• Home
  • About Me
  • Policies
  • Work with Me
  • Guest Posting
Stuff Parents Need

Stuff Parents Need

Easing the chaos in the nest, one find at a time.

  • Style
  • Parenting
  • Giveaways
  • The Kitchen
  • DIY Projects
  • Fun Things To Do
  • My Favorite Finds

Turkey Sausage Recipes We Love: Turkey Sausage with Sauteed Veggies

September 18, 2013 · by Tiffany Merritt · 2 Comments

Has your family embraced the turkey outside of the month of November? I have a great turkey sausage recipe for you to try, whether you already purchase and love this product, or if you need some convincing the turkey sausage is actually tasty. My family of 4 (remember, two of those people are quite young!) ate almost the entire dish in one sitting!

Turkey Sausage with Sautéed Veggies

turkey sausage recipes pinterest photo

  • 2 small/medium red bell peppers (or 1 large)
  • 1/2 large onion
  • 2 Tbsp butter
  • 1 Tbsp olive oil or grapeseed oil
  • 1 lb turkey sausage, cut into 1 inch pieces
  • 16 oz frozen whole kernel corn
  • 1 tsp garlic salt
  • ¼ tsp pepper
  • hot sauce (to taste…we only use 4 drops!)

turkey sausage recipes ingredients

Slice your bell peppers and onions into long thin strips, like this:

turkey sausage recipes peppers and onions

Heat the butter in a large skillet over med-high heat, and saute the pepper and onions until tender (about 6 minutes). Remove from the skillet and add 1 Tbsp oil. Then cook the sliced turkey sausage until browned and crispy on both sides.

Once the turkey sausage has been browned, add the peppers and onions to the skillet, as well as the corn. Cover the skillet and reduce the heat to medium and cook until the corn tastes tender. Add garlic salt and hot sauce, stir to combine, and serve!

turkey sausage recipes with sauteed veggies

 

If you try the recipe, I’d love to hear what you thought about it!

Filed Under: The Kitchen · Tagged: recipes, smoked turkey sausage, smoked turkey sausage recipes, turkey sausage, turkey sausage recipe

Grilled Cheese Recipes: Delicious Idea for Crazy School Nights

September 16, 2013 · by Tiffany Merritt · 4 Comments


In our home, grilled cheese recipes are what we turn to on the craziest of school nights, which is usually Wednesdays. While we are all home by 4:45pm, I have been in the car 4 different times taking each girl to school and picking each girl up (separate trips), and we’ve gone to ballet, and we’ve gone to the farmer’s market to pick up our CSA share. Wednesday is also supposed to be one of my big “work” days on the blog, which means I minimize the amount of time I spend cooking so that I can get more work done. And on Wednesdays, Tim is usually home for 10-15 minutes before he heads out the door to a weekly evening meeting he has.

So we are doing pretty good if we even manage to get some bread and cheese out for a quick, hot sandwich! I was recently inspired by a recipe Pillsbury offers for grilled cheese using Grands! Biscuits (sounds kind of crazy, right?). I took that recipe as a starting point, and made a few additions so that I could create a “grown up” grilled cheese sandwich that feels fancy and special, but that comes together lightning fast!

grown up grilled cheese recipes

 

The ingredients I gathered consisted of Grands! Biscuits (I chose homestyle flavor, but I think some of the other variations would also work well), prosciutto, mozzarella cheese, sharp cheddar cheese (I loved the sharp cheese with this, but mozzarella is perhaps the more obvious choice), and pesto.

I veered from the Pillsbury instructions in that I used grape seed oil in the pan (higher flash point…less likely to burn) and I set my pan on med-low heat, and cooked them for 2 minutes on each side instead of 3. I think the temperature setting your use and the amount of time you let the biscuits cook really will depend on your cookware and your stove…they are all a little bit different!

