What I cooked this (last) week: Thanksgiving

Here is where I try to remember what I cooked last week since I should have posted this sooner.

As far as I can remember, I only made a few things and they were all one-dish meals.



I know there was a pasta bake. I mixed elbows and shells, added some jarred sauce (Newman's Own Sockarooni, I believe), ricotta, Italian cheese blend, mozzarella, parmesan, and some extra seasonings. It all goes together on the stove, then I spread it into a baking dish, top with cheese, and bake until bubbly.

I also made this "Hawaiian rice" dish that I've been making since I copied it out of my text book for cooking class in 9th grade. It's cooked rice, onion, soy sauce, salt, pepper, scrambled egg, cooked bacon (crumbled), and green onion. I mix it up a bit sometimes, this time I added toasted sesame oil. Sometimes I add chicken, I've also used chicken sausage instead of bacon and replaced the green onion with bell pepper. Peas are good in it too.

While browsing through a magazine (I want to say it was Rachael Ray), I spotted an ad (don't remember what it was for, Hillshire Farms maybe?) that had this pasta dish with sausage in it; it looked good so I did my own version with items I had on hand. Elbow pasta, asparagus, mixed frozen veggies (green beans, yellow beans, carrots), beef polska kielbasa, salt, pepper, parsley, what little Italian dressing I had left, and olive oil. All of the ingredients were cooked and then combined. It's kind of like a warm pasta salad. It was a hit.

I also made stuffing for our Thanksgiving meal. The recipe I used was "Mushroom and wild rice stuffing" from the Thanksgiving issue of Everyday with Rachael Ray.

And then there were left-overs.

Oh, and here's a tasty treat:


Peanut butter banana open-faced s'mores.

What I cooked this week: Sick

Not much cooking was done this week since we have all been sick. A lot of canned soup was had and we had some chicken pot pie left from last week.
Here are the few things I did cook:
My chicken and rice soup using the rest of the chicken from last week. I don't know if it was because I was sick or what, but it was soooooo good this time. We ate this for a couple of days.
Last night we had "Bratwurst and Apple Kraut", a recipe from theBetter Homes and Gardens Crockery Cooker Cook Book, except I replace the bratwurst with polska keilbasa. Gag! Blehg, yuck. The apples (it calls for tart apples) make it so sour I could hardly eat it. I tried adding extra brown sugar but it didn't help much. I cooked us each a baked potato to go with it and mixing the kraut with the potato really helped. I won't be making this again.
Today was grocery shopping day, so I usually prepare and easy meal on those nights. Tonight it was tuna burritos, yes tuna, if you try it you'll understand.



Mine consisted of: whole wheat tortilla, re-fried beans (canned), tuna (we get the low sodium Starkist can), and Mexican cheese blend, and was topped with taco sauce, jalapenos, pepper jack cheese, and sour cream, with avocado on the side.

Wow, I really didn't cook much this week.



(Soup photo from Robert Couse-Baker on Flickr.)

What I cooked this week

I'm thinking I want to start doing a weekly post sharing the meals I've cooked with links to recipes and how they turned out. So here goes.



This past Saturday we hosted a picnic at our house. Our main course was fried chicken, then I made a few things and had friends bring something if they could. My sister came over Friday to help me make:
Vegetable soup (my own recipe, which I'll write down and share next time I make it.)
"The Ultimate Baked Beans" from Tyler's Ultimate: Brilliant Simple Food to Make Any Time, you can also find the recipe here, but everything I've made from that book has been excellent.
Macaroni and cheese from The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Recipes from an Accidental Country Girl (I add paprika). Possibly my favorite cookbook.
We also made a couple Pinterest finds, Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Brownies, and Pumpkin Pie Dip.
Everything was great, and people seemed to like it all. I do have to remember though, when I make those baked beans again (I've made them once before), to drain the canned beans. The recipe doesn't say to, or not to, so we drained half and they were still very liquidy.
We also made some chipotle ranch with peppers left from the baked bean recipe by modifying a recipe my sister found online. A little spicy for some, but it was excellent for dipping (even chicken) and mixed into the mac & cheese!

I didn't cook as much as usual this week because we had leftovers from the picnic.

