two later, take it out and cut it in 1/2” thick slices.  And bam!  Potato candy.  Clearly I couldn’t wait to taste it.

This basically tastes like creamy powdered sugar dipped in peanut butter. Maybe like a peanut butter fudge.  I don’t know.  All I know is it’s good.

My mom always kept it sliced up in a Tupperware container, separating the layers with wax paper.  Potato candy has a TON of sugar in it and it’s not good for you but definitely something you gotta try.

Potato Candy is a post from: Permission to Peruse

Mmmm.  Gluten-free or not, this must be shared and must be shared immediately.

I had some Bob’s Mill All Purpose gluten-free flour on hand so I went with this pie crust recipe.  Next time, I’ll cover the edges with foil, be sure to poke holes in the bottom and maybe knock off about a minute.  My oven is rather toasty compared to others.  Now to be fair, a gluten-free crust isn’t nearly as yummy as a regular, but it’s definitely good and honestly I’m not sure anyone would know the difference if you didn’t tell them.

The filling I got from this recipe.  You basically cook some strawberries, water and sugar and thicken with corn starch and then fold in whole strawberries to your cooked strawberry mixture.  I don’t like big strawberries to bite into in the pie, so I cut the second batch of strawberries into halves and quarters. But my favorite part about this one?  You can see it a little in this picture but there’s a layer of sugary cream cheese on the bottom of this pie.  I said yum, right?

Neither of these recipes were hard or time consuming on each step but a little time consuming overall because you have to cool things in between steps and then you have to let it all set in the fridge.  Definitely give yourself time on this one. In any case, make one while the strawberries are good and juicy.  If you’re in my area, be sure to get your strawberries from The Peach Stand.  We’re actually looking forward to going strawberry picking soon and this gives me just the motivation!

Gluten-free Strawberry Pie is a post from: Permission to Peruse

Look at all that creamy goodness.  I followed this recipe and used brown rice flour as she suggested to make it gluten-free.

The whole reason I made it because I saw this ridiculously easy crock-pot meal on Pinterest to make Crockpot  Ranch Pork Chops and I’m all about the ridiculously easy crock-pot meals.  Not a good fit for us though since the canned cream of chicken is full of regular flour (read: not gluten-free) and I’d either have to go buy something expensive at Earth Fare or go for it on my own.  So glad I went for it on my own because I did 3/4 of this recipe, dictated by the ingredients I had on hand, and came out with about 4 cans of gluten-free, fresh, homemade cream of chicken for about $1.18 a can.  I’m pretty sure you can’t beat that and it would be MUCH cheaper if you don’t need it to be GF.

So we made the pork chops tonight with the cream of chicken I made and yum.  Yum, yum, yum. 

Lexi had THREE helpings of the pork. 

I paired it with green beans and some leftover corn casserole I had made for Easter.  Follow my favorite corn casserole recipe from Paula Deen and use Bob’s Mill Corn Bread Mix instead of Jiffy to make it gluten-free.  Easy peasy!

Enjoy!

Gluten-free Cream of Chicken, Crockpot Ranch Pork Chops and Corn Casserole is a post from: Permission to Peruse

1 – Our puppy Tucker has made it to 1 year and 1 day.  Possibilities were sketchy at times.  Sadly, many, many, many things were destroyed in the process.  A blue tooth, Nine West shoes, more markers, pencils and pens than I can count, a pool skimmer, grill brush, pool lights…oh I could go on.  Scott tells me it’s worth it.  Possibilities are sketchy.

2 – Both Emma and Lexi are now riding their bikes.  We did not totally fail as parents.  We actually went on a family bike ride the other night and it was a pretty darn good feeling.

3 –This has no story except to say Emma was the one taking the picture.  I found this in my camera and this is why I’m scared of her being a teenager and thought you should be warned of my impending meltdown.  Those eyes cut through any fuzziness of the picture.  They are LOUD and CLEAR.

