An Answer to My Prayers

Marlee's peanut allergy, although very scary, is easy to maintain. No peanuts (or any nut for that matter), peanut butter, peanut oil, etc. Pretty simple, right?
The egg white allergy, well that's a different story entirely. It is quite frustrating to say the least.

Little Things

Last night for dinner I cooked chicken, pasta, and green beans.
Marlee ate. All of it.

Happy day!
I guess consistency pays off. Well, at least yesterday it did. Tomorrow may be a different story.

It's definitely the little things.

As a side note, isn't my baby getting oh so big?

Pickin' Apples

This past weekend Dave, Marlee, and I went to Gilcrease Orchard. Who knew we had an orchard practically in our own back yard. Imagine my excitement! We paid a couple of bucks to enter into the orchard and then we picked our own fruits and vegetables. At this time of year they have apples, pears, peaches, eggplant, tomatoes, cucumbers, all varieties of squash, and more.

Marlee picking a zucchini.

Our pickings for the day.

I had such a blast going up and down the aisles of trees and picking the apples. That’s probably why we left with 9 pounds of apples!
I’m off to make zucchini bread, bars, casseroles, pancakes…and apple pie, turnovers, chips, butter, muffins….

Look what I picked off my zuccini plant:


My first squash of the summer.
Nothing like making zuccini and carrot muffins with only the freshest ingredients.

As Promised

As promised, below is my potato salad recipe and as an added bonus a chicken recipe. Now I must warn you, I measure nothing when making my potato salad. I have come to the realization that any recipe I call my Mom for is so vague and she measures nothing, therefore I measure nothing. My Mom gets this from her Mom. Don't we all want food that tastes like Mom's?

Potato Salad

roughly 2.5 pounds red potatoes
kosher dill pickles-about 3-4 spears (this depends on how pickly you like things)
3-5 hard boiled eggs sliced (again, depends on how eggy you like things)
mayonnaise
regular mustard
dijon mustard
salt, pepper
dry ranch mix

place whole potatoes in pot of cold water on stove over medium heat
salt potatoes once they reach a boil
boil until fork tender (depends on size of potatoes)
drain and let cool
once cooled, peel the skins off half the potatoes (stole this idea from Levi)
cut potatoes into desired bite size pieces and place in bowl
add mayonnaise - as stated I do not measure, maybe start with 1/2 cup and go from there
add 1-2+ tbsp yellow mustard
and 1+ tbsp dijon mustard
add salt, pepper and about 1 tsp-1/2 tbsp dry ranch mix - to taste
stir everything together
lastly, add the hard boiled eggs and pickles and stir
check and adjust seasonings
refrigerate until cool and again, check and adjust seasonings
**The longer it sets, the better it gets
***Also, if you are wondering why I don't peel the potatoes until after they have boiled ask my Mom. This is how she makes potato salad with russet potatoes so I figured I would do the same with red potatoes.
****You can substitute red potatoes for russet potatoes. Just peel all the skins and dice after the potatoes have been boiled and cooled. However I must say the red potatoes with skins add color, flavor, and nutrition. Give em a try!
Easily serves 4-6

Want the perfect-every-time hard boiled egg? Do this (Rachael Ray tip):
Place eggs in pot of cold water on stove and cover. Once they reach a rolling boil, turn off heat and let sit covered for 10 minutes. Then run eggs over cold water. Perfect every time. This also works great for fresh corn on the cob, but of course don't run the corn over cold water.

I actually have a recipe for this next one. I got it off Food Network's website and adjusted it to my liking.

Yummy Chicken

Couple of tbsp olive oil
recipe calls for 6 bone-in chicken thighs, skinless
**I substituted 1 bone-in breast and 4 bone-in thighs. Use your choice of bone-in chicken pieces
salt and pepper
1 medium onion, sliced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup chicken stock
1/2 cup white wine (I only used about 1/3 cup - all I had)
1 14.5 ounce can crushed tomatoes in thick puree (I use San Marzano-the best!)

Heat oil in skillet over medium-high heat
Pat chicken dry and season with salt and pepper. Brown the chicken, meat side down first, and turning once, about four minutes on each side. Transfer to a plate and reserve.
Add onion and garlic to the pan and saute until tender, roughly 3 minutes. Add the stock and wine and stir, scraping any brown bits off the bottom of the pan. Turn heat to high and reduce by half, about three minutes. Pour in the crushed tomatoes and add the chicken thighs back in. Cover and cook on medium-low for 40 minutes.

Remove chicken and serve it with rice, buttered noodles, pasta, mashed potatoes, etc. Ladle sauce on top and garnish with fresh parsley, if desired.

So, there you have it. Hope you enjoy. If you try either recipe, let me know what you think.

Green Thumb

Marlee would like to wish everyone a Happy Earth Day!

The bow is for you, Auntie Kristy

In honor of Earth Day I thought I would share some pictures of my garden. I use this word very loosely because it is not a garden at all...more like some veggies and fruits Dave and I planted in pots. Hey, I had to start somewhere! We planted our garden on 4/13.

