eco-friendly cleaner.....

How to Make Eco-Friendly House Cleaner

The average home contains up to 25 gallons of toxic chemicals, many of which are in store-bought cleaners. If you have kids, pets or an eco-friendly attitude, this might make you nervous. Good news: by making your own household cleaning products, you can break free from those chemical bonds, save money, and keep your house squeaky clean.

Check out the recipes in the infographic below to get started on your homemade cleaning arsenal.

With a few simple ingredients that you probably already own—such as baking soda, white vinegar and lemon juice—it’s easy to substitute many store-bought cleaners with safe, eco-friendly options.

Laundry Detergent

Ingredients: 1 bar of laundry soap (available at your local hardware store), 1 cup borax, 1 cup washing soda

Nice and simple. Use a cheese grater to grate the bar of laundry soap into a bowl. Add the borax and baking soda and mix together. Use one tablespoon of the mixture for each load of laundry, and keep the rest in an easy-to-access jar.

Dish Soap

Ingredients: 5 cups of grated castile soap (this is any soap made entirely from vegetable oil), ½ cup baking soda, 1 teaspoon of borax, 6 cups of hot peppermint tea, 1 teaspoon eucalyptus oil

Add the castile soap and hot mint tea to a three-quart saucepan. Simmer for about 15 minutes and then add the rest of your ingredients to the pan. Remove the mixture from heat, let it cool, then add it to a squirt bottle or other plastic container. Note: This is a particularly useful DIY cleaner if you have kids because the leading cause of poisonings in the home for children under the age of six is liquid dish soap containing chemicals like formaldehyde and ammonia.

Oven Cleaner

Ingredients: ¾ cup baking soda, ¼ cup salt, ¼ cup water

Wet all surfaces of your oven with a sponge or cloth. Mix all ingredients together so they form a paste and then spread throughout the interior while avoiding metal and vent openings. Let the paste site overnight, scrape off in the morning and remove all remnants with a wet sponge or cloth.

Wood Polish

Ingredients: vegetable oil, vinegar

Mix a solution of equal parts vegetable oil and vinegar.  Apply a thin coat to any wood that needs a buff.

More secret cleaning powers of common household items:

• Lemon: A food-acid superhero, lemon can be used to destroy most types of bacteria found around the house.
• Baking Soda: The jack of all trades. Use baking soda to clean, soften, scour and freshen things around the house.
• Cornstarch: Can be used as a window cleaner, furniture polish or carpet shampoo

*from wholelivingdaily.com

chocolate "chickpea" cookies........

 On Sunday I was having one of the jonesing for sugar Sunday's and knew I needed to find a new recipe to try before I gave into the bag of powder sugar donuts in my pantry ;) So that is when I came across this awesome recipe. Chocolate Chip cookies made out of Chickpeas (garbanzo beans).

I was a bit skeptical but they did not let me down in any way.  I will say for some reason I liked them more the day after then the day of. Not sure why??  Let me know what you think.

Ingredients:

1 can of drained chickpeas

1/4 a cup of stevia baking sugar

1/3 cup of almond butter

(peanut butter works but it will make it SUPER nutty) to nutty for my liking

2 teaspoons of vanilla

1/8 tsp salt

SPLASH of milk (almond, soy, cow, whatever)

1/3 cup of dark chocolate chips

(next time I would smash mine a bit so the spread better through the mixture)

Directions:

1.Preheat oven to 350.

2. Combine all ingredients ----- EXCEPT FOR CHOCOLATE CHIPS---- and mix in bowl. I used my hand blender to blend it all together and it worked great. I thought if I used my big blender it would be to hard to get the dough out.

3. Once no whole chickpeas remain, add chocolate chips

4. Spoon balls of cookie dough on a greased baking sheet.  Use the back of your spoon to flatten cookie because they do not flatten on their own

5. Bake for 20-25 min or until chocolate chips are melting

6. Remove and let cool

YUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

homemade refried beans.....

My lovely waiter from this weekend at Lake Austin Spa gave me an amazing recipe for the best and healthiest re-fried black beans!! Plus it is SUPER easy.

Ingredients: Dried black beans 1lb, 1 onion, 1 garlic bunch, salt and pepper

-Before you start your day or head to work put your beans, water, whole onion and whole garlic cloves into the crock pot. Set on low for 8 hrs.

-30minutes before its finished add salt and pepper

-Then remove and chop onion in half, add half the onion back into the beans

-Remove garlic cloves leaving one in the pot (any more and they will be to garlicy)

-If you want your beans a bit thicker maybe remove some water, or leave it be. Then either with your hand puree or blender, blend all the ingredients. 

WOW!! That easy and now you have a VAT of re-fried black beans. I put mine in the fridge as is, he did suggest putting them in a skillet and cooking them for a bit, but I found no need for this.