Since I was trying out this dish over the weekend, I was also able to make a tomato soup to go along with it. Tomato soup, in my experience, freezes really well, so make a big batch for your family and freeze it. That way, syou can pull it out before those crazy week days when you know cooking won’t be an option.

grilled cheese recipes with prosciutto

I thought this was a delicious, indulgent take on the grilled cheese sandwich. Even though it was totally easy to prepare, it really did feel like a special meal. I’m going to make it again for my family next Wednesday, for sure! I think it will cause us all to pause, even if only for a few minutes, and really enjoy our food together.

Pillsbury has a lot of great recipe ideas using Grands! Biscuits. Check out the recipe booklet they offer for free and let me know what recipe you think you’ll try first with your family on a busy week night!

I was selected for this opportunity as a member of Clever Girls Collective. The content and opinions expressed here are all my own and are not indicative of the opinions or positions of General Mills. Compensation was provided by General Mills via Clever Girls Collective.

Filed Under: The Kitchen · Tagged: gourmet grilled cheese, grilled cheese, grilled cheese recipe, pillsbury, pillsbury grands, pillsbury grands biscuits, pillsbury grands grilled cheese, pillsbury grands recipes, recipes, review

Cooking With Kids: The Perfect First Cookbook (Giveaway!)

August 31, 2013 · by Tiffany Merritt · 88 Comments

Cooking with kids can be a lot of work, at least at first. But the payoff for having a child, and eventually a teenager, who is comfortable in the kitchen can be SO worth it! Has your child started to develop an interest in cooking? And are you ready to start encouraging that budding interest? Then I’ve got the perfect cookbook!

I was recently sent a copy of ChopChop: The Kids’ Guide to Cooking Real Food with Your Family. It is a beautifully photographed book filled with over 100 recipes that new little chefs will enjoy. It also has great tips and tricks and teachable moments , such as how to operate a salad spinner, or answers to questions that kids might be asking while cooking that will help them better understand why the recipe needs to be followed as written (such as why tomatoes get added so late in the process of cooking lentil soup).

cooking with kids: chop chop cover

Perhaps my very favorite thing about the book, though, is the fact that the photos inside show kids doing the cooking. How empowering it must be to a child to see example after example of someone their age creating something in the kitchen!

Here’s an example recipe from the book. Check it out and give it a try with your child in the near future!

Little Lasagnas

from ChopChop: The Kids’ Guide to Cooking Real Food with Your Family.

It’s fun to get your own cute little lasagna! And this is an easier, quicker recipe than the  big-pan lasagna. Plus, this recipe will give you some good math practice, too.

cooking with kids: little lasagnas

Adult Needed: Yes

Hands-On Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Makes: 12 little lasagnas

Kitchen gear: 12-cup muffin tin, measuring cup, measuring spoons, box grater (adult needed), pot holders, butter knife

Ingredients:

  • 1⁄2 cup hot tap water
  • 2 1⁄2 cups tomato sauce
  • 1⁄2 pound (1⁄2 box) spaghetti (any kind is fine)
  • 3⁄4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
  • 1 1⁄2 cups shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese

Instructions
1. Turn the oven on and set it to 350 degrees.
2. Put 2 teaspoons hot tap water in each of 12 muffin cups inside the tin.
3. Add 1 tablespoon tomato sauce to each muffin cup.
4. Count out 48 spaghetti strands. Break up 4 spaghetti strands and add them to the first
muffin cup, then continue, adding 4 broken spaghetti strands to each muffin cup.
5. Top each with 1 teaspoon grated Parmesan cheese.
6 Top each with 2 teaspoons shredded mozzarella cheese.
7. Top each with 2 teaspoons tomato sauce.
8. Repeat, starting with step 4 (the spaghetti strands).
9. Repeat again.
10. Carefully put the muffin tin in the oven and bake until the top is golden and the
tomato sauce is bubbling, about 45 minutes. Set aside for 10 minutes. Slide the butter
knife into the inner edge of each muffin cup and gently go around it, loosening up the
sides. Carefully remove the lasagnas from the tin and serve right away.

