I asked you guys on Facebook yesterday for any tips or tricks that you had for homemade tortillas. I didn’t want to make them with shortening, but I’ve heard that that is the only way to get them to turn out right.

You guys had lots of great suggestions and so I tried my luck at making homemade tortillas today.

My husband’s response? “I think these are the best tortillas I’ve ever had!” Seriously??? Wow, what a compliment!! I think they are pretty up there for me as well, and I’m kind of picky with tortillas.

So what made the difference? Well, I think the biggest change was that I used coconut oil instead of olive oil. The second thing I did differently was to let them sit covered for at least an hour after I made them into balls.

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Here’s what you need:

4 cups of whole wheat flour
1 cup of white flour
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 cup of coconut oil
1 3/4 cup BOILING water
Extra flour to help with rolling them out

Here’s what you do: (I used my Kitchen Aid mixer and dough hook, but you can do this by hand as well)

1. Mix all of the dry ingredients (flour, salt, and baking powder). Then add the coconut oil and mix thoroughly. I had to scrape the sides of the mixing bowl several times to keep the flour/oil mixture from coming out. Oh, and I HIGHLY recommend one of these types of measurers that is pictured in the second picture below. It makes measuring sticky stuff so much easier! (Mine is from Pampered Chef, but I got it at a garage sale).

2. Once everything is mixed, slowly pour in the boiling water and mix the dough up until it’s no longer sticky. I think I mixed it around 5 minutes or so.

3. Form the dough into balls and put them on a cookie sheet. I was able to make 35 balls with the dough I had and the tortillas turned out the perfect size for us. Cover the cookie sheet with a kitchen towel and let sit for AT LEAST an hour.

4. Heat up your griddle to HIGH heat (I would’ve tried a skillet on the stove, but that didn’t work so well the last time I did tortillas, so I tried the electric griddle instead).

5. Spread some flour out on a flat surface (I used a large cutting board for easy clean up) and place a dough ball in the middle of the flour. Sprinkle more flour on top of the ball and press down on the ball HARD with a pie plate to flatten it out in a circle. Peel the dough circle off the bottom of the pie plate and re-flour the top and bottom. Roll out with a rolling pin to the desired thickness. (Note: I tried just rolling one out without using the pie plate first and it didn’t turn out nearly as well).

6. Make sure that the griddle is fully heated, then place the tortillas on the griddle. Let it cook around 30 seconds, then flip it and let it cook on the other side for 30 seconds. Take it off the griddle and start on the next one. My 7 year old and I had a good little routine going…. she would cook the tortillas and I would flour and roll it out. They both took right around 30 seconds.

7. Enjoy!! I served the tortillas with homemade hummus and veggies, but I wasn’t really impressed with the hummus recipe, so I’m not going to share it. But I’m going to keep trying on the hummus too because we all LOVE hummus and I would love to make it from scratch. Any suggestions for homemade hummus recipes?

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Okay…. I have a confession to make.

Are you ready? You promise you won’t stop coming to Surviving The Stores?

I have never ever made beans from scratch before.  In fact, I’ve always been a little scared of it. And I have NO idea why!

But I have conquered my fear, and let me assure you, there is nothing to be afraid of!  It really is so much easier than I imagined it in my head.

You’ll likely see several beans and rice recipe variations over the next few months.   My goal is to make beans and rice at least twice a week during this season of surviving a layoff.  I really want our savings to last as long as possible.

So, are you ready? It really is so so easy and the whole family LOVED this recipe!

Here’s what you need:

2 cups of dry pinto beans (I’m sure you could use another type of beans too)
Water to soak the beans in
1 Tbsp. Olive Oil
1 Onion, chopped
Cilantro
Salt (to taste)
1/2 cup of your favorite Salsa
Cooked Rice
Grated Cheese (if desired)

Here’s what you do:

1. Put the beans in a bowl and cover with water.  Let the beans sit overnight (I, um, let them sit in the water overnight and until 4:00 the next day)

2. When you are ready to cook the beans, drain the water off of them and put them into a pot. Cover the beans again with water and bring to a boil.   Once the water is boiling, turn the burner down to low and let the beans sit covered for at least an hour.

3. Saute the onion in the olive oil until tender.

4. Put the sauteed onion, cilantro, salt and salsa into the pot with the beans.  Cover and cook about an hour more until the beans are tender.

5. Serve over rice and top with grated cheese if desired.

6. Enjoy!!

If you want to, you could drain the beans in the morning (instead of waiting until the last minute like me) and cook them in the crockpot all day on low with the other ingredients mixed in.

Now it’s your turn! What kind of recipes did you come up with to use with your deals? Please link directly to your frugal recipe below.

I also highly recommend heading over to $5 Dinners Bargain Meal Of The Week where she categorizes meals by different store deals!

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I am so excited to share with you guys one of my absolute favorite super-easy recipes! This was a perfect meal to make this week since I got such an awesome deal on Classico Pasta Sauce this week at Brookshires. I usually make this meal when we are having company over, or I will make it and freeze it to eat later or bring to a friend.

Sorry about the lack of picture quality… we brought all of the ingredients to a friend’s house to make and I totally forgot my camera so I had to use my husband’s phone for pictures (pretty good for a phone though, right?)