For our regular meals this week I made roast chicken from The Cast Iron Skillet Cookbook: Recipes for the Best Pan in Your Kitchen, slightly adapted and I didn't use the cast iron skillet this time because I was in the process of re-seasoning it.
For some reason I keep trying different roast chicken recipes, I guess because I don't want to do the same one all the time. I should though, because nothing compares to the Peruvian Roast Chicken from the February 2009 issue of EveryDay with Rachael Ray.
We had mixed veggies (broccoli, cauliflower, and carrots) with it—which is what Will ate that night—and I made a little pasta and alfredo sauce. The sauce is a couple tablespoons of butter, flour, milk, garlic salt, pepper, cream cheese, and parmesan.
I like to do a whole chicken every couple weeks, we usually get 3 meals out of it, plus lunches. Sometimes I make stock using the bones and innards. This time I saw part of the innards I didn't care to see and then could not use them. Let's not talk about it.
I also made open-face sloppy joes from the same cookbook. That's when I realized my skillet needed re-seasoning. Uneatable.
Our second chicken meal was a chicken pot pie. Unfortunately, I didn't make enough sauce/cream/whatever-you-call-it for the filling, so it was a little dry. Whatever that is was composed of butter, flour, milk, salt, pepper, thyme, and oregano.
Today, I actually made breakfast! I love making breakfast, but as I've mentioned before, it doesn't happen as often as I'd like. Thanks to the veterans, husband was off today so I made breakfast before we headed to Thomasville for some what-I-wish-was-more-than window shopping. I made Basic Breakfast Potatoes from The Pioneer Woman. On the site she says to boil your potatoes first, but in the book it says to bake them, eh whatev, I microwaved them because I didn't have the 45 minutes to spare. I was also out of onion, but I had a bell pepper, so I used that. Add some fried and scrambled eggs, and bacon and that was breakfast.



Tomorrow, Will and I are going to a little brunch, so tonight I baked too many of these pumpkin muffins from Smitten Kitchen. Smitten Kitchen is my absolute favorite website for recipes and the photos are uh-may-zing. Of course we had to test a muffin from each batch. The second batch I only used one egg instead of two, because, well, I only had three eggs. Somehow they seemed more moist, Shawn liked the first batch the best. I didn't use liners; I don't know if I've ever bought liners. I just sprayed the pan a little and there was no sticking at all. Mmmmm.

My 3 loves

Happy birthday to me!



Husband got me the most be-a-utiful KitchenAid stand mixer for my birthday. No, today is not my birthday.

Funny thing about not having your birthday on Facebook, you find out who really knows that it's your birthday and then who cares enough to say. My cousin, Melissa was the only one to wish me happy birthday on FB. Not that I want random people I haven't seen in years telling me happy birthday, really I don't. If I did I'd have my birthday posted on FB.

Anywho, did I mention that husband gave me this mixer the day after I spent nearly 2 hours trying to prepare myself a birthday cake using a hand mixer? It was one of those cakes that required 10 minutes or so of mixing here and there. My arm was sore!

The cake ended up in the garbage, but that's unrelated to coulda-used-an-early-gift mixer acquiring days. I ended up making a French silk pie instead.

You see I have this idea of starting a tradition of making myself a cake every year for my birthday. It has to be the same cake every year. The thing is I don't really like cake all to much, it must be super moist and not you're everyday cake. I hate boxed cake mixes (though they are good for making a dump cake or any of those other recipes that call for a cake mix and yet do not produce a cake). I hate decided on a 6 layer dobos torte, it was between that or this pistachio petit four cake. The torte seemed a bit easier. Until our oven decided it hate me and my birthday. 13 eggs wasted! 13! Oh well, there's always next year.

Do you have any birthday traditions? What's the best gift you've ever received?

On (not) stealing music

There are countless ways we justify it: The artist doesn't get much from CD sales anyway, all of the money goes to the record companies and production costs. They make their money from live shows and other merchandise, not CD sales (do you even buy the other merchandise or go to shows? For all of the artists you like?). It's like when your friend copied their tape for you or like making a mix tape (who ever said that was legal?)

It's not about laws for me and it's not about where the money goes. It's about doing what's right. Over the last year I've started to feel strong convictions over a few things*, one of the being my music collection, most of which was acquired by less than ethical means. So I deleted it. To be honest, I kept a few things that are OOP (out of print) or that I didn't see available for purchase online from a US seller.

I've purged my music collection a few times before, like when I stopped listening to any music that was not influenced by Christ. This time was much more drastic; I went from 737 albums (yes, albums) to 138. Actually 138 includes a few that I've purchased since the purge. My collection previously wouldn't fit on my old 60GB iPod, it is now only 7.37GB. Wait, that's weird, I had 737 albums and now my music takes up 7.37GB.

Deleting most of my music has really helped me realize what music I really enjoy the most, what I miss the most. I made a list of what I had and what I really wanted to buy but now I don't even think I want all of that, I just don't miss some of it like I thought I would.

