Eggs   Milk   Flour   Sugar   Salt   Pasta   Bread

What do these ingredients represent? They are all near the top of the Smart ingredients list. I am guessing the majority of you even have them on hand right now. What can they do for you? Make your Mother’s Day brunch a ridiculously easy success.

This simple set of ingredients can be mixed and matched to make what I refer to as “palettes” — or things that are a base for many different presentations. From this short list I will give you simple, but elegant palette recipes for your Mother’s Day brunch including crepes, strata, frittata and quiche — which you can combine with hazelnut spread, berries, lemons, other fruit, fresh vegetables, canned vegetables, herbs, spices and more. Whatever is your favorite, OR whatever ingredients you have on hand.

In fact, this manner of cooking is how I want you to approach all cooking in general. NOT approaching a certain dish as one which follows a specific recipe, but as a strategy that is a blueprint (drawn in pencil) that you can adapt to different ingredients and preferences.

Enjoy your Mother’s Day, and especially to any of you Moms out there who may be cooking, enjoy great flavors from simple efforts, and consider that a gift to yourself!

Crepes

Crepes are an easy and elegant brunch item that are extremely versatile. Unlike their sweeter counterpart, the pancake, crepes can be both sweet OR savory, eaten as is topped with some fruit syrup, fruit, and/or hazelnut spread, or housing either savory eggs, meat, vegetables and/or cheese, or sweet fruit compotes or fresh fruit.

4 servings (8 crepes)

Ingredients

•                3 tablespoons butter, melted

•                1 cup milk

•                1 cup flour

•                2 eggs

•                Dash salt

Blend milk, flour, eggs, 2 tablespoons melted butter, and salt. Blend until smooth, then chill, covered for 30 minutes. Lightly brush a 10-inch non-stick skillet with some of reserved butter and heat over medium heat until hot. Pour in 1/4 cup batter, immediately tilting and rotating skillet to coat bottom, and cook crêpe. Turn once and cook until just set and golden for about 1 minute in total. Repeat. Just before serving, drizzle on some fruit syrup, fill with fruit compote, eggs and grilled vegetables, hazelnut spread and bananas, or top with fresh fruit and powdered sugar.

Following is a sample recipe for a fruit syrup you can use to garnish your crepes. You can substitute oranges, limes, apples or berries for the lemon, and any kind of juice (3 tablespoons). To make a fruit compote, decrease the water to two tablespoons, and increase the amount of fruit to at least 1 cup.

Lemon Syrup

•                1 cup of water

•                1/3 cup of sugar

•                1/2 lemon, sliced

•                Juice of 1/2 lemon

Simmer water and sugar in a small saucepan over a medium heat. Stir to dissolve sugar. Add slices and juice of lemon and bring to a boil. Turn down to medium low and simmer gently for about 10-12 minutes or until the mixture thickens to form a syrup. Remove from heat and set aside.

Strata

Strata is a dish that is so easy, and goes such a long way, that every time I make it I wonder why I don’t make it more often. Even when I’m serving a crowd, I always have leftovers, which I freeze in single-portion ziploc bags for a healthy, quick, protein-rich breakfast for the kids. Some of my favorite strata combinations are bacon and cheddar, mushrooms spinach and gruyere, or chicken tomatoes and mozzarella. The options are endless. Think pizza toppings, or omelette additions… or of course whatever’s in your fridge. Use approximately 2 cups of vegetables and meat, plus one cup of cheese.

Ingredients

• 6 slices of bread, any kind, cubed
• 4 tablespoons butter
• 3 eggs, beaten
• 1 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon salt

Grease bottom of 13 x 9 x 2″ baking dish with 2 tablespoons butter. Top with bread.

In a small frying pan, melt 2 tablespoons of butter over medium heat. Add any vegetables you may be using, and sauté until browned, 3 to 5 minutes. Remove from heat and add to baking dish. Top with meat or cheese as desired. Whisk together milk, eggs and salt until well blended. Pour over bread.

Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes.

