Cheap and Easy!
Baked Bean Hash Pie
1 - 2 tins baked beans*
4 - 6 hash browns
2 eggs
1/4 cup milk
salt and pepper to taste
grated cheese
Bacon or saveloys - optional
Spring onions - optional
Fresh parsley or dried mixed herbs - optional
Roughly line a casserole dish with the hash browns. Top hash browns with baked beans - optimally about half an inch to an inch thick. Sprinkle over chopped spring onions, finely chopped bacon, or thinly sliced saveloys - optional.
Beat together eggs and milk, salt and pepper, and pour over.
Cover with layer of grated cheese if desired. Garnish with chopped parsley or dried mixed herbs.
Bake at 180C for 35 mins.
Serving Suggestions
* For kids' teatime with buttered bread
* As a special brunch, with baby spinach salad on the side
Leftovers can be served cold like an over-moist frittata - very tasty!
* Use budget or home brand or whatever's on special!
Showing posts with label kids. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kids. Show all posts
Hash Brown Stacks
Quick, tasty and cheap hot lunch or light supper - also yummy if you want a hot breakfast! And kids love these tasty treats.
Ingredients:
1 or 2 hash browns per person (frozen are fine)
1 tin spaghetti in tomato sauce*
A few rashers streaky bacon (if desired)
Grated cheese - about half a tablespoon per stack.
Preheat your oven to 200C (or heat as appropriate for your brand od hashbrowns) Grease an oven tray by spraying lightly with cooking spray, or rub with a little oil on a paper towel. (Don't pour the oil on or your hashbrowns will go soggy.) Lay hashbrowns on tray, and top each with a generous spoonful of spaghetti. It should heap, but not overflow. I find a small tablespoon is about right for most hashbrowns.
Top with a sprinkle of grated cheese, and if you're having bacon, chop it finely and sprinkle around a teaspoon on top of each.
Pop into your oven and turn on the grill, or best of all fan grill. time will vary depending on your oven - mine take about 7 or 8 minutes but it might be as little as 3 or 4. Basically, your hashbrown should be warm through, your spaghetti nice and toasty, and your cheese melted and bubbly.
Serve!
*Use the budget kind for recipes! They cant taste the difference! Trust me!
Ingredients:
1 or 2 hash browns per person (frozen are fine)
1 tin spaghetti in tomato sauce*
A few rashers streaky bacon (if desired)
Grated cheese - about half a tablespoon per stack.
Preheat your oven to 200C (or heat as appropriate for your brand od hashbrowns) Grease an oven tray by spraying lightly with cooking spray, or rub with a little oil on a paper towel. (Don't pour the oil on or your hashbrowns will go soggy.) Lay hashbrowns on tray, and top each with a generous spoonful of spaghetti. It should heap, but not overflow. I find a small tablespoon is about right for most hashbrowns.
Top with a sprinkle of grated cheese, and if you're having bacon, chop it finely and sprinkle around a teaspoon on top of each.
Pop into your oven and turn on the grill, or best of all fan grill. time will vary depending on your oven - mine take about 7 or 8 minutes but it might be as little as 3 or 4. Basically, your hashbrown should be warm through, your spaghetti nice and toasty, and your cheese melted and bubbly.
Serve!
*Use the budget kind for recipes! They cant taste the difference! Trust me!
Kids' Nachos
These nachos make an inexpensive, quick and easy-to-prepare snack or meal. Perfect for kids' teatimes on those days when they need something fast and nutritious.
It's light on vegies, so I like to include some raw carrot and cucumber fingers on the side; or raw peas, snow peas or broccoli heads depending on the season and cost!
A nice dollop of sour cream or my own preference, greek yoghurt (cheaper and healthier!) makes a wonderful dipping sauce for the vegies and also a nice topping for the nachos.
Corn chips (or sliced up pita bread, dried in oven)**
Baked beans (buy the plain-pack budget kind for this dish! They're usually no more than $0.99 (New Zealand Dollars!) for a 385g tin. And when mixed with the corn chips and cheese, no-one will taste the difference.) A 38sg tin feeds three kids or two teenagers :)
Grated cheese
Thick plain yoghurt or sour cream (optional)
Arrange the corn chips on a plate - a shallow dessert plate is what I find works best. Top with baked beans, and microwave for two minutes on high. Depending on your microwave, you might like to stir once during cooking. *
Top with grated cheese, and a dollop of sour cream if your kids like it!
**Top tip: Buy your corn chips in the largest bag you can find, and seal them in single-serve portions in freezer bags, in the cupboard. Each portion will stay fresh until required.
