Birthday

So, I had a birthday yesterday. One of those scary ones. But it turned out to be a really nice day.
First, we planned to go to the SLC children's museum with some family but then there was snow in the canyon that morning. So Hubby called from work to say we wern't going and did I want him to come home. Duh. So he first went to the store to buy the supplies for my CAKE. It's pretty awesome and he makes it for me every year (except last as I wouldn't have enjoyed it mid-pregnancy).  Ok, it's really awesome and he deserves best huband award for the hours it takes to create. Don't worry, it takes me at least as long to eat it, out of respect and out of pure enjoyment, stretching it out over a few weeks to enjoy it amazingness.
We watched Cars2, then went to Indian Oven for dinner (another annual, minus last year, favorite). Baby J had spinach soup and loved the complementary rice crackers and was a good sport about being kept up pas bedtime. Back home to put the Bubs to bed and open presents. My parents game me too many and great gifts, as usual. And, my sister with mad-gift-giving skills guessed right on my fav Bath &Body Works flavor.

Hmmm. Once a year is just right for a birthday.

News of the Autum Flavor!

So here is a little hutch we picked up at an antique store in Spanish Fork last week. Soon it will be a lovely country blue stain. I think.

And these are the varieties of specimen that I have bottled so far this year Left to Right:Whole tomatoes, halved peaches, Roasted Tomato Soup, pickled chile peppers, tomato sauce with aromatics, pear puree, and roasted totato puree. (missing apple puree and apple slices)
Yum! And so grateful for my kinds neighbors/friends/and family for the Lord's bounty this year!

Our 25 Days of Christmas

To help us focus on Christ, and generally enjoy this holiday season, I've decided to do something everyday to help us celebrate. I will/have draw from many different traditions to do this so don't be surprised if there is something new or something you don't quite get. I'll try to post everyday, as a surprise to Ethan.

December 1-also the 1st day of Hanukkah (you'll see many Jewish-themed things (food at least).
I am baking a Challah (plural-Challot-that makes me laugh) to have with dinner. We'll read from the scriptures and other sources about bread, leavening, and the like afterwards. Half the loaf will be savory to go with eggs and bacon, and the other half will be frosted for dessert.
If you don't know the history of Hanukkah, I highly recommended finding a legitimate source to study from. It is a beautiful tradition and has quite a few similarities to our Latter-Day doctrine of Temples and the Second Coming. May we pray for that day and be found faithful to rejoice in it!

As I understand it, the menorah is a symbol of covenants (upside-down rainbow). The lights are the Light of God, and the tree shape symbolizes Eve, the mother of life, or Mary, mother of Jesus (as taught in 1st Nephi). Jews place these formerly temple-only decor piece in their windows to show that the temple (lost ages ago, yet restored outside of their faith later) stilll lives on inside each believer and their home. And that they count down the days (by lighting 1 candle a day) when the Lord may again abide inside and invite them to the temple once more.

Thanksgiving Offerings!

To psych myself up to get this stuff ready for Thanksgiving I'm posting our contribution to Thanksgiving 2010!

We will bemaking Corn Pie

Recipe here. E wasn't sure that everyone liked it when I made it 2 years ago, but it's a fav of mine so we're doing it anyway.

Veggie/Cracker Cheeseball Snacker Plate

But decorated like a Turkey of course. Any ideas what veggies to use for the face/feathers? Recipe here

Then I'm waffling between Spinach Strawberry Salad with Poppy seed-Red Wine Vinaigrette and Indian Pudding.

New Recipes!

I just posted
Fish Tostadas
and
Sheet Cake Brownies 
Check them out!

Mounds of Deliciousness

I LOVE anything chocolate and cinnamon. 

Recipe here.