Frittata

Frittata is an egg & Noodle dish that, like a lasagna, can be cut and stays in a nice shape. This works well for a brunch of you want to plate it with fruit or a salad. It is also, of course, extremely versatile. Following is the palette recipe for frittata. Add up to two cups vegetables such as asparagus, peppers, onions, broccoli, tomatoes, spinach, artichoke hearts, garlic, olives, etc. and a half a cup to one cup of your favorite cheese, or combination of cheeses (shredded or grated), such as cheddar, parmesan, mozzarella, gruyere, fontina etc. Add a half cup chopped cooked bacon, sausage or ham if desired.

Frittata

Ingredients

• 2 cups cooked pasta
• 4 eggs
• ¼ cup milk
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons butter

Coat bottom and sides of baking dish with butter. Mix remaining ingredients in large bowl and pour into a large round or medium rectangle casserole dish. Bake at 375 F for 30 minutes.

Quiche

Extremely similar to Frittata, but with the carbs in a buttery crust, quiche can be made with any of the same additions. Here’s the recipe for the “palette”, feel free to use store-bought crust.

Ingredients

For Crust

• 1 cup flour
• 1 stick (1/2 cup) butter, cold, cut into small chunks
• pinch of salt
• pinch of sugar
• 3-4 tablespoons cold water

Pulse or cut butter into flour. Add in salt, sugar and water and continue to mix until a dough forms. Roll out dough using additional flour on the board and rolling pin so it doesn’t stick. Press pie crust into pie plate. Prebake for 7 minutes at 375 degrees F.

For Quiche

Ingredients

• 3 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

There is so much information out there about groceries — what’s on sale — what you should eat — what you should buy. I am frankly tired of my customers being so confused about what they should buy and their general feeling of inferiority that they don’t know the “right” answer. So my guidance to them, and to you, is to not listen to anyone about what to buy, except your family. Take a close look at your family’s eating habits and learn what are your family’s Smart Ingredients. What oil to use is a great example. I can’t tell you how many times I get the questions “Does it have to be extra virgin? Should I only use olive oil? Someone told me I should only buy grapeseed oil, what do you think?” I often answer all these questions with “Use butter.” Not because I don’t love oils and think they have a superior health value, because I do. I just want to make the point that in most applications, like searing or basting foods, fat is fat and whatever you have, use or prefer will work just fine. Listening to the information overload will never get you to the “right” answers. Playing the Smart cooking game, getting in the kitchen and working hard to win at dinner will.

My youngest child is a preschooler. So if the tv is on during the day, it’s typically Sprout or the Disney channel. If I listened to the food influences from those channel’s commercials, I would be feeding my young child noodles with processed dehydrated cheeses and sauces, bottled dressings, pop tarts and frozen dinners and feeling great about doing it. I don’t feed her those things, and I am not influenced to do so by what I hear and see. Because knowledge is power, and I already know what to feed her that is healthy and she likes. I encourage you to take control over what you need and what you should buy at the grocery store.

Then, your approach at the grocery store will become what I call “shooting straight” versus “casting a net”. Casting a net means buying some of this and some of that… many things that don’t always add up to feeding your family. Shooting straight means buying more Smart Ingredients (stock up!) and less clutter. If your family is eating a lot of processed foods and you want to move into more healthful options, start by buying the same one or two things you know your family will eat and prepare them in different ways. The chance that you’ll end up using them is much greater than if you decide to try an entirely new healthy food regime with foods you aren’t sure the family will eat. Don’t try to change the world (your family’s entire dinner process) in a day. Take it one day at a time and if you are using Smart Ingredients and building off of the 3 or so favorite “types” of meals your family likes, you will have 20-30 “go to” recipes in no time.

My Mom has jumped on the green smoothie craze, encouraged to do so by her chiropractor. She loves them and feels great about what she eats for breakfast, has even got the rest of us joining in, and I’m proud of her for her dedication. Then her hairdresser — the end of all information sources — told her that by blending her produce she’s losing all the nutrition value and it’s a waste of her time. Now my Mom is doubting her efforts. I told her to hold it right there, tell the hairdresser to stick to dye jobs and highlights, and to keep drinking her smoothies. I tried to find any scientific evidence that blending changes the health value of vegetables, and I couldn’t. The safest bet is that the food is still raw, and it’s still more greens than she would have been eating otherwise. But the more important thing is that the green smoothies are working for my Mom, and they are much healthier than the scones she used to eat for breakfast.  No one should be derailed by what someone else tells you you should or shouldn’t eat or buy.

