Good Eats

As much as I hate to admit it, Hazel is kind of a picky eater. We offer her a variety of different foods and most of the time she'll try it, then decide it's not what she wants and she'll throw it off her tray. She will also like a food one day and the next day think it's gross!

Some of the foods she likes right now are beans, eggs, almond butter, cheese, cottage cheese, toast, oatmeal, broccoli, cooked carrots, oranges, apples and sometimes grapes.

So, when she showed interest in his sandwich Owen gave her bits from it, and she demanded the whole thing! She started taking bites from it, it was entertaining to watch! I just wish she was more predictable on what she will eat!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Life's short, eat dessert first!

Hazel got into the apple pie before dinner. At first she was unsure about it, but then decided it was really tastey. Then I jumped in and did something I never do, 1)eat dessert before Thanksgiving dinner and 2) eat apple pie. Yeah, I'm more of a cookies and chocolates type person, not a pie person.  It was fun sharing that moment with her and I'm glad we got it on camera:)

Random Sunday Stuff

I was so tired that I ended up falling asleep around 8:30 last night and did not get around to blogging! Eeps! So, today there'll be two blogs :)

Owen and I went to see the new Harry Potter movie with some of my friends. It was actually a day for the books, because it is rare when the 4 of us and our significant others are in the same room together. I really enjoyed the movie. I remembered more of the book than I thought I would, since I read it over 3 years ago.




My favorite part of the movie was at the beginning when they were transporting Harry to the Weasley's house. It reminded me of a scene in the movie Garden State when Sam tells Andrew that "Sidecars are for Bitches" so that must mean that Harry is Hagrid's bitch, awesome!

We found a brand new fro-yo shop that opened near our house! I've been saying for months now that we needed one out here and now we have one! It's called Yogurt Munch. We shared a small sized fro yo. I was in charge of picking everything out, and I went with the Peanut butter-chocolate swirl, and the vanilla-pumpkin pie swirl yogurts. For toppings I added fresh fruit, m&ms, these strange gummy things that had liquid centers and chocolate sauce. Yeah, tasted a little weird. Owen didn't seem to notice, probably because it's exactly what he would have picked out. I think next time I would not do as many toppings like that together.

After reviewing the website, we found a few interesting flavors and toppings:


(click to embiggen)

Butternut Squash Soup

I know exactly when I became an adult, it was 2 Christmases ago when Owen gave me the Deceptively Delicious cookbook. It has recipes that hides purees of different vegetables in your food. Before this time I never liked squash. period. blech, eww, gross. Well, after I tried a recipe using pureed butternut and actually trying the roasted butternut plain, I decided it wasn't that bad after all. This led to discovering other foods I *thought* I didn't like (beets, zucchini), however, I still can't get into eggplant and tomatoes. Anyway I was pondering something Owen's mom told him when he was little and didn't want to eat squash for dinner, she said, "you'll like it when you're a grown up" (he didn't have to eat the squash, but then he wouldn't get dessert). Well, apparently I'm a grown up, because I like squash :)

So, I had a butternut squash that I wanted to make soup with last week, and I was trolling the Smitten Kitchen, because i knew she would have one. And voila, she did! winter squash soup with gruyere croutons. It sounded delicious, but had a lot of butter and made way more soup than I had intended to make. Also, I used our blendtec blender instead of making it on the stove, so it only took 20 minutes to make this and used hardly any dishes.

Here's my take on it, makes enough for 2-3 people.


Blend together:
1/2 a roasted butternut squash
1/2 onion and 4 garlic cloves sauteed with olive oil, salt & pepper
5 sage leaves
1 vegetable boullion cube
1.5 cups hot water
a couple dashes of cumin
some freshly grated nutmeg
some freshly ground pepper

Taste this and adjust seasonings to your taste.

Croutons:
1/2 of a small baguette
butter (I use Brummel and Brown yogurt butter)
5 sage leaves minced
Cambozola Cheese (a blue brie)

I cut the baguette into 1" rounds and buttered one side. I put them on a small cookie sheet and put them in the toaster oven until they were golden on the edges. Flip them over and spread the cheese on it and sprinkle the sage leaves. Put that back in the toaster oven until the cheese is melty.

