this and that and 30 day challenge 2

 January and February are not only speeding by but are also kicking my butt.  I've returned to working in the office part time and having to get up and attempt to look presentable, get out of the house and be gone all day AND be around <shudder> people all day, THEN go home and make dinner and get ready to do it all over again is.... a lot.

I'm tired, stressed, sad..... lots of stuff.  And lots of stuff has had to fall to the side - like meal planning and trying to be healthy and doing anything after 8 at night.

We've ordered Hello Fresh boxes for the past 3 weeks to get through the weeks but this week coming up we bravely decided to plan our own meals but have been ignoring the actual planning so far.  Last week I made the chicken and spinach curry above and we ate the whole thing and raved about it.

Don't ask for the recipe though.

I can share the recipe for the most delicious garlic soup I made last weekend.  I've been very drawn to brothy soups lately.  It's all I want.  

 

Another thing that is all I want is this pico de gallo from Costco.  SO spicy and SO good.  We are going through these quickly because of me.

You may recall that Decembers 30 day challenge was to drink more water.  It's going...not great.  But I'm trying.  I feel like this all the time

And I will keep trying.

January's 30 day challenge was journaling.    I'm dong a combo of journaling and habit tracking.  It was going pretty good until I went back to work and now it's just another thing I'm not doing consistently.  But again - trying.

When February arrived it did not even occur to me to think of picking a new challenge.  Maybe next month.

Lastly, I'm sad to share that the book club I joined has disbanded already.  I am pretty bummed because I really was enjoying it, but it was not meant to be I guess.  But the book club for 1 keeps rolling on.

Happy Sunday

bites

 Because spooky season is almost over, here are my little yarn pumpkins that I started making early this month

I saw - the the ole ticky toks of course - a recipe to scoop out the inside of your bagel and fill it with egg and ham and cheese and air fry it.  We didn't have any bagels but we did have buns and gave it a go and was so good.  I still haven't tried it with bagels.

We had a ton of cherry tomatos all ripen at once and we tried a marinated baked recipe that was pretty meh, so we squished them and covered them in feta and baked them and ate it on bread. 

Speaking of feta, I also tried the feta egg recipe, where you sprinkle feta in your pan, let it start to melt and then crack in an egg.  I don't like fried eggs, so I tried a scrambled, and it worked pretty well.  Cherry tomatos on top of course.

These pancake-sausage bites were GOOD - add cooked crumbled sausage and shredded cheddar cheese to your prepared pancake batter and bake as muffins or mini muffins.

I had a bunch of apples that were suddenly not looking their best, so I searched for a fast applesauce recipe and found a super super great one  here - not only does it not have any added sugar, but you don't even had to peel the apples!  The authors pureed the skins into their sauce - i pulled them out after it had cooled for a bit and left the sauce chunky.  So good.

bites/favorites

 Spring is finally here and I'm so excited.  The sun is out and it's warm and the other night after dinner we sat in the backyard and I finished my book  (and cried silently) and listened to the birds sing and the kids fight (one sound was better than the other) and I am looking forward to spending lots of time back there this season.

I made this No bake peanut butter cornflake tiffin for a Sunday dessert.  I was running out of chocolate for the topping and the bar part wasn't quite set when I tried to smear the chocolate over the top so it looked awful, but tasted lovely.

We are also back into energy bites and this was a recent winner - Oatmeal Cookie energy balls.

Pretty clouds

I bought these containers to keep fruits and veggies handy for snacks and dinner.  They really do help.  I'd love to buy more, but we have so many bottles of condiments and sauces in the fridge there's hardly room for leftovers, much less plastic bins.

I wanted to share the recipe for these Vrasciole - Italian Fried Meatballs - but the recipe was taken down.  Too bad.  They were really really good.

 It might be a basic bitch, but MacArthur Island Park is one of my favorite walks.

We've made these burger tacos from Tick Tok multiple times over the last couple of months, including a breakfast version with sausage and eggs.  So freaking delicious!

Season your meat, press a small-ish amount onto a tortilla, fry until done and add your toppings.

Brilliant.

