2012, It’s Good to Meet You

2011 was not my worst year, nor was it my best year, and I can't say I'm sad it is over with.
I don't make resolutions, or at least I don't call what I do resolutions. I acknowledge that I totally suck at follow-through. Yeah, I'm really good at making plans and setting goals, but I'm not really very good at actually following through on everything necessary to meet them. A lot of what I'd like to get accomplished hasn't been lately, largely because I really don't like my current living situation. The good news is, that in the next 2 months, it will change, and I'll be back in full control of my little world, instead of sharing a house with someone I don't particularly like. I will be able to have my home the way that I want it, and I won't have to worry about someone else's clothes in the laundry when I need to wash mine, or try to work out a tv watching schedule.
I've gotten my groceries for the week, and am doing my best not to eat a lot of junk or processed, foods. I've bought frozen veggies instead of canned, I made my turkey spaghetti sauce from scratch with a can each of tomato sauce & tomato paste and added my own spices instead of buying a jar of Ragu. Since I have tomorrow off, I'm cooking up a batch of brown rice, and a batch of quinoa that I can then freeze into individual portions to reheat easily. I also plan to clean out the refrigerator of the leftovers that haven't been eaten. My goal for January is to have all of my groceries for the week by Sunday, so I can spend the afternoon getting the pre-prep done, cooking up my starches for the week, getting sauces ready, portioning my meats, so that I can do quick prep each evening, and have more time to read, write, or play with the cats before we head to bed.
I borrowed a couple of books from a friend, because I spend entirely too much time on the computer, and I need to get back to one of my first loves, Reading. The books are The Chronicles of Faerie, which is a collection of 3 stories, and the finale to the series, The Book of Dreams, by O.R. Melling. I've started the first, but frankly, haven't gotten very far because I haven't yet conquered my addiction to the internet, and managed to tear myself away from the computer until it's time for bed. My 2^nd goal for January is to spend an hour a day reading, just because I love to read, and not because I have to read that contract, or that business email.
I need to get more organized, which is really not possible in my current living situation, because I just don't have space to spread stuff out and organize it, but I am determined that when I move, I manage not to move so much CRAP that I've wagged around for too long, so as I pack over the next few weeks, I'll start weeding out the crap and trying to organize as I pack. Goal #3 for January is to get my closet sorted and packed, starting with the Christmas stuff.
I'm not going to try to fool myself into believing that I can accomplish a bunch of huge goals, but baby steps I can manage.

Italian Crusted Chicken Tenders

I'm working on eating more balanced, healthier meals, and tonite I fixed my favorite breading for chicken to go along with some Quinoa and steamed green beans.
(Serves about 4)
Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon and 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 5/8 clove garlic, minced
• 2/3 cup dry bread crumbs
• 1/4 cup and 3 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
• 3/4 teaspoon dried basil leaves
• 1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 8-10 skinless, boneless chicken breast tenders

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease a 9x13 inch baking dish.
2. In a bowl, blend the olive oil and garlic. In a separate bowl, mix the bread crumbs, Parmesan cheese, basil, and pepper. Dip each chicken breast in the oil mixture, then in the bread crumb mixture. Arrange the coated chicken breasts in the prepared baking dish, and top with any remaining bread crumb mixture.
3. Bake 30 minutes in the preheated oven, or until chicken is no longer pink and juices run clear.

Quinoa is a whole grain that's cooked in the same manner as rice, 2 parts water to 1 part quinoa, and cook it covered until the water is absorbed. I do about 1/2C of grain and 1 C water, which easily gives me two meals out of it, and I don't get tired of it before it's all eaten so it goes bad and gets wasted. I season my water with a bit of garlic powder, and then when the cooking's done, I stir in about a tablespoon of butter, herbs of Italy, and then top with fresh rosemary. 

My green beans have about 1/2 tsp of butter, fresh ground black pepper, and some herbs of Italy.

My portions were about 4 oz chicken, about a cup of quinoa, and a cup of green beans.

 

My Favorite Vanilla Scones

I was given a basic scone recipe by a British friend, who told me it's Delia Smith's recipe, however the searches I've done show Delia adds an egg, which is not included in the recipe I was given. At any rate, I've made a couple of modifications that suit me, and thought I'd share it here. 

