Perfect Yorkies

We had roast for Christmas dinner, with all the trimmings - roasted potatos, sprouts, creamed spinach, gravy, and the best part - yorkshire puddings. 

I absolutely love yorkies but have always been afraid to make them. Years ago a friend and I made - tried to make - them and we failed miserably. 

I never attempted them again but always wanted to. 

So what better time than a crazy busy day with the stress of completely wired children and grandparents coming for dinner? 

 I followed Jamie Oliver's Amazing Yorkies recipe and they were perfect and impressive. 

Definitely the best part of the meal for me.

A couple of days after, we finished up the leftovers.  I'd discovered a yorkshire pudding mix package in the cupboard, so I made them to go with the leftover beef.

Yuck.  Little tasteless hockey pucks.  Won't be doing that again.

Recipe: Amazing yorkies

(For the beef we followed this recipe and omitted the peppercorns.  Delicious.)

Intentions for February

How things went in January:

Yoga every day - pretty well.  I have definitely come to rely on my practice to bring some peace and calm to my mind and life.  I went for a few days without practicing mid month, and was ready to "remove my skin and throw it at someone" as I so charmingly shared with The Mister.

Lots of water - during the day, I'm pretty good.  At home, no.

Use my Fitbit - I FOUND my fitbit.  So that's a start.....

Keep calm - hmmmmm.


For this month -

Yoga and walking every day.

Reading.  More.  Do it.  I have a big pile of books to read, but I don't actually have much interest in those particular books.  Boo.

Menu planning  _ I have totally fallen apart on this.  I need to make a plan for the week every weekend, and stick to it.

Say Thank You to The Mister, every day.  The man is a saint, and deserves the moon.  Instead, he got stuck with me.

Book Club - This Is Where I Leave You

'Once, when I was old enough to ponder these things and young enough to think there might be credible answers, I whispered to Dad during Rosh Hashanah services, "Do you believe in God?"
"Not really," he said.  "No."
"Then why do we come here?"
He sucked thoughtfully on his Tums tablet and put his arm around me, draping me under his musty woolen prayer shawl, and then shrugged.  "I've been wrong before." he said.'

Chicken Parm

This is my very favorite sort of recipe - a non recipe!

The Mister loves Italian food.  I've become quite "meh" about most pasta, especially pasta with red sauce, which again The Mister loves.

He "casually" mentioned that he'd seen a delicious looking chicken parmesan on TV recently.  Now I am very lucky that The Mister is a very easygoing eater - he'll eat pretty much anything you put in front of him, is always complementary, and very rarely complains about what I cook.  So occasionally I like to cook things he brings up, because he's obviously interested in them.  Occasionally.  Not too often.  Don't want to spoil him or anything.

Anyhoo, the chicken.  So I preheated my oven to 425' and got 3 shallow bowls ready for the breading of the chicken - flour seasoned with salt and pepper in one, 2 beaten eggs in the second, and panko bread crumbs in the third.  I lined a baking sheet with foil, placed a cooling rack on the sheet and sprayed it with non stick spray.  Then I cut up 2 chicken breasts into 3 cutlets each.  Flour, egg and bread the cutlets and lay on the baking rack.  I baked for 15 minutes, flipped, and baked for 5 minutes more.  Then I removed the tray from the oven, spread each chicken piece with a few spoons of pasta sauce and topped with shredded cheese.  Back in the oven for 4 or 5 more minutes, until the cheese is melted.  

I was going to sprinkle them with parmesan when they came out of the oven, but forgot.

Quick and delicious!

M&M Rice Krispie Cookies

I made these cookies for The Boy's class during December.  They were, I heard, a hit.  The rice krispies add some nice texture and crunch, and you cannot go wrong with M&M's in a cookie.

When I was a kid my mom would occasionally make Smarties Cookies.  I absolutely loved them and they are one of those childhood food memories you never forget.  A couple of years ago I asked my mom for a copy of the recipe - she couldn't find it, but said she was sure it was just a standard chocolate chip recipe that she swapped in smarties for the chips.  

My brain remembers them differently, but these are pretty good too.  

Maybe one day my kids will be making these for their kids.....

Recipe:  M&M Rice Krispie Christmas cookies

The Buffet

Last month we visited the new casino in town for lunch at The Buffet - their (you guessed it) buffet restaurant.  The Mister loves a salad bar, and you don't see them often any more, so he's been wanting to go since the concept was announced.

It's pretty straightforward - pay at the entrance, grab your cutlery, find a table, and get to eating.  