Here’s my Mom’s favorite Green Smoothie Recipe

Ratio 60% fruit to 40% greens

• Spinach
• Strawberries
• Fresh Pineapple
• Parsley

Combine all ingredients with water and ice. Blend.

Last year I was getting asked all the time if I “Super-couponed” by either passionate couponers or those who felt like they should be in on the latest thing. I get it – couponing can make the grocery store a game and the money saved can make you a winner. But like a kid who graduates from hungry Hippos to Monopoly, it’s time to learn a better game that makes more sense and works for life, both saving you money at the store and bringing you success in your kitchen. It’s called Shopping Smart.

The goal of the Shopping Smart game is to NOT have to go the store more than once every 7-10 days. And, to buy only items that can be mixed and matched to add up to dinner success in your home. Not shopping Smart would mean going to the grocery store, buying a bunch of this-and-that that looks good/is new/would be great in one dinner. Shopping Smart means going to the grocery store knowing just what items to buy because they are items that ALWAYS add up to dinner in your house. If you read my blog often, you’re used to pasta being a frequent example. Forgive me, here I go again… but I’ll throw in a side of produce too. My family loves pasta. I make it at least once a week though rarely the same way twice in a month, alternating baked pasta, mac and cheese, fettuccine, pasta with vegetables herbs and olive oil, and many of the other pasta recipes you can see on my website. The low price on pasta around here lately has been $1.39. This week a great brand was on sale for $0.79 per pound, so I bought ten pounds. I saved $5!…I won! I didn’t have to scan the papers, find the scissors, cut anything out or make sure I brought it with me, and there’s no chance that it won’t get used or will go to waste, because it’s one of my family’s Smart ingredients. Spinach is another great example. In the winter, fresh spinach can be a bit pricey. With Spring on the horizon, I found a large bag for just $2.22 at my local fresh market-type Euro grocer. I froze the majority of it in sandwich-size Ziploc bags for use in soups, pastas, pizzas, quiche, strata and more, and kept in the crisper just the amount I’m sure I’ll use before it wilts. 

As one mother of five who uses my cookbook 70 Meals, One Trip to the Store, says, the Smart shopping method is “a godsend.” This Mom, Shelly Mabe of Warren , MI, and author of the freehomeschooling.com blog, is using the cookbook to help her family get out of debt. She said “This falls right in line with our family plan to be out of debt in 1 year.” And, as a woman known for her tendency to grab her family a pizza for dinner, she is impressing her friends that she has actually making dinner every night — and that even her picky eaters loved the meals.

The fact that the “Super-coupon” phase seems to have faded speaks to it’s sustainability as a lifetime plan. By going to the store with the intention to save money using coupons you are risking two things: one is buying things that may not add up to dinner just because you have a coupon for them — and buying them in bulk for that matter. The other thing you’re sacrificing is your time. You don’t need to spend time accumulating, clipping, sorting, printing, and remembering your coupons. By buying only what adds up to dinner success you will save more money than could be put on a piece of paper. Think of it as a 40% off for life, with an added bonus of a lot of free time. And, this plan never expires!

What is better with bacon? Well, according to the saying, it’s everything. I know many of you agree, and I want to tell you that it’s ok! Bacon bears a bad reputation as a fatty food, but the truth is that because it has such a strong flavor, a little can go a long way. Which means bacon can easily be enjoyed in moderation in many many dishes. While types of bacon differ, 3 strips of cooked Oscar Meyer bacon contain only 6 grams of fat, and 80 calories. Yes, it is high in sodium, but it is also high in protein, and unlike many unhealthy foods, it is a pure cut of meat, and free of processed byproducts.

The following recipes and link to our recipes page include appetizer, salad, soup and entree recipes that showcase how butternut squash, dates, lentils, sweet potatoes, salad, and burgers can indeed be better with bacon!