Ingredients
8oz (225g) Self-Raising Flour
1 1/2 oz (40g) Butter (at room temperature)
1 1/2 tablespoons Sugar
4 fl oz (150ml) Milk
1 fl oz (37ml) Vanilla extract
A little extra flour
 Method
Pre-heat oven to 425 F
Sift flour into a bowl and rub the butter into it rapidly using your fingertips. After the butter is thoroughly mixed into the flour stir in the sugar, then take a knife and use it to mix in the milk and vanilla a little at a time. Now flour your hands and knead the mixture to a soft dough, adding a little extra milk if it feels at all dry.
Turn the dough out onto a floured pastry board or counter top and roll it out to a thickness of not less than 3/4 inch (2cm) using a lightly floured rolling pin. Take a 1 1/2 or 2 inch pastry cutter and place it on the dough. Tap it sharply so that it goes straight through the dough. Do not twist! Knead the dough together and repeat until you have used as much of the dough as you can.
Place the scones on a greased baking sheet, or a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. You can dust each one with a little extra flour or brush a little milk or egg onto the top of each one. Bake near the top of the oven for 12-15 minutes. When cooked the scones will have turned a crisp golden brown. Cool on a rack and eat them slightly warm. Eat as fresh as possible.
Scones do freeze well, but still eat them within a month.
Since my oven is a counter top version toaster/convection/rotisserie oven, and I like my breads BARELY cooked through, I bake for about 8-10 minutes, and take them out just as they start to turn golden.
***SUBSTITUTIONS***
Margarine can be used in place of butter
Soy milk works just as well as dairy milk, and the vanilla version is what prompted me to add vanilla to my recipe
If you eliminate the vanilla, and don't add some other flavored extract, add an ounce of milk to get the sufficient liquid

BLEU CHEESE

I LOVE bleu cheese dressing. I always have, and in fact, was 8 years old before I knew that there was a whole shelf at the commissary of different salad dressings! There are several that I've come to like on some level over the years, but my favorite creamy dressing will always be bleu cheese. My earliest memories of salad dressing were Kraft's Roka Blue Cheese, which my father called Roquefort, instead of Blue Cheese. I learned later that not all bleu cheese is Roquefort, as only cheese produced in the Roquefort region of France is actually called that. As I understand it, it's rather expensive as well.

I've tried virtually all of the brands available at the major grocery stores in the Tarrant County area, I think.  As far as store-bought, in a bottle or jar, Litehouse (Walmart) and Marie's are my go-to quick & easy to get choices. *don't bother with the "low fat" versions of commercially prepared ones, they just don't have the rich flavor. Central Market has a wonderful version in their bulk refrigerated bar, though I doctor it a bit to add a little more black pepper, and more crumbled cheese.

My absolute favorite though, is the homemade version that I make:
1 pkg softened cream cheese (I've also used reduced fat or neufchatel cheese to reduce some of the fat)
6 oz buttermilk
Garlic powder ~1/2tsp
Basil flakes ~ 1/2-3/4tsp
Black pepper ~ 1/2 tsp
8oz blue cheese crumbles

Mix the softened cream cheese to and buttermilk on low speed in deep bowl (a shallow bowl will splatter EVERYWHERE, trust me on this), adding seasonings to blend well, then add blue cheese crumbles until all mixed in.  Makes about 2 & 1/2 cups of dip.

This recipe makes more of a dip than a dressing, which is my preference, however if you want actual dressing consistency, add more buttermilk a quarter of a cup at a time until you achieve your desired consistency.  This will also mellow your blue cheese flavor out some as well, so if I am making actual dressing, instead of dip, I add more buttermilk and more blue cheese crumbles because I so love the rich tang of the cheese.

Taco Ring

I originally got this recipe at a Pampered Chef party more years ago than I want to count, but it's yummy, and it can be adjusted to your personal tastes.

