Salad to the rescue

Basically since vacation, we have been surviving on easy meals...I know, I know...but things keep coming up and I'm tired or I can't think or I don't get to the grocery store....so then I rummage through the pantry, the freezer or our stash in the basement. I can't even remember what we've been eating. Spaghetti maybe? Some crabcakes? I don't know...but today I've taken the first step towards recovery. I had a salad. I went to the store last night, bought some produce and today I made a salad for lunch. It wasn't as torturous as I thought it would be, just not as satisfying as maybe a steak bomb sandwich--which I did have the other night on a hot, fresh roll from the oven with A-1 and white barbecue sauce smothered in peppers and onions!!--anyway, I put some smoked ham and smoked turkey on top of the lettuce with a finely slicedgreen apple, sliced onions and chopped cukes. I forgot to add the craisins, I'm sure I'll remember tomorrow...yeah, I know, prolly not! The road will be bumpy, this I know, for my hunger tells me so...

Appetite lost...

Something very strange is happening. I have lost my appetite. True my daughter will be going in for surgery in 2 days, that might have something to do with it....but I don't feel stressed or worried, I feel "at peace", no anxiety, no apprehensions...but just no appetite. It's as if I've down shifted into low gear and I just want to stay in the slow lane. Maybe I am stressed, worried, not "at peace", anxious and apprehensive but don't realize it. Maybe I just don't feel like eating...that doesn't seem normal. It could be I am consumed by the week and my responsibilities...but I'm finding little enjoyment in my great past time...I guess if this is the new "me" I'm ok with it, that'll make each pound a little easier to shed.

MammaHulk

Yes, I do have a strange sense of humor. So if you read the previous post you'll understand how my humor works. I wrote about how I love Pico de Galo. A kind of "salsa"...so I thought it to be fitting to write my post in Spanish. If you want to know what it says, visit your favorite online translator, copy/paste then translate. It won't be exact to what I had written but it should be close enough.

Things are still up in the air with my youngest, just waiting to get an appointment at the ENT's office. If the call doesn't come soon, my MammaClaws will come out, my flesh will turn green and I will have muscles protruding from parts of my body that I never knew had muscles, I'll also need to buy a new outfit due to the ripping and tearing...

el pico de Galo es mi amigo

Pico de Galo...SI!! Adoro pico de galo! ¡Agregué algún pico de Galo a una cacerola caliente y agrieté un huevo sobre ello, que hizo el mejor huevo frito que yo jamás he tenido! Agregué unas pocas tiras de tocino y puse el todo en un panecillo inglés. ¡Fue tan muy bueno!

¡Delo un trata, usted lo puede querer tanto hice!

let me deviate from the subject...

I know this blog is conversations to myself about cooking and my love for food and pictures but I'd like to go a little off-subject. Yesterday, while visiting a friend at a nursing home, I noticed my youngest had a very large lump on her throat. The friend, who had been a nurse for 48 years, took a look at the lump and agreed that wasn't entirely normal. So I did my best to keep my cool and not go into a mommypanicattack and decided we'd go home and quietly call the doctors office. When we arrived for the appointment we were greeted by a very nice nurse practitioner. My first thought was "oh great" a N.P!! I want a doctor!!! However, she put a very worried and scared 5 year old at ease and said that she was going to bring in the on call doctor. So now the 5 year old and the 34 year old were at ease. After a few minutes of hearing the two "discuss" things down the hall, the doctor walked in with a very large medical journal opened to a certain page with a certain drawing of a child's head and many different labels pointing to various regions on the child's head and neck. The first thing he said was that if it is what he thinks it is, everything is all right. Phew! However, I was waiting for the punchline...whenever anything like that is said, there's gotta be more to it. The basics of it is he thinks she has a thyroglossal duct cyst. The only way for it be gone is to remove it surgically. There it was, the punch....my 5 yr old going in for surgery. So, that's where we are right now. We have to bring her to an ENT to have further tests to confirm his diagnosis. He thought we were ok, bringing her home, since she wasn't in any pain, no fever, no redness which means no sign of infection. If these things get infected, its pretty much a nightmare. So, we'll do our best to keep an eye on things and see what this week will bring. My little one is very scared about any type of needles, surgery, etc...so we're trying to make this as "painless" as possible. Trying to make the experience as "fun" as we can. Things like this happen, I suppose, when you least expect it. All you can do is just roll with the punches and do your best to take each and every step.