4 – I also need to confess I made cupcakes although I know how bad all the sugar is.  They’re from the King Arthur Gluten-free cake mix with my mom’s icing recipe.  They were divine.  If you couldn’t tell by Lexi’s face. 

5 – On a serious random note, please pray for my family.  My grandfather is very sick in ICU with pancreatitis.  My father-in-law has diverticulitis and is having surgery today and will be in the hospital for the next week.  Praying for peace for the family, healing for them and wisdom for the doctors. Thank you.

And if you’re feeling chatty, tell me the worst thing a puppy ever destroyed at your house.

Puppies, Bikes and Cupcakes is a post from: Permission to Peruse

But even that said, this week was SO MUCH better than last.  So much.  While I’m not 100% happy with what we ate (wish we could have had less red meat, less grains and more veggies), we ate and there was very little complaining.  I was tallying it up last night and I realized I had cooked every meal for ten days straight other than Sunday dinner at Scott’s parents’.  That’s a lot of meals in a row for me.  I’m sure it’s some sort of record.  And I have to say, this week I kind of liked it.  While our grocery bill has obviously gone up, our eating out category has drastically dropped and it feels good to know that while the meals aren’t perfect, it’s a lot better than fast food.  And ya’ll?  I like the meal planning.  It’s worked out great for us to either shop on Saturday or Sunday and buy for the whole week.

I thought I’d share some recipes and products that have absolutely saved us these past 3 weeks, broken down my meals.

Breakfast

• Van’s blueberry waffles.  Emma eats these every morning with syrup.  OJ for a drink.
• Granola bars.  I sub with Bob’s Mill gluten free oats and Bob’s Mill gluten-free all purpose flour (and 1.5 tsp of xanthum gum so it will hold together) and I have a bar every morning for breakfast with some OJ.  Emma would eat these but she can’t have the butter in them.
• I bought Bob’s Mill Pancake mix but haven’t tried it.
• Crystal swears by these waffles.
• We also do bacon, eggs or a smoothie as alternates.

Snacks

• Lots of fruits for the girls when they’re at home.  Their favorites are bananas, apples, grapes and kiwi.
• Zucchini bread
• Banana bread
• Smoothies with Silk Vanilla Almond Milk

I always have at least one of those breads made.  I alternate between the two and Emma eats that for snack after school.  I’m pretty sure she would eat the entire loaf if I let her.  I wish it didn’t have so much sugar in it but I’m just going with it for now.

Lunch

• Rudi’s or Udi’s Gluten-free bread.  It’s not the best thing ever but Emma has been a trooper and eats her PB&J’s at school.
• Vegan mayo.  I use this to make Emma some tuna salad for her.  Sometimes I put it on bread for lunch and sometimes she just eats it as a snack after school.
• Glutino’s pretzels.  Both the girls love these.
• Pre-packaged fruit.  I don’t know what it is but they hate eating fresh fruit at school.  Is it not cool?  I don’t know.  But the packaged fruit is the next best thing.
• Applesauce packs

Dinner – main course

• Steaks
• Salsa chicken in the crock-pot.  Just put a few chicken breasts and a jar of salsa in.  Shred it towards the end.  You can either make tacos out of it, put it over rice or just eat it separate.
• Spaghetti with alternate noodles.  We tried rice noodles last time and trying quiona noodles tonight.
• Manwich.  We tried Rudi’s hamburger buns and they were horrible.  They soaked in all the juice and made it very dry.  We all ended up opening up the sandwich and eating the meat plain which was just fine.
• Sweet potato chili.  This was delicious.  Scott’s parents and my sister all tried it and liked it.  Lexi wasn’t a fan and I think she hate some sort of leftover that night.
• Amy’s gluten-free, dairy-free spinach pizza.  Emma will eat the spinach pizza but I buy Lexi and Amy’s small cheese pizza and just bake them together.
• BBQ.  Put a boston butt in your crockpot all day with a little water, salt and pepper. Shred after you get it out.
• Pot Roast.  I don’t like potatoes and carrots in mine so I just put a chuck roast in with one package of onion soup mix and 1/4 cup of water.  I even made the gravy with corn starch.