Here's what I'm lovin' these days and links to an album by them:
JJ Heller, I just bought her newest album Deeper
Mason Jennings
The Civil Wars
The Innocence Mission
Denison Witmer
Page France
Sleeping at Last
Carlos Whittaker
Brown Feather Sparrow

I'm really missing Ray LaMontagne too, but I haven't bought any yet.

It's hard, but Pandora helps.

(*) "a few things" also includes eating pork and shellfish, what I wear, and a third thing that I'll write about once I've figured it out.

If my baby would sleep at night

I used to make Shawn breakfast every morning. I'm not talking cereal either. Eggs, bacon, sausage, grits, pancakes, omelets; I even tried to replicate a sausage, egg, and cheese mcmuffin once because he basically said he'd rather have McDonalds (rude, right?)
As I got into my 3rd trimester I started going back to bed after he left for work, then I quit getting up at all. Then, well then i had a baby.

There was a window of time when Will was sleeping through the night when I was going to start getting up and making breakfast again (I think I did once) but that window quickly closed. Now the longest stretch of sleep we get is maybe 3 hours at best.

Breakfast isn't the only thing I'm missing. If Will would sleep at night my house would be more organized, I'd bake bread again. Man, I used to bake bread. I would read, oh how I miss reading. I would blog more often; so many times I've started a post and put it off because my brain was too tired to process it. I would write; I have ideas galore for stories or articles I could pitch to web publications, for money. money! but I'm just exhausted. All. The. Time. If you don't get it, you've never experienced sleep deprivation. I mean, my brain does not function the way it should.

Maybe I would even do some of these crafts that I keep buying supplies for.

Rice cereal? Avocado? Banana! Sweet Potato!

Solids!



We started trying Will on some brown rice cereal the day after he turned 6 months. I'm pretty sure he didn't like it. At all. On our trip to Savannah we tried avocado.

I thought avocado would be a good choice since it's a taste he would be familiar with since I eat it fairly regularly, and it would be convenient on our trip since it doesn't have to be cooked. I just mashed some up in a small jar and stirred in a little breast milk.

To make the milk part easier than taking some of our frozen stash, I decided I would just pump a little there. Pumping was so weird after not doing it for so long. It seems like I pumped for a long time, but now I believe I've been directly breastfeeding exclusively for the same amount of time I pumped for. I hated pumping, it felt so strange to do it again, even though it was just for a couple minutes, and be reminded of all of those terrible emotions that I now have associated with it.

Anyway, back on topic, he didn't seem to like the avocado either, but later I wondered if it was the temperature, since it was cooler than what he's used to. I let Shawn choose which food to do next, banana or sweet potato; he chose banana. At first I thought Will didn't like it, but I tried it again the next day at an earlier time and as thin as I had done the rice cereal and it was much more successful!

After trying banana with good reactions for a few days, I pureed some sweet potatoes yesterday and let him taste a bit off my finger; he didn't hate it! So yesterday he ate solids twice, bananas for lunch and then banana mixed with sweet potato for supper. It went very well.

Unfortunately, Will woke up with a slight fever this morning and wasn't in the mood for anything other than mommy's milk today. The doctor (who was subbing for his regular pediatrician...how does that work? I mean if this guy is filling in for one doctor, who is filling in for him? What about his own patients? Is it his day off? So does a different doctor fill in on each day of the regular doctor's vacation?) thinks it's something viral that will pass. He still had a little fever this evening so we gave him Tylenol for the first time. How do you give a baby Tylenol? It's not easy, that's for sure, and I was nervous. After giving him the Tylenol, we went out for dinner (because our AC wasn't working, I'm not typically the type to go anywhere with a sick baby or even anywhere after baby's bedtime, for that matter. Oh yeah, and a 89.5° house and a baby with a fever, not a good combination) and he slept the whole time. His fever is gone now and I pray it stays down.

Tomorrow we'll try the banana sweet potato combo again. Next I might try mixing banana with the cereal or oatmeal to see if that's more palatable to my little Bubs. We'll also try avocado again at a warmer temperature and some peas soon.

Notes: We tried each food for 3 or 4 days before going to a different one. This is so any allergic reaction can be easily diagnosed. For the sweet potato (and for any future potatoes) we used organic, since potatoes are one of the "dirty dozen" foods with the most pesticide residue.

Maker's Diet: Week 4

Well, this post isn't going to go like the others. Today is Thursday (day 24) and I haven't had my phone to make daily updates. Soooooo, I'll just do what I can.

Last night I had pasta. What what? Yes, pasta. Tomato basil wheat Amish pasta. I've had it before, it's pretty good. It's especially good when you haven't had pasta in a while. My mom cooked it with mushrooms and onion on top. We made mixed berry cinnamon muffins for dessert.