Extra! Extra! Pathetic Atrocity Surprises Family!

Sitting ominously on the counter I saw my means to an end. I had to feed my family. But what to make? My mind was blank. Quietly sitting there was 2 lbs of ground Angus beef. The clock was ticking and nothing was coming to mind. It seems I had become bored with all the usual suspects. Spaghetti, nope...sloppy joes, nope....meatloaf, nope....hamburgers, nope....

Having nothing in mind, I plopped the meat into the dutch oven and started searing it. Dumped some spices in then put the cover on. Wandering about, I opened the pantry door. There staring back at me was a very large can of baked beans. Closing the door, I couldn't bring myself to put baked beans in with the meat....or could I??? Opening the pantry door, in somewhat disgust with myself, I grabbed the beans. What to eat with it? Bread. I know, pathetic, isn't it? However, I must say, yesterday was Wednesday. And the person dropping off the boy I babysit after school was late at the drop off site. So we got home 15 min later than usual. Why is Wed such a big deal in the equation in all of this? We have Midweek church service on Wed nights. We leave for church by 6:45 which means we have to have all schoolwork and piano practicing done, be cleaned up, dressed and presentable then fed before we leave. That 15 min is priceless on a Wed night! I usually try to do an "easy" meal on Wed nights b/c of those things. However this Wed night, I wasn't very prepared. So After I added the beans, I thought "What am I doing? I just ruined all this meat." I grabbed some barbecue sauce, garlic, mustard and ketchup then added the appropriate amounts to taste. What came of it was a tomato-less chili. I toasted the bread and scooped a spoonful on top...My husbands had a piece of melted cheese on the toast. I sheepishly handed each plate to each person, thoroughly embarrassed by decision to make such an atrocity. Before I knew it, I heard hmmm...then a mmmm....everybody liked it!! Go figure!

Its all in the details...

Why do the exact same dishes made by the same recipe taste different? Some have speculated that its the cookware, the humidity, the oils from the hands of the cook, the natural aromas of the kitchen. At a glance, a meal can be simple. I suppose when each of us cooks, we do things just a little bit different without realizing it. At a glance it all looks the same, but if you were to go into the nitty gritty details of the cooking you'd see minute changes that have a huge impact on taste. Its sort of like looking at a hand, at a glance you see the fingers, the palm, how the hand connects to the arm, and you may even see the fingernails. However, as you get closer you begin to see nooks and crevasses and wrinkles, pores and ultimately each individual finger print. I think that's how our cooking is, we each have our own cooking print, unique to our own. So no matter how many times I try to make porkum pup like my mother in law, its not gonna happen. I'll just have to be happy with the way I make it and try to convince her to have us over for supper on a regular basis! When you cook, think about your cookingprint and how its unique to you and you alone...

revenge of the gardener!

It has been brought to my attention that the meatloaf I made last night was liked by all. Check that one in the imaginary recipe box! I was able to mow the grass today. I had fun driving the mower through the garden. Slashing and cutting the broccoli that never flowered and squishing and pulverizing our midget corn that was once a beautiful green that turned into a sun-yellow. Although, I did run over part of the hose. And yes, it was damaged, well cut, well mutilated...but I think its still fixable. So now our sunflowers that once were towering above us looking down upon the beings below is now looking like it needs to be brought to the flower hospital and put on life support. What we need is some good compost. The soil needs some good ingredients. Or maybe it just needs to rest. So why don't I have an actual recipe box? I have my gram's but I never think to use it. Maybe I should try it, give it a whirl and see what happens....

hello??!! is it me you're looking for?

Last night I didn't quite make the stew I was hoping for....my hunger won and I decided to do the easy version...just some canned chicken, with some chopped onions, add a little chicken broth and corn starch with a side of green beans and some stuffing...voila! Dinner is served. Tonight is another attempt at the meatloaf. I did it pretty much the same as last time just added some mexican spices to it. so....we shall see, it will be a flop or a new menu item. I think I'll make some garlic mashed potatoes and wax beans to go with it. I know, not that exciting but hey the leaves are changing, the wind is blowing and comfort foods are knocking at my door...might as well let them in and say hello!

