Cherry Chocolate Chip Sour Cream Popsicles

I've made frozen treats with Greek yogurt and always found them to be a tiny bit too tart. Sour cream kept popping in my head as an alternative that could work. I'm happy to tell you - it does!

Cherry Chocolate Chip Sour Cream Popsicles
(my very own experiment, makes 7 in my small molds)
2/3c full fat sour cream
1/2c unsweetened almond & coconut milk blend
2tsp homemade vanilla
16 drops vanilla stevia
15 frozen dark sweet cherries, quartered
3T chopped dark chocolate 

Mix all. Pour into molds. Freeze. Eat. Yum.

Are you staying frugal?

What I've been eating lately:

Grilled pork chop/zucchini & squash zoodles/Chinese 5-spice carrots. Paleo Sesame Chicken on zoodles w/tomato & mozzarella.  Thai Cucumber Salad. Chopped Salad.
(Can you tell I've discovered my Spirelli again?)

What I've Seen Lately:

The purple flowers are striped hollyhocks - they're beautiful. Dad planted them between the corn and zinnias. They're single stalks about 4-5ft tall. Second pic is of garlic in its second year that I'd planted from seed from an online friend. It was supposed to be ready for harvest this fall. I dug out three that look like this and left about 8 more in the ground. They look like somewhat small shallots though they smell like garlic. I'm giving them a third year in hopes of getting some large bulbs of cloves. If anyone raises garlic and is familiar with either the variety of garlic this would be or would know what may have happened so that I only got a single bulb, I'd love to hear from you. Flowers in photo below are a few I snipped from what came up out of a packet of mixed perennial flower seeds.

Frugal doings lately:
> started a second part-time job
> adding half the amount of coffee grounds to the previous used grounds to get a second pot for half the cost (our coffee maker only makes 2 & 1/2 mugs of coffee)
> signed up with the area extension office for a cooking and walking program - free exercise and free food
> made a list of another bag of items to drop at Goodwill and filed it away for tax time
> getting my recipe and ingredients together to pickle garden beets
> sold two of A's college texts

> brought home some more sandwich wrappers from work that would've been thrown out (they'll be used to wrap/make party crackers again for a game at Christmas)
> making more of an effort to include garden produce as the core of meals
> found white cotton ankle socks on clearance at Mendards for A and me, 10pk for $2, and they're nice quality
> picked basil, put it on a paper towel lined plate to dry and some is hung to dry
> picked a small amount of sugar snap peas & green beans, blanched, then froze into 3 bags for future stir-fry meals
> made up several individual meals and froze them for when A moved into her college apartment for fall semester (3 salmon patties, 2 chicken primavera, 1 teriyaki shrimp stir-fry)
> bought 6 green peppers on sale 2 for $1, chopped and froze in 3 meal size servings
> cashed in for a $5 Amazon card at Swagbucks
> it rained and refilled my nearly empty rain barrels
> received a Redbox code for a movie, watched Divergent for free
> came across another Redbox offer for a free game rental that J & D enjoyed for free entertainment
> used coupons to get 3 bottles of hairspray for about $4.25 out of pocket but also got a $5 Target gc for the purchase of 3 Tresemme products (I just ran out of hairspray, so this was perfect and will last me for at least the next year hopefully!)
> used Target Cartwheel printout and coupons to get 4 boxes of low-carb snackbars for just a bit over $1 each, normally $4.69 per box
> more a frugal for boychild, D, he spent $4 on an arcade game and won a PS4 (though it was technically my $4 and my $$ that paid for he and two friends' laser tag rounds...still a much better deal had we been really intending to buy a new system...)
> cut watermelon, saved the juice, made popsicles, which we only ate half of and tossed the rest as we didn't like them and they have too much sugar anyway (guess that's more of a frugal fail)
> made low-carb muffins with some blueberries that were nearly ready to be tossed into compost
> ordered an analog stick off of Amazon to replace a broken one on a videogame controller as opposed to buying a whole new controller - received two of them for under $3 shipped
> cut buttons from a shirt that was headed for the rag bag

Low-carb Zippy Mocha Fudge Pops Recipe

These turned out so much better than I'd expected! I love it when experiments turn into something wonderful.

This recipe is one that I created based on an ice cream pie recipe out of an Eating Well magazine. A while back I'd made their recipe (well, I loosely followed it for the most part) using strawberries and rhubarb, though their recipe was for strawberries and lime. I also made my own nut crust and altered the sweetener, etc. You know how it goes if you're a fellow baker or cook. We all make changes and accommodations along the way, right?