1 pkg crescent rolls
1lb ground meat, browned & seasoned with taco seasoning
1 can refried beans, warmed in microwave
1 tomato, diced
1 small onion, diced (may be cooked in with meat if you want)
shredded cheese to taste
1 bell pepper, diced, then mixed in with cooked & seasoned meat

Preheat oven according to crescent roll instructions
Spray round pan (like an 8 inch cake pan) with non-stick spray
unroll crescent rolls and arrange in a ring in pan, with points lapping up over the edge, wide ends will overlap in the pan, kind of pinch them together to seal it
Spread refried beans in a layer on dough
Sprinkle some cheese over the beans
Spread the meat/onion/pepper mixture over the beans & cheese
Sprinkle cheese over meat
Top with diced tomato
gently pull points of crescent dough to center & tuck under wide end

Bake for about 20 minutes, until dough is cooked and golden

Cut apart and serve with tortilla chips

***notes***

• doesn't have to be ground beef, leaner meats, even shredded turkey, chicken or pork could also be used
• crescent rolls, cheese, & refried beans are available as well
• other kinds of beans can also be used in place of the refried, but I would suggest mixing them into the meat mixture and just layering it in that way
• I've found that the stuffing gets hotter if it's warmed before it goes into the oven, so I preheat my beans, or warm them in the meat mixture while I'm letting the taco seasoning simmer into it

Up & Down

This has been one of those up and down weeks. I used to have them ALL the freaking time, but in the past couple of months, since I've been uterus-free, they've not only gotten less frequent, they seem to have gotten less severe as well. Of course, it may be that they are still as severe as they ever were, but since I am feeling a little more balanced, the little stuff doesn't bother me as much.

On Sunday I got to visit with my sweet little kitty Molly. She lives with my friends Erin & Tony, but has been jointly claimed by another friend and me. She's not squatting or crouching down, she has really short little legs, sort of like me (well, and Erin for that matter). Erin used to breed and sell designer cats, including dwarves, sphynx, bambino, and others. Molly was born deaf, and therefore became a family pet, rather than a breeding cat. As much as I would love to bring her to my house, it just isn't fair to expect her, as a not young cat (I think she's about 5 or 6), to be moved into a strange house with not one, but 2 senior (both over 10 years old) cats that she doesn't know. Our other friend lives in an apartment and can't afford the additional pet deposit either. So we just love her when we are over there. And she loves us! My kids were all over me, trying to identify the white hair all over my red shirt when I got home!

On the down side, I've been frustrated most of the week because I want something that I can't have. At least right now. It's frustrated me off and on for several months, and I've truly learned more patience than I ever thought I had, but for some reason this week has been especially frustrating. There are one or two things that I could do and possibly rectify at least part of the situation, but I'm too big of a chicken to risk losing what I do have in order to POSSIBLY get what I want. Yep, that's me, covered with feathers and squawking bawkbawkbawk bukawk.

On the up side, only 2 weeks until NTIF, the local Irish Festival, which, at least for me, marks the beginning of the festival season. Most of my piping and drumming friends will be there, with their various bands. Some I've not seen since Dickens on the Strand in December, others its been longer, but either way, I'm looking forward to seeing all of them again.

It's also time to start getting busy with my sewing for Scarborough Faire. I've got several pairs of wrap pants to get made, as well as redoing some of my skirts that I made the first year I was making garb. I was going with EASY, at that point, and so not making panel skirts, or circle skirts. Yeah, 5 or 6 yards of fabric at the hemline is great. That same amount up around my waist, notsomuch.

There will also be SOMETHING using this fabric:

Awful isn't it? I think so too, but once a year something totally awful can be funny, and I assure you, once it's done, it's gonna be funny as hell, and I will post the evide-, umm, I mean pictures.

This weekend I'm hoping to get back to doing some cooking, so I can have better food than a frozen pizza for dinner in the evenings. This means I have to clean out the freezers and see what I've got in there to thaw, and what I've got in there that's just plain too freezer burned to salvage... The fridge got cleaned out last night, I need more veggies now. Darn, gonna have to make a trip to Central Market tonite, oh the horrors!