I bought The Mister this garden for his birthday, and it's pretty fun!  So far we've only had one plant not sprout and have had lettuce and herbs to add to our meals.  

Treat yourself!

Upcoming reads and miscellaeney

I received a book store gift card from The Mother In Law for my birthday this year.  The order was broken up into 2 deliveries and I just got the first.  Queso was a total impulse purchase but after reading the first few pages I can already tell it was money well spent.  

I have read in a few places how great we are never meeting in real life is, 

and am looking forward to it.

Some other stuff floating around my head -

I really liked this article - A High-Security Prison Is Offering YTT for Inmates
I am trying to convince my head that it is time to get back to yoga.  It isn't going well so far.

I made this honey garlic chicken a while back and loved it.

If you like chicken and peanut sauce- I do! - then you will love this chicken and broccoli with peanut sauce.

I don't watch much TV any more, but I am excited about David Letterman's show on Netflix.  When does it start?????  I liked this interview from early this year.


I have some childhood memories of visiting my great-nana when I was small; not many - but I remember quite clearly a big plastic photo cube she had on her coffee table.  It had photos of her great grandchildren in it, and I was fascinated by it.
I made one similar this Spring for The Grandmother - I bought a wooden cube and cut photos to size and glued and sealed them on.  It was a cute quick craft.  

Bites 12

I love pretty much everything that Zoot writes, but this one really struck me when I read it - Morality and Poverty.   So many people seem to think it is their job to judge others and tell them how to live lately.  Why is that?

Another one that got me in the feels is Angry Bees from Hillary. I can 100% relate with this - I went through a stage where I didn't want anyone to hold The Girl but me - I was convinced anyone else holding her would fall and hurt her.  Anxiety sucks.

I laughed until I cried - Bad Lip Reading - Inauguration Day.

I am very into calming music and nature sounds to help keep my anxiety levels down.  I really like the recordings Moby  released - ambient music that he's put on the internet for free.  So awesome.

I forgot to buy baking soda last shopping trip, so this homemade baking soda body scrub will have to wait until next weekend.

“Go and make interesting mistakes, make amazing mistakes, make glorious and fantastic mistakes. Break rules. Leave the world more interesting for your being here. 

Make. Good. Art.” ~Neil Gaiman

Bites 11

I have not done much bread baking lately - since November(!). I made some basic white rolls to ease myself back into the game.

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This is a corn dish I made  - the recipe is photocopied from a book so I have no source, but it was onion sauteed in oil, corn, curry, lime juice and coconut milk.  Different and very nice, although I thought it was a little too liquidy - was it the coconut milk I used?  But it was good, and I will make it again.

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Who remembers the Brie Bagel Melt  I made last year?  Well.

This is raisin toast with brie and honey and walnuts.  OMG. 

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Rice bowl!  I love them so much.  This one had ground pork and zucchini and carrots over coconut rice and topped with a fried egg and some sweetened soy sauce.

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This is another version of the breakfast buns 

Ham and cheese baby!  Can't go wrong with a classic.

Bites 10

If I was asked today what my top restaurants in the city are, Indian Aroma would be at the top of the list. On New Years Eve I picked up the Dinner Combo #1 - with pakoras, butter chicken, vegetable korma, salad, naan and rice. I also ordered a side of papri chaat. It was delicious and nice to not have to cook that night. These guys rock.

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We took our visiting nephew to the Amsterdam Restaurant for breakfast before Christmas.  Pax had a super cute Clown Pancake.  I had Eggs Benny.

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I found some ground pork in the freezer and turned them into crock pot meatballs.

Sweet and sour crock pot meatballs

Mix together 1 lb ground pork, 1 egg, 1/4 cup bread crumbs, 1/4 cup finely chopped onion.

Mix well, form into meatballs (I got about 20 total), and cook in a pan with a bit of oil until cooked through.

In your crock pot mix together 1/3 cup ketchup, 3/4 cup water, 3/4 cup brown sugar, 2 TB soy sauce, and 1/3 cup cider vinegar.

Add the meatballs, cover, and cook on low 2-3 hours.