After grabbing a red plastic Coke cup of beverage (ice tea and water for me, ginger ale for The Mister), we headed to the soup and salad station.  We tried both soups - Italian Wedding and Minestrone.  The Wedding was pretty standard.  The Minestrone was good - the fresh beans and zucchini had nice firmness to them.  

The salad bar station was not too bad - 2 lettuce choices, 3 dressings, plus cheese, bacon, veg, croutons and seeds.  The only quibble I had was there was only one set of tongs out for both cheeses and the bacon, meaning the cheeses had bacon in them, and the bacon had cheeses in it.  Not the end of the world, but I'm sure they could have found a couple of extra sets of tongs in the back.

On to the mains - there were 4 choices for vegetables - roasted potatos (which were borderline cold), peas, brussel sprouts, and deep fried zucchini.  There was pork fried rice, baked mushroom pasta, and the meats - 5 selections.  BBQ shredded pork, sweet chili chicken, teriyaki pork bites, spicy ginger beef strips, and fish bites.  

Lots of brown food.  A sea of it - the rice, the spuds, the zuke, pork, chicken, pork beef, fish.  Brown.

But, mostly tasty.  The pasta was super bland, and the chicken, while looking appetizing, hardly had any flavor.  But the rest were all good to quite good.

Desserts were bad.  3 choices, and all very obviously prepackaged from a supplier.  

The staff were all lovely, and the price was not bad - $12 for lunch.

The Buffet is open for weekend brunch, lunch Monday - Friday, and dinner nightly.

Supposedly they have "theme" buffets as well, but I can't see any info on the website.

Website:  The Buffet

The pretty frost with the rude name

I am  not a fan of winter, but there is something so pretty about lots of frost on a sunny day when you're inside and don't have to go out.

Australian Busters

You guys.  Seriously.  Finally, after all these years, I baked something that my family not 

only ate all of without me bitching at them, but actually fought over.

I've given up trying to figure out what they will and won't eat when I bake.  

It's a crapshoot.  I make oatmeal cookies and they tell me they're amazing, so I 

make them again a few months later and no one eats them.  

So annoying.

I sort of figured these would be a hit as The Mister loves cheese, but I was unprepared 

for how quickly they ate them, and how passionate they were about them.  

So weird.

Check out this recipe for Australian Busters - an easy and delicious cheese biscuit. 

Book Club - I Remember Nothing

"There was a diet cola ad that was so in love with itself that it actually recommended going to a special web site that explained how the ad had been made."


"I resent that asking for salt makes me seem aggressive towards the chef, when in fact it's the other way around."

"You always think that a bolt of lightening is going to strike and your parents will magically change into the people you wish they were, or back into the people they used to be.  But they're never going to. And even though you know they're never going to, you still hope they will."

Intentions for January

How things went in December:

Yoga every day -  Success.  I've taken classes 2-3 times a week, and done something at home every other day - some days just a savasana, or deep breathing, some days 10-15 minutes of poses, some days, although not enough - an hour or more.  I also learned the Wild Thing pose.  That made me feel so confidant.  Currently working on Crow Pose.  Not going as well.

Drink more water -  Meh.  Not as great as I wanted. 

Drink more smoothies -  Ha.  A complete failure.  I think I had 2 the whole month.

Read every day - Definitely better.  It can be hard to read with small children around, so I do my best.

Be grateful -  Not enough.

Be kind -  Not enough.



What I'm hoping to work on this month:

Yoga every day.

Water, water, water.

Dust off my fit bit  - somewhere I've got a basic one that counts steps and syncs with my computer to track it for me.  I've been meaning all year to look for it. 

Keep calm - I'm heading back to work this month.  :(
This is going to be upsetting and sad and stressful and tiring.
Here's hoping I don't completely fall apart.

Dave Cooks the Turkey

One of the best parts of the holidays for our family. Enjoy. 

Dave Cooks the Turkey

Merry Merry

(tree decorated by The Boy all by himself this year)  (More handmade ornaments added daily)

Have a wonderful holiday week, or wonderful regular week, whatever you do.

Peace and Love.

Instagram - 60 books reviewed

I've done 60 reviews of cookbooks from my shelf, and 45 are staying. 

5 additional books hit the highway without being tested:

A Martin Yan book that I deperately wanted to like, but between difficult to find ingredients and difficult to cook for family, it wasn't a keeper.

A Giada pasta book that wasn't inspiring to me.

An old Best of Bridge.

An old baking book.

An "inspiring women cook!" book from the dollar store.  I found the few recipes that interested me to be vague.  So, no.

Coming up - more Mark Bittman, Emeril Legasse, Ina Garten, and burgers. 

Arigato Sushi

We were back at Arigato Sushi last month for a birthday.  They very kindly sent over a platter of birthday sushi!  