Day 24
Had a couple muffins for breakfast.
Sweet potato for lunch, another muffin.
Chili for supper. It was a recipe from the book, good but not as good as the chili I'm used to.
Another muffin
Mayo Clinic tomorrow.

(today is Tuesday)
Friday, I had pizza and ice cream. Yes, the real deal, diet is off. My doctor was able to find some information about research out of Israel that showed no detectable bio-availability of the drug in the breast-fed baby's system. If insurance companies weren't so dumb I would have taken my medicine Saturday, but they are, so I should have it today.
I've been eating regular food, somewhat cautiously since Friday and the only thing that made me feel terrible was a couple sips of Sprite that I had.
Oh and this morning, this guy had his first normal looking poop since I started the diet, coincidence?



On a somewhat related note, I am pretty sure that I've developed pancreatitis. I've had it before, so I know what it feels like. This time is much less severe but still very painful. I think my medicine should take care of it as well, I hope.

I know this diet has helped people, but I never noticed any positive change with it. A lot of the information in the book about why we should or shouldn't eat certain things has made me question how I eat, however. I don't eat very badly anyway though.

Will I never again eat pork or shellfish? Stay Kosher? Choose goat milk over cow? Bacon?!?!?!
Stay tuned for the answer!

Maker's Diet: week 3

Day 15
Well there are a couple things at Panera Bread that I can eat, not necessarily tasty things. But at least I got to eat while at the Hearts meeting (a crochet charity group I'm in). Shawn was exciting that he could eat the potato chips there.
How many of those muffins did I eat today? 4? 5?!

Day 16
Ate the last muffin for breakfast. Was going to have an omelet but baby had other plans, so I had an omelet for lunch.
That brown rice pasta was pretty weird. For one, it turned the water it was cooked in white. Also, while it did live up to the promise on the package of not getting mushy, it was gooey and slimy instead. In hindsight, I should have rinsed it after cooking, I'm just not used to rinsing pasta. I did make some spaghetti sauce that was pretty good, if I do say so myself. Crushed tomatoes, baby portabellas, onion, grass fed ground beef, basil, a little salt, evoo, and Italian seasoning.
Speaking of grass-fed beef, we may be buying a 1/4 of a cow soon. I want it regardless of the diet, actually, I had wanted it before the diet. Cows aren't supposed to eat antibiotics or corn.
I made "ice cream" for dessert, frozen bananas, cocoa powder, goat milk and a little stevia. It's refreezing right now, but it tasted pretty good on my testing.

Day...what day is this (counting) 18!
Not much to report. Husband's birthday, had hamburgers for supper. Had cheese made from cows milk for the first time since starting the diet.
Well, I have an appointment at the Mayo Clinic a week from today, going to see about starting my Humira again. I've done some more research on it online and while most sources say the effects on a breastfeeding baby are unknown the consensus seems to be that the negative effect would be him becoming immune to the medication. He is only 2% more likely to have Crohn's disease that a child whose parent does not have it, and then what's the likelihood that the same medication will be used 20 years from now?

Day 19
Hate this

Day 20
Fathers Day at my parents, I ate an all beef hot dog, I hate all beef hot dogs, but it was a nice change from what I've been eating. I also ate a steak and a sweet potato. We found some snacks at world market, organic white cheddar popcorn and veggie sticks. The popcorn was a little stale and the veggie sticks seemed greasy to me. I really wanted some dessert, there was cream cheese pound cake, cheesecake, and brownies, I think my mom was trying to torture me.

This post is delayed since I am so used to updating from my phone and my phone had to be replaced.

Maker's diet: Week 2

Well, I told at the end of last week's summary that we were skipping to the 3rd phase, so last night I had a sweet potato! Yes, I couldn't wait for today.

Day 8
For breakfast I had a boiled egg and two slices of sprouted bread with organic butter. Sprouted bread must be very closely related to what they make cardboard out of, but it was kind of like bread and that was nice.
Took sweet baby to the doctor, he doesn't think it's my diet, but I'm not willing to completely disregard the wisdom of breastfeeding professionals. Baked potato with chicken for supper, no seasoned salt allowed.
It's sad when I consider this a tasty treat.


Realized I might be able to have Amish apple butter! I don't know of any place to find it here so I called my mom to have her check the ingredients and get some if acceptable. While on the phone with her I thought about the Amish pasta I've had before and asked her to check it's ingredients too. I don't think it's flour based, so that would be great.