One of their other combinations was for a mocha pie. That was what I was going to make to begin with so that I could use up the last of the Greek yogurt. But then I got lazy. I didn't want to fart around with making the crust first. I didn't want to use so much sweetener. Plus, I really did not want a bunch of slices taking up valuable real estate in my freezer. So I began to think "small scale" and ended up with these popsicles. I've made chocolate popsicles before and I wasn't certain that I'd like the Greek yogurt tang in these. I threw caution to the wind and gave it a whirl and found the yogurt gave it a little extra bite, or, zip! They also turned out creamy, with no icy crystals. Whether it was due to my tightly packed freezer or the high-fat content of the whipping cream, I can't say. All I can say is... Yum.

Zippy Mocha Fudge Pops
(makes 4 small pops)
3T xylitol
10 drops liquid vanilla stevia
1/4c heavy whipping cream
1/3c Greek yogurt
1T water
3/4T instant coffee granules, strong/dark variety
1T cocoa powder

In a mixing bowl, combine xylitol, stevia, whipping cream and yogurt. (You may want to add only the xylitol and taste before adding stevia, then adjust accordingly. I'm a sweet-head.) Set aside. In a small dish place the water, instant coffee granules and cocoa powder. (A sample size tube of instant coffee is what I used, which measured at about 3/4T.) Stir until smooth. Then stir into the yogurt mixture and blend well. Pour into molds and freeze. 

Summer's winding down...

8/16 - Garage sale tomorrow morning! Yes! Finally going to (hopefully) get rid of all this clutter and junk piling up in the garage. Whatever's left I will put on Craigslist or Freecycle, followed by a one-way visit to Goodwill. Sadly, we live out of town a few miles, so we won't get as much traffic as those located in town. But I heard that there's a small bunch of sales going on and am counting on people planning ours into their "sale-ing route". I have a ton of pricing to do still, lots of organizing and figuring out how to display stuff... I decided to be lazy with clothes and just printed a poster with prices for tops (25cents) and jeans ($1), or marked and hung up for higher priced items. I still need to get to town and get some money to make change, too.

Yesterday I harvested one of the four cabbages from my garden box, as well as enough pea pods to give me a total of 4 meals' worth, which I blanched and froze. My dad made soup with the cabbage. I also picked enough green beans so that I now have a total of 6 meals' worth in the freezer. I'm hoping to get to the kale either today or tomorrow after the sale, which I also intend to blanch and freeze. This fall I intend to can some beets and make applesauce for the freezer, too. We've really got to work harder at reducing what we are spending at the grocery store. I hate that every other check written out is to them.

School begins again in a couple of weeks, which means I am back to work. I'm sort of looking forward to it. Partly because it keeps me busy for large blocks of time where I don't think about food... which is weird when you consider I'm a lunch lady. But it's hard to consider the food schools serve as FOOD. It's almost all pre-breaded/pre-cooked brown foods. Yuck. Not to say we don't have anything else to eat there. We do have a nice salad bar and there are soups and sandwiches, too. As well as an a la carte line, filled with more pre-breaded/pre-cooked brown foods. Look how I meander off course...

I've been walking our paved paths in town when I have the opportunity. It takes just a bit under an hour and is about 3 to 4 miles after walking both ways, I think. I've also been starting my Leslie Sansone dvd's again. The first one I did was the 2 mile walk and I didn't even break a sweat. So the next time I popped in the 3 mile walk, which made me work a little harder, but I think I will go on to the 4 mile walk next. "D" joined Cross Country (like track... without the track) this week, too. I intend to do lots of walks while he is participating in that since I will have to come in to town to drop and pick him up several evenings a week. I noticed yesterday that "D's" sister, "A", hopped on her bike and went for a short ride last night. She hasn't done that for nearly a year now. See how contagious physical activity can be?

8/25 - Yesterday I gave my brother a head of cabbage, let him pick a bunch of the green beans and a couple of onions. There's still a few more meals' worth of beans out there, which if I can bear the heat, I will pick and blanch/freeze this afternoon. The garden's dwindling quickly since we haven't had rain and we've used all the water caught in the rain barrels. We have salty, hard-water so we can't use from our well. It's been so hot and the ground's cracking from the dryness.

I made another batch of popsicles with avocado. This time they were peppermint bon-bon flavored! No recipe, really. Just pulverized some avocado/mint extract/xylitol & stevia/h&h/dark chocolate chips in a blender cup. Next time I would like to have larger chunks of chocolate so I will just roughly chop some and stir in before pouring into molds.