** have these beans in an egg white veggie filled omelet, as a side with lunch, or a Mexican dinner

E-N-J-O-Y

cocoa snacks....

I have been looking for some good "treats" to pack in Owen's lunch box and for afternoon snacks....I discovered these two delish cocoa snacks.  Notice I used Cocoa and not chocolate, obviously they are one in the same but when you are eating or buying things that use cocoa powder it usually doesn't have all the added fat and sugar as a chocolate  flavored snack does. Not only were these two a good discovery for Owen (because he eats the somersault ones the same way he would an Oreo cookie) but they are a new favorite of MINE too. A handful is just enough to fill your sweet tooth after lunch or dinner and won't break your days work of health and exercise.

First..  Somersault Snacks, DUTCH COCOA

Nutrition info -- 14 pieces (5 normally does the trick for me )

calories- 140    fat-7g    protein-6g    sugar-4g    carbs 17g

and all the ingredients are ALL NATURAL!!!!!!! so your body actually knows how to digest them

Second.. Chocolate Super Cookies

these cookies are tasty but not quite as tasty as Somarsaults

Nutrition info: 18 pieces

calories- 160    fat-9g      carbs 17g      sugar- 11g       protein 2g

-- you can probably find these are your local grocery store, on their website or on amazon.com--

E_N_J_O_Y

ginger lime vinaigrette......

This is the perfect "Asian style" dressing.. it is super fresh and low in calorie!

Ingredients:

1 inch of fresh ginger grated

small tbsp of minced garlic

3 tbsp of fish sauce (I used Bragg's soy sauce b/c I don't use fish sauce ;)

juice from 3 Sm limes

3 tbsp of sesame oil

-mix and store in the fridge

**salad idea to put it on...  

spinach, THINLY sliced bell peppers, thin cucumbers, edamame, fresh tomatoes, 1/4 cup of cooked rice noodles,  and a 3 oz of rotisserie chicken

for daily convenience, pre chop veggies and cook the rice noodles and edamame at the beginning of the week, then build your salad day by day! I do this every week with different ingredients.

ENJOY

veggie brownies....

Healthier Veggie Brownies

 I made these on Sunday night and they are pretty dang good. I have been snacking on them all week.

Each brownie is only 24 calories, .5 fat, .2 saturated fat, .1 trans fat, 18.6 sodium, 14mg cholesterol, 3.6 carbs, .4 fiber, 2.2 sugar and 1.4 protein and they taste good!

1 cup of shredded zucchini with skin

1 cup of shredded apples with skin

1/2 cup of shredded carrots

2 large egg whites

1/2 chocolate cake mix (I like Duncan Hines double choc. fudge)

- I also sprinkled a few dark choc chips in the raw mix, a nice bonus (those were not in the nutritional info)

**Mix all together. Spray a 9 x 13 glass pan w/ non stick spray. Bake at 350 for 25-28 min

MAKES 12 Brownies!

E-N-J-O-Y

cauliflower pizza crust......

Yummmmm............. 

5.0 from 3 reviews

Print

Healthy + Gluten Free Pizza with a Cauliflower Crust

Author: Eating Bird Food

Prep time:  15 mins

Cook time:  35 mins

Total time:  50 mins

Serves: 8

 

Ingredients

• ½ head cauliflower (about 2 cups riced)
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1 cup part-skim shredded mozzarella cheese
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon basil
• 1 teaspoon oregano

Instructions

1. Pre-heat oven to 400° F.
2. Prep a cookie sheet or pizza stone. You can grease the cookie sheet or use parchment paper. (I used a Pampered Chef baking stone, which doesn’t require any prep if it’s seasoned.)
3. Remove the stems and leaves from your cauliflower and chop the florets into chunks. Add to a food processor (I used my Vitamix) and pulse just until the texture is similar to rice. If you don’t have a food processor or Vitamix, you can grate the cauliflower with a cheese grater or chop it.
4. Sauté cauliflower “rice” in a non-stick skillet over medium heat and cook until translucent, approximately 6-8 minutes. (You can use the microwave for this as well. Just place cauliflower in an uncovered microwave-safe bowl and cook for 8 minutes.)
5. In a bowl combine the cooked cauliflower with all remaining ingredients.
6. Spread dough out evenly over parchment paper (or stone) – about ¼ to ⅓ of an inch thick. The pizza should be about 9-10 inches in diameter.
7. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until the crust is golden, crispy on the edges and cooked through the middle.
8. Remove the crust from the oven.
9. Top with pizza sauce and toppings. Be careful not to add too many heavy toppings as you don’t want to weigh down the crust.
10. Broil the pizza for 5 minutes, or until the toppings are hot and the cheese is melted. Allow the pizza to cool for 2-3 minutes then cut and serve immediately.