Day 9
My stomach is really upset this morning. As soon as I get Will asleep, I have to put him down to use the bathroom. Is this diet ever going to work?
Omelet for breakfast. Chicken, sweet potato, and broccoli for lunch.
I hate this diet! It's not even craving other things, it's the fact that finding something to eat is such a chore now. Can I eat this? Read ingredients. No. Really I may as well figure if it has ingredients I can't eat it. I love food and right now I don't even want to think about food.

Day 10
Two slices of cardboard with organic butter and honey for breakfast. Not looking forward to lunch, will probably be chicken again.
If I wasn't on this diet I would have had a baked potato for lunch. Baked potatoes are my go-to lunch. It would have had butter, cheddar cheese, bacon bits, seasoned salt (Lawry's only!), and sour cream. I can almost taste it, almost.
It's 5:30 and I have no idea what's for supper. I hate this, I never knew this diet would make me hate food. I'm starting to think that the true reason for the book's "partial fast day"s is that they couldn't come up with enough meal plans. I really want some pepper jack cheese, preferably in stick form.

Day 14
Why haven't I updated? Because this diet is depressing. I did have duck for the first time yesterday, it was okay.
I did make some whole wheat blueberry muffins that were pretty good with organic butter spread inside.
My mom and I went to the Winn-Dixie on Magnolia, which is surprisingly more like a Publix than a Winn-Dixie and has a decent amount of organic products. I was a little too excited about finding this.


I also got a couple Lara Bars. It was almost kind of like a treat.

Maker's Diet: Week 1

This is a recap of my first week on The Maker's Diet. It is written day-by-day usually during, or at the end of the given day.

Day 1
My first day on the Maker's diet Will thought it would be a good time to start a growth spurt. We also haven't shopped for the diet yet so my meals were interesting.

For breakfast I had two fried eggs, no complaints there. For lunch, I thought I could eat a can of tuna but noticed that even though it says "in water" there is vegetable broth and other stuff in there. No go. I could eat salmon, but it was frozen. So I had some spinach, carrots, and half an avocado. I fed Will 8 or 9 times. I was exhausted and hungry. We had salmon and broccoli for supper.

Day 2
I think having no sugar hit me hard today. I've had hot flashes all day. I had a fried egg and half an avocado for breakfast. I almost passed out while changing a diaper (not because of the diaper) and decided to drink a glass of orange juice (no sugar added, but still not okay on the diet.)
Shawn went grocery shopping so supper was good, sirloin steak and asparagus. Yogurt and strawberries for dessert. Goat's milk yogurt is pretty much like regular yogurt, actually I think it tastes better.

Day 3
Really craving some powdered sugar donuts and chocolate chip cookies. Whenever I can put this baby down I'm going to have a goat cheese and mushroom omelet. I used to only eat omelets filled with cheddar and covered in powdered sugar. Yes, seriously.

Day 4
Today I felt terrible, I don't know if it was the diet or just the progression of my illness. I felt weak, tired, and nauseated, and on top of that Will refused to stay asleep when I laid him down. I felt so bad that husband came home early from work. I took a nap and when I woke up it felt like I hadn't slept at all even though it had been over 3 hours!
Husband had to leave so his parents came over to help me. Felt like I was going to puke on the baby before they got there. When they did, I took a walk outside and was confronted by a serpent lying in wait (seriously, I almost stepped on a snake). Ate some spinach and drank a small glass of orange juice (which tasted so sweet it was disgusting) and soon felt a lot better, like a billion percent.
Husband suggested formula so I could take my medicine; I've overcome too many breastfeeding challenges to give up now, before the 40 days is even over. Plus I like nursing, I need nursing.

Day 5
I feel a lot better today, except for a headache in the evening; I didn't even drink any orange juice. Went to farmer's markets with Becky while Shawn hung out with sleeping baby in the car. Got some local honey since I'm out. Will did so good and even fell asleep in the car seat right when he needed to all day.
Lunch was difficult since we were in town, ended up getting a chicken caesar salad from Publix and only eating the romaine and chicken, even finding water that was just water, and was not chlorinated, was a problem.
For supper I cooked a French style London broil (one of the recipes from the book), green beans, and eggplant. Tip: don't saute eggplant in extra virgin coconut oil, good flavor but the first few pieces I put in absorbed all the oil. Supper was tasty but all through the day I was just thinking about how I miss normal food. I saw pizza on TV, baked goods at the farmer's market, I really wanted a donut and some pasta! We've been eating berries and goat's milk yogurt for dessert but tonight I decided to make a smoothie using my immersion blender. Bear with me, this is going to make me sound really crunchy, so I made a smoothie with frozen berries, goat's milk yogurt, raw almond butter, honey, and flax oil. It was pretty decent, maybe a little less almond butter next time.

