Yellow Wallpaper

Tonight I made some lentil soup for dinner, but I changed the recipe up a bit to give it more of an Indian curry vibe. I kept in the cumin, but instead of chili powder I added some curry powder, ginger, and a bit of smoked paprika. I also used about a cup of coconut milk and the juice of an entire lemon. The kids all rated it a 9/10 and would eat it again.  I've been thinking about going back to being more vegetarian in what we are eating, but the truth is that we actually don't eat meat very often as it is. I particularly find myself craving beef on a regular basis, especially in the winter. It probably would, however, be good to give up ham and sausage. Those are two of my favorite meats, despite knowing how bad they are for me. I'm not sure I'm quite ready to do that yet, but I do think we need to start eating more veggies and beans (I need to remind myself that vegetarian food isn't just cheese pizza.

I have a memory of my seven-year-old self standing by the counter in the kitchen of our house on Paradise Street in San Diego. I'm contemplating how I can get a taste of the Blueberry Strata Pie without anyone noticing; if I remember right, I probably picked off a corner of the crust or swiped my finger through the blueberries. Just the name was magical: "Blueberry Strata Pie". It took me many years and at least one geology class before I learned that 'strata' is simply a fancy word for layers. I don't know when my mom started making it, but for years it was our family's special pie when we had guests for dinner. I also have a memory of my sixteen-year-old self slaving over fancy whipped cream on a Blueberry Strata Pie that I made when I knew a particular missionary was coming over for dinner. Sigh. I recently had a nice slice of the pie when I went to Portland for my sister's graduation. This time she was the chef, while I held my baby and watched. S...

I'm writing these posts because I've had a few friends ask me for meatless recipe ideas lately. Freezer meals are good because they eliminate preparation time, but they still need time to cook and require advance planning to make sure they are thawed in time. I thought I'd write up a few of the quick meals that we have on hand for days when I'm busy or when I don't really feel like cooking. Eggs Eggs are a wonderful, cheap source of protein that are easy to cook. If you aren't eating a lot of meat or other saturated fats, having eggs one or two times a week is usually not a health issue either. Eggs are a great food for little kids too. You can also replace some of the whole eggs with egg whites in order to make your recipes even healthier. Fried or scrambled eggs with toast are a great, simple dinner. Sometimes we will make omelettes , which are fun for kids because they can choose what they want to have inside (cheese, green onion, mushrooms, peppers, olives, ...

Back before I had Little Dude I went to Costco and bought five pounds of ground beef to turn into freezer meals. They were tasty meals, but after his birth I discovered that my body really needs more fiber. During the last few years our family has transitioned away from eating meat so often (now it's probably about once or twice a week at most). With this recent baby I wanted to have some meals in the freezer but didn't want them to involve meat. Thankfully many of my regular recipes have worked well in the freezer and it has been great to be able to have some easy dinners on hand. I just thought I'd share a few of my recipes. I did try one for a veggie lasagna with white sauce, but it wasn't that great and I think that it would be just as easy and cost-effective to buy the Stouffers one next time. In addition to casseroles, I also made a few batches of spaghetti sauce and froze them. Plain cooked beans and chili are also two other meatless meal ideas that freeze well. ...

Even though things have been kind of crazy with the move and the new baby we've still been trying to talk about a country every week. Most weeks we've just read a few books, colored the flag, and had some food that's somewhat related to the country we're talking about. So far the kids are still having fun and they really like learning new things. Canada: I wasn't really sure what to cook for Canada, so we ended up having baked salmon with rice pilaf. The kids really liked the salmon and they liked learning about the fact that Canada is close to the United States and that they have two official languages. China: I found a bunch of different books about China at the library and we found some coloring pages about Chinese animals as well. For our dinner I made these noodles as well as some stir-fried tofu with veggies and rice. The kids really wanted to try chopsticks, so they didn't end up eating much of their dinner because it was too hard. We also checked out a ...

Remember how I asked if pregnancy makes you crazy? I'm glad so many other people understand where I'm coming from; for the record, PMS tends to do the same thing to me too. I generally have a few days each month where I cry over everything and get frustrated easily by little things. Like some of my irrational obsessions that take hold of me now and then. This morning I headed over to Target to get a few things that we need. Yesterday I found a coupon online to try new gingerbread Pop Tarts. I'm not usually a big fan of Pop Tarts, but I love gingerbread and though they'd be a fun treat. Sadly, Target had no gingerbread ones anywhere. I ended up in a bad mood because they were also clean out of several other things that I had planned on buying. I really hate it when I go to a store and they don't have what I'm looking for in stock. It's been happening way too much to me lately. Even though I had Little Dude with me I decided to go to Walgreens since I needed s...