Our Easter Weekend

Saturday was spent lounging around and (attentively) watching conference. What bliss. What truth.
Saturday evening I spent some time in the kitchen prepping some stuff for our Passover lunch that we planned to have with another couple and their new baby on Sunday. Oh, and while E was at priesthood, I visited an old mission buddy grilling her on the details of her upcoming wedding. SO EXCITING!
Sunday morning E helped me get things ready to go in the oven, offering his hand at washing and chopping potatoes, rolling out bread dough, and mixing up the sauce for the roast. He said he was surprised by how much work it was getting a little meal ready. ;-)
Well, the meal turned out very yummy and uplifting. After dessert some of us shared our testimony of Christ. I shared about my favorite Easter memory. On my mission I was asked to put the Easter program together for the branch sacrament meeting. I was terrified. Seeing my musical incompetence, the Lord truly blessed me with so many wonderful experiences at that time and we were able to pull it off. I also mentioned how much I love the idea of the Passover. With the blood of the Lamb on our doorways, death cannot enter in, evil cannot enter it. Yes, death will visit us all for a little season. But it will not stay, again, because of the blood of the Lamb. Do we need a symbol of some kind to place over our doorways so that the world will know of our faith? Of course not. We do not need a symbol because we have the true power of the Priesthood that makes out covenants and the Atonement real and efficacious in our lives.

Our Passover Meal: (Keep in mind that this was not a kosher meal, just a traditional one.)
London Broil Roast (from bakedbree.com/our modifications follow)
1 – 3.5 pound brisket (we used London Broil as it was cheaper)
3 onions sliced thin (2 onions)
3/4 cup chili sauce (should've halved this, it was SPICY)
1/4 cup ketchup
1 cup red wine (1 cup beef broth)
4 Tablespoons brown sugar
3 Tablespoons apple cider vinegar
3 cloves chopped garlic
1 teaspoon fresh thyme (omitted)
salt and pepper
Mix all of the sauce ingredients together. Season well. Pat the meat dry .Season with salt and pepper right before you sear it.  Crank up the heat in your pan and add a little oil.  It needs to be screaming hot before the beef goes in.  We are after a nice crispy crust on the outside of our brisket.

When both sides are seared put it in your roasting pan.
Pour the sauce all over the brisket.
Cover the brisket with the sliced onions.
Add a few sprigs of thyme and season with salt and pepper.
Cover with tin foil. Put the brisket in a 300 degree oven.  The time depends on how large your brisket is.  Mine was 3.5 pounds and it cooked for almost 3 hours.  Brisket should be fork tender.  If it is not fork tender, put it back in the oven until it is.(we cooked it for 2 hours and let it rest for 30 min-it was not very tender) Get on with the other parts of your meal.

Let it rest a bit before you cut it.  Slice on the bias against the grain.  This is very important.  If you cut with the grain, you will lost the texture of the brisket and it will be tough.(true dat)

Orange Jello
duh. And anyone who knows me well will attest that I am awful at making Jello. One recipe I found actually called for juice and gelatin, not a box of Jello. But we used a box.

Unleavened Bread (from tammysrecipes.com)

Yield: 

6 cookie sheets full

Ingredients: 

1/4 cup oil
1/4 cup honey
2 teaspoons salt
3 eggs
1 1/2 cups water
6 to 6 1/2 cups bread flour or all-purpose flour

Instructions: 

1. In a large mixing bowl, combine the oil, honey, salt, eggs, and water. Stir until well-mixed. Stir in about 4 cups of the flour, then add more flour as needed and knead into a fairly stiff dough.
2. Divide dough into 3 pieces. On a lightly floured surface, roll each piece into a large rectangle. You can make your matza as thin or as thick as you wish; we like ours rolled fairly thin.

3. Cut rolled dough into squares. Place squares onto lightly greased baking sheets. Prick with a fork. Sprinkle with salt if desired.
4. Bake in a preheated 375-degree oven. For thin matza, bake 10-11 minutes. For medium matza, 13-14 minutes. For thick matza, bake 15-20 minutes or until done. Matza should be very lightly browned on top. Over-baked matzah will be hard and not very good, so be careful to not bake too long!


