Check it Out!

I'm almost famous. Ok, not really, but a fellow blogger asked me to do a guest post and... here it is!

Rachel writes at No Preservatives Added. She's actually part of the reason I started my blog to begin with, and definitely part of the reason I keep going. (By the way, she's really awesome, you should read her blogs).

I know I haven't been around much but that's because I've been crazy busy and sadly, this lovely blog is pretty low on the priority list when it comes to family, work, school, cooking, and sleeping. :) I do enjoy my family and my sleep.

In other news, I am not dead! Just in case you were still wondering if this was a figment if your imagination or if you were dreaming. Nope, this is really a post from me.

I'll write a catch-up post about goals soon and also about all kinds of other things.

Now, however... I have to go tend to my kombucha!

Facelift

I got bored with the look of my blog. It's more fun now. Plus I think I talk about food more than anything so I think it's fitting. But I'll probably change it again in six months, so don't get too comfortable with it.

What do you think?

Yogurt, Cute Shoes, and Croutons

What do these three things have in common?

Well, I'm not really sure, except that they were a part of my day. Also, tasty soup.

I made my first big batch of yogurt--almost a whole gallon. I didn't have enough jars to use the whole gallon. Actually, I probably could have fit the whole thing, but I didn't know how much space I would lose when I added my starter so I over estimated and my jar for my starter next time was only 2/3 full). My hubby was so funny when I was making it. He was on his computer, watching with half an eye, if you will, and randomly interjecting with insight like "is it yogurt yet?" He eventually got up to see what it was I was doing and was very surprised at the simplicity.

"So all you did was heat up milk, add yogurt, and now the whole thing's yogurt?"
"Yup."
"Wow, that's so cool."

That's almost verbatim what happened (but my memory sucks so... maybe this didn't happen at all.. *twitch*).

By the way, this yogurt may be my best batch yet. I haven't tasted it yet, but as I was pulling it out of the cooler today, I noticed it was much firmer than the last batch when I took it out of the cooler. I turned the jar on it's side before putting it in the fridge and it only started to pull away from the side of the jar when it was completely horizontal. This was the jar of starter so it wasn't all the way full so it wasn't like it just didn't have anywhere to go.

We went to Walmart to get shoes for hubby today. So of course, bearing the burden along with him, I looked at shoes and, in order to fully understand his pain, even tried some on. :) I found a super cute pair of... ok, I'm a bit embarrassed, brown loafers and they were soooooooooo comfortable. Seriously. They were also leather, which doesn't matter at all, but was kind of cool. But they were $30. So rather than give into spontaneous purchases, I used my willpower to put them back in their little box and back into their little piece of shelf. But I want them. And if, in a week, I still want them, I may go back and buy them.

Croutons. are. tasty. But they are so overpriced. So this is my second attempt at making them by hand. This time was much better. A bit heavy on the garlic, but in a salad, I think it will be a good contrast. i used half a loaf of the french bread I made last week and put them in a bag so I could shake them up with the olive oil / spices combo to coat them. It sort of worked. I baked them on a much lower temp this time and it worked much better. They are really good!

Ok, that's about it for now. Now I have to try to be productive for an hour or so until bed time.

Reuse

So, yesterday marked our first trip to recycling! We packed up the stuff I'd been saving for probably 3 weeks now and turned it in. It felt good.

So, this is random, but oh well, that's me.

Every time I go out to the car, I see all the trash on the ground. Grocery bags, soda cans, etc. After feeling all good about myself for recycling, I got mad at the people who couldn't take their trash the extra 100 feet to their apartment or the extra 40 feet to the dumpster. So today, I decided, enough was enough. I took a grocery bag of my own down to the parking lot and filled it with trash.

Here are some of the things I found in the precipice-like piece of land next to my parking lot.

