grace's favorite salty party mix

16 to 18 cups of whatever quantities of the following you like...or substitute anything with anything!!!

(pretzels, nuts, goldfish crackers, ritz bitz, rice chex, krispix, cheerios, honeycomb cereal, life cereal, bugles...)

Melt the following in microwave:

1 cup butter

1/4 cup worcestershire sauce

1 tsp garlic powder

1 1/2 tsp seasoned salt, 

cumin and chili powder optional

Mix with dry stuff and bake at 250F for 1 1/2 hour stirring every 20 minutes or so. When cool add a pile of peanut m&m's. (3 cups or more!!!)

craisin party mix from my-friend-rachel

sauce: 

1/3 cup white syrup

1 1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup butter or margarine

Boil this for 1 minute and pour over the following stuff:

9 cups Krispix

1 cup craisins

1 cup sliced almonds

(ad-lib on amounts of craisins and almonds. Rachel adds more craisins; I add more almonds.)

Bake at 250F for an hour, stirring every 15 minutes. I always double the recipe and bake it more like an hour and a half, stirring every 20 minutes. Dump out on wax paper to cool. Addicting.

chicken noodle soup

(note: no measurements are followed exactly on this recipe...at my house anyway!)

1 broiler/fryer chicken

2 1/2 quarts water

1/2 medium onion, chopped

3 tsp salt

2 tsp chicken oxo

pepper to taste

1/4 tsp marjoram

1/4 tsp thyme

1 bay leaf

1 1/2 cups fine uncooked egg noodles

1 cup chopped carrots

1 cup chopped celery

I add curry as well (Epicure Madras curry is mild and flavorful)

In stock pot combine the first 9 ingredients. Bring to a boil. Simmer a couple hours and then debone chicken. Add the rest of the ingredients except noodles. Cook these and add just before serving. Simmer soup until done. Sooo good. 8-10 servings. This would work great to can without noodles.

p'butter oat cakes for the birds

stir together the following:

2 cups softened lard

2 cups soft peanut butter (crunchy or smooth)

2 cups flour

2/3 cup sugar

4 cups oats

4 cups cornmeal

Okay this is the original. I have long since started replacing some of the flour and meal with bird seeds of all sorts...sunflower seeds, niger seed, canola, cracked wheat, song bird mix that the birds refuse to eat UNLESS mixed with this concoction. Press into 9x13 pan and chill for a couple hours. Cut into 6 squares or whatever size fits your suet feeder best. You can also form into balls to fit mesh onion bags and hang outside. Our birds LOVE LOVE LOVE this. Woodpeckers, chickadees and if you're not careful, the magpies do too!

turkey barley soup

leftover turkey, diced finely, maybe 3 cups give or take

1 1/2 cups shredded carrots

few stalks shredded/sliced celery

1 or 2 chopped onion

1/2 to 1 cup pearl barley

chicken broth to cover above ingredients

salt and pepper to taste

2 or 3 bay leaves

1/2 tsp each poultry seasoning and sage

Very slowly simmer together all afternoon. Serve with sour cream and mozza and parmesan cheese. We just love this soup. It's so simple and delicious. Last night I added some shredded potatoes that needed using up and that worked too.  What makes this soup so good IMO is the sage and poultry seasoning. It would work to quad this and can it.

(I'm realizing just how difficult it is to write my recipes down; I do NOT measure much at all! Hope you can use these.)

coconut butter

hard margarine or real butter and soft margarine to equal about 1 1/2 cups

1/2 tsp coconut flavoring

1/2 cup icing sugar

2 Tbsp honey

Whip all together and serve with warm fresh bread or hot toast. If you have Torani Coconut syrup, use just butter and syrup to make a fabulous spread.

cinnamon butter

A mixture of either real butter or hard margarine and soft margarine to equal about 1 1/2 cup

2 Tbsp honey

1/2 cup powdered sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

Whip all together and spread on fresh bread or toast