Green Salad
My friend made it. It was good.

Roasted Veggies with Rosemary
We used about 3 pounds of red potatoes and 2 carrots. 1/2 cup of olive oil and 2 T of fresh rosemary. Seasoned well. Lined a cookie sheet with foil and they roasted with the meat at 300 degrees for 1 hour. Perfectly tender.

Macaroons (there are a million recipes for these. And it doesn't help that 2 distinctly different cookies have that name. I settled on a simple one and now I can't find it. Internet Cops: Please forgive me.) P.S. These we awesome. Next time I'll make a double batch.
7 oz sweetened coconut (1 small bag or 1/2 a large one)
1/2 cup sugar
3 egg whites
pinch of salt
Mix together and mound into tablespoon-sized balls and bake at 350 for 15 minutes.
I think next time I'll try unsweetened coconut and increase the sugar just a little. In my opinion, these cookies don't need to be really sweet to be good.

It was the general consensus around our table that the Jews used unleavened bread in remembrance of their flight out of Egypt. Oh, to have the kind of faith to flee from sin and follow the prophet in such haste that we wouldn't even allow our bread to rise! Reminds me of "Gazelle Intensity".
Thanks Jessie for the inspiration.

My hubby rocks!

Look what E did for me!! We had to mess up the house a little to be able to do it, but E put up some shelves in the "pantry" under the stairs for me! I love you honey!

All things in moderation . . .

. . . like chocolate. So here's my frugal kitchen tip of the day:
When I open up a bag of chcolate chips for chocolate chips cookies and other such necessities, I always dump in half the bag, grab a bag clip and toss it back on the shelf, Why? Oh, why would a chocolate enthusiast only use half a bag? Well, I never miss them, and I let the mixer go an extra minute to break up the pieces so they're more spread through. That's it.
P.S. Hershey's Special Dark Chips are the preferred bag around here.

Quick! Notice the "Baked Oven Fries" in my shared items up there under the banner? I'm making those. Like yum. Edit: it's farther down the list now, you'll have to to click "View All" to see it.

P.S. 2-I'm loving the new Michael McLean song "Hope Hiding There", #18 on the playlist at the bottom.

Blackberries for sell! No scratch that . . . for SALE!

Here I sit on my parents front porch attempting to sell blackberries. The sale at our local grocery store of choice is 1 cup of blackberries for $3.59. My father, helping me make some extra cash as well as unload a too large crop, has allowed me to try and sell them at $3 per cup.
Wish I could take a picture, as I usually forebear the reading of posts sans pics, but alas, I have no camera, nor the patience to retrieve it, snap, and upload said photo.
So, if your you're in the area, please stop bu for a chat.
(The following photos are from a Google search meant to entice buyers to come and partake of this smokin' deal.)

$5 a stinkin' cup??? I told you it was a smokin' deal!!
Yes, it would be apropo for me to include a few recipes for such decadent, plump, juicy-sweet delectables. But then again, if you know me and fruit, it would be completely out of the question. Case dismissed.
P.S. I love that above the roar of SUVs, trucks, and consturuction you can still here the clip clop of horses hooves tramping through this little town.

Kitchen Tip: "cutting in butter"

Here's a tip for when you need to "cut in" butter for pastries or biscuits.
Praticing Mise en place, put the butter in the freezer at least 10 min before you need it.

When ready, grate the butter right into your flour mixture (if possible), then give it a quick stir with a fork to "cut" it in.

To see the recipe I use this in go to 61st Ward Wives.

New Kitchen Stuff!

Ethan bought me 2 new kitchen gadgets for my new kitchen.
The first is this bowl. I LOVE it. It never gets a chance to dry because I'm always using it. The Isi bowl is made of silicone so it's flexible enough to pour and has measurement markings on the inside.I LOVE to use kosher salt when I cook, so Eth got me a salt pig with a lid and shaker in the back. They're both so cute and white to match.