During the last year or two we have increasingly described ourselves as 'vegetarian', but the truth is we are more like ' flexitarians '. I haven't bought meat for about a year now, but we still indulge in fast food from time to time and will often eat meat when others serve it to us. As I typed that sentence about not buying meat, I realized that I have been buying some fish, so it is probably simply hopeless to attempt to label ourselves and we should just go ahead and eat what we want. Lately we've decided that adding some beef back into our diets would probably be a good thing. We're scouting out sources of local, pasture-raised healthy beef so we can buy some for this winter. I know that many women can have healthy pregnancies with a vegetarian diet, but I've struggled with anemia in the past and my digestive issues make me wary of adding too much iron in supplement form. We will probably still eat meat only about once a week and will put some fish ...

We had another great Saturday; it seems like we have had quite a few of those lately. It's nice to always have the weekends free; well, free from work. I try to get my homework done during the week, but sometimes I need to take over a Saturday. Today I didn't have anything pressing so I skipped the school stuff. My classes are MWF this quarter, so it's great to have Monday off. Plus we're on the nice side of the weather system right now and enjoying warm, sunny weather. This morning we spent some time cleaning the house together and then went for a bike ride. There's a bike loop that goes through the entire town on various trails and we rode the whole thing. It's about twelve miles and I can't believe I did it. Since we were starving by the end of it we decided to splurge a little and ate a yummy burger spot downtown. I had a very tasty veggie burger with sprouts and avocado on it. Then Mr. Fob took the kids home and I spent a little time shopping with so...

It's been a busy week for me, which is why there haven't been any blog posts for a few days. I started my classes and they are going well; however, I ended up changing my schedule and it has resulted in a lot of stress. This quarter I thought I'd be clever and avoid signing up for three graduate classes by adding an undergraduate Italian class. After going to class on Tuesday night I realized that I needed more of a refresher. I sat on the feeling for a day or so, since the class is at a great time for my schedule and the book is cheap. I realized that although I could handle the readings, I would greatly struggle with writing assignments and in-class presentations. So I decided to drop down a level. Friday morning I went in to meet with the new professor, and first she gave me a hard time for suddenly adding a week into the quarter and for not having taken the prerequisites recently. I think she didn't want me assuming I could just speak Spanish in her class and get aw...

As I mentioned, last weekend was Mr. Fob's graduation as well as Father's Day. My parents and sister came up to visit, as well as Mr. Fob's mother, so we had a lot of fun entertaining everyone for the weekend. As I've mentioned before, one of my favorite things to do is cook so I love throwing big parties. This time the food all turned out so well that I thought I'd post a few recipes. On Saturday evening we went to the park and had a nice picnic dinner by the water. I made chicken salad sandwiches on croissants, Asian coleslaw, potato salad, and chocolate-cream cheese cupcakes. We had friends who brought fruit and chips and it turned out to be the perfect picnic. Then on Sunday after church (we all went to see S-Boogie sing in sacrament meeting) we had vegetable quesadillas with guacamole, cilantro rice, black beans, and strawberries. For dessert on Sunday we had a cake that S-Boogie decorated at the grocery store on Saturday morning. Yes, I'm kind of sucker, ...

I feel like I've been posting a lot about food and grocery shopping, but cooking is a passion of mine so I'm going to keep talking about it. As I've mentioned before, we've gone mostly vegetarian lately. I'd like to find a local, healthy meat source, but when we do we'll probably just eat meat a few times a month. Maybe just for Sunday dinners. We still have a bag of frozen chicken from Costco in the freezer that we're trying to use up right now, but I think we only have one meal left. I think that cutting out meat has been one way to keep our grocery bill low. We also don't buy chips, soda, lunch meat, or very many processed foods (canned soup, Hamburger Helper, bakery items, frozen foods, etc) at all. Most of the time my shopping list includes produce, bread, and dairy products like yogurt, cheese, and milk. I also go to Costco occasionally (like every six months or so) to stock up on things. I've found that I can often buy things on sale for cheap...

I really love to cook, and I especially love to cook for the holidays. For me one of the things that makes a day special is a tasty home-cooked meal spent with those you love. This year I really thought hard about what to eat for Easter. We both love ham, but we're trying to move away from commercially processed meat. ( Plus it was only us and the kids, so I didn't feel like making a ham just for four people and I just did ham for Christmas). But then I found a cool recipe in The Joy of Cooking for "baked stuffed eggs". Basically you just make a white sauce, make deviled eggs using a few spoonfuls of the white sauce in place of the mayonnaise, and then bake the eggs in a pan with the rest of the sauce poured over them. I thought it was pretty tasty, although I think next time I would like to add some fresh herbs and perhaps some sauteed onion to the sauce. We also had roasted asparagus, a fruity jello with strawberries and pineapple, and rolls (shaped like bunnies). ...