Day 6
Man, I wanted regular food today. I kept think about how much I miss just being able to eat whatever and not really think about it and I thought about how long I'll have to eat this way and how hard it is. Hulu really needs to get rid of that Reese's peanut butter cup commercial, it's killing me.
Deer meat hamburger patties are pretty good though.

Day 7
Well, we've made it a week. I keep thinking how in another week I can eat a sweet potato! Yam patties! I don't think I've ever looked so forward to these things. I think I've developed a distain for celery. I was also unable to eat chicken today. I'm wondering when I'm going to start really feeling/seeing some results from this diet.
Bad news, I think this diet is upsetting Will, possibly making him sick. Now I researched whether it was okay or not to do this diet while breastfeeding before I started, I'm a big researcher, and I couldn't find any reason not to. However, he's had less frequent bowel movements and the ones he has had have a very foul odor (not normal for exclusively breastfed babies). It could be that something new in my diet or something I'm now eating more of is bothering his digestive system; I am eating a lot of almond butter and berries. I did some more digging though and found out from a breastfeeding website that when you start any diet that causes you to detox (which the first phase does), those toxins can be released into your breastmilk. I knew toxins could be released through bodily fluids such as urine and sweat, I had no idea they came out in milk. So I've decided to end the first phase now and skip ahead to the 3rd phase, which is still very strict, but includes more of my regular foods, like potatoes.
Oh, and I've lost 3 or 4 pounds in the last week. Not that I'm doing this to lose weight.

I'm doing it for this little farmer man.

Maker's Diet (not the drink)

As a lot of you know, I have Crohn's disease. Well, I was on a medication that worked really well for me, but I had to stop taking it in January so it wouldn't be in Will's system when he was born. I haven't resumed taking it because it is unknown how it may affect him through breastmilk.

That would be okay, except that I've started having some pretty bad symptoms. I do not want to give up nursing and I don't want to take a chance on Will's health by taking the medication (or any other for that matter). I mean look at the great views I get while nursing.


So I've decided to try so I decided to try The Maker's Diet. Some of you have probably heard of this before, maybe you've even read the book. In short, the diet follows the guidelines set out in the Bible, you could compare it to a Jewish person's diet: no pork (and you know how I love pork), no shellfish, and a dozen other limitations that will make eating out pretty impossible.

My main difficulty with this will be that I love food! I love meat from pigs! Bacon! I also love sweets, no ice cream!
I'm willing to sacrifice these things so I can continue to give my baby the best food possible.
The Maker's Diet
is a 40 day plan and I'm only on day 2 and it's been rough, more on that when I do a weekly recap.

(Please note this post was written last Wednesday, the 1st.)

Chicken and Rice Soup: a recipe

Often times, I will glance at a recipe online and end up forming my own recipe form it in my head as the day goes on using ingredients that I have on hand. In the end, the two recipes may not be very similar, apart from the basic ingredients, but my results are pretty good, if I do say so myself. This recipe is a chicken and rice soup that I've now made twice, it was somewhat inspired by Rachael Ray's Chicken and Rice Stoup.

In this adventure, I intentionally over-boiled the rice (by using more liquid than necessary), which causes it to kind of burst. I think it gives it an interesting texture and has the bonus of confusing people who may not realize that it's rice.


Photo by Husband

Warning: This recipe will make your house smell amazing!

You will need:

• 3/4 cup rice (I use white)


• 1 box (4 cups) chicken stock (I like Rachael Ray's Stock in a Box)


• 3 chicken breasts, already grilled and cubed*


• 4 cups water


• 1 carrot, chopped


• 2 celery, chopped


• 1/4 white onion, chopped (about a 1/2 cup)


• 3 bay leaves


• 1 teaspoon oregano


• 1/4 teaspoon thyme


• 1/4 salt


• 1/4 black pepper

What you do:

• In a 3qt or larger pot, boil rice in 1 cups chicken stock and 1 cup water until all liquid is absorbed into the rice, be careful not to let it stick or burn.


• Then add 3 cups water and remaining 3 cups of stock.


• Throw in the carrots, celery, and onion. Stir in all the herbs and seasonings. Bring it all back to a boil, then add chicken and reduce to a simmer.


• Let it simmer for a really long time, I'm talking at least an hour. Then let it rest for a while, it's tired.

I have some simmering right now; I'll probably let it simmer for an hour or more then let it rest for another hour, so it'll be waiting when Shawn gets home from work [I originally wrote this up between 2 and 3p.m. Monday]. I might also bake some bread for dipping.