Finally Getting Around

to posting about my house concert over the weekend. I hosted another show for Marc Gunn over the weekend. Originally, I had about a dozen or so people who were coming. I would have liked to have a few more, just because I wanted to make sure that Marc actually made money, though since it was his 2nd show in the area in a few days, I wasn't totally stressed or anything. A couple of weeks ago, I had 2 back out because they had committed to something before I scheduled the show, which they had thought was on Sunday, and it turned out was on Saturday instead, so I was down to about 10. 3 got sick, which took me down to 7, and then 1 bailed an hour before the show. *sigh* Bless Marc's heart, he played his heart out anyway. It was a good show, if a bit, umm, quiet, which is funny considering that there were 4 women in the audience, and 3 of us definitely are talkers!

I had baked a blackberry wine cake for Lissa's birthday. I was a little unsure about it, and very nearly screwed it up, because I didn't read the directions and put the butter in the cake instead of saving it for the glaze. I baked it in a casserole dish instead of a 9x13 pan because I didn't have a 9x13 platter to put it on, so it took about 35 minutes longer than the directions stated. When I started mixing the glaze (with another stick of butter), it looked TOTALLY funkified! The butter didn't cream at all, it sort of turned into these flakes that were all clumpy. Now the glaze recipe said "To Make Blackberry Wine Glaze: Mix together the confectioner's sugar, 1/2 cup blackberry wine, and the softened butter or margarine. Beat until smooth" Yeah, it never did get smooth, it just looked disgusting, so being the fly by the seat of my pants gal that I am, I decided to make glaze the way I usually do, but substitute the wine for the water. The sugar didn't completely dissolve, but it looked appetizing, and actually, once it went on the cake, you couldn't really see the glaze anyway. In the end, about 1/3 of it got eaten, I saved 2 pieces for specific people who didn't make it, and sent the rest home with Lissa.

On the upside, I made a new friend, Angela, who I've seen perfoming as a Drunken Damsel with Lissa, and dancing at the same studio I do. How cool is that? She's not allowed to dance right now, and I've not danced in months, but am going to try to get back to that this week. We stayed in here talking and giggling after we ran Marc out with our estrogen-fest. I think it was nearly 12:30 when they headed home! Fun times

One of my cats, who, at the last house concert in August was acting all orgasmic over Mike's sandal, was of course thrilled to have a houseful of people to pay attention to her. I think Lissa is her new best friend.

1/5/09 Well, today was my first day back to work after the 3 weeks I had off between the holidays and recuperating from my surgery. I was up the first time the alarm went off, and was out the door by 5:45 in an effort to get to the office before the icy rain started. I made it by 6:15, and lasted until about 1:45 or so, which got me about 7 hours in before I had to come home and lie down on the couch. Dinner smelled fabulous. I did a chicken & rice thing in the crock pot with brown rice, 2 cans of cream of chicken soup, and some boneless, skinless chicken breasts. For seasoning I used some wild garlic dip mix. This was one of my learning recipes, I guess. Too much soup, rice was too mushy, not enough seasoning. Yeah, the chicken itself is pretty tasty, but the other stuff is just bleah mushy gross! So I’ll take the chicken out and shred it for chicken salad and toss the other stuff, having learned a lesson. I would have done all of that tonite, before I started getting everything together to throw into the big crock tomorrow for my soup, however, at about 8:15, our power went out. Yeah, it’s 9:30 now, and it’s still out. The whole block on our side of the street, plus the opposite side of the street behind us, except for a couple of houses on the next block in a cul-de-sac on our side of the street is out. Plus on the street behind us, there’s another little cul-de-sac that has like 4 houses with nothing, then 1 with full lights as far as we can see (porch light, etc.), then 2 houses with nothing, then another 1 with full lights, and all the rest are out on that whole street. It’s bizarre. The opposite side of my street is fine. I’m near a corner, and the other side of the cross street is fine. I went for a drive through the neighborhood to see how far the outage ranges, but didn’t find any power trucks doing anything for us. Yeah, it was like 34 degrees when the power went out. We had some rain today, but the power lines in my neighborhood don’t look terribly icy, nor do the trees, but perhaps the trees nearest the main transformer that our grid is on had a problem. Since I use a provider other than TXU because I have a better deal, well, I’m SOL on trying to find out what the status is because TXU won’t talk to me. So my house is currently about 65 degrees and dropping. I sleep better when it’s cold, but not when I’m shivering! Too many covers drive me crazy, but I’ve got my usual winter set of sheets, 1 blanket and my quilt, plus a flannel- backed lap quilt, plus 2 more lap quilts piled on top of me. Hopefully the power will come back on soon and I can actually sleep through the night. Ok, the power came on around 1 a.m. and while I'd slept some up to that point, it wasn't restful, and since my alarm goes off at 5, I got about half the rest I actually need to be able to function. *sigh* AND when I got online this morning to check mail, there's a 'past due' notice in my email about my electric bill, WTF??? So I went to the website and what do you know, they show I have a $0.00 balance. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, that is a big fat ZERO balance, because, well, I paid the bill on 12/17/08, and it was applied that day, a full 5 days before it was due. I dunno what they are thinking, other than they are clearly nuts.