MyMenYou

Cell phones and I don't mix well. If you ever call me on my cell, please have some compassion on me during our conversation. For some reason, when I talk on a cell I can barely hear what the other person is saying and/or I'm in a place that is very distracting! I am not a multi-tasker and for that I am truly sorry. The groceries I just bought are all put away and I keep seeing my reminder note to freeze some cheese...gotta do that soon!

On the menu this week is....

1.meatloaf, garlic mashed potatoes, green beans

2.Baked chicken, potato wedges and salad

3. Pizza/mini hot dogs in a blanket (for Wed night, AKA: church night)

4. Chicken stew

5. kielbasa Spaghetti, garlic bread, salad

6. Pizza for the babysitter and kids and roast beef sandwiches to bring to a get together!

7. ?? no clue!

I did make the meatloaf last week. I liked it a lot! I followed the recipe and it was a very fine meatloaf :) I liked it so much I want to make another! Maybe I'll make the meatloaf tonight? hmmm....maybe I'll wait until tomorrow...its rainy today and the chicken stew sounds pretty good....whats on your menu for the week??!!??

I will....

Ok, so Loryn and I are the only ones who liked last nights dinner...remember the kielbasa, wild rice and corn? Yeah, Dave and Syd didn't like it, they said it tasted too "sharp". Oh well, that's ok. It doesn't matter....mostly because I'm sipping a banana shake topped with some soy whipped cream and the whipped cream has sought and found my nose more than once....that's all that matters right now. "Carpe" the moment. Right? Food does rescue me from so many things. I use it to heal and make things all better. Not such a great thing, in the grand scheme of things. Just one of my many flaws...

This week I will attempt meatloaf. Every time I've tried it, it hasn't turned out well. I've given myself some "I wills"...

1. I will use a recipe

2. I will take its internal temp.

I think I'll be safe if I stick to those principles. I love meatloaf sandwiches so if all goes well we'll be enjoying some leftovers. If not, I'm sure I will write about it...

Daily Deglaze

Cooking is definately relaxing for me, not the clean up but the cooking. I've got some kielbasa, onion, corn, mixed rice cooking together in some chicken broth. As I started the chopping then the sauteeing my mind began to wander...yes, my mind wanders quite a bit but its a theraputic wander. Before I deglazed the pan, with the chicken broth, the rice was beginning to stick to the pan and I thought about how our lives can become stuck from stress/chaos then we get frazzled and panicky. Some, like me, have a low "boiling" point. I don't multi-task well and I don't handle stress well. I begin to panic and become stuck like the rice. Now others have a much higher "boiling" point. Some people can be in a situation and be totally calm and think things through. Lets just say for people like me, we need people like that in our lives. As I began to deglaze the pan, I saw it as a stress reliever. It was relieving the rice from the pan, it was calming the rice down. I think sometimes we can allow ourselves no chicken broth, we think we can push through the heat and eventually we'll be done. But what we don't see is that we need the chicken broth to be done quicker and better. So deglaze and pour on the chicken broth!

'Tis the season...

Apple pie. The most ingenious combination of dough, sugar, fruit and spices. By far, my favorite dessert. Today I made two pies. They're still in the oven. The process took quite a while. Let's just say I'm not the fastest peeler or dough roller...I believe it took about 40 minutes to peel, cut and slice/dice the 10 apples. Then an additional 30 minutes to make and roll out the dough. I do like my pie to have soft apples. In order to make a soft apple pie, I do a few things that deviate from the recipe...I know, big surprise. I almost always stray from the recipe. When I cut the apples I don't make them all uniform, making sure to cut out any of those horrid seed cocoon/shell things you find every once in a while. I slice some thin, some thick and some are cubed. This makes for different textures and consistency in the pie. So you have some slices that are fully intact and then you have a somewhat homemade applesauce as the filling. I also don't add in as much cinnamon but then add in a little extra nutmeg. As far as cooking time goes, the first ten minutes is at 400 degrees then after that I drop the temp down to 325 for 50 min. The entire cooking time is 60 min. Most recipes say about 30-40 min at 400 degrees but I like how everything cooks slower and longer. I may be tempted to just have pie for dinner tonight...I hope no one calls the food pyramid police.

