Photo Credit: Simple Bites

I think this is one I’m going to have to try to believe it works! I’m ready and willing for anything if chocolate chips are involved

• Chocolate Chip Chili

Photo Credit: Food for My Family

My friend Shaina shared her Steak Chili this time last year…to help combat the January freeze!  Num!

Some fantastic information on food co-ops from Jamie…

Just like many of us, I am on a budget and must figure out ways to get more with less. Obviously, one way we do this is to get ideas and inspiration from each other. Another way I discovered was to start and operate a food co-op, where buying in bulk gets better prices, and gives me the opportunity for me to serve others.

Here’s how it works for us…

People who join the co-op can order as often or infrequently as they wish. We place orders once a month, and on the day of delivery we get together to re-package bulk items into the sizes ordered. Most of what we order comes from Walnut Creek Foods in Holmes County, Ohio. Much of what gets ordered is from their published sale flyer.

They email this flyer to me and I, in turn, email it to all our members and interested parties. We have available quite a variety of foods, from dry cereals and staple items to cheeses and meats to cold salads (potato, macaroni & cole slaw), jams, jellies, pizza ingredients, and on and on.

Each person who joins the co-op pays a one time fee ($5), is assigned a member number and receives a catalog from WCF. Most orders are sent to me via email; a few are called to me. Some items are at 50% of the retail price in grocery stores.

Check out some of these amazing prices that our food co-op is currently offering:

• Colby Cheese – $2.41/lb
• Smoked, honey roasted turkey breast -$2.93/lb
• Maple ham -$2.25/lb
• Rolled oats – $.44/lb
• Unbleached, unbromated flour – $.34/lb

I have been operating this co-op for over 5 years, and it presently has about 124 members. I am thankful I not only have a way to save money on my own groceries, but a way to serve others, helping them do the same. We have become a community of people working together to save money while enjoying the benefits of healthier ingredients, community fellowship and less trash to inpact the environment.

If you have any questions on how to start a food co-op, let’s talk about it in the comments!

Jamie

Do you want to enjoy homemade applesauce year round?  Even better you could make homemade applesauce and use it as gifts this holiday season.  Be sure and head over to Some the Wiser for this great post on How to Can Applesauce.

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Don’t forget to shop through Ebates and get 30% cash back!

This post brought to you by Carapelli Olive Oil. All opinions are 100% mine.

Anyone who has peeked at more than a few recipes here on $5 Dinners knows that I use olive oil. All. the. time. Unless I’m making scampi or baking cookies, I generally steer clear of butter. Not sure why…I just prefer olive oil.

Carapelli sent me 3 samples of olive oil, along with a “tasting kit.”

• Premium 100% Italian – made solely from the first cold pressing of the finest 100% Italian olives with an intense, robust flavor and aroma
• Il Numerato – a supremely smooth and low acidity oil that is a result of a delicate cold pressing of olives
• Organic – Obtained only from organically grown olives and produced according to organic farming standards

Thankfully, I’d been to an olive oil tasting in the past, so I knew what to do.

During an olive oil tasting, you use the “Four S’s” (Swirl, Sniff, Slurp and Swallow) process. You pour a little into the blue glass (blue so that you can’t see the color of the olive oil), swirl it, sniff it, slurp it and then swallow. I think the slurping part is the most difficult…but I tried! When doing the testing, I just pretended like I was off in the hills of Tuscany, Italy, enjoying the olive oils before an Italian feast.

A girl can dream, right?!

I suppose that different varieties of olives used to extract the oil result in different flavors and strengths of olive oil. I was quite surprised at the difference in flavor. I learned that pure olive oil has a milder flavor and can be used in place of vegetable or canola oils when baking. And that extra virgin olive oil is perfect for sauteing and cooking meats and vegetables. The warmer flavor brings out the best in the food as it cooks.

Pressing on (pun intended), I’ll continue with my kitchen love affair with Carapelli olive oil.