Butternut Squash and Bacon Risotto

In a large pan on stove, cook bacon until crisp. Remove bacon from pan, reserving 2 tablespoons grease in pan. Add rice and cook over medium heat, stirring often, 5 minutes or until slightly browned. Add the onions, squash and wine, and stir until combined. Add enough broth to just cover the rice. Cook, stirring frequently, until the broth is mostly absorbed. Add more broth and continue cooking, stirring, and adding more broth as the previous additions are absorbed, until the rice is tender with just a slightly firm quality, about 25 minutes. As the risotto cooks, adjust the heat so that it bubbles gently. Feel free to add water or a bit more broth if needed to complete cooking of rice.

Bacon-Wrapped Dates

Ingredients

Click here for additional bacon-infused recipes on our website, including Bacon Stuffed Cheeseburgers, Lentil Soup with Goats Cheese and Bacon, Simple Coq Au Vin and Chopped and Sweet Potato Salads: bacon recipes.

Pasta is a Smart Ingredient in the 70 Meals, One Trip to the Store cookbook. It’s also one of the top 10 Smart ingredients in my house.

It is a great example of how shopping Smart adds up to more dinner success. Shopping Smart for Smart Ingredients means buying more of what adds up to dinner and less ingredients that you will only use for one recipe. We call these items “ingredient clutter”.

Once you understand your family’s Smart Ingredients you will never again struggle with not having things on hand you can make for dinner.

So why is pasta so Smart? For my family, pasta is a favorite main course, and also in many variations, a favorite side dish to round out almost any meal.

It can be made fresh and vegetarian with eggs as a Frittata, hearty with meat for a Baked Pasta Bolognese or Chicken Parmesan, creamy as a Fettuccine, Cajun Shrimp Pasta or a Homemade Mac and Cheese. Other favorites include Chickpea Olive Pasta Salad or Spicy Peanut Satay Noodles. Find these and other pasta recipes on the recipes area of our website. 

Knowing this, pasta is one of the things I will always make sure I have on hand. Since I know I will use it, I will dedicate much of my cabinet space to this Smart ingredient. Prices for pasta in my area range from $0.88/pound to $2.00/pound. When it’s on sale for under $1, I buy 10 packages. It is a beautiful thing to have cabinets that flow through Smart Ingredients, rather than cabinets that gather ingredient clutter that doesn’t add up to dinner success.

Dinner inspiration does not always need to come from completely new ingredients. Much greater dinner success comes from expanding on your family’s favorites within their themes. If you’ve been to one of our classes, you’ve heard me say this… easily change up your dinner menu from 3 or 4 “go-to” dishes to 20-30 just by expanding on family favorites. Anything in a tortilla (such as soft-shell tacos or Chicken Caesar Wraps), pizza and baked tilapia are a few of my family’s other favorites for dinner. I make these dishes often, but with different fillings, and different toppings, respectively. WIth just the basic ingredients from the 70 Meals, One Trip to the Store shopping list, that I always have on hand, there are more than 7 ways I can make each item. Combine that with the 7 different pasta dishes that I mentioned, and that’s 28 “go-to” recipes that my family loves that I can turn to any night of the year. And that’s just a start.

It really can be easy to win at dinner, just by changing the way you shop. Pay attention, and discover what are your family’s Smart Ingredients. Buy more of those, and less clutter, and just try not to have more dinner success, spend less at the store, and reduce stress at dinnertime… our bets are on you!

I had a great reminder of how well 70 Meals, One Trip to the Store works this week. We had a busier-than-usual week. In addition, I tried to spend very little on groceries. I spent a total of $100 for the week for our family of five… which for me is very little. This included all of our fresh fruit and breakfast items, but also the 14 items on the 70 Meals, One Trip to the Store weekly shopping list.

This list includes:

• Milk
• Eggs
• Butter
• Shredded Cheddar cheese
• Mozzarella cheese
• Green Peppers
• Mushrooms
• Lettuce
• Tomato
• Bread/Rolls
• Chicken
• Ground Beef
• Fish Fillets
• Tortillas

Combined with the Smart Ingredients that I have stocked in my cabinets, I love that there are so many things I can make, every night this week, using what I have. Tonight we are having Homemade Pizza and Pizza Salad (one of the very best from the 30 Spectacular Salads cookbook). Tomorrow is Chicken Fried Rice with peppers, onions and mushrooms, and the next day is Chicken Fajitas. Beyond that I’m not sure, but it’s nice knowing that I don’t have to plan and yet know that I will have everything I need to make dinner.