rebellious couscous

Couscous, that funny little pasta. Each time I've tried it, I haven't really liked it. Recently I bought some to try it again...but this time, I didn't follow the directions. I know, I'm such a rebel. A rebel with a cous...yeah, I'm corny. I added garlic and my usual seasonings and extra water! What a difference some seasonings and extra water can do! Last night I cooked some diced onion and kielbasa together, added my usual spices, varying amounts than the usual just to come up with a different flavor and then some chicken stock...in 3 minutes it was done. My husband was rather unsure of it when he saw what we were having....I was glad to see he had seconds :) I made some Amish bread to go with it, some wickles (wicked good pickles) and applesauce on the side. Somewhat of an odd combination but it worked.

So if you don't like something, try it again but make it your own way...you may end up liking it like that.

Great Expectations....

Except for eating at Five guys, Dipsy Doodle and a recent burger at the 99 I'm disappointed when I go out to eat. Why is that? Is it because I'm expecting too much? Am I conceited b/c I like my own cooking? Am I too critical or picky? Am I selfish b/c I want my food to yell at me and say "Hello! I'm the best thing you've eaten all year!" Do I have my own agenda of wanting to convince myself and others that my cooking is the best??? Deep down, honestly, the answer is no. I guess everyone in their own way, likes their way the best. But is that what motivates us to have an opinion? Is being confident about what we like or don't like to fulfill a selfish desire or want?? Maybe for some...So what motivates us to have an opinion about what we like or don't like?? What motivates me? That's a good question. I'll have to think about that and get back to you.....in the meantime, I wouldn't get the chili from the new place on Rt 3 in Tilton....

doggy biscuits

This holiday weekend we had my sister, her husband and kids come over for a barbecue. We had a great time! We had our annual game of catch with a softball followed by all of us showing our kart wheeling skills... I must say, I was rather impressed by every ones techniques and abilities! We gabbed for a couple of hours while we made the kids go outside and play....Muhahahahah! Adults have such power...

For our lunch I made 2 lbs of burgers and two packages of Hebrew National hot dogs. We had some wickles and kosher pickles on the side, Dave made some barbecue beans, I made a tuna pasta salad with the wickles...if you haven't tried wickles they are a fantastic pickle that's "wicked" good...their slogan is wicked good pickles, hence the name wickles. Wickles have a hot chili pepper with garlic in the jar with them. So your mouth goes through a carousel of flavors and heat with each bite...its wonderful! My sister brought 13 ears of corn, of which I successfully burnt and undercooked them all at once! The grill was literally on fire! I was so disappointed in myself. She also brought a tortellini pasta salad. Once everyone had eaten and it was time to clean up, we had a TON of hot dogs leftover! So for the next three days, guess what we ate for lunch and dinner???!!! By Monday night I didn't want to see another hot dog but that's what we had so we had to make do. I had actually run out of my non-dairy hot dog rolls so I made some biscuit dough, rolled it out and wrapped a couple of hot dogs with it. I had a heated skillet with some olive oil and cooked them up...I was pleasantly surprised! The outside of the biscuit had browned nicely and the hot dog was nice and hot. I dipped them in some honey mustard sauce along with some barbecue sauce. It was very good! Now I know how to make pigs in a blanket in a cinch. Maybe, someday, if I ever have you over for dinner and on the menu is doggy biscuits, you'll know what it is!

Condiment Confessions

I confess, I love condiments....ketchup, mayo, mustards, barbecue sauce, dressings, A-1, you name it and I will most likely have put it on something, sometime in my life. I've been trying to lesson the drenching and increase the "natural" taste of what I eat. Since doing that I have found I like my food moist! Yes, moist. Not like "oh this is a moist piece of meat", I like it dripping with something that makes it gooey....It sounds gross but thats how I like it. I experimented today with my lunch. I cooked up some chicken tenders and some rice. The rice is a mixture of white, brown, wild and red. I added some spices to it and extra water. Once the rice and chicken were cooked I poured the rice on to my plate and the chicken on top of the rice. The rice was kind of soupie but not so much it was like soup, just enough to dip the chicken into it! It turned out to be pretty good, the rice had a lot of flavor! Yay, for experiments!