*Alternately, heat the baked beans on the stove pot in the saucepan, and finish the dish (with cheese, but without sourcream) with a few minutes under the grill - long enough to warm the corn chips and melt the cheese.
It's light on vegies, so I like to include some raw carrot and cucumber fingers on the side; or raw peas, snow peas or broccoli heads depending on the season and cost!
A nice dollop of sour cream or my own preference, greek yoghurt (cheaper and healthier!) makes a wonderful dipping sauce for the vegies and also a nice topping for the nachos.
Corn chips (or sliced up pita bread, dried in oven)**
Baked beans (buy the plain-pack budget kind for this dish! They're usually no more than $0.99 (New Zealand Dollars!) for a 385g tin. And when mixed with the corn chips and cheese, no-one will taste the difference.) A 38sg tin feeds three kids or two teenagers :)
Grated cheese
Thick plain yoghurt or sour cream (optional)
Arrange the corn chips on a plate - a shallow dessert plate is what I find works best. Top with baked beans, and microwave for two minutes on high. Depending on your microwave, you might like to stir once during cooking. *
Top with grated cheese, and a dollop of sour cream if your kids like it!
**Top tip: Buy your corn chips in the largest bag you can find, and seal them in single-serve portions in freezer bags, in the cupboard. Each portion will stay fresh until required.
*Alternately, heat the baked beans on the stove pot in the saucepan, and finish the dish (with cheese, but without sourcream) with a few minutes under the grill - long enough to warm the corn chips and melt the cheese.
The Dress Up Box - Old Fashioned Toys for Today's Families
Sorry LastPenny's been quiet the last couple of days - I've succumbed to a nasty cold! But today things are looking up so we're back to our regular posting schedule :)
Kids today are not really any different from us when we were little. Sure, they've been exposed to electronics and communications from an early age - but that doesn't mean that the only toys that interest them are expensive, flashy electronics.
When kids play, they like to act out their fantasies. And toys that enable them to do that are the toys they'll come back to, time and time again.
The Dress Up Box
If your childhood was anything like mine, the dress-up box got to come out on "special occasions" - and looking back, those "special occasions" were any time our parents wanted us raptly amused for hours at a stretch!
Perfect for rainy weekends, cousins visiting, children's parties, or simply everyday play, a dress-up box costs around five dollars or less to assemble and will provide literally years of fun.
You can work with a simple cardboard box, but if you have an old suitcase, it's even better. I remember ours was in an old-fashioned leather trunk, which added to the air of mystery. If you're using a box, have the kids decorate it with stickers and drawings - you'll love to look back at the box in years to come.
A good dress-up box contains:
Kids today are not really any different from us when we were little. Sure, they've been exposed to electronics and communications from an early age - but that doesn't mean that the only toys that interest them are expensive, flashy electronics.
When kids play, they like to act out their fantasies. And toys that enable them to do that are the toys they'll come back to, time and time again.
The Dress Up Box
If your childhood was anything like mine, the dress-up box got to come out on "special occasions" - and looking back, those "special occasions" were any time our parents wanted us raptly amused for hours at a stretch!
Perfect for rainy weekends, cousins visiting, children's parties, or simply everyday play, a dress-up box costs around five dollars or less to assemble and will provide literally years of fun.
You can work with a simple cardboard box, but if you have an old suitcase, it's even better. I remember ours was in an old-fashioned leather trunk, which added to the air of mystery. If you're using a box, have the kids decorate it with stickers and drawings - you'll love to look back at the box in years to come.
A good dress-up box contains:
- Clothes. Rather than buying kids dress-up outfits from the store (expensive and unnecessary), go to your nearest op shop. Look for items made of glittery or shiny fabric, netting, velvet, corduroy - fabrics with texture and presence. The size and the fit of the items don't matter - kids will wear things the way they want to when they are dressing up, and "grown-up" clothes are half the fun.
- Little boys in general love suit jackets and ties. Look for 80s suits in bright colours, pin stripes and other eyecatching looks.
- If you have access to any kinds of old uniforms, pop them in. Lab coats can sometimes be found in op shops - grab one if they come up!
- Add things like old sheets and lengths of fabric (most fabric shops have cheap remnant bins) for making costumes.
- Accessories such as scarves, costume jewellery, handbags.
- Have plenty of reds and blacks for witch/wizard outfits.
- Don't include shoes, or bring them out only when supervised - kids can hurt themselves running about in ill-fitting shoes.
- Have face-paint or some cheap make-up for very special supervised play sessions :)