Here’s what you need:

2 lbs of ground meat (I used 1 lb. of ground beef and 1 lb. of ground turkey)
2 jars of pasta sauce (obviously, I used Classico… by the way the Carmelized Onions and Garlic Classico is AWESOME!)
1 onion, chopped
2 Tbsp. minced garlic
2 Tbsp. Worcestershire Sauce
7 ounces of Ricotta Cheese (about half of a container)
2 boxes of pasta (such a penne or rotini)
Italian spices to taste (I use parsley, oregano and basil)
2 cups of shredded Mozzarella Cheese

Here’s how to make it:

1. Cook the onion in a very small amount of olive oil. Add the meat and cook until almost cooked through, then add the minced garlic. Continue cooking until the meat is cooked through.

2. Add the 2 jars of pasta sauce, Worcestershire Sauce, and Spices and mix thoroughly. Allow to simmer for around 15 – 20 minutes.

3. While the sauce is simmering, cook the pasta according to package directions. I am trying to stay away from gluten for the most part (not going completely gluten-free) so I made one pot of rice pasta and another of whole wheat pasta. Once the pasta has finished cooking, drain the water off and mix with the sauce.

4. Grease or spray the bottom of 2 9×13 inch pans (or 1 large lasagna pan) and spread half of the pasta mixture along the bottom of the pan(s). Place small blobs of ricotta cheese over the first layer of pasta.

5. Put the other half of the pasta mixture on top and then sprinkle the mozzarella cheese on top.

6. Bake at 350 degrees for around 12-15 minutes or until the cheese is melted.

7. Enjoy!!

Now it’s your turn! What kind of recipes did you come up with to use with your deals? Please link directly to your frugal recipe below.

I also highly recommend heading over to $5 Dinners Bargain Meal Of The Week where she categorizes meals by different store deals!

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This week I’m going to share with you one of my absolute favorite recipes! It’s super easy and great to make when pineapple is in season. You can use canned pineapple with it (remember that great 50¢/1 Dole Canned Pineapple coupon a few months back?) but since fresh pineapple is on sale for as low as $1.99 right now (or free this week if you have an Earth Fare store near you) then I would recommend using fresh.

You can use bone-in chicken pieces for this meal, but I personally prefer using Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts instead. My “buy it” price for BSCB is when it’s under $2/lb, and especially when it’s $1.88/lb like it is this week at Kroger.

I ended up buying the off-brand Heinz 57 sauce because this is the only recipe I use it for and even though I could’ve bought the larger brand-name bottle and used a $2 off coupon from the 3/14 SS (which would make it cheaper per ounce than the off brand), the bottle would end up just sitting in my fridge for YEARS! If you are feeling really brave, you can make your own Heinz 57 sauce (did you know it has pureed raisins in it??)

Here’s what you need:

2 pounds of your favorite Chicken Pieces
Salt and pepper to taste
Enough sliced pineapple to cover each piece of chicken (or 1 can of sliced pineapple in its own juice)
1/3 c. Heinz 57 Sauce
2 Tbsp. Honey

Here’s what you do:

1. Place chicken in lightly oiled (or sprayed) baking dishes. Season with the salt and pepper. Bake chicken in a 400 degree oven for 30 minutes.

2. While the chicken is cooking, cut and drain the pineapple, and reserve 2 Tbsp. of the juice. If you are using a fresh pineapple, cut the top and bottom off and then cut off the sides. I didn’t have a pineapple corer, so my centers that I cut out aren’t perfectly round. Also, I juiced the cores in my Vitamix to get enough juice for 2 Tbsp and strained it into a measuring cup.

3. Combine the pineapple juice, Heinz 57 sauce and honey and pour over the chicken. Bake chicken an additional 25 minutes, basting occasionally.

4. Arrange sliced pineapple over the chicken and bake an extra 10 minutes.

5. Spoon the excess sauce over the chicken and serve with rice and veggies! I thought it went very well with sauteed spinach with garlic. ENJOY!

Now it’s your turn! What kind of recipes did you come up with to use with your deals? Please link directly to your frugal recipe below.

I also highly recommend heading over to $5 Dinners Bargain Meal Of The Week where she categorizes meals by different store deals!

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I saw this Asparagus Casserole recipe when I was looking through the Easter Recipes eBook that I posted about yesterday and I just couldn’t wait to try it!

Asparagus is on sale for $1.47 a pound this week at Kroger, so it’s the perfect time to make this dish!

You could use it as a side dish to your Easter Ham this weekend, or add some cooked chicken to make it a full meal casserole. You could also use homemade crackers instead of store-bought. I’m planning on trying it again with homemade gluten-free rice crackers.

Here’s what you need:

2 pounds of fresh asparagus
1 can of cream of celery soup
1 can of cream of chicken soup
2 cups of crushed saltine crackers (I used about 1 1/4 sleeves)
2 cups of shredded cheese (the original recipe calls for Velveeta, but I’d much rather use the real stuff)
2 eggs

Here’s what you do:

1. Break off the ends of the asparagus. Just hold the asparagus at both ends and snap off the end — it will break where it’s supposed to (thanks to my friend Erin at $5 Dinners for that tip!)

2. Wash the asparagus, then put it in the crockpot.

3. Add the cream of chicken soup and the cream of celery soup, the crushed crackers, the cheese and the eggs.

4. Mix it all together really well and cook on HIGH for 3 – 3 1/2 hours.

5. Enjoy! I will definitely be making this one again!

Now it’s your turn! What kind of recipes did you come up with to use with your deals? Please link directly to your frugal recipe below.

I also highly recommend heading over to $5 Dinners Bargain Meal Of The Week where she categorizes meals by different store deals!