Do you have any great lunch ideas for a brown bagger with limited access to a microwave and fridge? Hubby takes his lunch everyday and we have exhausted the sandwich option. I am looking for some great ideas and I thought you might be able to help.

-slmpetersen

Honestly, I am a poor choice for lunch questions.  Everyone in my house gets the same sandwich for lunch every day.  We rotate pb & j, ham and cheese, and turkey and cheese!  I am going to assume hubby can carry a soft or hard cooler with an ice pack in it (but not all of these would need refrigeration).

One thing that is a great substitute for sandwiches are muffins or scones (think of them as biscuits if its more manly).  For example these Bacon and Swiss Rye Muffins or these Quiche Lorraine Scones are a good sandwich substitute.  Also many variants of pizza bread need no refrigeration.

Salads are also a good choice since they only need to be kept cold, not cooked.  Cobb or pasta salads are a little heartier if your husband eats a big lunch.  This one looks great as does this one.  Depending on how adventurous an eater he is you could send bean and cheese burritos, at room temperature, or spring rolls, which just need to be kept chilled.

Just approach it the way you would any picnic.  Fruits, vegetables, salads, cheese, smoked meats, summer sausages, a variety of breads or pastries, cold chicken, chips and crackers are all good picnic fare.  He won’t notice a single, substantial sandwich is missing if he has a variety of foods to choose from at each lunch.

* Ok foodie public, here is where you come in-do you have any ideas for Stacy (and the rest of us who brown bag it everyday)?  How do you keep free of the sandwich rut?  Feel free to link up your own or your favorite blog posts.

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This post is for my mom, but it showcases one of my absolute favorite, everyday recipes.  One I make often and everybody loves.  See, my mom and I were at the grocery store together and she was pretty disappointed that the store was out of the low-sodium version of Rice-a-Roni.  I suggested she make it herself so she could control the sodium completely.  I love Rice-A-Roni but it is much tastier, healthier, and cheaper when you make it yourself.  So I thought I would bring this post to the front, and explain how easy it is.

For the recipe, visit the original post here. 

It is just as easy as making the stuff in the box except you do have to measure two things: 3/4 cup long grain rice and 1/2 cup of pasta.  You can use fideo or spaghetti, just break it up into little pieces and measure out a 1/2 cup.  Then you simply proceed the same way as the box stuff.  Melt a little butter and saute the rice and pasta til golden.  Add water or chicken stock, spices (garlic, salt, pepper, and a little dried parsley if desired), and a teaspoon of chicken base.  Bring to a boil, cover and turn the heat down to low, then simmer for about 15 minutes.  Done.  Perfectly fluffy, flavorful rice pilaf that really does taste just like Rice-A-Roni but not as salty.  There you go Mom.  Love you.

Oh and Mom, while you’re here, you should click this link and nominate my blog for an award before September 30th.  Cause I’m your favorite daughter.

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I have posted about making chicken stock before.  Having homemade chicken stock on hand is one of my favorite kitchen staples.  It is rich and flavorful with no calories or sodium and-the best part-its free!  What could be a better investment of a lazy day at home?  I save up my chicken parts and carcasses in the freezer until the day I feel like hugging the stove and puttering around the house.  I will admit, though, it is kind of a pain.  I can never seem to keep the pot at the right temperature.  Plus while it is certainly an easy process, you do still have to babysit the stove all day.

Enter: the crock pot.  I have a huge crock pot and I have started using it for my chicken stock.  It keeps the stock at the perfect simmering temperature and doesn’t evaporate as much off, resulting in copious amounts of rich, golden stock-no babysitting required.   I make stock so much more now that I know this trick.  I just throw the leftover chicken and vegetable bits in the pot with water to cover and then 8 or 12 hours later-or whenever I get around to it-I strain it and cool it.  You can start it after dinner and let it go overnight, or you can throw it in the pot in the morning and put it away before bed, whatever works for you.

When I make my stock in the crock pot I easily get 16 cups of perfect broth.  There is no recipe here, you put in whatever you want to flavor your stock with.  Here I have a chicken carcass and some wing tips (both I pulled from the freezer and thawed briefly under running water while I gathered my other ingredients), a red onion, a few stalks of celery, garlic cloves, a lemon, some cilantro stems (when adding herbs the leaves get gunky so just use the stems), a piece of ginger, some peppercorns, coriander seeds, and star anise for making Pho Ga.  Just use what you have on hand, or even just chicken and water!  Remember that what you flavor your stock with will really carry over to the dishes you make with it.