Dinner – sides

• Baked potatoes.  Earth fare has non-dairy cheese and sour cream Emma uses while the rest of us use  regular.
• Refried beans.  Emma didn’t like these but Scott and I loved them with the salsa chicken.
• Any kind of Alexia potato fries. We’ve done both yukon gold and sweet potato.
• Spinach.  Turns out we like spinach.  Lexi of course hated it but Emma asked for me to make it the next night.
• Cauliflower mashed potatoes.  I made this with the roast and put the roast gravy on them.  No one knew it was cauliflower instead of potatoes.  Amazing.  It felt so good to get up from that meal and not feel too full.
• I also use canned or frozen corn, green beans, carrots or peas as a side.

Desserts

• Chocolate Cookies
• Earth fare Gluten-free chocolate chip cookies
• Dairy Free ice cream.  You can get this in any store.  Just look for a yellow wrapping at the top.
• Oatmeal raisin cookies.  These didn’t bake well for me but it still tasted good.
• Peanut butter cookies

Miscellaneous

• Smart butter is what I use for Emma on popcorn, potatoes, bread.  I actually really like it and use it too.
• Dino’s BBQ sauce. I got this recommendation from Katie and it’s really fabulous if you like it both sweet and a little kick.  It was too hot for Emma and Lexi hated it but Scott and I loved it.
• Agave nectar for sweetner in smoothies and coffee

So that’s what the last 10 days or so have looked like.

In really good news, Scott has seen no acid reflux at all.  Before, he would only see a few good days in a row before he’d need to take some medicine.  He did have one incident this week when he ate gluten by mistake and threw it all up that night.  The doctor said it was a normal reaction when you are cleansing yourself from gluten.  He also said it could be related to the bad fats they used to make it.  I think that speaks a lot to how his body must be changing because of the diet changes.

Emma has only had one stomach ache in the past week and it was one morning she woke up and I can’t say it wasn’t just because she was hungry.  She was fine as soon as she ate.  She also has been MUCH more regular.

As for me, I’ve lost another pound or two, I rarely get bloated and my skin is looking so much better.  Someone at work just saw me for the first time in a few weeks and immediately commented on my weight and skin.  That was a great confirmation for me.  I’m just enjoying having no cravings.  For at least a week now, I haven’t had ANY food after dinner.  We eat between 5 and 6 and sometimes don’t go to sleep until 10 or 11.  I think that’s huge.

Truth be told, I’m not sure we’ll go back to gluten.  This week really proved to me we could happily be gluten-free and I’m not impatiently counting down until our check-up at the end of the month.  Feels great!

How We’re Coping with Gluten-Free – Week 3 is a post from: Permission to Peruse

Do you need some reading for the weekend?  Perhaps something else to mull over while you do laundry?  Over the past few days I’ve gotten completely lost in cancertutor.com.  I found it on a Google search after our friend Joy, who is battling breast cancer now, was talking the other night about how much diet affects/causes cancer. 

The site’s purpose seems to claim many alternative cures to cancer, AIDS and other diseases for which I can make no claims.  They seem legit but it’s a tough call to make a leap of faith on the kind of processes they are suggesting.  Many are quick to label it quackery.  On the other hand, I think all of us could agree there are natural solutions for our bodies’ health issues.

A small part of the site which I’ve been fascinated with though are the articles on how to Prevent Cancer and The Cancer Diet, which isn’t required for me but I think includes some interesting facts about how food and cancer are related.  Most of the the stuff we know…lots of fruits, veggies (heavy on the green ones, including grass), nuts, beans and little to no meat are best.  But there are many other nuggets (no McDonald’s pun intended) that I’ve found like how bad peanuts are for you.  As I’ve heard before, sugar feeds cancer cells.  Food like margarine, french fries and aspartame cause cancer. 