My weekly stock up was all fresh ingredients. While I may use some processed foods this week in my meals, the majority of what goes on my table is fresh. And even if you use some packaged shortcuts, know that if you are cooking a fresh meal you are still many steps closer to healthy eating than if you were eating out or wholly-processed pre-packaged dinner.

I was on a frugal cooking chat group for a while. I learned some very interesting tips and recipes for how to eat extremely frugal (who knew you could make burgers out of ramen noodles??). While I was entertained, I was also affirmed that my strategies were innovative and that 70 Meals, One Trip to the Store does frugal in a way that does not have to equal unappetizing or processed foods. If you are looking for a way to save money on groceries, or just to be able to make dinner every night without a trip to the store, try our book. It will pay for itself many times.

There are certain items that are plentiful and priced right at the grocery stores post-holiday. Stock up on these Smart Ingredients, and you have tools for dinner success that you can use throughout the next few months, and make many cheap and easy — and delicious — dinners.

Ham

What is leftover from the holidays is priced extremely well in stores right now, or even, buy one get one free. A great Cook Once, Eat Twice food, ham can be made for one delicious elegant dinner, with the leftovers used for many recipes including Ham and Cheese Muffins, Split Pea Soup with Ham and Ham and Swiss Baked Ziti (from the cookbook 40 Dinner Duos: Cook Once, Eat Twice.

Ham and Swiss Baked Ziti

Serves 4-6 (easily doubled)

• 8 ounces Ziti or similar pasta
• 4 tablespoons butter
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1/4 cup flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
• 2 cups shredded Swiss cheese (cut fine if you can only find slices or cubes
• 1 cup leftover ham, cubed
• 1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
• 1/4 cup bread crumbs

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Cook pasta according to package directions.

Meanwhile, melt butter in medium saucepan over low heat. Cook garlic in butter for 30 seconds, stirring frequently. Stir in flour and salt, increase heat and stir until mixture is smooth and bubbly. Add milk, heat to boiling and stir until smooth. Add mustard and cheese, reduce heat, and simmer, stirring until cheese is melted and mixture is smooth.

Pour pasta into ungreased 2-quart baking dish. Add ham and cheese sauce. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese and Bread crumbs. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until bubbly and browned.

Shrimp

Used for cocktail around the holiday season, it is priced at less than half of what you can find it for at other times of the year. Stock up and freeze in 1-lb. portions for a great “Smart” dinner ingredient. See the “Recipes” tab on our website for recipes for:

Shrimp Creole

Shrimp Po Boy Sandwiches

Coconut Shrimp

Shrimp Etouffee

Chipotle Shrimp Tacos

Cream of Mushroom Soup

While I often prefer to make my own white sauce with mushrooms, I must admit canned Cream of Mushroom soup is an undeniable Smart Ingredient when it comes to easy weeknight dinners. When I need a quick or easy comfort-food dinner, I use it to make Ground Beef Stroganoff, Pot Roast in the crock pot, or Tuna Casserole. The excess from the holidays should be priced at half what it is the rest of the year. If this is an ingredient you use, stocking up at half price is a great way to shop “Smart”.

French’s Onions

These gems are a nice bonus to top casseroles, salads, burgers and at the holidays… of course… green bean casserole. With the holidays gone, nab a can or two you can use over the next few months.

Cranberry Sauce

The price of canned cranberry sauce has really gone up this year, so nabbing some at a holiday price is a bonus. I love cranberry sauce (fresh or canned) to make Cranberry Brie Pizza, Apple Cranberry Pie, Cranberry Brisket, Cranberry Meatballs and Cranberry Chicken. At a sale price, I will buy at least a dozen cans if this Smart ingredient, and know that it will add up to so many appetizers and dinners in coming months.

Happy shopping and stocking up!

