Cowboy Stew

One of our new favorites and go to meals is cowboy stew. Why it's called that I don't know it's not stew like at all...giggle but it's my version of something they served the children at school. It's tasty, filling and very quick and easy to make.

In my every continuing need to cut cost, I've gotten into the habit of cooking a pot of beans every week. I like to make my own beans so I can control the amount of salt and flavor them like I like, but you can use canned if you want. You can also use whatever kind of beans you like or have on hand.

Cowboy Stew

• 1/2 lb ground meat
• 1/2 onion, chopped
• green or red onion, chopped
• med can of tomato sauce ( we use salt-free)
• 1 tbsp. chili powder
• 2 tsp. cumin
• 1 cup cooked Dreamfields Pasta
• 2 cups or more beans ( I make chili beans from scratch and have on hand)
• Optional: grated cheese, sour cream, chopped green onions and olives.

1. Brown ground meat with onions and peppers and put on pasta to cook
2. Add tomato sauce and season with chili powder and cumin and let simmer a few minutes
3. Mix in beans; drain pasta and add it too
4. Taste for seasoning and serve with cheese, sour cream, green onions and olives or whatever else you might like. I normally just add a little cheese in mine.

Since I keep ground meat with onions and peppers in the freezer and I usually cook a pot of beans at the beginning of each week, I can get this on the table in the amount of time it take to cook the little bit of pasta.

This is a good for those nights when you just don't feel like or don't have time to cook a whole dinner.

What I've been up too

As most of you know, mom has had a really hard time since the valve replacement surgery in January. She came home very imbalanced with severe left side weakness. On a walker and not looking all that great. They had sent her for a week of rehab after the surgery but it wasn't enough to help her take care of herself. I spent every night up so I could help her get up to go to the rest room. She couldn't get out of bed by herself and when she walked, even with the walker she would start falling towards the left side.

First the two sides of her heart managed to become out of rhythm (arrhythmia) and had to go back in the hospital about a week after she came home. She was there for a week or so before they got it corrected. Meds didn't work they ended up having to shock her to get it back in rhythm. They put her on some new meds and sent her home. This was in February just a few days after the surgery.
Not to go on about everything, we had to take her back to the ER for the 4th time on Easter Sunday. She was so weak that morning when she got up, after having been doing much better, that I had to go help her get dressed and walk to the kitchen. She was shaking so badly I had to poor her coffee and fix her breakfast for her. Then when trying to help her walk into the living room so she could get into her chair, she fell. I just couldn't get around the walker to get in front of her in time and I couldn't hold her up with the hold I had on her from the wrong side. She fell, hit the couch , all tangled up in her walker and my crutch. I don't know what happened but when we went to help her up she couldn't move her legs or help us get her up at all. I called the kids (niece and her b/f) and they ran over and helped us get her up. She couldn't walk at all at that point or sit up without falling over. I had to sit right behind her and hold her up. She couldn't stop shaking and was freezing to death. She had been shaking and getting more unbalanced for the last week or so but nothing like this.

When they first got her into an exam room they immediately told us she had some kind of infection and the first thought was kidney. She had them before and had kidney stones removed. But even with the worst kidney infection she had never been this weak and sick and never this fast.
After 4 days umpteen test and dozens and dozens of blood test they found she had a staph infection in her blood. The major concern was that the bacteria would grow on her new heart valve and it would have to be replaced. Bless her heart she was so so sick and getting weaker all the time. They finally put in a PIC line (which is a catheter that goes from just above the elbow to just over the heart) to deliver antibiotic straight into the blood line. She has to have hour long antibiotic treatments everyday and have blood work done several times a day to monitor bacteria levels. She has to be weighed several times a day to make sure she's not gaining any fluid. Since she needed all this for the next 6 weeks she was moved to a speciality long term hospital here in Mesquite where they could care for her and monitor her progress.

She's been there for almost 3 weeks now and she's doing wonderfully. While I know you can't kill a staph infection, her blood is now bacterial free. She still has 3 weeks to go, but she's getting so much stronger. She is still on the walker but she gets an hour a day of physical therapy and an hour a day of occupational therapy.

She's just bored and being a hospital instead of a rehab center we can't check her out on Sunday to take her to church or to dinner. Everyone came to see her the first few times she was in the hospital so now no one going to see her and Cindy and I can't go everyday (most but not all). They won't let her get up and walk down the halls so she has to sit in her chair most of the day and she's bored out of her mind.

I've been trying to cook cheap and easy so not doing so well on low carb at ALL. But I'm getting back with it. No more pasta and rice (both cheap meal stretchers) but I'm keeping the beans. I just believe they have to much nutrition and fiber to stop eating and they are cheap! So the beans stay and I have a box of brown rice to use very sparingly in small amounts. Not sure I'll replace it when it's gone, but for now I'll use 1/4 -1/3 cup in a few things to help stretch them a bit farther.

Another thing I've learned over the last month is that things like rice and pasta fill me up while I'm eating much much faster than protein. I know the reason, they break down and digest much much faster than do the proteins. But in an hours I'm starving if I eat the carbs and I'm full if I eat protein. I'm hoping adding beans will help make me full faster and keep me that way. Not that I would ever want to eat beans every single day, but I have stocked up on 4-5 bags of dried beans.

Well that's what's going on with me. I'm trying to get new recipes together so I can start posting them on my other blog and get back to blogging about my day to day here.

Have a wonderful day, take care and thank you for reading!

Life on a budget

I've gotten a good start cutting our grocery bill, but I still have a long way to go. I'm trying to get the stuff together to plant a small container garden in the back yard to help with veggies this summer. I want to start an herb pot too.

I've priced the stuff to make a shelf to set the pots on and it shouldn't cost more than $15.00. Since I can't get on the ground and will need to tend to them in my wheelchair, I need the pots up off the ground a bit. The biggest cost is going to come in buying big pots, soil and plants. I'm hoping to find a good deal at one of the home building stores or nurseries around here. I have a few pots that might works for smaller plants, but nothing big enough to grow much. I just hope I can grow enough veggies to make it worth the cost and that it helps with the grocery bill.

I've picked up a few bags of beans I can cook to help stretch things. Though techniqually fairly high in carbs, beans have something called resistant starch that works rather like fiber, and doesn't cause insulin surges. I've eaten beans in moderation every now and again on my low carb diet, now I'll just be eating them more often. I also have several cans of beans on hand for when I don't have time to cook dried beans.

I've got chicken fajita's cut, seasoned and ready to cook for tonight, along with a big bowl of salad and some low carb tortillas.
I have stuffed pepper meat ready to stuff some peppers tomorrow night, I added 3/4 cup of rice and 1/2 cup chopped mushrooms to stretch the meat. I should have enough meat to stuff the peppers for us tomorrow and freeze enough for another night. That way I can get two meals from one package of ground meat.

The flax bread still works for breakfast, and I need to make up bowls of tuna and egg salad for lunches over the weekend. We can eat them on lettuce leaves or a few triskets. At least I think there is some triskets up in the cabnet. All in all I think I have a fairly good handle on it. At least for this week.
Wish me luck for next week.