Win it!: One lucky Stuff Parents Need reader will win a copy of ChopChop: The Kids’ Guide to Cooking Real Food With Your Family!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Filed Under: Giveaways, The Kitchen · Tagged: chop chop, chopchop: the kids’ guide to cooking real food with your family, cooking with kids, first cookbook, giveaway, healthy kids recipes, healthy recipes, kids cookbook, kids recipes, recipes, review

Meat, Potatoes and a Dessert Made in 90 Seconds with Reynolds Aluminum Foil!

March 9, 2013 · by Tiffany Merritt · 13 Comments

I’ve got a 90 second video to share with you. It may not make you laugh as much as Charlie Bit My Finger, but it will still give you some really good ideas for ways you can make a meat and potatoes type of meal almost effortlessly. And cleanup is a non-issue! Gotta love that! Check it out!

 

 

And here’s a breakdown of each recipe in case you want to try any of them out!

Super Simple Slow Cooker Baked Potatoes

Ingredients:

  • 8 Baking Potatoes*
  • Reynolds Wrap® Aluminum Foil
  • Toppings of your choice

1. Scrub all of your potatoes so they are nice and clean!

2. Poke each potato 4-6 times with a fork. This helps the steam escape the inside of the potato.

3. Wrap each potato with aluminum foil. This traps that steam that escapes and creates the perfect cooking environment!

4. Set your slow cooker to high for 3 1/2 hours or so. Your potatoes will stay warm inside the aluminum foil for quite a while if they are done before the rest of dinner.

5. Add the toppings of your choice to your perfectly cooked baked potatoes. And enjoy not having to clean your slow cooker.

*I like to make a large batch of baked potatoes at one time to eat throughout the week, but you could also do just enough for one meal.

Crazy Easy Baked Ham

Ingredients:

  • 7 Pound Bone-in Ham (cooking time will vary by weight…see instructions)
  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 1/4 cup yellow mustard
  • Reynolds Wrap® Aluminum Foil
  • Meat thermometer

1. Preheat your oven to 325.

2. Line a baking dish with Reynolds Wrap® Aluminum Foil.

3. In a medium sized bowl, mix together brown sugar and mustard until a smooth sauce is formed.

4. Add your ham to the baking dish, flat side down.

5. Cover the ham with the brown sugar and mustard sauce.

6. Place another sheet of Reynolds Wrap® Aluminum Foil on top, sealing the bottom layer of foil and the top layer of foil together to create a pouch in which the ham will cook.

7. The ham needs to be cooked for roughly 25 minutes per pound. If you have a 7 pound ham that means it will need 3 hours to cook. Ham only needs to reach 145 degrees to be considered fully cooked. A meat thermometer is very helpful here to make sure you have cooked your ham enough, but not too much!

Baked Apples

Ingredients:

  • 4 apples (Fuji or Galas are my favorites)
  • 4 tablespoons brown sugar*
  • 4 large marshmallows
  • Reynolds Wrap® Aluminum Foil

1. Preheat the oven to 325.

2. Core each apple, making sure that the bottom of the apple remains intact.

3. Peel one to two rings of the apple skin away from the top of the apple.

4. Add roughly half a tablespoon to the inside of each apple.

5. Next, add one large marshmallow to the inside of each apple.

6. Add the remaining half tablespoon of brown sugar on top of each apple.

7. Wrap each apple in aluminum foil. Place inside a baking dish and bake for 45 minutes.

The apple is yummy on its own, or fantastic served sliced over ice cream!

*As a variation, add a bit of cinnamon to your brown sugar!

For more fantastic (really and truly!) tips from other Reynolds Real Moms, check out the Reynolds Facebook page. Dinner is about to get so much easier at your house!

I’m a Reynolds Real Moms finalist. As such I have received complimentary products. This meal was my creation. I hope you enjoyed it! 

Filed Under: The Kitchen · Tagged: cooking, cooking video, kitchen tips and hints, kitchen tips for cooking, meat and potatoes, meat and potatoes recipe, recipes, reynolds, reynolds facebook, reynolds foil, reynolds real moms, reynolds real moms contest

Let Me Change Your Life Real Fast (6 Month Supply of Reynolds Products Giveaway!)