2 brake pads (about 15 feet apart and partially obscured by grass)
grocery bags
part of a soda can
some random candy wrappers
styrofoam chunks
part of one slat of the large vertical blinds used for balcony entrances
Part of a wooden pallet (I might grab that later and turn it into a frame for my tomatoes)
a 4x8 foot piece of particle board

I put what I could of it into our bag for recycling, but really most of it wasn't recyclable, and threw out the rest. I wasn't able to get the pallet or particle board. I washed and kept the part of the blind slat. No, not because I'm a pack-rat, because just the other day I had read a post about how useful old blinds were for turning into markers for your garden. So I happily cut it into sections and got about 18 markers--for free!

I know I'm absent-minded enough to forget which pot I put what in, so this will be nice. Especially when it comes to planting different varieties of the same plant like tomatoes.

Does anyone know if you can recycle brake pads?

I'm Glad I Burnt Dinner

I haven't burnt food in a long time. Not since I've been on my own. Sure, growing up, with a sad little gas stove that never had the correct air / fuel ratio, with crummy pots an pans, I used to burn stuff. It didn't help that mom was hyper-paranoid about disease from raw meat. I was supposed to burn it. I know, right? Most of our meat, especially pork products, were usually well blackened. MMmmhmm, tasty char.

But seriously, I haven't burnt food in years. I've got my little electric stove which always produces consistent heat and the oven's the same way. Last summer I spent $100 on a good teflon set of skillets / pots. I've overcooked things a bit here and there, but it was still edible, just a bit chewy / rubbery. And even then, it's not that often.

Last night, I burnt about 8 oz of black beans. I'm not really to upset about wasting it, even though I do hate wasting food, because it was only about $0.60 worth of food. Plus, I don't want to go on feeling guilty after something has happened. I do that enough anyways on different stuff.

Anyway, that's only half the story.

The other half of the story is that I'm actually happy that I burnt those silly beans. For $0.60 in wasted food, I got the chance to spend the whole night with my hubby. This is a rare treat with our busy lives. I wasn't up for cooking anything else, so I asked if we could go to Chipotle. We still had money in our eat-out budget (even though, as sad as this sounds, we've eaten out 3 times now since the beginning of the month. Ack), so we went for it.

We got to just talk about different stuff that's been going on, talk about our plans, etc. We got to plan at least a bit of our weekend (which never happens and I like to plan, heh). Friday night we're going to a friend's place to grill out / chill out. but besides that, it was just nice to actually get to talk to each other. Then we got home and got to continue spending time together just talking and cuddling. It was fantastic. I love my hubby.

so yep, I'm really glad I burnt dinner.

Stuff I want to Cook / Bake Soon

ww bagels
soft pretzels
apple pie
more different kinds of homemade pasta
honey cakes
rye rolls / bread
some kind of cheese / veg (spinach?) stuffed pasta
more bean-based dishes
more meatless dishes
hummus
cheesy potato soup
pot roast

Sigh... most of these I can't even think about making till after this week. Which is ok, because I'm using up some of the older random food I have lying around. After that, I can buy stuff to restock.

The biggest thing is that I know this month I will have to get creative, as we spent a lot of our grocery / household budget already and bought hardly any food. We still have a few more things to buy that will come out of this budget as well that are not food.

It shouldn't be too bad. I've already resigned myself to the fact that I'm probably not buying any more meat until next month's budget, so we will be living off what we have left until then. I don't want to buy cheap meat anymore that has all those crazy hormones. So I will wait patiently and plan every penny.

And I will enjoy my beans this month. :)

PS, DH and I went to Whole Foods for the first time and he actually liked the store! Even though it is "a hippie store." We made fun of the imported water from Norway together (seriously! Talk about food miles. Not Cool, Whole Foods) and sampled some awesome cheese together. It was a good time and I don't think he was turned off to the store because we only spent about $30 there!

My Yogurt is... Yogurting?

Fermenting? Resting? Curing? Well, whatever it is, it's doing it's thing in the cooler and hopefully the result will be tasty yogurt. I made 6.5 cups and split it into 2 jars, and I drank the last half cup that wouldn't fit. It was tasty. I don't have any canning jars so I just used some (very thoroughly washed out and then sterilized) salsa jars.

