You MUST try this!!!

And I mean MUST!!!!

I found this recipe a little over a month ago and I have made it three times since and my sisters have also tried it. We all LOVE it!

It is called Balsamic Chicken Noodle bowl. You can find the recipe here. It's pretty simple and super delicious.

I'm going to go for now - someone has to fold the laundry, sweep up the graham cracker crumbs under the table and taste test the peanut butter-oatmeal chocolate chip cookies I made earlier.

Oh wait, I already did that last one...and they were goooooood!

The bread

Grandma's Pumpkin Bread

2 c. sugar
1 c. oil
3 eggs
2 c. pumpkin
3 c. flour
1/2 t. salt
1/2 t. baking powder
1 t. baking soda
1 t. cloves
1 t. cinnamon
1 t. nutmeg


Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease 3 loaf pans. Beat sugar and oil with mixer until blended. Add eggs. Beat until light and fluffy. Then beat in pumpkin.

Sift together flour, salt, baking powder, soda, cloves, cinnamon and nutmeg. Then with mixer at low speed beat flour mixture into pumpkin mixture.

Pour into pans. Bake 60 min. Cool in pans for 10 min. before removing to wire rack.

*The original recipe calls for the pan size to be 7 1/2 x 3 1/2. I used two pans that were 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 and then I made 6 muffins. The bake time on the muffins was about 26 minutes.

As an avid cream cheese LOVER...

I find it extremely important to share this recipe with you.

PUMPKIN Cream Cheese - that's right, perfect for my favorite time of year, this is easy and delicious.

Here's what you need:

1 8 oz. block of cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup of canned pumpkin puree
1 1/2 t. cinnamon
1/4 t. ground ginger
1/8 t. ground nutmeg
1/8 t. ground cloves
1 t. vanilla
4 T. brown sugar

Beat together until smooth. Refrigerate.

We enjoyed this on a bagel and it was also wonderful spread on a graham cracker.

Simply UNBELIEVEABLE Cookies

I have a recipe that I must share. I have been on a quest to find a chocolate chip cookie that will satisfy everyone in our house (read: Jeremy). I have been unsuccessful, they get too thin or flat or whatever. Mind you a chocolate chip cookie is a chocolate chip cookie to me, but not too everyone.

We were recently camping and a friend had brought the perfect cookies. So I found a recipe that contained the important ingredient (a box of pudding mix!) and have since scored in the cookie making department.

The basic recipe is this:

2 1/4 c. flour
1 t. baking soda
3/4 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. butter, softened
1/2 c. shortening
1/4 c. sugar
1 pkg. (3.4 oz.) vanilla pudding mix
1 t. vanilla extract
1/8 t. almond extract
2 eggs
1 pkg. chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine flour and baking soda, set aside.

In a large bowl, beat sugars, butter, shortening, pudding and extracts. Add eggs, mix well. Beat in flour mixture.

Stir in chocolate chips. Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls onto cookie sheet.

Bake for 10-12 minutes.

SUPER SIMPLE and so versatile! You can combine different pudding flavors with different chips and have a completely different cookie. At this moment, I am making some with pumpkin spice pudding mix and chocolate chips. This cookie turns out soft and definitely not thin OR flat. You will LOVE it!

A day in the kitchen

Yesterday, I was busy in the kitchen. I hadn't baked bread in a while and I was eager to try a new recipe that Meg had loved. The honey oatmeal bread pictured above is absolutely fabulous.

And then I was trying to imagine up something for dinner. I decided to make calzones. They were pretty easy and extremely yummy! This is how I made them:

The dough:

1 pkg. yeast
1 T. sugar
2 T. oil
1 t. salt
2 3/4 c. flour

1. Dissolve yeast in 1 cup of warm water.
2. In another bowl, mix sugar, oil, salt and flour. Add to yeast and water.
3. Mix together until smooth.
4. Knead dough on a floured surface, about 10 min.
5. Cover and let rest for 30 min.