March 6, 2013 · by Tiffany Merritt · 186 Comments

It’s voting day for the Reynolds Real Moms campaign! I need your help in order to make it to win this thing! Please vote for me! It takes just a few seconds and it can change my life, just like Reynolds products have already done! I’m on the bottom row, second from the left. My name is Tiffany!

One of my very favorite things to do on this blog is to share products that have changed my life for the better. Sharing those types of products, and potentially changing someone else’s life for good give me the biggest thrill ever. If I can save some parents a bit of time and a bit of hassle in their already crazy day, then I have done my job!

Today I want to help change your life for the better in two ways. First and foremost, you have probably already learned that slow cookers are a VERY good tool to have on hand in the kitchen. They can take care of dinner for you with very little effort on your part. But is your slow cooker getting under-utilized? I have found that most people who don’t use them often have two main reasons: either they don’t have good slow cooker recipes, or they find the cleanup to take so much time that it negates the time the product saved them in the first place. 

I can identify with both of these concerns. And I can offer you solutions, as well! Check out my video highlighting a fantastic cheesy chicken dip recipe, and see how Reynolds Slow Cooker Liners make cleanup that easily could have taken FOREVER take just a few seconds.

Reynolds Slow Cooker Liners have changed my life for the better. I am head-over-heels for this product, and I can’t believe that I only learned about them in the last 6 months. Where have you been hiding, my love?!?! If you haven’t had the pleasure of cooking a meal with a Reynolds Slow Cooker Liner, then that needs to change! Why don’t you grab some Reynolds coupons and head on over to the store. Also start picking out the show or movie you are going to get to watch after dinner with the time you saved on cleanup. 🙂

Ok, now for the second way I’d like to change your life…at least for one of you! As part of the Reynolds Real Moms campaign, I get to offer one lucky reader a 6 month supply of Reynolds products! You will be SOOOOOO excited to get this box from FedEx! It will have all sorts of goodies, including foil, parchment paper, baking cups, slow cooker liners, oven bags, bake ware pans, freezer paper and pan lining paper. EEEEEE!!!!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Be sure to enter my other current giveaways, found on the sidebar of my page.

I am a Reynolds Real Moms finalist, and as such have received complimentary products. All thoughts and opinions expressed here are strictly my own. If I win this competition, there will be more opportunities for me to spread the Reynolds love (and offer Reynolds prizes!) to my readers. Will you take a moment today to vote for me? Thank you! 

Filed Under: Giveaways, The Kitchen · Tagged: cheesy chicken dip recipe, giveaway, kitchen tips and hints, kitchen tips for cooking, recipes, review, reynolds, reynolds coupons, reynolds facebook, reynolds foil, reynolds real moms, reynolds real moms contest, slow cooker liners

A New Recipe Resouce: Cooking with Coke (GIVEAWAY!!!)

May 21, 2011 · by Tiffany Merritt · 137 Comments

In most societies all over the world, food is a key element in bringing people together and sharing memories. What’s a family gathering without joining together around the table, or hanging out in the backyard with a plate of food in hand? We mark holidays, milestones and even seasons of the year with food. But the food, as good as it might be, isn’t the end goal. It is a means to an end of bringing people together with one another. Food is often a reason to gather, but the memories that are formed when people get together are the reasons that we keep planning events, and menus to go along with them!

There’s a very cool new web resource for finding yummy recipes that will draw a crowd of various sizes, be it enough to fill your dining room table or enough to fill your house. It’s called Cooking with Coke. You will, of course, find an excellent selection of recipes that feature Coca-Cola as an ingredients (who knew you could do so much with it?!), but beyond that, it features recipes that readers have submitted, along with stories of memories that they have related to the food. I find this to be one of the most enjoyable features of the website, as it it fun to read about why a particular dish is so special to someone. I’ve actually found that the dishes that have those great stories are the ones I’m most interested in trying for myself. The dishes on their own sound good, but its the memories they have created for someone else that makes them irresistible!