Update: Here’s my method for storage in case you aren’t familiar with making stock.  Strain your hot stock into smaller containers, I use the tall 4 cup Ziplock Twist ‘n Loc containers, then I fill the sink with ice and cold water and chill the stock like that for a few minutes until it is about room temperature. Then it goes into the fridge for up to a week. The fat will solidify at the top and you can remove it and throw it away.  I either make lots of chicken stock heavy dishes that week (a good batch of risotto or tortilla soup will go through a couple of containers) or when I get around to it I scoop the stock out in one cup portions and freeze it flat in freezer bags.  It should be fine in the freezer for several months.

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Don’t you just love popcorn?  I think popcorn is one of those few perfect snacks.  It is high in fiber and protein, it counts as a whole grain serving, it is fun to eat and quick to make, and you get a lot of it for not too many calories.  Between myself and the kids we could easily go through a couple boxes of microwaveable popcorn a week.  That is not cheap and those bags sometimes contain some questionable ingredients.  I recently experimented with buying actual popcorn kernels and making kettle corn on the stove-top.  I was surprised and pleased by how easy and delicious it was-and the fact that you didn’t need to buy a popcorn popper!

The kettle corn is a wonderful treat but with 1/4 cup of oil and 1/4 cup of sugar it isn’t the healthiest of snacks.  Also, getting out a heavy pot and shaking it over the heat for ten minutes or so to make the popcorn is pretty time consuming when the kids are whining and you just want a quick snack.  This method is great.  You get the ease and convenience of microwavable popcorn with the nutritional benefits or air-popped popcorn and all this for the low price of a bag of popcorn kernels ($2 for 20 oz. organic) and a pack of paper bags (which you can re-use by the way).  Update:  This method also work just fine with just a glass bowl.  Place the bowl in the microwave with the kernals inside then cover it with a glass lid or a microwaveable plate.  One bag of pop corn kernels will make you between 11-14 bags of microwaveable popcorn depending on how much you want per bag.  My generic pack of paper bags cost $1.50 for 50.  So each bag of popcorn costs about 20¢.  If you consider that the process doesn’t damage the bag and you could re-use it multiple times that price gets even lower.

Microwaveable Air-Popped Popcorn

• 3 tbsp popcorn kernels
• paper bag
• stapler or scotch tape if desired

1. Add popcorn kernels to a paper bag or a glass bowl.
2. Close bag. You can fold it over once or twice, you can tape it closed, or you can even staple it.  We have tried all of these methods and they all work the same. If using a bowl, cover.
3. Microwave the popcorn as usual for approximately two minutes.  I found that ours was usually done after about 1 minute and 45 seconds.  By two full minutes the popcorn was starting to burn.
4. Open the bag, carefully if you plan to re-use it, and season to taste or eat plain. If using a bowl, handle it carefully as it will be hot.

We tried adding salt and pepper to one bag but the seasonings just don’t stick, even if we spray the kernals lightly with spray oil.  So season the popcorn once it is finished popping (or eat it plain like we do).  What I like is this method is just as portable and convenient as the store-bought bags.  Just portion out the popcorn kernels, staple the bags closed and store them in the pantry or in your desk drawer.  Each bag has about 100 calories and no creepy ingredients!

You can also use a glass bowl with a lid instead of the paper bag.  Just place the popcorn in the bowl and then then place it in the microwave.  Cover the bowl either with a glass lid or with a microwaveable plate (this just keeps popcorn from flying all over the microwave) and pop until there are two seconds between pops.  The bowl will be hot so use a towel or mits to handle it and transfer the popped popcorn to another bowl for serving.

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It is officially spring.  It may not feel like it depending on where you live but in Texas it is already warmer and wetter.  Here, the best part of spring is ushered in in pastels and sparkles in the form of brightly colored eggs full of glittery confetti.  It is supposed to be good luck to have a confetti filled egg cracked over your head but I think it’s a trick to keep any party poopers from complaining about all of the fun.  In all their messy, colorful madness, confetti eggs are such a merry way to celebrate.  The kids love being given the freedom to perform the the forbidden: cracking eggs on people (especially adults). In place of the yolk-surprise!-piles of fluttering, shiny confetti are loosed into the air instead.

Confetti Eggs are decorated in much the same way as Easter eggs.  Instead of hard boiling the eggs before dying, confetti eggs are hollowed out then dyed.  Use a sharp knife or skewer to break a smallish hole in the top of the egg, then poke one tiny hole in the opposite end.  Blow through the tiny hole, allowing the egg yolk and white to fall through the larger hole into a bowl.  Wash your empty egg shells in warm soapy water then decorate.

You know you don’t need to buy an Easter egg decorating kit to dye eggs, right?

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Click here for the recipe Cascarones (Confetti Eggs) or Easter eggs

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