Pumpkin Potluck Party

Last month Tami sent me a link on Facebook to a recipe for Pumpkin Spice Lattes that you make in a crock pot. Here it is. It looked like a good recipe, but I didn't have any occasion to make 12 cups of lattes. I was talking to Shelia about it at knit night and she said if I made the lattes she would bring pumpkin cookies. Then Tami chimed in that she would make pie and Angela said she would make pumpkin fudge and before we knew it, we had the makings of an awesome pumpkin pot luck party. Since Whole Foods requested we do not bring outside food in for knit night, we decided to have it at the grange during our Wednesday spinning group.

So, today was the party! I have to say it was a success. There was soup, breads, pies, cookies, chips and salsa, whip cream and rum for the lattes, and I also brought some home made goat cheese with crackers. It was quite a feast!

I think this worked so well, we should do a similar pot luck around Christmas time!!

--------
Here's how I made the lattes

I brewed Starbucks Verona coffee espresso strength (1 cup of coffee to 4 cups of water), but I only used 3 cups of coffee in the mixture.
8 cups whole milk
Most of the can of TJ's Organic Pumpkin
1/2 cup of brown sugar
2 T of Vanilla
1.5 T of Pumpkin Pie Spice
optional - a shot of Rum for an extra kick

Put all of the ingredients into your crock pot, taste it to make sure you like the flavor or adjust the amounts to get a flavor you like. Then set your crock pot on Hi for 3 hours. My crock pot doesn't seem to get very hot, so I cook everything on Hi. Yours may vary and you might be ok with Low for 3 hours. Also, I assembled it all the night before so the flavors had time to develop. In the morning I turned the crock pot on and let it heat up.

Happy Birthday to me!

I had the most wonderful Birthday weekend!

It started on Thursday. My mom came up after work and babysat Hazel for the evening, so Owen and I could go to dinner! We went to the Melting Pot, my most favorite restaurant. When they seated us at our table, the gave me a birthday card and there were roses from Owen already on the table. We had a lovely California salad, Wisonconsin cheese trio fondue and a flaming dark turtle dessert fondue. With dessert they brought out a little plate that had my name written in chocolate, I thought that was a nice touch. I indulged and got a cocktail, it was so yummy, it didn't taste like alcohol (the kind of drink I like), it was a "Love Martini" (Love at first sip! Malibu rum, peach schnapps, cranberry juice and fresh strawberries). After all that we still had a little time before we had to be home, so we went to Voodoo. I ordered my first voodoo doll and it had a unicorn on it! How did they know???? It was delicious for the eyes and tummy!

On Friday the 24th (my real bday) I woke up and had to get over to the chiropracter. Owen and I were in a small car accident that left the front of the car slightly damaged and my back in a little bit of pain from the impact. So after being adjusted I went to my Friday knitting group to knit and chat! Hazel and Owen showed up after an hour or so and we had lunch, then they went back home and I knitted some more! After Hazel's afternoon nap the three of us went out to dinner to La Hacienda (my favorite Mexican restaurant). We next went to the mall to buy Hazel new shoes and we went to build a bear. Hazel picked out the pink bear and I picked out the outfit. It's name is "rainbow bear", yeah, original I know :) They had a balloon guy out front and he made me a turtle :) Hazel spent some time playing in the play area while we watched from the side.

On Saturday I was up early for Oregon Flock and Fiber! That will be a separate post, with pix later (when I get more time to write), but Owen and Hazel showed up in the afternoon and we had a yummy sheep cake (not sheet cake) that Owen and I made so that I could celebrate with my knitting friends!

On Sunday was OFFF again and I had dinner at Red Robin with my friends from college! It was fun seeing them, but it went so fast, so I don't feel like we got to talk too much :( Hazel loved it because my mom was there doting on her. Outside she showed me the flower she would pick for me if I'd let her.

I am pretty tired from that long weekend and all the celebrating! I will post more pix soon :)

Cuban Sloppy Joes and Mojito Mashed Sweet Potatoes

Rachael Ray always inspires me with her meals. Most of them are not vegetarian, but they can easily be modified. Here is my version of her Cuban dinner, serves two (plus some left overs). It is pretty garlicy and oniony, so don't make this if you plan to be around a lot of people. Oh and it is normal if your eyes tear up from the onions while eating this meal.

