yummy ways to up your milk supply.

first off is some yummy chocolate chip oatmeal lactation cookies.
these cookies are awesome and I swear if I'm not careful, the whole batch will be gone withing a couple days (hubby likes them too!)

Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Lactation Cookies


1 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
4 tablespoons water
2 tablespoons flax seed meal
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
3 cups oats
1 cup chocolate chips
2 -4 tablespoons brewer's yeast

Preheat oven to 350°. 
Mix the flaxseed meal and water and let sit for 3-5 minutes. 
Beat butter, sugar, and brown sugar well. 
Add eggs and mix well. 
Add flaxseed mix and vanilla, beat well.
Sift together flour, brewers yeast, baking soda, and salt.
Add dry ingredients to butter mix.
Stir in oats and chips.
Scoop onto baking sheet. 
 Bake for 12 minutes. 
 Let set for a couple minutes then remove from tray.

I like to add a bit of cinnamon when I make mine.  I usually just sprinkle some in, so I don't have a measured amount to give you.  You can also up the amount of brewers yeast and oatmeal to help increase your supply more.

Another option (which i'm enjoying for the first time right now) is a guinness float.  I've heard from multiple momma's that it works.
All you have to do for this one is put some ice cream in a cup and add guinness.  If you want you can also throw it all in a blender to make a milk shake.

canned pasta sauce

Here's the recipe for the pasta sauce as I promised yesterday.
It's from the Ball Blue Book Guide to Preserving.  If you want a copy of the book for yourself, I got mine for around $5 or $6 from walmart.  Now on to the recipe.....

Seasoned Tomato Sauce
Yield: about 14 pints or 7 quarts

45 pounds tomatoes                       1 tablespoon black pepper
6 cups chopped onions                   1 1/2 tablespoons sugar
12 cloves garlic, minced                1/2 cup salt (optional)
1/2 cup olive oil                             2 teaspoon crushed red pepper (optional)
6 bay leaves                                  Bottled lemon juice

Wash tomatoes; drain.  Remove core and blossom ends.  Cut into quarters; set aside.  Saute onions and garlic in olive oil in a large saucepot.  Add tomatoes, oregano, bay leaves, black pepper and sugar.  Stir in salt and crushed red pepper, if desired.  Simmer 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Remove bay leaves.  Puree tomatoes using a food processor or food mill.  Strain puree to remove peels and seeds.  Cook pulp in a large, uncovered saucepot over medium-high heat until sauce thickens, stirring to prevent sticking.  Reduce volume by one-half.  Add 1 tablespoon bottled lemon juice to each pint jar, 2 tablespoons bottled lemon juice to each quart jar.  Ladle hot sauce into hot jars, leaving 1/2-inch headspace.  Adjust two-piece caps.  Process pints 35 minutes, quarts 40 minutes, in a boiling-water canner.


now this is what i did different:
First off I only did a 1/2 batch and that pretty much filled up my biggest pot (except for my canner, but I needed that to can the sauce).  2nd I removed the skins from the tomatoes at the start.  You can easily do this by putting them in boiling water for about 20-30 seconds and then putting them in cold water, the skins should peel right off.  Lastly, I don't own a food processor or a food mill so I just used my immersion blender (used this for the salsa as well).

canning, canning, and more canning

The past couple days have been busy in the kitchen.  Yesterday hubby & I scored 2 big boxes of tomatoes at the farmer's market (if you're in the Springfield, MO area it's the one in the mall parking lot).

Yesterday was pasta sauce day.  We (and by we, I mostly mean me...J did help some though so I have to give him some credit) canned 9 pints of sauce.  I'll post that recipe later (I'm much to comfy right now to be bothered to go get out the cookbook).

Today was salsa day.  Canned 9.5 pints (8 full pints and then 3 of the little 1/2 pint jars).  The last time I made salsa it was just the easy add the tomatoes to a package of mix kind of deal.  This time I went all out and made it completely from scratch and from the spoonful that I tasted it's yummy!

So on to the salsa recipe:
I found this recipe here:  http://homesteepedhope.com/2007/07/30/homemade-salsa-and-canning-tips/

Mary’s Mild Salsa–makes 10 pints


22 tomatoes (I put in twice as many if they’re on the small-to-medium side)
4 bell peppers, chopped fine
3 onions, chopped fine
1 cup vinegar
3/4-1 cup jalepeno peppers, chopped fine
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup salt
1 cup (12 oz) tomato paste (I omit this)
Cilantro to taste
3 cloves garlic minced

After getting skin off tomatoes (dip in boiling water 20 seconds, then into cold–skin falls off), put 2/3 of them in blender and blend. Chop the rest of them (if you have a good blender you can blend all veggies together, we like it chunky) and put all ingredients into pot, bring to a boil and then simmer for 25 minutes. Use a ladle and funnel to fill hot jars with salsa, leaving 1 inch headspace. Slip a plastic knife or other non-metal straight object along sides of jar to release any bubbles. Wipe jar rim with clean washcloth for a good seal. Apply lid and ring and put jar into canner. It will be fine as you continue filling pints/quarts till canner is full. Water bathe pints for 15 minutes and quarts for 20.


For the most part, I followed the recipe as it was written.  Like the author I omitted the tomato paste, I also used sweet peppers (what I'm assuming were most likely banana peppers, got them at the farmers market as well) instead of the bell peppers and upped the jalepenos slightly.

After all of that I still have more tomatoes left.  I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them, but I'm leaning towards making more pasta sauce.