Additionally, Cooking with Coke features two celebrity chefs, G. Garvin and Ingrid Hoffmann, and some of their favorite recipes to share (along with video demonstrations of how to make them! Awesome!).

I want to encourage you to spend a bit of time on the Cooking with Coke website. You can create your own recipe book right on the website and print it for yourself or to share with others. There’s nothing to lose and only great memories to make!

Win it!: In celebration of the launch of Cooking with Coke, Coca-Cola has offered one Stuff Parents Need reader an Ingrid Hoffman T-fal Tamale Pot and Steamer (it is BEAUTIFUL!), with a retail value of $49.95! The winner will also receive a Coca-Cola oven mitt! The contest will run until June 1st at 11:59pm EST when a winner will be selected using Random.org. The winner will have 48 hours to respond before the prize is forfeited and a new winner is selected. Open to residents of the United States. Limit one entrant per household, please.

REMEMBER, YOU MUST BE A PUBLIC FOLLOWER OF MY BLOG VIA GOOGLE FRIEND CONNECT TO BE ELIGIBLE FOR A GIVEAWAY. YOU CAN SIGN UP THROUGH MY SIDEBAR IF YOU HAVEN’T DONE SO, ALREADY.

Mandatory entry: Tell me one recipe that catches your eye on the website, or share a food that brings back great memories for you!

My answer: I am going to be trying these, “Fastest Ever” Chicken Enchiladas. Sign me up for anything that looks that delicious and comes together that fast!

Additional entries:
1. Sponsor love: “Like” Coca-Cola on Facebook
2. Blogger love: Follow Stuff Parents Need on Twitter

Rare bonus entry: Submit a recipe to the website (doesn’t have to have Coke in it!) along with a memory. Come back here and submit a link to your post, and you will earn 3 extra entries (be sure to submit your link 3 separate times in the comments).

Be sure to enter my other current giveaways, found on the sidebar of my homepage.

Disclosure: The prize was provided by The Coca-Cola Company. The Coca-Cola Company is not a sponsor, administrator or connected in any other way with this giveaway. T-fal® had zero involvement with this contest.

Filed Under: Giveaways · Tagged: coca cola cake, coca cola recipes, coke cake, coke recipes, cola cake, cook coke, cooking coke, cooking with coke, giveaway, recipes, review, uses for coca cola

  • « Previous Page
  • 1
  • …
  • 8
  • 9
  • 10

Connect

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter

Welcome!


Grab your beverage of choice (mine is iced coffee) and let's hang out for a spell! I'm Tiffany, and I've rambunctious little girls and a fierce desire to share any tip and trick I can find to make lives with little ones a bit less hectic and a lot more fun. [Read more...]

Popular Posts

Keep Slowing Down. You’ve Got a Race to Lose

Keep Slowing Down. You’ve Got a Race to Lose

Free Summer School for Moms (You’ll Love It!)

Free Summer School for Moms (You’ll Love It!)

The Best Cheap Mattress is Also The Best Quality Mattress: A Must-Read

The Best Cheap Mattress is Also The Best Quality Mattress: A Must-Read

25+ Moana-Inspired Easter Basket Ideas

25+ Moana-Inspired Easter Basket Ideas

The Book Every Child Should Own (And How to Get a Free Copy )

The Book Every Child Should Own (And How to Get a Free Copy )

Recent Posts

  • Personalized Clothing in Family Portraits: Showcasing Unique Style
  • The Psychology of Dual-Monitor Productivity: Why It Feels Easier to Work
  • The Secret to Style Confidence – Even During the Messiest Days
  • The Science of Healthy Hair: Foundations, Care, and Everyday Styling
  • Stroller Shopping Made Simple – A Guide to Matching Your Lifestyle

Search

Sponsors

Copyright © 2026 | Innovative by The Pixelista | Built on the Genesis Framework

 

Loading Comments...