We've started an annual tradition of having a party for Dia de los Reyes . I love throwing parties, and it's nice to have one a little later than most other holiday parties. Plus it's a good excuse to eat yummy Spanish food and attempt to bake roscon de reyes . This year my attempt rose rather dramatically in the oven. It was still yummy, but a bit dry. I decided this year to make hot chocolate to go with it and that ended up being a perfect combination. In years past I've generally stuck to tortilla and paella , but this year I was inspired by our proximity to gourmet grocery stores to have a tapas party. It seems a little weird to have a Mormon tapas party since we didn't drink any wine. I did buy a bunch of fun drinks to try with our food; the sparkling blueberry juice was my personal favorite. From left to right we had: assorted Spanish cheeses ( Manchego , Mahon , Tetilla ) with membrillo , tuna tapenade on toasts, jamon serrano and chorizo , assorted olive...

This is over a week late, but at least you can use these for next year. Or make some of them now for dinner; they're all great. Turkey Breast : I bought a small turkey breast (5 pounds) and tried the Alton Brown method of brining and starting it at a high temperature. I cut the brine recipe in half and soaked it in a large tupperware container in the fridge for a few hours in the morning. It also didn't get very brown due to the fact that after 20 minutes the pan broke. But it still turned out very tasty and juicy. I think the best thing that helped was using a meat thermometer. The turkey was at the right temperature much earlier than I had expected. Stuffing : This year I used Trader Joe's stuffing mix. It was pretty good, but a little dry for my taste. It also made a lot, which was fun for leftovers. Rolls: I used this recipe and they were very buttery and tasty. I made one batch as crescents and another as cloverleaf pullaparts in muffin tins. They baked faster than ...

One of the best ways to get out of a recipe rut is to borrow a cookbook from a friend or from the library. I've even bought a few that I discovered at the library. One of my latest finds is The Vegetarian Five-Ingredient Gourmet . I like this book because all the recipes are simple and involve easy to find, fresh ingredients. I don't like the fact that most of the salad recipes don't include any sort of dressing besides "use your favorite vinagrette", but they are still good. I really liked the menu suggestions throughout the book, since they give you good ideas for combining things. We enjoyed sweet-potato quesadillas, where you mash sweet potatoes and green chiles together, then spread it on the tortilla and top with jack cheese. They were delicious. I also really liked this recipe for black beans: Garlicky Black Beans 4 cloves garlic, finely minced or pressed 2 cans black beans, drained and rinsed Juice of one lemon 1/2 cup water Heat a small amount of olive o...

Since I seem to have nothing more significant to say, I will sing the praises of Trader Joe's again. Last week I spied these little ravioli on the shelf and thought they seemed like something the kids would like. I was right; they were the perfect size for S-Boogie to eat and she loved the idea of little noodles filled with cheese (half the eating battle is just getting her to try new things). Little Dude also loved the ravioli, and I even thought they were pretty good too. So that is your spiritual thought for Sunday; nurture your family by finding good, nutritious food that they'll actually eat. Then sit back, watch your children scarfing down their dinner, and congratulate yourself on being an excellent parent.

I have a few post ideas rolling around in my head, but decided that I'd go ahead and write up a few of my favorite meatless meal ideas in honor of Earth Day today. I mainly have become mostly meatless due to the fact that meat is expensive, but eating less meat is also a good way to help out the environment. Middle Eastern Rice and Lentils ( Vegetarian Times Complete Cookbook ) 1/2 medium onion, chopped 1 tbls . olive oil 1 cup brown rice (has to be brown) 1 tbls . tomato paste 2 1/2 cups water 1/4 tsp. cinnamon 1/4 cup lentils 1 tsp. salt 1/2 cup raisins 1/2 cup slivered almonds or pine nuts, toasted In a large saucepan, sautee the onion in the oil until it is soft (medium heat). Add the rice and cook and stir for a few minutes until it is toasted. Add the water, tomato paste, cinnamon, and lentils. Bring to a boil, then turn down heat, cover, and simmer for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Stir the salt, raisins, and nuts into the rice. It should still be a l...

One of the semi-infamous incidents from my childhood was the time my mother tried to feed us garbanzo bean casserole. We were actually pretty adventurous eaters as kids and ate a number of healthy, natural foods readily. But for some reason, the name "garbanzo beans" threw us off and we rebelled. Just the sound of the word "garbanzo" was enough to send us running away from the table in horror. Now that it's been about 20 years and I am a much more mature (ha) sort of person, I actually enjoy garbanzo beans, or chickpeas if you prefer a more sonorous name. They eat them in Spain in a variety of dishes, and I've even had them toasted and salted like peanuts. Tonight we ate one of our new favorite vegetarian recipes, curried chickpeas *, and as I watched S-Boogie eat her rice and garbanzos I realized that I can't ever eat them without thinking back to my first exposure to the dreaded word "garbanzo". So far, S-Boogie doesn't seem to share my a...