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I called this my Sunday Night Steak - guess why?  It was so good!  We haven't eaten much steak lately and I wanted to jazz them up.  I marinated them all (Sunday) afternoon.  When I mixed the sauce up I set some aside for drizzling on the plate at dinner time.  A wise move.  I just threw stuff in  - a few TB of hoisin, a splash of water to keep it thin, a few more TB of soy sauce, a squirt each of bbq sauce and honey, some garlic and ginger.  All good stuff.

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We found ourselves out at dinner time recently, and conveniently very close to Sushi Plus, a newish restaurant in Aberdeen.

No photos, but we tried some miso soup, tempura, yam sushi, beef udon soup, and the katsu don (pork rice bowl).  Sadly, they like so many other Kamloops sushi restaurants, are not open on Sunday.

Sushi Plus 

Bites V9

Back in December 2012 a new restaurant opened on Victoria Street downtown - Jay's Good Eats. It was a small place in a little food court, and served mostly sandwiches, and also dogs and ribs.

Sadly and shockingly, the owner Jay passed away in April 2013. I ate there once, and below is a photo of my beef dip sandwich.

 I was served by Jay, a very friendly guy, and I enjoyed my meal very much. I had planned to go back with Scott and Paxton one Saturday but, just a couple of weeks later, they were closed.

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We went to Calgary in May.  Just a 5 day trip including travel days, so not much time for anything.  We had an early family party for my Brother in Law's 40th birthday, did some shopping at stores we don't have here in Kamloops (I love you, Ikea and Old Navy!) and spent time with family.  I also caught a cold and got sick.  Quite sick.

We (Scott and I and Paxton for one meal) got out for 2 lunches.  The first was for Vietnamese food, which is one of my very favorite cuisines of all time, for ever and ever.  It wasn't one of my favorite restaurants in Calgary; this was more of an emergency lunch to make sure I got some Vietnamese food on the trip so Scott wouldn't have to listen to me complain until the next time we went out of town and there was a possibility of Vietnamese food for me.

Anyhoo, the food was fine.  I've had better, but beggars can't be choosers. 

Then the next day we left Paxton with his grandmother and cousins and went and did some shopping.  We ended up at Chinook Center at lunch time.  I had done some googling on my phone and discovered that on Sundays all the Vietnamese restaurants in the area were closed.  So we ate at the mall, at Chachi's Sandwich Bar.

I love pickles, so we had a great big pickle. 

This was pastrami or corned beef.

And this was bulgogi or something similar.

They were good. 

Also on the trip, the family took us to Crossiron Mall just outside of Calgary.  We ate lunch in the food court and I had Lebanese food.  In a food court!!!!  Here at our "best" mall you can walk by the empty spots in the food court and have a burger, or Chinese food, or a hot dog. 

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My parents came over for Mother`s Day dinner this year, and I made a turkey burger from Bobby Flay.  It had a vinaigrette and bacon and blue cheese, and was delicious. 

I forgot to take a photo of an actual burger, but here`s the table all set up so everyone could top their burger as the liked.

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I bought a pack of portobello mushrooms and had planned to grill them and serve them on buns.  But my evil husband decided they should be pan fried, perhaps with a breading, so they would be crispy. 

So we did the flour, egg, breadcrumb, pan fry in oil routine, then sliced them and piled them on a bun with mayo, cheese and tomato and oh my GOD.  This very poor photo does it no justice.

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I NEED the weather to cool down so I can make this recipe.  I am obsessed.

Stuff and things

These are all dishes I made in the summer and wrote about in the summer.  Since it's November and there's now SNOW on the ground, I will share them with you.

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I found this recipe for Strawberries with Basil Granita in a Food Network magazine, and thought it sounded so wonderful. I made it, and eh. It was ok.


I loved the cold granita with the berries, and in theory the granita was good - cold, sweet basil equals yum - but it was just too sweet. I would play with this recipe, and work on getting it less sweet. But it sure has potential.

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frick frick frick. I just messed up and deleted the photo for this dish. Look up stupid in the dictionary, and they may well have a picture of me.