Ropa Vieja Joses

Mojo Sauce:
4 cloves garlic
1 small onion
1 T Cumin
1 Lemon (zested and juiced)
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup olive oil
Dash of salt

Pulse it a few times in a food processor, do not puree.

Sloppy Joes:
2/3 the mojo sauce
1 bag of Boca meatless ground crumbles
1T paprika
1T Cumin
A1 sauce to taste
Cholula sauce to taste
1 small can of no salt added tomato sauce
1 small can sliced black olives, chopped up
4 slices of zesty dill pickle
small amount of cheddar cheese
2 hoagie rolls
optional - one bag of plantain chips

On med-hi heat, cook the mojo sauce for a few minutes to take the edge off of the raw onions (no oil needed in the pan). Pour in the Boca crumbles and olives. It only takes a few minutes to cook these, so don't walk away from the stove. Then add in spices and sauces and tomato sauce. Taste it and adjust the seasonings to suit your taste. When it's hot, it's done!

Prepare your hoagie rolls by cutting them in half and hollowing them out, then toast in a toaster oven. When toasted, put the cheese in the bottom well and top with the sloppy joe mixture. Put the dill pickle slices on top.

Mojito Mashed Sweet Potatoes

1 large sweet potato (I buy the ones marked yams and they are bright orange under the skin)
2 limes, zested and juiced
1 pat of butter
2 sprigs of mint leaves, chopped

Peel and chop the sweet potato, boil until tender, hint: the thinner the slices the faster it cooks. Drain and place back onto burner, add butter, lime juice and zest. Mash with a masher. Just before serving add the mint leaves and stir them in.

When you've got it all on your plate a nice side to this is plantain chips topped with the reserved mojo (pronounced mo-ho) sauce.

Eat and enjoy!

Whole Bowl

One of our favorite Portland food carts is The Whole Bowl (WB), we like the one on 11th & NW Glisan. I discovered WB on Stumptown Vegans and Owen went to check it out, then he raved about it so much, I had to go check it out too! There were a times when I would go downtown a couple days in a row just to get a WB fix! Then there would be times when I would crave WB, but they were closed, so, we started to make it ourselves! Our version is similar to WB, but is obviously not quite the same since we don't know the actual ingredients of the Tali Sauce (which is what makes WB so great!), but it is much cheaper to make it at home.

Our version of Whole Bowl (for 2 people):

1 bag of Trader Joes microwave Organic Brown Rice
1 can of beans, drained (we like black or white)
Tali Sauce (see below)
grated cheddar cheese
1 small can of sliced olives, drained
bunch of green onions (use white and green parts), chopped
La Victoria medium red taco sauce
plain non-fat yogurt or sour cream
1 avocado, sliced or cubed
cilantro
Sunflower seeds (optional)

Our Tali Sauce:
equal parts of at least 2 Tablespoons:
Olive Oil
Lemon Juice (we use the Minute Maid found in the frozen section)
French's Yellow Mustard
1 clove of garlic (we use a garlic press)
Black Pepper, to taste


Here is how we put it all together.

I use one bowl and mix up the tali sauce, then I add the microwaved brown rice and stir until coated. Portion out half of the rice into a 2nd bowl, then add microwaved beans between the two bowls. Grate cheese over this bean/rice mixture so that it can melt. Then top your bowls with the olives and green onions, add some red taco sauce, sliced avocado, a dollup of the yogurt (or sour cream) and sprinkle the cilantro on top. You may also add the sunflower seads for crunch!

Eat it with a spoon and enjoy!

Happy Birthday Owen!

A low-key bday for Owen this year. We had a fondue dinner on Friday night! Saturday, his actual bday, after he took Hazel to Gymboree (while I was at a spin-in) we had lunch with my mom at Red Robin. After lunch she baby snatched Hazel and the two of us went to see the new A Christmas Carol movie. I liked this version. Of course, I think it is probably scary for smaller children, and I'm surprised that Disney would make it scary! But, it is my favorite Christmas story so I was expecting it to be creepy. The animation was so realistic, I forgot that it was animation some times.