Hmmmhmm, Salsa yogurt. Just kidding. I added a bit of sugar and vanilla so we'll see how it goes.

Sometime soon I will establish a price point of this yogurt, made with organic milk, vs organic yogurt.

That's all for now. Now I must make myself go write my document for work. I am awesome at procrastinating.


:)

Bee Slayer

I am the bee slayer. Hubby is allergic and so at first site of bee, I must rush in to save him. Which I don't mind at all. His fear is pretty well completely justified considering how allergic he is. But still, poor bee! Yesterday was one such killing.

Which is sad, because I love bees. They are such awesome little creatures. They are what every church should be: unified, diligent, productive, pollinators (spreading the "Seed").

Ok, I know that sounds weird, but it totally makes sense. I hate it when churches are apathetic towards the community or reaching out to people. I hate it when church is passive and not active. It's like we've turned church into a television show you drive to and not a get-your-hands-dirty-helping-people activity center used to reach those in need.

Bees are always busy, they are always working, working, working. They build up their stores for the winter. They are good stewards. Everyone in the hive has a job, from the very young bees to the old, all have a purpose. They are (almost) always unified in purpose. One colony helps countless hundreds and hundreds of plants by pollinating them. this in turn helps the plants' survival, and the animals which depend on that plant. They are one of the reasons the world still turns.

The church should be as integral in their community as the bees. They are always flying around helping plants and animals.

The other thing I thought of was that I need to be like a bee. All of those things I just said I hate about the church? I need to make sure I am not like that. We could all learn something from bees about productivity. A bee colony in decent conditions makes way more honey than it could ever use.

I know this is sort of random, but that's what came to mind today as I squasheded the little guy (technically, girl, but heh).

I hate apathy.

Autumn in a Cup!

Ok, so it's Fall. I love Fall. I dunno if it's because I was born in the Fall or what, but I love it. I love everything about it. Partially because Fall and Spring, to me, are practically magic. The incredible transformations that occur in just a short time amaze me every year. How everything works like clockwork together to create a symphony of new sights and smells and sounds. Ahh, breathe in the magic.

Anyhow, I'm off topic. Today I finally got my milk! It's tasty. Ok, it tastes about the same, but that's not why I'm switching.

So what better way to celebrate finally having milk in the house than making... hot chocolate! I didn't want just ordinary hot chocolate, tho. I wanted hot chocolate that tasted like Fall. So I made hot chocolate and for a little bit of Fall kick, I added cinnamon and ginger.

It's amazing!

You will need cocoa powder, sugar, milk, cinnamon, and ginger. It takes a little practice to figure out the balance you like. I went heavier on the cinnamon than the ginger. I bet pumpkin spice would be fantastic in this.

You should probably try it.... now. :) And let me know what you think!

Not Productive Enough

Man, I'm trying, I'm just not making it.

I had all these grand plans for this weekend and I've already gotten off to a crappy start. For starters, tonight I was going to power thru for about 3 hrs and bust out a document I need for work soon-ish. so what happened when I got home? I tried to stay awake for a while on "mental break" from work for a bit so that I wasn't just a complete zombie, but I hardcore fell asleep until 9:30. So, while I was supposed to be done with it by then, I haven't even started.

I was also going to call stores until I found that carries Organic Valley dairy products. I called a whopping one store during my mental break before I fell asleep. Lame. But I think Whole foods will carry it and I will be calling them tomorrow at 8 when they open to verify. I haven't had milk in the house in a week and it's driving me crazy! I want my milk! WF's website had a coupon for OV milk, so that is promising, but it was on their main site and not the site for the specific store local to me, so I'm not completely sure.

Just in general, I'm struggling to maintain a high level of productivity tho. It's like every task on my list has been all willpower and a lot of effort. I want to do so much, but only have a limited amount of time. Especially with my job being intense with this big project I'm working on. I only have so much will / spirit / energy leftover after work to devote to taking care of my family outside of fulfilling the bulk of the financial burden (not that it's a contest by any stretch, and my hubby definitely puts in plenty of hours at his job. My job is very mentally taxing tho.).