Notes: none of my measurements are exact and most of them are optional. Well, the chicken, stock, rice, bay leaf, and oregano are pretty important, other than that you can leave out or add anything you want. You can also adjust the amount of liquids added after the rice has cooked, depending on how soupy you want your soup Measurements for herbs are using dried, you can use fresh but you'll need to adjust the quantity.

*I will often cook several chicken breasts at a time, cube them and store them in the fridge to use for quick meals like quesadillas or the Larry's BBQ style "Giant baked potato" I had for lunch (Panama City and Dothan people will know what I'm talking about). This chicken was grilled in a grill pan with olive oil after being seasoned with McCormick's Montreal Steak seasoning. You can substitute any cut of chicken you want. The intention of the recipe is to be able to make something that tastes great with items you have on hand; if you have thighs, use them. I usually have chicken breasts on hand because we buy the large bag of frozen breasts nearly every time we go grocery shopping 'cause you can always do something with chicken. This last grocery trip, however, we bought a whole chicken (sometimes we get both) as I'm eager to try "Stretching a Whole Chicken for 4+ Meals" from Passionate Homemaking. Now I'm just rambling.

If you try this recipe let me know what you think in the comments.

I baked bread

A few months back, I guess, I decided I wanted to bake bread. Not because of practical reasons (though they do still apply) like lower cost, fresh and pronounceable ingredients, and the bragging rights of telling everyone that I baked bread. No, I decided I wanted to bake bread because it would be fun.

So, we went to Bed, Bath & Beyond to find a loaf pan, because we received a gift card from there and I have no idea what we'll use it for. I really wanted something fancy like a Le Creuset stone loaf pan, but the B,B&B failed me. So, off we went to Kohl's to use one of our many other gift cards. The only stone loaf pan they had weighed about 40lbs and had a price tag that sported a similar number simply because it was Food Network brand. Le Creuset I would have paid that much for, Food Network brand? No, who is it even made by?!

Unwilling to leave without a loaf pan, I ended up with a stainless steal, non-stick dealy. Eh, it baked the bread, and was less than $20.

For my first attempt [read: overwhelming success], I used this recipe. It was delicious and looked good too.



I still felt the need for a stone loaf pan, so when Shawn and I went to Jacksonville for a doctor's appointment we stopped by the William Sonoma store. Of course the woman working there thinks that everyone who likes to cook or bake is supposed to be all chitty-chatty (I can't help but disappoint these types) and asks me about what kind of bread I'm going to bake. Then she tells me about how she used to be in a bread baking commune in the '70s. Commune? I'm pretty sure that's what she said, but it sounded like she really meant "group" or "club." They would each bake 6 loaves and trade them with each other, along with the recipes. Sounded neat.

Anyway, they didn't have a Le Creuset pan in an appropriate size so I bought one made by some other fancy French company.

Back to baking. Second round looked just as good, but taste? Not so much. I used a recipe from a Loretta Lynn cookbook I picked up at the Goodwill bookstore and while it was a simpler recipe, it tasted simpler too.

Today I went for an Amish white bread
.


(notice the fancy French pan)

It's still cooling now, but from the little pinches I've tasted every time I walk into the kitchen it seems to taste pretty good. Now I with I had some Amish apple butter to go with it.

What I learned from pregnancy nutrition books

Like any expectant mom, I want to do whatever I can to ensure that my baby is and will be healthy. One thing I was concerned about was my eating habits. Even though I make sure that I take my prenatal vitamins everyday, I know they are no substitute for for healthy eating (and they do not counteract bad eating habits).

I really wanted some ideas for meals that would give me and Will a lot of nutrients we need while not forcing me to eat 1,000 extra calories a day instead of just 300. I didn't know if these books would really be useful to me, so I checked out two from the library instead of buying them. The books I chose were What to Expect: Eating Well When You're Expecting and The Pregnancy Cookbook. I really only read much of the first one since I didn't realize when they had to be returned to the library, but I'm not disappointed.

I'm not disappointed in the fact that I didn't really get to read them, that is. After going through just the first bit of What to Expect, I realized that I don't eat that bad after all. I'm not saying the books are useless by any means, I'm sure for a lot of people they would really help. But do those who would be helped by these books ever care to pick them up? If your eating habits are terrible to begin with maybe you do try to do better when you're pregnant, but what would I know, mine aren't that bad.

The book has a little quiz in it too to help you see how much adjusting your diet really needs. This quiz may have been the most amusing part of the book to me; I was just shocked at some of the answer choices. Seriously people, the creamer in your coffee is not going to fulfill your baby's calcium requirements.

