Monday, January 25, 2010

Spinach Artichoke Mac N Cheese

Spin-Art-Mac-N-Cheese

I must have missed the airing of this recipe. I MUST MAKE IT!! I bet Justin will LOVE it.

Maybe next week since I've already purchased my groceries this week.

I still haven't found a recipe for this week yet. I might just have to make one up.

Friday, January 22, 2010

Julie and Julia

Side note from my previous post...

I've been thinking about this a lot and I am just not happy with the way that movie ends. It's so abrupt. I think the length of the movie was fine, but maybe they should have left out what Julia thought about the blog. Or explained it a little more a little earlier in the movie, not in the last 10 minutes.

I'd have to drop my rating of this movie down a smidgen because the movie doesn't really end, it just stops.

Harry Potter Update

So, everyone else I know is on their 3rd or 4th book this month already..and I think Kate is on her 5th! Crazy people. Anyway, since I'm still on Order of Phoenix I'm starting to feel like a loser. I've bumped knitting and cooking down a notch so I can get the ball rolling on my reading! I've still got 321 pages left I'm positive that I can get it all read very soon. I've only been reading about 2 chapters at a time though which makes for very slow reading, which I have previously discussed.

So, where I'm at in the book.

Snape just gave Harry his first Occlumency lesson.

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Martha Stewart Christmas Gift Ideas

Here are a bunch of pages from Martha Stewart of things I will consider making for family and friends this year.

Bath Fizzies
Baker's Apron
Patterned Sachets
Neck Scarf
Jade Beaded Necklace

Bella's mittens

Claire's Christmas present.

Monday, January 18, 2010

Beef Stroganoff




The stroganoff was yummy! I would suggest adding more sour cream and some water, possibly milk instead of water. It also seemed like there was an herb missing, dill maybe? I'm not sure. The tarragon was good though. This paired excellently with steam broccoli with butter and s&p.

To finish things off I made my first ever Angel Food Cake and topped it with whipped cream and blueberries, delicious! Claire wanted me to post this picture of her enjoying the cake.

This week was much better than last! Now its time to go rest because my stomach hurts from the pre-dinner crudite. What a wonderful day for food!

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Bad week

I destroyed the chicken hot pot. I'm not entirely sure what happened, all I know is that it was so disgusting that I threw away all traces of food that was anywhere near the pot. The seasonings were a little wonky.

My stuffing was also a catastrophe. :*( It was a bad day for cooking. I was watching some cooking show a while back and they said to save all your left over bread in the freezer and use it for stuffing/dressing(whatever you want to call it). So I've been stock piling it up and I had almost a whole loaf and decided it was time to try it out. It was all mush and extremely gross. I will only be using fresh stale bread from now on. (I love that oxy-moron).

I just watched Julie and Julia tonight and loved it so much. Boeuf Bourguignon may be on the menu soon! Even though it wouldn't be a new recipe for me.

As far as my reading is going, I pretty much haven't read anything all week. I've been busy relaxing. You would think I would have read more this week since Justin has been working all nights but, no such luck. Sometimes its nice for a little break.

I think I will be making Beef Stroganoff this week because I've only tried to make this once and it was a really weird recipe which I inevitably threw away. Plus, I have never cooked with tarragon and am excited to!

Thursday, January 14, 2010

Quilt idea



This is an idea I had while thinking up stuff for Violet's quilt. I dont think I will be making this though because its not exactly what I had in mind. I need to redo the math. But its pretty neat. I will save it.

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

quilt

I started planning today. Now if only I had some cash laying around here somewhere. I think I'm going to go with a girly english countryside look. But, that might change tomorrow. I'm trying my hardest go avoid any pattern that is too traditional so I think I will just continue researching quilting methods and create my own design. I will be much happier in the end.


That's all for now. carry on.

Chicken Thighs

So, I bought a 5lb thing of fresh chicken thighs yesterday for $5! I couldn't resist buying it. Thank you Super Walmart!

Anyway, now I have a crap load of chicken thighs. So, I found this hot pot recipe. I think I can alter it to fit my needs.

Instead of breasts I will use thighs, duh, instead of parsnips I will use potatoes and I will omit the cabbage altogether. I am currently lacking some chicken stock to make gravy so I think I will boil the thighs to create my own and then fry them lightly so as to get that yummy crispy crust and go from there. Other modifications will need to be made but I will post that when all is said and done.

Sunday, January 10, 2010

My Sloppy Joes

Sloppy Joe recipes, though easy to come by, aren't really made to my liking. So, I found the closest recipe and altered it a smite. I used the Rachael Ray recipe previously posted and changed it to my liking. Here goes!

2lbs Ground Beef
1 Medium Onion
1 Clove Garlic

2T Tomato Paste
1T Red Wine Vinegar
1T Worcestershire
1/3 C Brown Sugar
2T BBQ Seasoning
2 8oz Cans Tomato Sauce


I decided to use my crock pot(on high) for this and first added a dash of olive oil to the pot, onion, garlic and beef with a little S&P(stirring and breaking up the meat occasionally) . I let this brown up almost all the way before adding the rest of the ingredients in this order. Tomato paste(let cook for a minute and mix in well), red wine vinegar(I stirred up the pot really good and got all the bits off the side and down into the sauce.), worcestershire, brown sugar, bbq seasoning, & tomato sauce. I let this continue to cook on high for an hour or so and then dropped the temp down to low for the remaining 3 hours-ish.

Time to cook - 4.5 hours.

Not to boast "more than any person in the world" but, this is by far the best sloppy joe recipe I've ever had. I was extremely impressed with it.

Thursday, January 7, 2010

Slow going...

I've decided that since I'm rereading Harry Potter and am likely to never pick it up again that I will read it slowly and absorb everything I can. I must say that I am thoroughly enjoying it. I've only been reading a couple chapters at a time and sometimes I catch myself rereading sentences and taking time to just soak in pages. I've never read this slowly and I feel like I'm getting more out of it. I normally read very quick and get it over with as fast as I can so I can move along to something else. I'm not sure if I could do this with a book for the first read through. I like that I've read all these books at least once, some of them a few times and I know what is going on. It gives me time to piece things together slowly and methodically.

I highly recommend reading all books twice for this reason. I think I will read Deathly Hallows twice in a row when I get there. So far I'm only 1/4 of the way through Order of Phoenix. I just finished the chapter where they finally get back to school and start their first day. Umbridge just gave Harry detention for calling her a liar.

Sloppy Joes

So, I've never made sloppy joes from scratch and have decided its about time. I am currently looking everywhere I can for recipes...I have cook books galore and cant find anything that sounds good. I'll get back to you when I find one.

Here is one idea. Sloppy Joes

Monday, January 4, 2010

woopsie...


Time for a do-over. This is the same yarn, different skeins, same needles and same tension. And this is also why I shouldn't have used homespun because it varies in thickness. Ug, ok..so I will make a third mitten and hope that it matches the 2nd(on the right) in thickness.

Anyone need 1 mitten?

Fiesta Mittens


Well, here is a picture of my first ever grown up sized mitten. I made the thumb too small but will make it bigger. This is a great beginner project for DPN's.

Pattern is from Ravelry.com Cinchy Chunky Mittens. (The previous pattern was for people with HUGE wrists. Since my wrists are not even 6" around, they didn't work.)

Sunday, January 3, 2010

The Order of the Phoenix



Alright, I finally started Order of the Phoenix last night. I was too tired to get very far though. I really need to read during the day so I can fly through this. Night reading is SO slow for me. I forgot how much Fudge annoys the piss out of me in the end of Goblet of Fire since he refuses to believe that Voldemort is back. But, its just a book I need to chill.