The filling:

Whatever pizza toppings you like!
Shredded Cheese
Garlic Powder
Italian Seasoning

Ahh, the beauty of choice...I made one with pepperoni and cheese and one with pepperoni, mushroom, red pepper, black olive and cheese. You have room to be creative here.

Putting it all together:

1. After dough is finished 'resting', divide it in half.
2. Roll each piece into a 10 in. circle.
3. On half of the circle, put all of your toppings - leave an edge to seal the two sides together.
4. Put shredded cheese on the toppings and then sprinkle with garlic powder and italian seasoning.
5. Fold over and pinch together to seal edges.
6. Put on a cookie sheet or baking stone (my baking stone worked really well)
7. Bake at 375 degrees for 15 min.
8. Melt 1 T. of butter, stir in some garlic powder, brush on top of calzones.
9. Return to oven for 10-15 min. more.
10. Serve with pizza sauce for dipping.

Pepperoni and cheese

Pepperoni, mushroom, red pepper, black olives and cheese





Yesterday, little Zoe girl got her first tooth. A baby milestone. And you really wouldn't have known without feeling her gums because she didn't put up too much of a fuss about it.
Happy days!

An extremely glamorous job

That's mine.

Well, after this past week of all of the kids having a pretty nasty cold. I have definitely earned the title of #1 nose wiper. If it wasn't one that needed to be wiped, it was another. I am glad that week is over.

I definitely won't miss the crankiest kids I've had in a while.

I will miss the fact that, if only for a few days, sweet little Judah just wanted to be held.

They are all feeling better and almost back to their normal selves and for that I am very grateful.

We had planned to have Judah's 2nd birthday party last Saturday, but we had to postpone it because he didn't feel well. I had already bought the avocados to make guacamole for the party, so I had to make it on Sunday night for supper. It was great as always and so were these chimichangas that I made to go with it.

This is it!

I believe that I have to come to the end of my search...for the perfect granola bar recipe.

Last Friday I stumbled across this site: www.makeandtakes.com. Here you will find all sorts of sweet, little crafty things that are wonderful for kids to make.

The recipe for chewy granola bars caught my eye. Over the past couple of weeks, I have tried to make a few different granola bars and none of them were quite right...until now - this one is totally fantastic! It's not too hard or too crumbly, it holds together beautifully and is just, well, darn near perfect. I have made them twice since finding the recipe and may have to make it again this week because these bars are LOVED here at our house.

Chocolate lovers this is for YOU!

Last Saturday night, we had some friends over and I made dessert. The recipe that I chose was called extreme chocolate brownies. I made them and decided to go all the way and top them with chocolate buttercream frosting.

Let me tell you...extreme is in no way an understatement. A restaurant would probably call this death by chocolate or something. The intensity of this chocolate delight could be due to the 2 bags of chocolate chips that you use to make it with. These brownies are definitely intense and oh so delicious.

I assure you, if you need a REAL chocolate fix, take the time to whip these up. You won't be disappointed!

What are we going to eat today?

This past weekend we stayed home, out of necessity not choice...like Hosanna told her Aunt Emily, "Our cars are broke, we need a new van." We are experiencing car issues and dealing with those the best we know how. Meanwhile, we haven't gone far, so it gives me plenty of time to spend in the kitchen. I know that having a 'plan' for meals isn't always easy, so I want to share with you a few ideas from our 'menu' this past weekend.

Saturday

Saturday evening for dinner, we enjoyed Crockpot Sausage and Potato Soup. This turned out pretty well and there wasn't a lot of effort involved thanks to the good ole crockpot. I even had time to make some rolls to go along with the soup.

Sunday

Sunday's breakfast was exceptional - blueberry pancakes, absolutely phenomenal if you ask me. This was a first for me, actually making pancakes from scratch - I was very pleased with the results. Judah enjoyed the leftovers for breakfast this morning, it is funny to hear him say pancakes.

