Go BIG or Go Home

The theme in our house yesterday.

What’s that big pot on the stove?

Why, it’s our turkey fryer pot.  But what’s in it?

A whole lotta spaghetti sauce.  We had dinner with it and then packed the rest into 32 oz yogurt containers for the freezer.  We had 16 make their way downstairs.  (There are 4 lbs of ground moose and 4 lbs of ground beef – PLUS another 2 lbs of ground beef and 1 1/2 lbs ground pork in my take on Alton’s Baked Meatballs [we don’t eat lamb and I made a batch and a half-ish].)

Salad goes well with spaghetti, right?

I’m hoping that bad boy lasts us more than 2 days.  We’re on a big salad kick right now – I made 3 last week!  (There are 2 bags of chopped lettuce blends, 1 bag of baby spinach, 4 carrots, 2 cucumbers, half a tomato and 1 each of 3 different colored peppers in here.  NOM.)

Let’s round out the meal with some bread.

Don’t mind the end where my 2 little mice ripped off a chunk to taste it.  ;-)  This would be a Rustic Bread from Country Living.  It’s big.  It took up most of my half sheet baking sheet.  I think I’ll be making some croutons with some of it to go with that big salad.

I’m getting hungry again.  Maybe I’ll go rip off a chunk of that bread……

 

I’d like to send a shout out to Kim @ Achorn Farm.  I may have given her the heads up on using Windows Live Writer but she clued me in to the fact you can edit pictures and so much more here!  I’ve been editing in Picasa, uploading to Writer and it just takes so much time that I don’t have much of.  So..  YAY!  Thanks!  (Maybe you’ll see more of me now?)

Cooking with kids

A friend asked me today how I cook with two kids.  She makes dinner every night with her son clinging to her legs.

I decided to give you a glimpse into dinner preparations in our household.

It usually starts off with Little Man in his high chair with a toy or two.  He was getting unhappy by the time I took this picture.

While Little Man is otherwise occupied, here is what Monkey is up to.  Hear the scraping of the chair being pushed across the floor.

She can’t very well help from the floor, right?

 

After a quick cooking break to give Little Man some sweet potatoes and a bowl of cereal, he went to play on the floor a bit.  Monkey wanted to entertain him a bit so joined him while I cut up raw chicken (she’s not allowed to help with raw meat, obviously).

He played alone a little…

while Monkey made “pancakes.”

Little Man then ended up back in his high chair and decided to take a nap (I didn’t dare take his picture for fear of waking him with the flash!) and Monkey went on to “wash” dishes.

 

So there you have it.  This is what happens here during dinnertime preps.

Come back tomorrow for a big announcement!

I learned a valuable lesson this week.

There is a good reason to follow a bread recipe to the letter.

Every time we've made bread, neither T nor myself have put the butter on it when you pull it out of the oven. What could possibly be the purpose? It's just added fat, right?

Last weekend, while in Fort Kent visiting family for Easter, I paid a visit to my grandparents on my Dad's side. I was telling Memere how I started baking my own bread this winter and have no plans on stopping. She told me how she used to make bread all the time. And then mentioned rubbing butter all over it when it was fresh from the oven.

Turns out, those recipes have it listed for a reason.

It keeps your bread soft!

I tried it Monday when I made this week's bread. Sure enough. We started in on the 2nd loaf this morning and the bread (specifically the crust) is still just as soft as it was on Monday!

So thank you, Memere, for informing me of this little tidbit. Otherwise, I don't know if I would have ever put it together on my own.

I'm also curious as to how others store their homemade bread. I've been storing mine in Ziploc bags. I reuse them a few times to help reduce waste, but I'm sure there has got to be a better (and GREENER) solution.

Any tips or ideas would be appreciated!

Friday's crazy

So, my crazy today was another hanging shoe organizer for Monkey's room. And I found a couple of baskets on clearance at Target.

Tada!


Organized toys!

I also found a great area rug for her room, too. I've been looking for one of those for, well, 19 months now.

I picked up a couple other storage solutions, but they are for another project on another day. I'm hoping to take the weekend off from organizing. HA!

So, here we are. Friday. It's pizza night and I realized I never did share the dough recipe T's cousin N gave us. I have perfected it for my needs. And I cut it in half because otherwise, I'd be freezing a ball of dough every week (and always forgetting to take one out for Friday, hence needing to make another batch). This is the full recipe (makes 2 pizzas).

Pizza Dough (NC)

3 cups flour
1 tbs sugar
1 tbs salt (I use less)
1 tbs yeast
1 cup warm water
1 tsp olive oil (I use a little more)

Knead until smooth.

