Cabbage and Sausage Soup

Recipe as it is written: 
4 Cups Chicken Broth
1 large onion, chopped
1.5 lb smoked sausage
1 small head of green cabbage
8-10 medium potatoes
4 medium carrots, sliced
4 large celery stalks, sliced
salt and pepper to taste

Combine ingredients in pot. Simmer until done.

My Notes:

This recipe is very forgiving and I do not bother measuring these quantities.
Usually I end up adding an extra cup of broth because I like the broth. I do add an entire onion, but usually add less than a pound of the sausage (~12oz or less).
I add 1/2-1 head of cabbage depending on the size of the head. usually I keep larger potatoes on hand, so I only add 4 or so. I prefer more cabbage and less potatoes.
I use baby carrots, so I add a bunch, until I think there are enough carrots.
Salt and pepper are added at the very end, right before serving. The sausage will add a good bit of salt, so I don't add much.

Basically, I toss these ingredients into the pot until it seems like enough, then heat to a boil, and turn down to a med-low heat until the potatoes and carrots are tender.

Whole Wheat Pancakes

I make this a few times a month.  They are not extremely light and fluffy like store bought pancakes in a box, but they are good, and VERY healthy.  I think Angela makes this sometimes too.  For my family (7 kids, three and a half of which are teenagers) I 1.5 times this recipe if we are not having a bunch of other things.  If we are adding hash browns, bacon, eggs, etc I make it as is.

2 Cups Whole Wheat Flour
1 Cup Rolled Quick Oats
Trace of Salt
1 TBS Baking Powder

3 Eggs
2 Cups Milk
1/3 Cup Oil
1/2 Cup Honey
2 tsp Vanilla
1 Cup cottage cheese*

Mix dry, add wet, cook!  Voila!

* I used to substitute this with Yogurt, apple sauce, or sour cream.  All were good.  I like cottage cheese the best.

Slow Cook Taco Soup

The original recipe can be found here.  There were all sorts of good ideas about in the comments about how to change the recipe, including an idea to saute the onions first.  However, this has become my "I have no time, but I want delicious hot food" recipe, which means I usually go for the simple route. Consequently I usually keep the ingredients for this soup on hand at all times. Below you will find my version.

Ingredients:

1 lb ground beef - I have a freezer full of ground beef in 1lb packages.  So for this recipe I just pull out the ground beef as is (aka still frozen) and toss it in the crock pot and let it cook through before I break it up a little while before serving.

1 onion, chopped - I like to use the sweet onions, and use a medium/large sized onion for this.

16oz can chili beans - For the beans you could probably use just about any bean. I get pinto and kidney beans, but they don't have to be the seasoned chile beans.

15oz can kidney beans

8oz can tomato sauce

4oz can diced green chile peppers

29 oz diced tomatoes - I forget these often enough that I would list these as optional. :o)  Also, in the summer I prefer to use fresh tomatoes rather than canned ones.

~3½ cups water - If you are at home, you can measure this.  I cook this away from home enough so now I just use one of the cans and add about two can-fulls of water. 

1 pkg taco seasoning

Cheese (optional)

Chips (optional)

I leave the corn that the original recipe calls for out usually, because of friend's food allergies, but the corn is yummy.  I also usually add a green bell pepper, just chopped up and thrown in. 

Directions:

Combine all ingredients in slow cooker. Cook on low for ~8 hours. If desired top with cheese and serve with chips.