Healthy Budget Cooking

Ultimate Carrot Cake Recipe

Healthy Budget Cooker — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 19:00:04 +0000

Okay, so here’s the scenario… you’ve got your kids birthday coming up, you want them to be able to celebrate, have something sweet because they’re so sweet… problem is you don’t have tons of money to go and buy a cake, and you don’t want something that’s terribly unhealthy for them. What do you do? My fall back in this situation is always a Carrot Cake Recipe, plenty of vegetables, and if made right doesn’t cost a ton to make. That’s where the ultimate carrot cake recipe comes in to play.

Here’s what you’ll need for your ultimate carrot cake recipe:

3 cups of unbleached all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups of sugar (I like Sugar in the Raw, which you can get in bulk from Costco, but bleached white sugar will suffice)
1/2 cup dark brown sugar (if you’re using Sugar in the Raw you can just make it 2 cups of sugar and skip the brown sugar)
1 tablespoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons salt (sea salt, or better yet Himalayan Pink Salt will help add valuable water soluble minerals to your diet)
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
4 cups grated carrots
1 1/2 cups chunky applesauce
1/2 cup chopped pecans
4 large eggs
1 1/2 cups extra virgin olive oil
1/2 cup buttermilk
3 tablespoons pure vanilla extract

And that’s just for the carrot cake batter! You’ll need more for the cream cheese frosting, but we’ll get to that next, you’ll have plenty of time to make the cream cheese frosting as the carrot cake batter is cooking then cooling off.

Preheat oven to 325°F take a large baking dish (if you use glass lower the temperature to 300 and add 15-20mins to the baking time) coat with a thin layer of butter and set it aside. Now combine the flour, sugars, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a large bowl. Next mix in the carrots, applesauce, and nuts (you’ll want to do them separately as the carrots will be moist and the dry ingredients will stick to them, so mixing the flour, sugar, etc. ahead of time allows you to get an even spread before adding the carrots). Set these aside and begin mixing the liquid ingredients together. Whisk the eggs, olive oil, milk, and vanilla in a medium bowl then add to the flour mixture and stir until it is evenly combined.

Transfer the cake batter to your buttered baking dish and put in the oven on the middle rack for about 50-60 minutes depending on your oven. You should be able to insert a toothpick into the center and it will come out clean if it is done, if it is not you will need to put the cake back for additional time. Some older ovens do not go below 350°F if this is the case for you 350° for 40 minutes should suffice in cooking your carrot cake.

Now we move on to the frosting, for the cream cheese frosting recipe you will need:

1 lb. confectioners’ sugar (powdered sugar)
1/4 lb. butter, softened
2 8-oz. pkgs. cream cheese, softened
2 tsps. vanilla

Combine butter and cream cheese. Stir in sugar, add vanilla and pecans. Ice cake after it has cooled.

This is an old carrot cake recipe I got from my mother years ago, and I’ve never been able to find anything else that compares. To me carrot cake should be moist and palatable, most carrot cake recipes leave it dry and undesirable. There is no need to have undesirable carrot cake recipes as it is hard enough to get children to eat things that are healthy for them. If you make changes or substitutions to the ultimate carrot cake recipe let me know how it turns out, I’m always interested in improving the ultimate carrot cake recipe.

Healthy Budget Cooking for the masses

Healthy Budget Cooker — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 17:51:28 +0000

I know a lot of people who believe that having fresh meals at home is just for the wealthy. I’m here to tell you that cooking healthy meals at home is the way to go if you are on a budget. Not only will your medical expenses drop, your food bills will decrease as well. I think what scares a lot of people is the $200 and $300 grocery bills, but that will last a week or more if you get the right stuff like frozen veggies, rice, canned meats, etc. Where you might only be spending $20 a time at McDonalds, that’s $20 three times a day seven days a week for a total of $420 for the week, and that is if you’re getting really cheap meals. No, in my opinion healthy budget cooking is for the masses, McDonald’s is for the super wealthy! I don’t see how anyone on a budget could afford such expense, and then add the health risks on top of that and you could be saving hundreds of thousands of dollars through the years.

A healthy budget cooking 30 day challenge

Healthy Budget Cooker — Sun, 04 Mar 2012 22:10:31 +0000

Well my attitude is starting to pick up… Gotta find some sort of balance in eating that helps keep depression away… hmmm… maybe that will be a challenge for me to undertake as well Anyways, Feeling a little bit peppy so I am on the verge of beginning a new 30 day blogging challenge with all my blogs. Including of course the healthy budget cooking blog! Gotta get my sites up and rolling and bringing in a few bucks while I’ve got the motivation. Then it’s off to figure out if a combination of 5-HTP, Quercetin, liquid vitamins, and caffeine is enough to keep this “mojo” flowing. I also gotta at the very least get into the routine of blogging every day so I can get back to coding on The Bible Animated and get that all wrapped up.

Cost of dinner for a family of four

Healthy Budget Cooker — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 16:07:15 +0000

This is a quick overview of why cooking at home can be beneficial to the average American family. This overview is simply the cost of the food; it does not include preparation time, cost of equipment (pots, pans, knives, etc.), cost of gas/electricity to do the cooking… but it also does not include the health benefits, or potential reduction in medical costs. Some of these things are hard to average especially since a lot of cook ware is made to last a lifetime or more (I use a lot of cast iron that I got from my mom) and the more you use it the less its cost averages out to be in the end. Extending your lifespan with healthy foods, and reducing medical bills may be worth a lot more to some than others. So I am making you aware of what is not included, and why it is not included, but obviously do not plan on figuring out or finding sources to include it. Also, be aware that these figures are based on national averages through 2011, your results may vary but the ratio of home cooking to going out to eat should remain fairly consistent. This is also for a family of four, and does not include what you might save with leftovers… some times batch cooking a large pot of chicken noodle soup for instance might feed a family of four for 3 or more meals at about $25 total cost to make.

Home Made:

Vegtable Stir Fry and Rice – $8.62
Rice and Pinto Beans – $9.26
Chicken Dinner – $13.78
Steak Dinner – $23.18

Out to Eat:

McDonald’s – $27.89
Arby’s – $34.00
Chili’s – $69.64
Outback Steakhouse – $109.82

And for fun the average single US restaurant meal costs $35.65 and the average meal price at the 20 costliest San Francisco restaurants is $85.27 per plate!

As you can see, even with a steak dinner including baked potatoes, and a vegetable side cooked at home for a family of four is cheaper than going to McDonald’s! I’m not suggesting that you have steak and potatoes every night, as that would not be very budget conscious… but I’ve known a lot of people who believed that they were saving money by going to McDonald’s every night for dinner… many of them actually have the audacity to suggest that they cannot afford to cook at home, absolutely foolish talk! A Vegtable stir fry dinner for four, or even throwing in a little tofu, or shrimp would be 1/2 the cost of going to McDonald’s.