I love my crock pot

So, part of my plan for this year is to eat better, which means eating at home, and not eating pre-packaged junk. To that end, I went the other day to Central Market with my shopping list. side notes: 1. I do NOT eat fish, shrimp, or other water dwelling creatures. AT ALL. I don’t particularly like the taste, and it doesn’t particularly like me, so we came to an agreement that I won’t eat them and they won’t do nasty stinky things to me. It’s a plan I can live with. 2. There are several common veggies that I just can’t stand, sometimes it is a texture thing, sometimes it is a flavor thing, sometimes both. That list includes: eggplant, raw tomatoes, broccoli, onions, most squashes, avocados, pumpkin, Brussels sprouts, canned green beans, beets, cucumbers, most peppers, artichokes, asparagus, mushrooms, shallots, and leeks. 3. There are some veggie rules that I have: I cook with purple onion, finely chopped. I eat grilled zucchini sometimes. I cook with red bell peppers. Cucumbers-bleah, dill or sweet pickles-yummy! Raw cauliflower-yummy, cooked-bleah. Mushy carrots SUCK. 4. I don’t do asian food, though I do stir-fry stuff on occasion, but not with asian spices 5. I’m not big on pork particularly, other than bacon. 6. I LOVE beef, unfortunately, it’s reached a point that beef really dislikes me most of the time these days, unless it’s VERY high grade (and therefore high-dollar). Thursday was my shopping day and by the time I finished all my errands, I just wasn’t in the mood to cook anything, so I wound up skipping dinner. Friday I made a couple of individual meatloaves, using ground bison. I’ve done it before, and it was fabulous. This time around, I messed up and used tomato paste instead of sauce, and the result was VERY acidic. Fortunately, I’d only cooked one of them, the other is in the freezer, and I’ve gotten information on how to correct the acidity once I thaw the other one to cook it. Paired with ½ a small baked potato, and a salad, I was pretty happy with the meal I had that night. Saturday, I woke up early and put some beans in the crock pot. Unfortunately, having not cooked with it nearly enough, I didn’t know that I needed to either use fresh spices and herbs, or use extra of the dried/crushed ones. I seriously needed to doctor the beans to have them taste decent. The cornbread, on the other hand, despite being from a package that only required me to add an egg and milk, was outstanding. Added a salad again, and had me a nice, balanced, fresh meal. This morning, I got out the bison roast I’d gotten at Central Market, sliced some garlic and put in it, then plopped it into the crock pot with some low-fat-sodium beef broth, some fresh thyme, rosemary, oregano, bay leaves, Italian parsley, garlic, some potatoes, and some purple onion, and cooked it all day long. The only problem I had was that I put the carrots in too soon, because they were MUSHY and gross by the time I was ready to eat! The roast, on the other hand, was absolutely FABULOUS! Tender, tasty, ahh! And of course, with a salad, I had another healthy, tasty meal. Now I’m off to bed, back to work tomorrow, after 3 weeks off to recouperate from my hysterectomy. Wish me luck! Hopefully I’ll be up on time, to work on time (which to my boss means 7, though I’m usually there by 6 or 6:30), and make it through the whole day!