If you’ve come to my demos, or are a loyal blog reader, you’ve likely heard me talk about some of these before. Today, I want to give you a recap of a few of my favorite Smart Ingredients and the ways I have been using them for great flavor and health impacts in my cooking. We’re also including Smart ingredients with all purchases from our website this week. . . and it’s Giveaway Time! (Read on for details.)

Vegeta

Vegeta is my favorite seasoning. It’s made from dehydrated vegetables, and has a fantastic flavor. I use this powder to season all my poultry, as the base for all of my soups and gravies, and to add great flavor to my mashed potatoes and rice pilafs, replacing 3/4 of the butter usually used for flavor and moisture.

Greek Yogurt

I keep Greek yogurt, such as this one from Fage, on hand all the time. I use it as a straight substitute for sour cream in dips, potatoes and fajitas, often to replace mayonnaise, and as an addition to many of my baked goods. If a recipe calls for buttermilk, I use equal parts Greek yogurt and milk to substitute for the buttermilk quantity (It’s much easier than keeping Buttermilk on hand, which I rarely use). When I am making biscuits or cake that call for just milk, I always blend the milk with the Greek yogurt for added creaminess and moisture. Greek yogurt not only has less fat, calories, and additives than sour cream, but a hearty serving of natural protein, which is great for any diet. It also has great flavor and is very filling.

Vinegar and lemon juice 

Making a potato or pasta salad this summer? Chances are that many of you will. And before you go to mix them up with mayonnaise or oil, try this: Immediately after boiling your potatoes or pasta, rinse in cold water until fully cool, and then douse in the juice of one lemon, or a half cup of vinegar. Stir to blend. This will seal in the moisture. Once you’ve done this, you will need less than half of the oil or mayonnaise you would normally use. In fact, we encourage you to use even less, and instead dress up your salad with fun vinegars, such as Sicilian Lemon Balsamic Vinegar or the Oregano White Balsamic Vinegar from the Olive Tap. Add to that your choice of fresh herbs such as rosemary, basil, oregano, parsley or dill, basic seasonings such as salt, pepper, onions and garlic, and fresh vegetables that add a flavor punch such as onions, peppers, cucumbers and more.

It’s time for some FREE Smart Ingredients. I know the Vegeta is hard to find. I hope to start offering it for sale on the Organizing Dinner website soon. In the meanwhile, for just this week, we are going to including an 8.8 ounce can of it, RED STAR yeast, and other FREE Smart Ingredients with any order from Organizingdinner.com. This includes cookbooks, cookware and cooking classes. Order by Friday, July 1st.

It’s also the end of the month giveaway time! Comment on this blog post to be entered to win a FREE copy of 70 Meals, One Trip to the Store. Our randomly-chosen winner will be notified via e-mail on Friday, July 1st.

Do you, like me, hope to get invited to many impromptu backyard barbeque and gatherings this summer?

Perhaps you’ve gotten to know me well enough through these blog posts to know that I dislike unnecessary trips to the store. One of the best parts about being invited to someone’s house for dinner, besides the good company, is that you don’t even need to think about dinner or its ingredients. But wait — you’ve got to bring something, right? Perhaps it’s an appetizer you volunteer. Then you discover you have no fresh veggies in the crisper, and recall you finished off your chips and salsa last night.

I have two “Smart” ingredients for you to keep on hand this summer are sure to fulfill any last-minute, or even well-planned-out appetizer.

The first is pre-made mini phyllo shells.

These will be in the freezer section. They are sometimes hard to find. Much more available is phyllo dough, from which you would have to make your own cups. They are doable, but fussy, and the pre-made cups sacrifice no flavor. SO, if you find the frozen pre-made cups, stock up, and here are some of the many ways you can put them to good use:

Cook the phyllo cups according to package directions. Then fill with:

• Goats cheese topped with your favorite chutney
• Goats cheese topped with roasted red pepper and fresh mango strips
• Brie topped with cranberry sauce or a rich jelly (toast for 3 minutes)
• A combination of equal parts cream cheese and Greek yogurt with a splash of vanilla or lemon extract, topped with our choice of fruit. These can, of course, double for a desert, and you can even substitute chocolate mousse for the cream.