If you’d like to try Carapelli’s olive oils out this holiday season, you’ll want to print this $1.00 OFF coupon at www.CarapelliUSA.com!

These are just adorable, wouldn’t this be cute addition to a tea party with your little girl? Thanks to Martha Stewart for this idea on Crunchy Critters.

I don’t say this often. (Because I generally think of myself as a humble person.)

But I’m proud of myself.

If I can be so bold to say that, because I really am. I did something this month that I never dreamed possible. And it didn’t kill me!!!

I have long been a lover of cookies, brownies and anything sweet. I have tried a number of times to “give it up,” but just was never in the right place in my life or in the right frame of mind to actually do it successfully.

I took a leap at the beginning of the month and made 3 goals for the month of August.

• Eat no sugar and no wheat flour.
• Finish the One Dish Dinners Manuscript.
• Exercise 3 times a week.

Goal #1.

With the exception a few mindless licks and bites of the kid’s snacks that had some “cane juice”…I managed to get through the month without a bite of dessert…or sugar. It was really an experiment to see if I had more energy while not eating sugar.

Here is my answer to that…I had more energy, yes. I also found a bit more clarity in my thinking and my daily productivity was up. But probably what I value most, I have a much better sense of my fatigue level and found myself sleeping more soundly and waking up more rested. I fell asleep quickly, I felt when I was tired and sat down to rest, I could better sense when I needed to go to bed…and had many a 9 pm lights out nights! (I’m usually up til 11 pm – midnight!)

I do plan to continue this…with maybe a treat once a month. Because I do believe that moderation is important…and a simple treat once a month is perfectly reasonable!

Goal #2.

The One Dish Dinners cookbook manuscript is FINISHED!

6 months of recipe testing, writing, recipe tweaking, writing…and the final product is ready to send in.

The only reason that I haven’t sent it to my editor…he is “swamped in” at his vacation home in Massachusetts after Irene blew through. So I will send it in after Labor Day, when he is back in the office.

Goal #3.

I spent much of the first week of the month in front of the computer working on the manuscript, while my mom took care of my kids. So I didn’t get out much to exercise that week.  But since then, I’ve been to the gym at least 2 times a week…with another exercise session of walking with the stroller, or doing weights at home.

Overall, I really like Ashley’s 3 in 30 approach of making 3 big goals to accomplish each month…and I have my own 5-10 “smaller” goals each week that I try to get done in addition.

Did you accomplish any goals this month?! Do you have any for next month you’d like to get done?!

We are totally into giraffes these days. The kids got to feed them at the Cincy Zoo…several times this summer. And they were so excited to see the adorable baby giraffe, born earlier this summer!

This giraffe sandwich idea comes from Funky Lunch…and amazing resource for clever lunch ideas!

Growing up, I have vivid memories of my mom putting a casserole dish filled with yellow squash and some water in the microwave to steam. Then when it was done, she would sprinkle some Parmesan on top and set it before us on the table.

It never got too many complaints…at least not from me, and not from my brother and sister, if my memory serves me right.

And I think this memory is so vivid because it’s one of the few that I have of my mom cooking. (If you count steaming vegetables in the microwave cooking. Which I do. In her case.)

It’s a running joke in our family…my mom didn’t cook when we were growing up and we still can’t figure out what happened with me. I cook at least 6 nights a week. Without complaining.

I *big puffy heart* cooking.

What really happened is that the cooking gene skipped a generation and was passed down from my mom’s mom right on to me.

So I’ve taken the concept of my mom’s steamed squash with Parmesan and kicked it up a few notches here with this caramelized yellow squash with Parmesan on top.

If you’d like to learn more about Square Foot Gardening, please check out the Square Foot Gardening books by Mel Bartholemew.

Do you have a yellow summer squash recipe to share?! Feel free to link up your blog post below…or leave an update in the comments!!!