So, this is my first year gardening and I started very simple. After doing some research about gardening in the desert, Dave and I planted:

2 tomato plants

squash

and strawberries

I completely expect and accept this first season of gardening to be a crap shoot. Imagine my surprise when a week after my fruit and veggies were planted, I go out to water and find this:

Yes, this is a strawberry already blooming. Actually, there are four strawberries blooming. Imagine my excitement. I don't think blooming is the proper word to use, but whatever. I think the proper word is yielding.

Well, I'm off to make strawberry jam. Yes, you read right, make strawberry jam. No, not with my four fresh bloomin' strawberries.

Yes, I am a cook, baker, and gardener extraordinaire (insert sarcasm here).

Marlee's 1st Saint Patty's Day..

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!!

Doesn't Marlee look so cute in green? Heck, she looks cute in anything.

Ahhh...I can breath a sigh of relief tonight. Between tax preparation and midterms I have been one busy bee!

But...

The dutiful wife and Mother I am (insert sarcasm here) still had time to prepare dinner for the family.

So, can you guess what we had for dinner tonight?

Well, Marlee had GREEN beans..yummy.

and Dave and I had New England Boiled Dinner (aka corned beef and cabbage)

Doesn't it look yummy! It tastes a lot better than it looks!

After I got done cleaning up the kitchen, this is what I found:

How sweet is this picture?

Recipe Reinvention #2

Anyone interested in my recipe reinvention of the week? One of my favorite recipes growing up as a child is chicken noodle soup over mashed potatoes. I enjoy making this dinner on a gloomy, rainy day but I always have SO much soup leftover. No matter how hard I try to make a small pot of soup, I always end up with enough soup to feed a family of 8. Why not just eat the soup leftover, you ask? Just not my favorite thing. So, I have come up with a chicken pot pie for my leftover reinvention. It actually turned out pretty darn tasty. Again, very vague recipes. Who is really precise when it comes to soup?

Night #1 Chicken noodle soup over mashed potatoes
In a stock pot cover chicken and your choice of root vegetables with quite a bit of water - my choice of veggies: carrots, celery, and parsnips
Season water
Cook chicken until done
Once chicken is done, remove and cut into bite size pieces
Add chopped chicken back into the pot with the veggies
Season to taste
*At this point, before you add noodles and thicken, reserve about half of your stock, chicken and veggies (for second night reinvention)
Add your choice of noodles and cook until done
Thicken sauce to desired consistency
Serve in a bowl over mashed potatoes - everyone knows how to make mashed potatoes, right?
and bread or biscuits
..Yummy, I believe this is an Unruh recipe. So good, it's kind of like chicken and dumplings (I use the words "kind of" loosely)

Night #2-Chicken pot pie
In a pot, make a ru (sp?) with butter and flour
Add leftover chicken soup
Add a dollop of sour cream (optional-made gravy nice and creamy)
Add cooked, cubed potato(es) to soup (I just baked 2 russet potatoes, peeled and cubed. You could even use precut frozen or canned)
Season to taste
Simmer on med-low until soup is heated through and has thickened (5-10 minutes)
Pour soup into individual soup bowls
Cover bowls with pie dough (homemade or store bought)
Cut slits in dough and brush with egg wash
Cook at 400 degrees for about 25-30 minutes

I served a side salad and bread and..
Enjoy.!.

Wasted

A couple of years ago I made a decision to never make a New Year's Resolution. This is not to say that I don't make resolutions, I just don't feel that a person should wait until the beginning of each year to live a certain way or do a certain thing (much easier said than done, I know).
With that said, I did make quite a few "resolutions" a couple of weeks ago. I will not bore you with what these resolutions are (except for one-the reason behind this post) as I want to live each day with these thoughts and promises to myself and not just talk (or write) about them.
So, the one resolution I will share with you is to be less wasteful. When I think of how wasteful I am on a daily basis it nauseates me.
One area that I am wasteful in is the kitchen. My Grandma Bea would be so disappointed as she can make a dinner out of anything, and I mean anything. It's so hard to not waste food when there is only two adults living in my house and you can't even get just FOUR hot dog or hamburger buns, but I am trying. I have started making one dinner, taking the leftovers, and "reinventing" the leftovers for another night. Here is what I do with a beef roast:

Night 1-Beef Roast
Place a beef roast, onion, carrots, potatoes, and garlic in a crock pot. Add seasonings, either beef stock or water, and cook accordingly.
Note: if you put slits in the roast and place pieces of whole garlic in the slits it gives the roast great flavor.
Oh so yummy. This dinner so reminds me of Sunday's growing up. We had roast every Sunday after church..yummy. Thanks Mom!

Night 2-Hash (recipe courtesy of Marlee's Grandma Viola):
In a pan, saute one chopped onion in olive oil
Take leftover roast, carrots, and potatoes and cut them into bite size pieces.
Add to pan and heat through
So good..thanks Grandma Viola for this recipe. It's now a family favorite.

I can't wait for dinner tonight. Hope you enjoy. I'll be sharing more recipe reinventions in the future.

Oh-and yes, if you feel my recipes are too vague that would be my Mom coming out in me..a little of this and a little of that.