I don’t know what to think of the site but I do know at minimum it was a good reminder to eat a healthy diet which I have STUNK at the last few months.  Ugh!  Why is it so hard?  Why can’t blackberries taste like a banana split??  And many apologies for posting this on Super Bowl weekend!  How about a side of guilt with those wings?

I’m very curious if anyone is familiar with any of these treatments or is pretty smart about a cancer prevention diet.  Would love any information, stories and particularly any healthy recipes you have!

Another Reminder to Eat a Healthy Diet is a post from: Permission to Peruse

This is a super quick post tonight but I just have to share.  We had our small group over for our White Elephant Exchange.  At the last minute, I decided to make a Caramel Apple Cider recipe I saw in a blog post.  Well, it called for whipped cream and caramel on top. The problem was it was 30 minutes until go-time and I had neither whipped cream or caramel. Since the title is Caramel Apple Cider I figured it was pretty important to include.  Google to the rescue!  I made both the whipped cream and caramel sauce while the the cider was simmering and the whole deal was a huge success.  Everyone agreed it tasted like apple pie in drink form.  Seriously best cider I’ve ever had.  I thought I’d link to all three posts since I’m not responsible for any of them.

Caramel Apple Cider

Caramel Apple Cider Recipe from LeAnn at She Cooks.  You’ll know her as the Executive Director of Operations of Lysa TerKeurst’s Proverbs 31 Ministries.

Whipped Cream

I’ve actually made whipped cream several times.  The last time was a dud but this recipe was a winner.

Caramel Sauce

The caramel sauce was SUPER easy.  And I’m so proud I have a jar of it left in the fridge.

So there you go.  If you’re entertaining this year, this is a MUST . Thanks to LeAnn!

Caramel Apple Cider Recipe is a post from: Permission to Peruse

There’s nothing much healthy about this but it’s one of those meals that is super easy to make and feeds a huge crowd. For father’s day, it fed 6 adults, 2 kids and we had at least 5 servings left over. If you can make spaghetti you can certainly make this!

1 – Brown 2 lbs of hamburger and cook 1 lb of noodles. There are no noodles in this picture but, you know, I’m not Pioneer Woman!

2 – When the meat is done, mix in 2 jars of Prego Traditional spaghetti sauce. So ok, you could use a different kind. Or not. It really is the best.

3 – While the noodles finish, let the sauce simmer and put in two cans of Cream of Mushroom into a 9×13 baking dish. And if you don’t have a Pampered Chef stone one, find one RIGHT NOW.

4 – Drain the noodles. Yes, I really took a picture of that.

5 – Dump the noodles on top of the cream of mushroom in the baking dish

6 – Stir the noodles and soup and flatten out a tad.

7 – Pour the meat sauce that’s been simmering on top. No need to stir a thing.

8 – Sprinkle about 2 cups of shredded cheese on top. Freshly graded!

9 – Cook on 350 for about 25 minutes or until the cheese is melted and the sauce begins to bubble on the side.

10 – Stick some garlic toast in the oven!

Be sure to give each serving a little stir and you’ll have some creamy spaghetti goodness! Throw it on top a piece of garlic toast for a few bites. Mmmm….

Find more Top 10 posts over at ohamanda.com

Top Ten Tuesday – Butch’s Spaghetti Casserole is a post from: Permission to Peruse

However, those days are gone and I have been really good at trying to eat something of value.  Most of the time, this ends up looking like a kids’ lunch box, usually 3 or 4 snacks rolled into a lunch.  There’s nothing profound here but I feel so much better when I’ve eaten off this list!  And I guess it’s working because I’ve kept off the 6 pounds I lost during the fast!  I have to give a shout-out to Jo-Lynne and Kristi for always inspiring to eat better!