I saved this recipe from Deb last year, for her Thai Chickpea Curry, and made it earlier this month. We had it for dinner the next 2 nights and it was marvelous. I didn't follow the vegetable part of this recipe, just threw in what I had, which was sweet potatos, peas, cauliflower and carrots.

If you like curry, try this recipe. So, so good.

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I had some strawberries that were heading south faster than we could eat them. Instead of turning them into a smoothie like I normally would, I decided to make some fast jam.


I gave the berries a quick chop, then put them in a pan over medium heat. When they started to bubble, I added some maple syrup and a splash of balsamic vinegar, and then mashed them with a potato masher.

We liked it.

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I made these on Canada Day - I call them "meatballs stuffed with tomatos stuffed with cheese". I took some grape tomatos, cut off the stem end and cleaned out the seeds with the point of a knife. I stuffed them with cheese (I had some Laughing Cow pieces, but any cheese would work). I mixed some ground chicken with salt and pepper and then formed meatballs around the tomatos. Then I grilled 'em.




And lo, they were good.

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This is THE banana bread from Cookin' with Coolio, and if you don't own this book you are a fool, A FOOL, I tell you. We've made this approx 137548686597 times and love it. What are you waiting for?

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If you weren't quite convinced you should pick up a copy of The French Women Don't Get Fat Cookbook, this will seal the deal. We tried the vegetable pancake recipe, made it for some dinner guests and it got RAVE reviews. I ended up in a fork fight for the last piece with a guy who doesn't even like veggies that much. (We shared it, like civilized people do)
I have no photos but man oh man, it ruled. It ruled hard.

bites

Last month at my fathers request I made him and my mom my pork skewers with almond butter sauce, the recipe I have entered in the Maple Leaf contest.

You still have time to vote for me! Go to facebook, and visit the Maple Leaf page. You have to "like" the page, and then click on the red box that says Vote Now, and then you can click on (MY) any recipe you like, and then click on the "like" button.

That'd be super. Thanks.

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I have some really excellent cookbook reviews coming up this month and next month, but I want to tell you right now about one that I bought myself - Balls!: Round the World Fare for All Occasions by Angela Murrills. I LOVE THIS BOOK. It has, as it states on the cover "Over 100 Ball-istic recipes" for every kind of meatball, fruitball, riceball, dessertball, fishball, and pretty much anything round that you could think of. We've tried the French Meatball and Onion Soup (which was amazing), the Gehaktballen (Dutch Meatballs) (very very nice), Boules Provencales (tasty), Bistro "Steak" with Oven Fries (delicious), and Grapes Glaces (refreshing). I've got many many more of the recipes marked, and when Fall arrives (it is so gorgeous right now! And how many parenthesis am I using here???) we'll give some more of them a try. Check out this book, you'll love it.

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Last month I crossed something off my Life List - I gave blood.

I tried to do that in the spring, but because I'd given birth just a few months before I was not eligible. Then I got a little freaked out and avoided making an appointment for the rest of spring/all summer when I could have given. But they called me last month and I stopped being a weenie and went and did it.

It was a piece of cake. And I'll be doing it again and again for sure. Free cookies!

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If you happen to be in the BC area, here's 3 things you might like. First, in Vernon - Davison Orchard, about an hour away from Kamloops (where I live). We went last month for the first time and enjoyed it. Paxton is a little too young for the kid activities, but we had a nice walk and a delicious lunch which included apple pie and fresh apple juice, and the most delicious turkey and spinach sandwich. Then we bought a bunch of apples and tomatos and delicious rye bread and went home. Paxton enjoyed the tomato container.

Also last month we went with my parents to the annual autumn feast at Thistle Farms. It was a beautiful setting and the food was lovely. I hope to go back again.

And last, the Salmon Run has started up at Adams River. This is an annual occurrence, which I've mentioned before. This is the biggest run in about 100 years, with millions and millions of salmon swimming home to spawn before they die. We've seen them swimming up the Thompson River, right at the park downtown, which is something we haven't seen in other years. We haven't gone to Adams River yet, probably in a couple of weeks, but I'll share photos and more info with you then.

Happy Sunday!