We made $100 on our junk last weekend at the garage sale. While it's pretty darn sad to think of how much all that stuff had cost, the money made is better than the nothing we would've got for it had we just tossed it. We still had the seat down in the back of the Escape and the back packed with leftovers that were brought to Goodwill. I also set a bunch of stuff out by the road for free. Some went but the garbage man ended up taking most a few days later. There are some books and movies that I am going to look into selling online, too. I come away from this sale with new resolve to control our spending.

A "want" now and then is okay. In the case of "J" working full-time and even over-time lately, he should be able to have $20 cash in his pocket each payday. I have no qualms about that. What I do have a problem with is when you allow yourself cash but then write checks out for a case of beer, pop and candy, or a Playstation giftcard, etc. Is it just me or is it absolutely insane to download a videogame or two nearly each month, which isn't even something... tangible?!? I'm off on a rant on all this videogame junk - I hate it. Now, before I am accused of picking on "J" and how he spends, I will admit to my splurges. A few times a month I find myself either picking up a sugar-free coffeeshop or McD's coffee, or swinging in for a 6" flatbread sandwich at Subway. However, I am working at cutting those things down to maybe once a month. As far as make-up and such... I use minimal make-up bought with coupons if available, just foundation/powder/blush, a little mascara on occasion that I received at Christmas from my sister, "T", and sometimes a dab of lip balm that I received from "A" at Christmas. I buy a face cleanser and moisturizer about once, maybe twice for the cleanser, a year... using a coupon at Ulta and buying Walmart brand... for a grand total of a bit under $15. Clothes? For the whole family, we usually buy thrifted or rummage sale finds, sometimes clearanced priced items from the stores. A couple of times per year I will use a Kohl's coupon code for 30% off and buy a few new items for "D"and "A" for school or to replace worn out stuff. We can't avoid spending money on "J" as easily as he needs new scrubs now and then, as well as shoes fairly often. I have made several tops and have a couple more in progress that I will replenish his closet with eventually. I do watch for coupons or free shipping deals for the online scrub place we like to use and will make a small purchase if there are suitable items in the sale section. How do you like to save money or reduce costs?

Currently, the biggest stressor for me with our money situation is that the Escape has an oil leak. It will be picked up and worked on tomorrow to the tune of about $850... and that's only the labor. We only had just over $600 left in our "emergency" fund. So I picked up a few days of extra work so that we could cover the whole sha-bang with cash. This is the only reason I would like to live within easy walking distance to town... when it comes to owning vehicles. The maintenance, insurance and fuel. Yikes. The mechanic tried to make me feel better by telling me that if it is for sure leaking where it appears to be (they added dye and will check with black light), that that part is only about $20. Auto manufacturer's did a great job at putting our vehicles together just so, so that it takes 8hrs of labor to get in to replace a $20 part! Good grief.

Grilled Chops with Cherries

7/18/13
I made it into a Trader Joe's yesterday afternoon. Actually, my sister, "T", drove us over three hours away just to check it out. Well, she also wanted to check out a Byerly's grocery store, which we did. While I did buy a few things I just felt kind of meh (with shoulder shrug) about both stores. Of course I had to buy canned coconut milk and coconut oil from TJ's... and apparently I also bought two dark chocolate bars... I swear I do not know how that happened. Picked up a treat for "J" - chocolate covered coffee beans. And was it just the store we went to or are TJ's always so FREAKIN' CROWDED?!? From Bryerly's (I may quite possibly be spelling that completely incorrectly) I bought some red curry paste. I'm not sure why other than I've seen several paleo recipes where I was like, "I wish our little hick-town store would carry some decent crap for once", and I also bought some instant miso soup packets for "A". Not sure that any of that was worth the 7 or so hours spent sitting in the car...ha ha.

I just popped a batch of popsicles into the freezer. This evening I found myself in the kitchen trying to raid the fridge or freezer for something (crimeny - anything, really) sweet and two tiny squares of dark chocolate weren't cutting it. A few days ago I'd made a raspberry syrup, basically the same as when I'd made this blackberry one. I decided that I am really craving something long-lasting and cold (it's been so hot the past week) and thought I'd incorporate the raspberry syrup into it somehow. I poured a little more than half a cup of syrup into a 1c measure Pyrex measuring glass and filled it the rest of the way with some coconut milk, gave it a little whisk (no, really... I have this adorable little whisk that's only a couple inches long) and poured it into my molds. I got 4 popsicles and there's enough left to almost make one more which I will do after eating one... tomorrow. Drats. So I've now guzzled a couple glasses of water to take my mind off of wanting something more. I'm going to bed. (That's in my little-bratty-girl voice.) Stomping off now...