1. Carrots with ranch (admittedly the ranch should go)
2. Cottage cheese (full fat!)
3. Strawberry yogurt with granola (I’ve also heard rave reviews over greek yogurt with honey)
4. Mixed nuts (don’t expect any pecans or cashews to be left after my turn!)
5. Garlic hummus with pita chips
6. Fruit – whatever I have: strawberries, grapes, etc
7. Baked potato (with only butter and salt. ok and maybe a little sour cream sometimes)
8. Salad with balsamic vinegar and oil
9. Tuna salad plain (with Nayonnaise (vegan mayonnaise) instead of Miracle Whip)
10. Egg salad plain (with Nayonnaise(vegan mayonnaise) instead of Miracle Whip)

Pretty sure I should have a ton more veggies on there but that is what I’m able to conjure up for now.

What else would you recommend?

Visit ohamanda.com for more Top Ten Lists!

Top Ten Tuesday: Simple Healthy-ish Lunches is a post from: Permission to Peruse

What is it?

OK first off, what IS the Daniel Fast?  Well, let’s be clear first that this is a fast, not a diet.  I’m sure you’re familiar with fasting from the Bible.  You take a set time to quit eating and use that time for prayer.  There are many instances when people fasted and prayed.  The first that popped into my mind was Esther telling the Jews to fast and pray before she went to talk to the King.  Daniel’s seemed to be a bit different.  It two cases, he ate but only a limited type of food.  In Daniel 1:

“Please test your servants for ten days: Give us nothing but vegetables to eat and water to drink.  Then compare our appearance with that of the young men who eat the royal food, and treat your servants in accordance with what you see.” So he agreed to this and tested them for ten days. At the end of the ten days they looked healthier and better nourished than any of the young men who ate the royal food.  To these four young men God gave knowledge and understanding of all kinds of literature and learning. And Daniel could understand visions and dreams of all kinds.

Now as you noticed it does not specifically mention that it was a fast, only that they restricted their diet.  In Daniel 10, he mentions restricting his food again as he mourned:

At that time I, Daniel, mourned for three weeks.  I ate no choice food; no meat or wine touched my lips; and I used no lotions at all until the three weeks were over.

OK first off, there is a lot of interpretation from this if you ask me.  From what I can tell, neither of these were specifically a set time of fasting and praying for Daniel (unless the mourning means a time of spiritual fasting?).  However, these are the verses from which the Daniel Fast comes from, which is specifically a time of fasting and praying.

What can you eat?

From what I have found (and I have not read books on this), this is left up to great interpretation.  If you take this at face value, you can only have vegetables and drink water.  However, from what I’ve read by vegetables, it would also mean fruits.  By “no choice food”, that would mean no sweeteners or breads.  They also conclude after all this that no artificial or processed foods are allowed.  This is not a case of natural vs. processed.  Coffee and tea are natural but you can only drink water.  Honey is natural but it’s a sweetener.  As far as I’m concerned, a cow is natural but it says no meat.  So basically the guidelines are you eat vegetables, nuts, and fruit and drink water.  Many people make their own interpretation and allow honey.  I would suggest reading and then letting the Holy Spirit guide on what is best for you.  God continually said to me, “I’m not a dictator, it will be ok.”  I chose not to eat honey but a lot of my issues are with sugar so I chose to avoid it.

So what did you eat?

This was a huge change for me.   Surprisingly, I really could care less about the meat, but I never realized how much I relied on sugar and dairy products (cheese! milk! sour cream! cream cheese!).  In all honesty, it was really hard but I found as with many things, once you find your groove, you’re fine.  I found in most cases, I was eating 5 small meals instead of 3 big meals and 2-3 snacks.

Here are some things I ate:

Breakfast

• Banana
• Grits made with water, sprinkled with garlic powder, salt and pepper. (Wow, super dry if but filling.)
• Oatmeal made with water, with strawberries. (YUCK.  I hate oatmeal anyway so I don’t know why I tried this.)

