Cheese Ravioli with Browned Butter and Sage Sauce

Hello, easiest dinner ever.

1 package of Trader Joe's cheese ravioli
3 Tablespoons butter
3 sage leaves
1/4 cup good Parmesan, grated

Cook ravioli according to package directions. While that's cooking, brown butter over medium-high heat. Add sage leaves. Reduce heat to low and stir around until ravioli is done cooking. Drain pasta (don't shake off all the water) and add to browned butter. Toss to coat. Add Parmesan and freshly ground black pepper.

I served along with a giant salad of romaine, oranges, shallots and parsley dressed with olive oil, white wine vinegar and white balsamic and a pinch of sea salt. Also, roasted broccoli with a squeeze of lemon and salt and pepper.

I wish I could just keep eating and eating.

Side note: I absolutely love finding little live critters in my produce. It's so exciting to me to see evidence that I'm eating REAL LIVING food instead of food that has not only grown in sterile soil, but been sprayed while it's growing and also irradiated when it's packaged. I'll raise the roof to that!

Deodorant

Remember how I said I love making things myself instead of buying them? Well, I really mean it. I love being all "Damn the Man!" in absolutely as many things as possible.

I've been making my own deodorant for about 9 months now. I love knowing exactly what is in it, it's super cheap, and there's no wasteful packaging. Plus it works better than anything else I've ever used.

Just mix together:

1/4 cup baking soda
1/4 cup corn starch
4 Tablespoons coconut oil
a few drops of essential oil of your choice (optional)

You may need to soften the coconut oil a bit to be able to stir it up, but the melting point is only 76 degrees so it doesn't take much.

I store mine in a wee little 1/2 pint (I think that's the size?) canning jar and it works great. I've heard of people just reusing an old roll-up deodorant container, but my house is often too hot (over that 76 degree melting point) and it turns to liquid. So this screw cap jar works just perfectly no matter what the temperature. To apply, just rub your fingers in it a little and massage in.

The coconut oil smells deliciously coconut-y so no other scent is really needed but I've added orange and tea tree oil in separate batches just for fun. This is my third batch in 9 months, so it definitely lasts awhile. I should do the math and figure out how much a batch costs to compare to store-bought deodorant. But that would involve actually doing math. All I know is that it's CHEAP and you're using stuff you already have. Which is just awesome to me.

There are a lot of other recipes out there that include shea butter and other cool ingredients, but this is the one I tried since I didn't have to buy anything. And it worked, so I'm sticking with it.

Coming soon, some more cheap and natural hygiene products!

Tortilla Soup

This is one of our new favorites. I just made it up one night and it never ends up the same way since I've never even written it down until right now. But it's always good.

olive oil
1 onion, chopped
3 carrots, sliced
1 cup frozen corn
1 leek or some cabbage, chopped (optional, but I love cabbage in soup so I put it in whenever I can)
2 cans (or 3-4 cups) pinto beans
1 Tablespoon cilantro, chopped
salt
pepper
some cumin
some paprika
some garlic powder
some chili powder
1 quart vegetable stock

Saute the onion and carrot in a tablespoon or so of olive oil until they begin to soften. Then add the rest of the above ingredients. Let simmer for an 30-60 minutes until all vegetables are tender. Adjust seasonings as needed.

Serve with:
sour cream
tomato
avocado
crushed tortilla chips
more cilantro

Now, unfortunately, my photo up there is sadly lacking in a couple ingredients that make it most delicious: sour cream (I'm working on making my own. Yep, you heard me), avocado (Mine aren't ripe. Sad face) and I just forgot to add the chips before I took the photo and I'm too lazy to take another. But, it's still good.

If you wanted to add chicken you easily could. Maybe slow cook in a crock pot for a couple hours with the stock and then shred it up? I've never done it but it sounds viable and I'm sure you'll figure something out. :)

Vegetable Broth

I have been working on some recipes but between being sick and then my mother-in-law being in town, not a lot of cooking was happening around here.

So, I figured I'd talk about making your own vegetable broth. Because I love it. And it's so easy and so superior to anything you can buy pre-packaged. And I feel so environmentally friendly when I make it myself.

All you have to do is save all of your leftover bits of veggies as you're cutting them up. Ends of carrots, skins of onions, leaves from celery, leek tops, ribs of kale, mushrooms stems, herbs, almost anything (except broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes, asparagus, artichokes). I collect all of these scraps in a plastic bag in the fridge. After about a week I have enough to make some stock.

Dump the scraps into a big stock pot and add water. I usually add about 2 quarts. Then, just simmer for a couple hours. I simmered mine today for too long without watching it and I lost about 1/2 of a quart of water (oops).

Then, strain the now-stock into jars and either refrigerate for a few days or store in plastic containers and freeze for a month or so.

I love using something that is usually regarded as "garbage" and making something amazing (it'd be even better if I had a compost pile that I could toss the veggies in after making stock). I also love not having to buy something from the store that I can make myself, and not having packaging to throw away. It's a win-win-win situation!

I'll be back with some incred soup recipes you can make using this vegetable stock.