What I learned from these books is that I could be a lot worse off. Evidently a lot of people with very poor diets before and during pregnancy still end up with relatively healthy kids. Does this mean I'm going to give up and start eating bread and ice cream for lunch like I'd like to? No way, but it does mean I'm not going to feel bad about the handful of pepperonis I just ate because I don't do it every day.

A Slow Goal

Due to reading In Praise of Slowness and some other thoughts that have been swimming around in my head lately, I've decided to go for a new goal.

My new goal is to cut out pre-made or over-processed foods. I guess I don't know exactly how to define the type of food I'm talking about. I'm talking about things that people made from scratch 30 years ago but now we depend on mixes or frozen boxes for.

This isn't a big leap for us; I already cook nearly every meal we eat at home and most of our grocery shopping is already from the perimeter of the store. I haven't bought frozen pre-cooked chicken fingers or bagel bites since we've been married (5 months today!). Those used to be my go-to lunches, so if I can cut those out, it won't be hard to stop the rest. I already no longer buy canned vegetables, they're either fresh or frozen fresh, and we don't buy pre-cooked meats other than pizza toppings. So for us this means no more Bisquick pancakes (I've made pancakes from scratch many times, so not a biggie), no more brownie or cookie mixes (everyone loves these anyway), and no more Kraft mac & cheese.

The last one will be the hardest, I eat mac and cheese for lunch all the time. Don't get me wrong, homemade mac&cheese is no stranger to me, this is just one area where convenience has me so won over it will be hard to break the habit.

Thinking on this same topic last night I asked Shawn what he thought about getting rid of the microwave. I don't think that idea went over too well.

The Many Reasons We Need (Want) a House

Oliver: our puppy is going to be very big—huge, the vet says. He has gained about 10lbs a month since we got him and still has a ways to go. We need somewhere to put him where he can play by himself other than our tiny balcony. We also need a place where we don't have to worry about him trying to make new friends with people who really don't want to be his friend when someone takes him out without a leash.

Money: payments for several of the houses we've looked at would be cheaper than our current rent.

No more elephants: I really don't know how the people upstairs make so much noise.

Garden: I really want to plant a vegetable garden. Actually, I want to do this: Produce all the food you need on just a quarter acre!

Buying the cow: We'll have room (hopefully) for a freezer so we can buy a half of a cow.

We're having a baby: Okay, the baby isn't due until February, but I'm sure it would be a lot easier to make the move into a house before then than to wait until our lease is up and move with a 2 month old.

I'm pretty sure I had a lot more reasons than this when I first wanted to post on this topic, that's what I get for being a slacker.

Rock Square Butts

Matchmaker, matchmaker

What would you do if you saw someone you knew on match.com? An ex? Someone you went to school with?

One night Amy and I were browsing match for just these types and find them. Amy finds an ex and I find this guy I went to school with.
During my first stint at GCCC there was a guy in my radio classes, JP we'll call him, 'cause that's his name. JP liked attention I guess, he talked with a fake Australian accent, we all knew it was face, yet he still went on insisting it was real. Occasionally, when he would slip up and not accentuate words enough, or at all, and someone would call him on it, he would just say he'd been in the states so long that the accent comes and goes. Then we would talk about him behind his back, good times. Don't get me wrong though, other than this weird reach for attention, he could be a really nice guy when you spoke with him one-on-one.

Maybe a couple weeks later after finding him on match.com, Amy and I are on a quest for pizza and stop at Gumby's, which seemed to be the only pizza place open after 10 on a Friday night, weird. We go in and I immediately recognized the guy behind the counter and he clearly recognizes me because he begins to speak in a well out-of-practice fake Australian accent. Gumby's just has a tiny lobby—it's not a dine-in restaurant, so we're cornered. I don't let on that I know him and don't have an opportunity to say to Amy, "this is that guy." So he slips up on a word and Amy calls him out, he shrugs it off. I'm having such a hard time trying not to laugh. When I get the chance, I text Amy and it's good I did because she thought he looked familiar and almost asked him how she knew him.

So we leave and we're both cracking up as we walk back to the car. Of course, we're talking about him and there he is standing behind the building talking to a coworker. I don't think he heard us and the laughter resumed with added hilarity once we were safely in the car.

Multimedia Monday: Stop-motion Food

I love food, you probably do too. I also love stop-motion animation, I wish I had the skills for it. Here are a couple videos that combine these two wonderful things. (If you're viewing this in an RSS reader you may need to click over to view the videos.)


Now those look like crepes to me and not what I would call pancakes, but great video anyway.


Okay, so this one is not real food, but it's still really entertaining and I love the different things they came up with and how they used them. This video is made by PES, you can find more stop-motion videos from them on their website: EatPES.com; "Human Skateboard" is a good one to check out.