Place in oiled bowl and flip so oiled side of dough is up.

Let rise 30-60 minutes.

Split in half. Either use both or freeze one.

Enjoy!

Monkey and I are just waiting for ours to rise now. She loves helping put the toppings on.

Holiday baking

Monkey loves helping Mommy in the kitchen. Thanks to my nice new kitchen chairs (I bought a set of 2 as a present to me and my parents gave me an early Christmas gift and had another set of 2 shipped to me), she can help every day (the old chairs were from the 70's and were on wheels - not exactly safe to let a toddler stand on - and these look so much nicer, too!).

We decided to attack a batch of Snickerdoodles yesterday. By we, I obviously mean me. If you don't know what a Snickerdoodle is, let me try to explain. They are a cookie, similar in taste to a sugar cookie. However, you roll them in a cinnamon sugar mixture before baking. This makes the exterior sugary and crusty - and the inside remains moist and chewy. I only make them during the Christmas season even though they are my favorite cookie.

I let Monkey help pour flour and sugar into the mixing bowl. Then, when I turned around to wash my hands, this is what I found:

She had already gotten a glob of cookie dough into her mouth and decided she liked it enough to reach for more. That's my girl with the sweet tooth!

So, we set the dough in the fridge to chill. It remains there until I have time to bake it this afternoon. If you leave to chill more than the recommended hour, be sure to cover the dough well so it doesn't dry out.

Yesterday, I promised to share the recipe. I don't know the history of it because it has been in my Mom's recipe box for as long as I can remember. If I had to guess, I'd say it came from my Great Aunt Violet's recipes because she was great with baking.

Snickerdoodles
1/2 cup soft butter
1/2 cup shortening
1 1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 3/4 cup flour
2 tsp. cream of tarter
1 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt

2 tbs. sugar
2 tsp. cinnamon

Mix butter, shortening 1 1/2 cup sugar and eggs. Blend in flour, cream of tarter, baking soda and salt. Chill for 1 hour. Mix 2 tbs. sugar and 2 tsp. cinnamon together. Roll dough into 1 inch balls and then roll in the cinnamon/sugar mixture. Place 2 inches apart on cookie sheet. Bake at 400 for 8-10 minutes.

I also mentioned an Amish Friendship Bread in need of baking. I was given the batter by one of T's coworkers along with three instruction choices. I chose this one because it didn't require my doing any dishes after mixing it every day (squeeze the bag? I can do that!).

This is how T entertains Monkey while I'm trying to get in and out of our hot oven without her underfoot. Unfortunately, it caused more clawing at my leg than anything. Yes, I'd have been scared of that, too.


Sorry ladies. I snatched him up already. You can't have him. hehe

Back to the bread. I've seen Friendship Bread numerous times before but had never been given one (I usually said thanks but no thanks to anyone offering). It was supremely easy. A child could easily do it on their own (they obviously need reading abilities - or an adult to read the instructions for them, of course).

I toasted a couple of slices for breakfast. It tasted like cinnamon toast!

I'll definitely be making it again.

Mommy's little helper

I will be adding pictures later today, after I've worked all morning, run a few errands, gone to my grandma D's appointment, rushed home for the oil man to check and fill the tank and Monkey is taking her nap. I don't have a busy day ahead of me or anything, really.

It was an overcast, cool and rainy day yesterday. Perfect soup weather, so my menu worked out very well indeed.

Monkey is a "needy" child. She likes to be held. This makes cooking and doing dishes very difficult. I've started sitting her up on the counter so she can watch what I'm doing. She's happier, I'm not getting stressed out by a child yanking on my leg and things just go much more smoothly. So when it came time to start chopping onions last night, it was just easier to plop her up on the stove while I worked (the burners were still all turned off at this point, obviously - I put her on my hip once I turned it on).

As I gathered what I needed for my soup, Monkey amused herself in the container of spoons, whisks and spatulas. By the time I was chopping onions, she was stirring away at the raw onions in my pot.

She decided she enjoys Mommy's food so much that whatever it is Mommy's doing in that pot must be good, so she grabbed a fistful of raw onions and shoved the entire thing in her mouth.
After taking one bite into it, she promptly spit it all out into her hand and dropped it back into the pot.

At this time, I'd like to reassure any of my readers whom have eaten in my home in the past (or will be eating in my home in the future): THIS IS NOT NORMAL ACTIVITY IN MY KITCHEN!

I didn't bother trying to take her slobbered on onions out seeing as it is just the three of us eating the soup. And I'll be sure to not let Monkey help when I'm having people over for dinner.