This one is a huge fav. of Annie’s.

I peel and grate 2-3 potatoes.  Then dump all the grated potato into a clean cloth and wring the juice out of the potato – it needs to be very dry.

Cut up a couple of strips on bacon into small pieces.  Put bacon piece and potato into a bowl.

Whisk one egg and add to the bacon and potato mix.

Heat some oil in a fry pan on medium heat.  Spoon potato mixture in and cook on both sides for approx 4 minutes.

You can also make a giant potato cake and just add all the mixture in one go.  It doesn’t’ get as crispy around the edges but it is yummy.  I cut it into quarters and flip each quarter separately rather than trying to flip the whole frypan size potato cake.

Heidi is still not a fan but I’ve found this is a great way to fill Annie and my tummies at lunch time and makes a pleasant change from bread and sandwiches.

I used 250g mince,  2 grated carrots and one grated zucchini for these sausage rolls, along with one egg to bind the ingredients together.   I mixed up the mince, carrot, zucchini and egg in a bowl.

Then made the mince mixture into a sausage shape on some puff pastry.  I cut one big sheet of puff pastry in half so I wasn’t wasting any.

Roll the pastry around the mince mixture and use a little egg wash to hold the pastry together.  I cut the rolls up into 2cm size rounds and lay them join side down on a baking tray.

Took about 45minutes in my 200C oven to cook them.

My girls and hubby loved these.  I was not so happy with them.

Ingredients

8 Pears
5 Apples
1 cup Water or apple cider
1 cup Brown Sugar
2 teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon Ground Cloves

Put all the ingredients into the crock pot / slow cooker.  I had frozen up left over pieces of apple and pear from the girls PreSchool snacks, the bits they hadn’t eaten.  Much of it was not peeled even and I worried that would effect the end result but it didn’t at all.  So now I know not to waste time peeling all the apples and pears.

Cook on low for 6 hours stirring occasionally.

Leave a toothpick or chopstick under the lid to vent some of the steam and help the liquid reduce.

After 6 hours use a stick blender to mush everything together until it is smooth and spreadable.

Cook in the crock pot / slow cooker for a couple more hours on low with a tooth pick or chopstick in the side to vent the steam.  Basically at this point I was aiming to make it really thick, if you prefer a thinner consistency you could stop after blending and move straight onto bottling.

Once finished you can bottle it up to give away as gifts or keep it all for yourself and don’t share the yummy goodness.

Tastes great on toast, sandwiches or as a spread for roast pork.

The Verdict – Apple Butter has been a staple in our home since I discovered the recipe and how easy it was to make in the slow cooker / crock pot.  You MUST make this.

Delicious fruit snacks (pineapple, banana and mandarin) and equally delicious Strawberries with our cereal.

Yum yum yum.

Both Pre-Schools my girls attend have a strict fruit and veg only policy for snacks.

Here is Heidi’s snack box for today (we use the lunch box tin that her Wiggles DVDs came in).

That is a Murcott Mandarin, two strawberries (quartered – they were quite large) and carrot sticks. Strawberries from this weeks box, Mandarin and carrot from last weeks and still very fresh and yummy.

One trick I’ve found to get kids to eat fruit is to put the fruit in an appealing bag.  That I learnt from McDonalds, make the packaging fun and people will eat just about anything Mmmm cheeseburger :drool:

Here is the bag Heidi’s strawberries and carrots were in, unfortunately Coles Online don’t stock these so I have to go into the actual grocery store to purchase them. You can rinse and re-use these bags but I find hot water does make the pretty picture wear off.

Hubby has already eaten two of the pears from this weeks box after I put the pears on the very top of the fruit bowl. High Five! Only two pears to go.