7/19/13 - Yeah. They're good.

7/24/13
We returned home today from a mini-vacation to a small outdoor recreation park where there are waterslides, go-karts and an alpine slide. I'd brought sunscreen and you would think, out of four people, that one of us would've remembered it. Nope. It sat in the trunk of the car while we headed into the park. So we're a little crispy and sore.

A few nights ago I made some boneless grilled pork chops with a fresh cherry topping. According to Zorba Paster's On Your Health on National Public Radio, each serving is 5.81g of sugar and 10.64g of carbohydrates. I gave myself less than a whole serving of the cherries. I used ponzu sauce in place of soy as I've had a bottle that I wanted to finish off, and I used coconut oil in place of vegetable oil. (Recipe is copy/pasted from a public radio site.) While it's a bit higher in sugar, I can't pass up fresh cherries at a great price. In the background is a summer squash casserole of sorts, no recipe as it was just this and that tossed together.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

GRILLED CHOPS WITH CHERRIES

4 Pork loin chops (½" thick)
¼ Cup Low-sodium soy sauce
1 tsp Vegetable oil
½ Cup Chopped onion
1 Clove Garlic minced 1 Tbs Freshly chopped thyme
1 Tbs Chives, diced
2 Tbs Balsamic vinegar
1 Cup Sweet cherries, chopped, pitted
Salt and pepper to season
Dust pork lightly with pepper. Place in a baking dish and top with soy sauce. Coat the chops and cover. Chill for at least an hour, turning occasionally.
Prepare Grill (or Broiler)
In a small skillet, heat oil over medium heat. Add onion, garlic, thyme and chives. Sauté until onion is almost tender. Add vinegar and sauté a minute or two more to coat. Add cherries and continue cooking until tender (about 10 minutes). Remove skillet from heat and season with salt. Grill marinated pork about four minutes per side until cooked through. Transfer to plates and top with cherry mixture. Enjoy! Servings: 4

Creamy Lime-Avocado Popsicles

I've been rushing the family to eat the last batch of popsicles that I'd made using a regular pudding mix (i.e. made with sugar). Finally forced the last one on "J" and was able to make these yesterday. OMG! I've been struggling with teaching myself to enjoy avocados. I just haven't so far, really. This low-carb way of eating is a challenge if you're like me and not really into green foods. Now that I've made these? Well... if I can get my avocado every day this way... No problem! They are FANTASTIC! I altered the recipe that it links to by reducing the amount so it would fit in my molds, as they are pretty small, I think they hold 2oz. each. I got 6 popsicles with my recipe. I also replaced the sugar with my preferred sweeteners and added the coconut milk because... well, just because I had some leftover in my fridge to use up and I figured it might make the avocado more palatable for me. Boy, did it ever - these are great! I had to eat 2 last night. Just to be sure that I really liked them.

Creamy Lime-Avocado Popsicles
(adapted from current issue of Cooking Light magazine)
1/4c water
2T xylitol
25 drops vanilla liquid stevia
1/2c canned coconut milk
juice of 1 lime and zest from half
1 avocado, pitted and chopped

In small saucepan heat water and xylitol, stirring until dissolved. Remove from heat. Once cool enough to handle, pour into blender cup and add remaining ingredients. Wiz it up and pour into molds. Freeze until set.

Just wanted to update the garden box, or square foot garden. It's starting to fill in! Yippee!

The pale, yellowing seedlings in front of the two painted pots are radishes that I started to thin out. I gave up after being eaten alive by flies. Judging by how unhealthy they now look, I'm glad I didn't get to transfer more of them. My peas are almost tall enough to reach the sisal twine, as a matter of fact, a few tendrils have curled around it in a couple of spots. The row of plants over on the right are green beans.