Blogcation

My blogcation has been good and very refreshing. The kids are in their second week of school and I'm starting to figure out our new schedule. Today has been very productive. It feels good. Some days feel like you've been working all day and everything is worse than you started! I just finished making some pasta for our dinner tonight, its chilling in the fridge. Pasta salad is one of those life preserver sides. When there's nothing to go with that main course, there's always pasta salad. We like ours pretty plain and simple. I just boil some kind of small pasta, tonight it was rotini, then drain and pour Italian dressing on it then throw it in the fridge. Before I serve it, I just pour a little more dressing on it and toss. Everyone likes it so it works for us. My husband had requested Sloppy Joes. He recently got invisiline so when he puts a new set in, his mouth is really sensitive and needs easy foods. I feel funny sending him off to work with oatmeal and applesauce...but its better than nothing. The sloppy joes consist of ground turkey, green/red peppers and onions from the food processor, and tomato paste with various spices. Sometimes I make Sloppy Jose's. That's the same thing just with "Mexican" spices like cumin and such. Its so easy to make sloppy Joes like this, plus we like it better than the can or the packets.

Now that I'm back from my blogcation, I shall be writing more about my love for that little thing I like to call food. (yes, that was supposed to be a lame joke...)

Sneaky Snacks

Snacks are that special something that I hate to love. Snacks are my enemy that I can't seem to get enough of. Snacks are like a secret agent who infiltrates the thickest web of secret service and somehow finds its way in the middle of the oval office staring at the president. Snacks sneak. They hide in the darkness and whisper in your ear, telling you to walk zombiefied to the pantry and the fridge and just look. There's no harm in looking, right? Yes, a snack is my kryptonite. I must regain my power over the snack. I must arm it with some kind of proximity alarm system so when it comes near, my common sense will be alerted and I can protect myself from the incoming snack attack. When all is said and done, my alarm is me, I am allowing myself one snack per day. I have it sitting in front of me. Its a small bowl of pretzels. When its gone, its gone. No seconds or convincing myself a tuna fish sandwich with bacon is in fact a snack and not a meal...because in order for it to be a meal you'd need some chips or a side of fries, right? EEEEEK!!! It's scary how some thoughts can help justify things! I've been going without an evening snack for a couple of days. I must say I am incredibly hungry when I go to bed. Yeah, I know I'm complaining a little bit. Maybe if I continue going snackless, the hunger will go away and I'll stop whining...

The King and I....sigh....

While on vacation, I chose to keep up with my posts with plain old pen and paper. So here is an entry from our week away from reality...

It's extremely humid here, by the ocean. The paper I'm writing on is damp and the fan is blowing the page every time I lift my hand. I think a little boredom has set in with the kids. They can't fully grasp the concept of relaxing or doing little to nothing. Between the bike rides, walks, swimming and late nights you'd think we'd be scooping them off the floor because they've oozed into some kind of gelatinous substance. As one of my dear children is peering through a broken kaleidoscope and the other is making necklaces with string and various odds and ends that she calls beads, my thoughts wander to food. What will eat? I suppose our lives revolve around eating, whether we'd like to admit it or not. If we don't eat, we don't function so whether we're planning our days around each meal time or cleaning up from the mess that is required to keep our bellies happy, there it is staring at us each and everyday, the need to eat. Ok, enough about trying to make myself not feel guilty about thinking about food or pondering about how much food we actually have to consume and how many times a day we're stuffing our faces....back to vacation....We've decided that each person will get to pick one restaurant to choose from. Today is my youngest's day to choose. Of course, like every fine 5 year old, who somehow sees every fast food window display, she has chosen Burger King but only for the happy meal toy....sigh.....We don't usually go out to eat so I suppose a trip to BK is ok....its vacation so anything goes, right??