Lunch

• Homemade hummus with carrots
• Sweet potato fries
• Oven roasted potatoes with homemade ketchup
• Salad with balsamic vinegar/oil dressing
• Baked potato sprinkled with salt, pepper and seasoned salt
• Mixed nuts

Fruit with one of the above

Dinner

• Grace’s Golden Carrot soup made with tomato juice instead of broth and pureed into marina over whole wheat pasta
• Vegetarian Chili
• Havana beans and brown rice
• Sautéed squash
• Salad

Snacks

• Popcorn (not packaged).
• Plain raisins.  These tasted like nectar compared to what I was eating!
• Mixed nuts.
• Fruit
• Rice cakes with natural peanut butter spread on it

For dinner, I also ate some of the lunch items I mentioned.  Like a salad and potato fries for example.  Basically I just mix and matched whatever I felt like eating.

Since I chose to only do 10 tens (many do 3 weeks or even 40 days), you can see I just recycled most of this.  I tried to not make this about the food, but more about the praying.

I bought the Version 2 cookbook found here.  In general, I wasn’t impressed with the recipes but I did use the following recipes: sugar-free ketchup, balsamic, garlic and herb dressing, oven roasted potatoes.

What about the family?

This was actually one of my biggest concerns going in and to be honest, the kids didn’t eat so great.  The first few days I got some chicken from the store and spread that over a few days and let them eat that with a veggie and fruit.  They ate the oven roasted potatoes one night, the sweet potato fries one night and Emma LOVED the sautéed squash.  Other nights, they got pizza or ate breakfast for dinner and I made myself something different.

Scott actually ate what I ate for dinner when he wanted and other times, made himself a salad or sandwich.  He is working nights right now too, so many nights he wasn’t even home for me to cook for.

How was it?

Spiritually

It was unlike anything I’ve done.  I don’t know how to describe it, but I felt very connected to God.  I know He answered my prayers and gave me a word.  I would expound but it’s not really my story to tell.  Let’s be clear though that I did this for spiritual reasons and that is the real motivation I had to stay on top of what I ate.

Physically

I needed to do this from a physical aspect.  I had gotten so lax in what I was eating.  I’d been watching my friend Kristi go through a 3 week sugar detox and all the reasons she did it was why I needed to do it too.  Bottom line, I think my body was addicted to sugar.  I preach to my kids about not having too much sugar.  It shuts your immune system down, it messes up your blood sugar, it even feeds cancer cells.  I just needed to say no.  At one point this winter, I was 10 pounds more than I had been a few years ago when I was eating healthy and exercising.  I knew it was all the sugar and carbs I was eating.

Well, it’s now been 12 days since I did this and I am down 6 pounds.  I feel clean.   I don’t get tired in the afternoon.  I’m not craving food all day.  In fact, after dinner, I rarely eat any snack.  And I am SURE my body is rejoicing from the break!  Who knows what kind of good it is doing!

What about now?

Here’s the thing.  When the 10 days were over, I didn’t gulp down a Mountain Dew and eat the box of Girl Scout cookies that had arrived during my fast.  I got up Sunday morning and ate a banana like I had been.  The bagel and coffee at church didn’t appeal to me.  When we went to Jason’s Deli for lunch, I didn’t use Ranch on my salad, didn’t eat the bread and didn’t have the ice cream.  For dinner, I ate the leftover Vegetarian Chili from Saturday.  I LIKED how I felt and what my body was doing and was so motivated to keep it going.  Yes, I have added some things back in slowly.  I ate corn chips with the chili, had tuna for lunch yesterday and even splurged on ONE Girl Scout cookie last night.  I’m planning to add back in meat and would like to enjoy coffee again.  I don’t know how long this will last or how I will find the balance in what I eat.  But I can say I’ve done food both ways…eat the basics and eat what I want and I 100% feel better eating the basics.

And if you read all that, congratulations, you win the P2P reader award today LOL.  I’d be happy to answer any questions you might have after that if it’s possible.  If you’ve done the fast, I’m very curious as to the recipes you used and would love if you shared!

And in closing, I just want to thank God for sustaining me through this, being close to me and answering my prayers in a very real way.  He’s awesome!

My Experience with The Daniel Fast is a post from: Permission to Peruse