Moms are the best help!

Since I've been married I've had to make quite a few phone calls to my mom.

Most of which are when I'm at the grocery store...example one:

"Which isle would apple butter be on....?"

I really had no idea what it was to begin with.

Another example:

"Where the heck is pizza sauce? It is not over by the spaghetti sauce..."

Of course, spaghetti sauce was an okay alternative...haha.

Not the best, but it works!

Recently I was trying a recipe for Minestrone soup.

A while ago my mom was so sweet an made us some freezer bag dinners at an enrichment night. It came in really handy, because I just had to thaw the bag and then either stick it in the crock pot or on the stove and boom, dinner was ready!

I loved it!

So I decided to make my own freezer bag of this soup.

When at the grocery store I grabbed all the ingredients,

one being "Vegetable juice". Silly me....

This is what I grabbed...

I thought that maybe vegetable soup and juice were pretty similiar...

looking back I have no idea what I was thinking... it's just what I grabbed.

The other part I didn't think about.... look at the picture on the can...

All I needed was juice, not noodles and veggies...

Of course I didn't realize that until I opened the can at home.

So after work yesterday, I ran into the grocery store to get vegetable juice...I immediately go over to the soup isle again thinking the right can was closeby.

After a minute of looking all over there, I called my mom.

I was glad I called her, because I wasn't even close!

haha...

of course...juice...

go to the juice isle..right?

wow, thanks mom!

I feel so silly sometimes at the grocery store,

but thank goodness for cell phones and mom

Some day I will hopefully be a smart shopper.

For anyone else who didn't know....this is veggie juice,

much different than veggie soup...haha.

There is nothing that could ever replace a mother!

And the soup turned out delicious!

It was so nice to get a break from having to prepare a dinner after a long day of work.

For anyone who's interested, here is the recipe... (It's Betty Crocker by the way)

TWO BEAN MINESTRONE:

1 can (15oz.) dark red kidney beans, drained

1 can (15-16oz.) garbanzo beans, drained

1 bag (1 lb.) frozen mixed vegetables

1 can (14.5 oz.) diced tomatoes with Italian seasonings

1 large bouillon cube (beef or vegetable)

1 can (11.5 oz.) vegetable juice

1 cup of water

1/2 uncooked macaroni

Pour all ingredients (except noodles) into a freezer bag. Label and lay flat.

On cooking day:

Pour all ingredients in a slow cooker for 8-10 hours on low. Stir in 1/2 cup of uncooked elbow macaroni and let cook for 15 minutes longer. Or you can place frozen ingredients in a pot on the stove on medium heat for 20 minutes. Add macaroni and cook for another 15 minutes. Serves 6

After making dinner, Alex was so funny...

he looks at the soup with all the veggies and says,

"where's the meat?"

I guess there were too many veggies...haha...

I just replied "There's a bouillon cube in it." haha.

He didn't think that answer was as funny as I thought it was. He did eat the soup though, and said it was good, he's so sweet!

Well good luck to all you other cookers,

I hope you find the joy of the freezer bag dinner too!