Dark Chocolate Fudge Popsicles (NOT LOW-CARB)

Last night my husband was craving ice cream.  He's not on this reduced-carb bandwagon so my homemade mock almond joy creation that's currently in the freezer was not going to satisfy him. While he's also had a big bucket of vanilla and multiple ice cream bars in the deep freeze recently, we do have two teens. He was crushed when he went to the freezer and found none. He soothed himself with a pile of gummy worms. (Yes, he is a sugar addict.) So I offered to make him some popsicles. These are the result (so fudgey good!):

Dark Chocolate Fudge Popsicles
(adapted from ? several online ideas)
(makes 4-5, depending on your molds)
1c h&h
1/4c dark brown sugar, packed
1 egg yolk
dash of pink salt
1/2tsp cornstarch 
2Tbsp dark cocoa
1/4tsp vanilla
1/4c chocolate chips

Mix h&h, sugar, yolk, salt and cornstarch in saucepan. Whisk while heating over med-low heat for 5-8mns. Whisk in cocoa and heat additional 5-8mn over medium heat. (Mixture will thicken into a custard.) Remove from heat, stir in vanilla, then chocolate chips. Stir until melted. Let cool enough so it's easy to handle and then fill your popsicle molds. Freeze and enjoy.

Lemon & Coconut Popsicles

This recipe came about due to an accident.  Well, more like, due to my frugality.

When I have bought canned coconut milk I have bought the brand in a red can - Thai Kitchen brand.  I took a chance and purchased a cheaper brand - Imperial Dragon.  I had picked the can up from the shelf and brought it close to my ear where I proceeded to tip it/turn it upside down/shake it.  It didn't make any sloshy sounds.  That indicated to me that it was not going to be the watery type.  That was good.  However, I was expecting it to be like Thai Kitchen in that it would have an awesome, thick, dreamy creamy layer on top and the rest would be an opaque layer that I could drain off.  So I stuck it in the fridge for the day so that it would be easier to separate once the bulk of the fat/cream solidified.

Alas, it was not what I was expecting.  But it was somewhat thick (like yogurt) and very creamy, from the top to the bottom of the can.  The flavor was good, too.  While I couldn't make what I intended to with it,  I thought about making an ice cream.  I also had most of a lemon left after a previous meal.  So that's where I started.  But not where I ended up.

Lemon & Coconut Popsicles
(from Becky @ Becky's Place)
1 - 13.5oz can coconut milk*
2T xylitol
15 drops liquid vanilla stevia
2T fresh lemon juice**
1T lemon zest**
1tsp vanilla extract

Mix all in a jar or mixing bowl.  Pour into popsicle molds.  Freeze overnight or until firm.

Number of servings depends on your molds.  I have a 4pc set and will get 7 popcicles from this recipe.  I could have got 8 if I didn't fill them so completely.  These turned out smooth and creamy, no ice crystals after being in the freezer for one day.  The xylitol dissolved completely before I poured into the molds, too.  *The brand of coconut milk I used contains 3grams sugar and 6grams carbs in the entire can.  **Depending on how tangy you would like yours, you may want to start with less juice and zest.  I didn't measure mine, just eyeballed it.  Another good reason to begin with less.  You can always add more, too. 

I now need to bellyache.  (But I know it's my own damn fault, too.)  I gained 10 pounds in 4 days.  10 pounds in 4 days!?!  What the hell?!?  We took a mini-vacation with family.  Lots of food (everything offered was brown) and one night down at the bar is how it happened.  Man, but that bartender made a great mudslide...  Anyway.  I'm back to behaving (and feeling so much better for it, too) today.  I also resumed the walking videos, with weights even.  Oh, plus I rediscovered the chia seeds I'd bought some time ago and added them to a raspberry protein shake.  I love that, in my mind, they pass for berry seeds - makes it so easy to incorporate them into my diet.




 

Strawberry Popsicles

Pureed strawberries.  That's it.  No sugar necessary.

Yes, I know strawberry season's over here.  Just wanted to share one more way with fruit leftovers.
I'd made strawberry jam and had pureed more berries than needed.  Not quite enough for everyone to have on ice cream, which is my favorite way to have a strawberry dessert.  But I was able to get four popsicles out of it!  Yummmm...

Pineapple-Pear Popsicles

What's summer without popsicles?!?
I like to save the juice from canned fruit in a Pyrex measuring cup in the fridge.  (Its spout makes it quick and easy to fill the popsicle molds.)  While I occasionally end up getting our canned fruit in syrup, depending on prices and availability,  I mostly aim to get our canned fruits packed in 100% fruit juice.  This past week I opened a can of pear slices in real pear juice and a can of pineapple rings in pineapple juice to have along with a stir-fry supper.  I poured both juices into the Pyrex cup, then later poured that juice - with nothing else added - into my popsicle molds.  Over the week we eat the frozen treats and refill the molds with the rest of the juice.  So stop paying for high-fructose corn syrup soaked fruits, and don't pay for Splenda treated either.  Buy your fruits canned in 100% fruit juice, don't dump it down the drain, keep it for fantastic frozen treats!  I can't believe it took me as long as it did to start doing this...