For lunch, we had leftover soup.

Supper included two of our faves - nachos and guacamole. To me, nachos are taco meat and whatever other fixin's you have to pile on tortilla chips.

Guacamole is simple to make, here's what I do:
Peel and dice 2 avocados. Place them in a bowl and mash them. Chop 2 roma tomatoes and as much onion as you like. Add to avocados, then add a clove of finely chopped garlic, a finely chopped jalepeno (seeds removed) and some chopped cilantro. Lastly, add the juice of one lime and salt to taste. Stir everything together and enjoy. This doesn't last long at our house!

I made dessert - chocolate chip cookie pie - to celebrate the return of 24, welcome back Jack Bauer!

Monday

While Judah enjoyed his pancakes, Jeremy and I had granola for breakfast. Jeremy likes his with fruit and yogurt and I had mine with milk. Making your own granola is very budget friendly, I made a batch from staple items that I already had - at the store, you would probably pay about $12 or so for the same amount of pre-made granola. It is easy to make and store and the kids like it too.

Lunch was turkey sandwiches and salad.

You can never have enough ways to make chicken, that said, for supper I made a wonderful garlic chicken that I really love and is quite simple to make. I have never made sweet potato oven fries...until tonight. They were absolutely delicious. I saw Rachael Ray make them on her show the other day and I thought I might give them a try. All you do is cut the sweet potatoes into wedges, toss them with olive oil and salt and bake them on a baking sheet. Roasting them gives them a whole new taste. The chicken and sweet potatoes were accompanied by corn and rolls.


Looking for new ideas on a weekly basis is what I constantly find myself doing. WHAT ARE WE GOING TO EAT TODAY? is always the big question in the mind of a mother. I am over being unprepared as to what to feed my family. I will continue to share ideas that have worked for us to help you prepare yourself to answer that big question.

the latest craze

A couple of weeks ago, my sister, Megan, started talking to me about baking bread. So I went on my favorite site, recipezaar, to look into some recipes and I have been 'experimenting' ever since. This morning I was in the kitchen working on some wheat bread, which I was kneading it by hand (which is a great core workout!). Lately I have been reminded how rewarding it is to MAKE something in the kitchen that didn't come from a box and my family has enjoyed the fresh baked bread.

While I was working on the bread, the kids were busy in the sink. Water play is the latest craze at our house. Judah can't get enough of it. He will stand there on the chair, at the sink, in the kitchen until you MAKE him stop and get down. And that isn't an easy task either. To him, water play ranks up there right after spending time outside and before eating...yep, you read right...before eating! Filling, pouring and dumping, filling pouring and dumping...it's amazing to watch a toddler do a simple task over and over and over. The repetition of a small task like that is crucial to his development. And this morning it was all fun and games until something got broken, like one of my cereal bowls!

Hosanna joined him at the sink today. Her craze for the past few months has been wearing a dress all of the time, usually a summer dress. That is what she lives for, she claims that she can't be a 'princess' without a dress (thank you, disney movies!). Surprisingly, she stays pretty warm and doesn't fight too much when she actually has to wear clothes to leave the house.

Jere's latest craze is drinking pop from a glass bottle, you know, the IBC rootbeer or cream soda. Everytime I go to the store that is what he asks me to get for him. It's a throwback to his childhood when he used to ride around town (a VERY small town) on his bike and get Dr. Pepper in a glass bottle from the pop machine outside the grocery store. Back when it only cost like 25 cents, those were the days!

Lately, Zoe has been spitting bubbles and making a buzz sound while doing it. She can't stop smiling either, she is SO stinking happy most all of the time.

For all of us, our crazes usually change, if they don't then it becomes a hobby. As we go through life, there are certain things that we enjoy more than others, for the kids hopefully, its just ages and stages - all a part of the learning process. The bread, by the way, turned out well. Here's the recipe: traditional wheat bread. It will be fabulous with the pepsi roast that we are having for dinner. I can't wait!