• Chicken Salad with Sundried Tomatoes, Spinach and Feta from the 30 Spectacular Salads cookbook.
• Chicken Salad with Apples and onions from the 30 Spectacular Salads cookbook.

The second Smart appetizer base is RED STAR yeast, one of our often-mentioned favorite Smart ingredients.

A typical kitchen contains flour, salt, oil and water most days of the year. If you add to that yeast, you have the makings of a crusty bread that can be made in a jiff, sliced and toasted and topped with any number of toppings for an easy and delicious appetizer. The other day I was having an impromptu meeting at my house. I whipped up a loaf of French Bread from the RED STAR website. After I basted the loaf with water, I sprinkled it with garlic salt and Italian seasonings. When it was done, I sliced it, gave it a quick brush of olive oil, and toasted it for 4 minutes in a 350 degree oven. I topped it with cream cheese, and then the mushroom gratin (mentioned a few blog posts ago) I always keep in my freezer, combined with some roasted red pepper strips I had in the refrigerator. They were a huge hit, and the STAR of the show was the bread. Here are some other ways you can top your bread crustinis:

• Prosciutto and roasted asparagus
• Brie, granny smith apples and gorgonzola cheese (toasted for an additional 4 minutes)
• Fresh sliced tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella and basil, drizzled with balsamic vinegar
• Fresh sliced tomatoes, avocados and goats cheese
• A mixture of 1 jar artichoke hearts, drained and chopped, 4 tablespoons mayonnaise, 4 tablespoons Parmesan cheese, 1/4 cup diced onion and a dash of hot sauce (toasted for an additional 4 minutes).
• A combination of Feta cheese, onions, balsamic vinegar and canned diced tomatoes, drained*.

* Canned diced tomatoes have a very long shelf life, and packages of crumbled Feta have a shelf life of more than 3 months (check package for expiration date). Add both to your Smart ingredients stash, along with some RED STAR yeast, and you will have last-minute appetizer fixings on hand all summer.

Going shopping when you shop Smart can be so stress free, you may wonder what you’re missing. You know that feeling of “what am I forgetting?” at the grocery store if you’ve forgotten your list? I was hit with that feeling during today’s shopping trip, as after being out of town for a week, and with a nearly empty fridge, I expected I would need a lot of things at the store. But I quickly realized those thoughts as I knew what they meant – there really wan’t much that I needed.

I grabbed a package of fresh mushrooms knowing I have ground beef in the freezer (from last week’s stock up) and every thing else I need to make salisbury steak. I grabbed avocados, tomatoes, cheese and lettuce, knowing that with them I can make many variations of tacos/tostadas with the chicken, shrimp, beef and tortillas I have in the freezer.

Then, because I had room to spare in both the cart and the budget, I added a brisket and cranberry sauce to my cart to make my favorite elegant meal, Cranberry Brisket, from the Cook Once… Eat Twice! cookbook.

When I got home to unload, there was plenty of room in the cabinets to unload my groceries — and I don’t have that much cabinet space. The thing is, after you really get into shopping Smart, and buying ingredients that you use over and over in many different dinners, you are buying a whole lot less of “this and that”. Believe me, “this and that” can take up an incredible amount of room in your cabinets and storage space. And because it’s only rarely used, it doesn’t move. When you buy Smart ingredients, you use them. And you’re buying less clutter, so your cabinets become naturally organized.

My Smart ingredients are mostly the things on the 70 Meals, One Trip to the Store shopping lists (These can be seen, and printed, off the Smart Ingredients page of the website), along with a few of my favorite seasonings and frozen shrimp. Your Smart Ingredients can vary based on what dinners are a sure-fire hit for your family. What’s your family’s Smartest ingredient?

If you’re a blog subscriber you should have received a coupon code via e-mail for the new copy of the 70 Meals, One Trip to the Store cookbook, including beautiful photos, extras and a fantastic new design by Studio One Eleven www.studio-oneeleven.com. If you own an original copy of the book, check out the Shop page for information on how to order a replacement copy at cost. Thanks Studio One Eleven, we love our new look!