For his present, he got this Blendtec blender. Tonight we made Tortilla Soup


It was the smoothest soup I've ever had! A little too much jalepeno though, but it was only 2 servings and we have enough ingredients for a couple more soups. At least they will be fresh each time:)


I also promised to make him a hat and I proposed a few I thought he would like, but he found this one online all by himself - Habitat by Jared Flood. Of course, it would have a million cables. Did I mention the yarn is a charcoal gray (almost black). Yes, I love him that much :)

In-n-Out

Last in n out of the year

Gingerbread latte

First gingerbread latte of the season. and It's 91 degrees outside!

Grilled cheese and a chocolate shake

Newman's Own

Has anyone read the back of their salad dressing lately???

Burrito Boy Mini Tacos

When Owen and I were poor college students in Corvallis and poor just out of college adults, we would frequent this place called Burrito Boy. They had the best cheap Mexican food that was not sketchy and the place was clean. Then they switched ownership and became Andele Burrito, they were still good, but when the original owners sold it, the place was never the same. So, Owen and I figured out how to make our favorite dish - the mini tacos. Still don't know how they did the wet burritos or their chips and salsa though.

Burrito Boy Mini Tacos for two:

12 Don Poncho 4" Lonchera corn taco shells (not sure if they are sold everywhere, but these are smaller than the taco size)
1/2 can of Rosarita refried beans heated up (we get the green chile & lime)
1/4 bunch cilantro
1/4 white onion, finely chopped
grated cheddar cheese
taco sauce
roasted unsalted sunflower seeds (optional)

Steam the taco shells for 1 min 30 secs in the microwave with a damp paper towel over them.
Arrange the shells on your plate and put all the toppings on.
Enjoy!

Dinner Harvest

Our garden provided us with this scrumptious meal tonight! It spent all summer growing for us.



Roasted carrots, parsnips and onion with sage.


Roasted purple potatoes with rosemary


This carrot wanted to be different.

California

We went down to So. Cal last weekend to have a mini family reunion, but also to clear out my grandparent's house. My grandfather died in January and my grandmother was moved into an adult foster home (because she has dimentia and no one in the family could give her the care she needs). They had sooooooooooo much stuff that was just junk that we got rid of. I'm sure they wouldn't have wanted us to deal with their stuff, but that's how life is. It made me realize that some day I will have 2 houses to do that to since my parents are no longer together. Also, Hazel will have to do this some day as well! Made me take a look at all the stuff we have in a different light. Just to let you know, however, there will be no yarn destashing any time soon! I ended up shipping home the items that I took (a set of Christmas china and a porcelain doll - pictures when they arrive :) )

We were there for 5 days, but it felt like 3 weeks. Each day was very long and very tiring. I did get to meet up with a few of my friends that live in the area and so that made the trip not as sad as it could have been. I held up really well considering all the crying that my mom and aunts were doing.

Hazel was such a good baby on both of her flights - I worried for nothing about her having a melt down. I am so proud of her :) I did do some research on traveling with babies so I got some good tips. The best one was taking along a "mini" diaper bag that had: two diapers, a disposable changing pad, a few wipes, purel and a onesie in case of an accident. It worked great on the plane so we did not have to get out of our seats to change a wet diaper during the flight :) Our airport has a special family security lane and I didn't have to worry about making the people behind us annoyed at us because we had so much stuff going through security and taking a little longer to get it on the x-ray belt. Oh, and we proved to ourselves that we can indeed travel with 2 carry on suitcases, a diaper bag, a stroller and a car seat. It did help that we had access to a washing machine, otherwise it would have been a little more difficult.

a few photos:

On the train headed to the airport. Hazel loved looking at the bridges over the Willamette!


The family line I was talking about


She got to meet her great grandmother. It was very sweet seeing them interact with each other!


Finally got that Italian Margarita from Olive Garden. The last time I was there I was still pregnant and couldn't have one!


Art-O-Mat. It's an art vending machine, it was also addicting, because I didn't know what I was getting.

Rahel's Ethiopian restaurant in L.A. Very tasty!!

Owen's balancing act with the hotel breakfast.

Jimmy Jack Corn

And I don't care

Coconut M&M's

Coconut m&ms they taste like almond joy without the almonds

Lalibela

Baby loves Ethiopian food

random photo