(The Boy ate all the crab.)

Treats - Sweet and Salty Chex Mix

A special treat for the holidays.  Reminds me a bit of my Moms caramel corn.

1 cup butter
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup corn syrup
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp salt

1 395 gram box Honey Nut Chex
300 grams roasted cashew nuts
1/2 cup mini M&M's, or chocolate chips

In a medium pot, melt butter, sugar and syrup over medium high heat, whisking to combine.  Bring to a boil, then remove from heat.  Carefully add the baking soda, vanilla, and salt.  Whisk until smooth.

In a large (very large - you need room to pour in the sauce, then stir!) microwave safe bowl, mix the cereal and nuts.  Pour the caramel sauce over and mix carefully, and well.

Microwave the mixture for 2 minutes.  Stir, microwave for 2 more minutes.  Stir again.  Microwave for 1 minute.  Stir, and pour onto a large parchment lined baking sheet.  Spread out.

Let sit for 20 minutes, then sprinkle on the chocolate.

Let sit for another 20-30 minutes, then break up any very large clumps.

Let cool completely.

Enjoy!

How To: Break up ground meat

This is one of those tips that is so easy, so obvious, that when you see it you're 

like - why didn't I think of that???? 

Sometimes when you're cooking ground meat, it's a bit tough to get the meat 

broken into small uniform pieces while cooking. 

The solution? 

Your potato masher.

Use the masher to mash and break up the ground meat as it cooks.

It's easy to break up clumps.

Switch to a spoon or spatula once the meat is broken up as you like, to finish the cooking.

Easy!

Book Club - Unprocessed by Megan Kimble

This book took me a long time to read - nearly 3 months - but there is 

so much interesting and sometimes surprising information

it felt like a book to read slowly.

Some good bits - 
 
"According to a study by Local First, if 
you spend $100 at a local business, $73 of it will stay in your 
community.... spend that money at a national corporation and only $43 
sticks around."
 
"Only about 10% of the salt in the American diet 
comes from salt added at the table; the other 90% is already added to 
processed foods." 
 
"Salt is perfect for processed foods... It is 
cheap...Even better, it binds water and makes foods weigh more, so you 
pay more for heavier packages."
 
"Salt is one of the most common 
of the 10,000 chemicals added to our foods. Of these 10,000, 1,480 have 
been approved by the FDA; 3,600 more have been deemed GRAS, or generally
 recognized as safe. A thousand more have never been tested by the FDA 
and a further 3,800 are "indirect additives" and so are totally 
unregulated." 
 
"....on average, 91 cents of every dollar American 
consumers spend on food goes to middlemen- to suppliers, marketers, 
producers."
 
"Over the past 50 years sugar consumption has tripled worldwide..."

Cado English Muffin

The Boy charmingly called avocados "Cado" when he was younger, and it's stuck with The Mister and me.  I'm sure in a few more years The Boy will be irritated beyond belief by our usage of it.

(Another freaking adorable stage was when he called ALL food "Ham".  I loved it!)

We buy avocados almost every week; they are so good for you, and of course, guacamole.

For the kids we mostly cube it and serve it straight up, but I love it squished onto a toasted english muffin and sprinkled with a teensy bit of salt and lots of hot sauce. 

Intentions for December

This is what I'm hoping to work on this month:

Yoga every day - I've been practicing yoga in classes between 1 and 3 times a week for almost 3 months now, well, once a week for 2 months, then 2-3 times a week for the past month.  I've been trying to establish a home routine for the past few weeks, mostly unsuccessfully so far.  Between classes and home, I want to practice every day, even if it's only a handful of stolen moments when the children can't find me.

Drink more water - I used to be really good at this, but not so much the past few months.  Being hydrated.  So important. 

Drink smoothies a minimum of twice a week - another thing I used to be good at. 

Reading every day - and not blogs or facebook either.  Books.  Real live books.

Be grateful.

Be kind. 

Gift Guide: Skin Deep

Ahhhhh, the good stuff.

Relax-O-Ring from Saje This is so cool.  It's a massager for your fingers that is instantly both energizing and relaxing. Get one for you too.

Aromatherapy diffuser This is the one I have - also from Saje, but you can find lots of these out there. Use them with your favorite essential oils. Obvs.

Ocean Salt Scrub from Lush. Lovely and gentle.

EO body lotion and potions I am a huge fan of EO. I use their soap, body and face lotions, and the kids use the kids soaps.

Thieves Oil  You may or may not believe that Thieves Oil can help combat illness, but if you don't, it smells good too.

Vitamin C Energizing Face Spray Instant perk up.