My tomato seeds are almost ready for drying and storing, which is nice. I got a random (but tasty!) tomato from the craigslister I bought my containers for my balcony garden from and also some pear tomatoes (small yellow tastiness) from my husband's uncle. I'm hoping some of them actually pan out. I think they will because a good number of the random tomato seeds are all at the bottom of my watery moldiness and maybe 1/2 to 1/3 of the seeds from the pear tomatoes are. It should be enough to get my 3-5 plants going. We're only talking maybe 8 seeds need to germinate.

I still need to get my dirt. I want to start composting (hubby is against it, have to try to talk to him at some point about why I'm doing all these hippie things). Need to actually get a schedule for dropping off recyclables (hubby is neutral, but unsupportive, and I can't just take it myself. See 3 paragraphs down from here.). I am pricing out my organic seeds for the spring. I am planning to start ordering them from this month's food budget since it IS a new month and I can.

I've been checking every day for postings on craigslist and freecycle for canning supplies, but nothing yet. I am hoping sometime before April I will find a canner / canning supplies. But that's like 6 months so I feel like that is doable.

My avocado seed is sprouting (his root just stuck his tongue out at me!) and I just planted my second one. I need to get my dirt soon because I've got all my seeds squeezed into such a tiny tight space / small amount of dirt that very soon they will kill each other fighting over it. Another thing where I need hubby for since he is the one with the driver's license.

Speaking of, one of my goals this year, before winter sets in mind you, was to get my license and I still haven't done it! I'm so upset about this because I feel so trapped sometimes. I know we only have one car but I still hate it. I am just going crazy. I want to leave when I want to leave. I want to drive when I want to drive. I hate having to bother him from whatever he's doing just so I can go to the store or window-shop or go to the park or visit with friends.

I was going to talk to hubby about all this stuff tonight but he had to work late and then asked if he could go hang out with friends. Which, how could I say no? He's already... Oh I dunno.

Sometimes I just don't know what to do.

Tomorrow will be better.

What I do when I'm Bored

I have no reason to be bored. At all. I've been running around like crazy since school started (first time I've been in classes in 2.5 years). but for some reason, that just isn't enough to keep me occupied (ha! I'm insane), so I've started saving seeds from my fruits and learning how to make them germinate.

So far, I have 3 granny-smith apple seeds and 2 lemon seeds that have all sprouted and just got moved to their dirt homes just within the past day or two. Also, I'm trying to grow an avocado pit. I have more seeds still incubating including more lemon seeds and some other type of apple that I forget. I also "seasoned" 3 honeylocust seeds, but I don't know if it worked or not. As soon as I seasoned them, the instructions I found online said to plant them right away. So I put 3 in one pot and I am waiting to see if any take root. Ugh, suspense.

I am going to need more dirt and more pots I think.

PS, speaking of seeds, if you are looking to grow awesome tomatoes, check out this website! It's so much fun.

Sauerkraut

So I had a 3/4 of a head of cabbage leftover from a stew I made and I didn't know what to do. So I did the only thing I could think of that had cabbage in it besides the stew I just made: Sauerkraut.

I let it sit for a week, doing my best not to disturb it too often, but also checking liquid levels and for spoilage.

I just tried it and I honestly can't tell if I did it right or not. It doesn't taste spoiled to me (always a good thing), but I wouldn't know what spoiled sauerkraut tasted like because I've only ever had sauerkraut in any form once, and that was a long, long time ago.

It's sort of a semi-sweet, semi-salty, crunchy mass of pale yellow / white stuff that also tastes a bit like caraway seeds (since I added these, this is no surprise). It also tastes no different--not even a little bit--when I ate some rinsed versus some that had not been rinsed, which makes me believe I screwed up somewhere.

Does anyone have any advice on this? Did I mess it up? Since it tastes ok, can I eat it anyway?

Whirl

Whirl is a weird word. Just recently I've been seeing it crop up in a most unexpected place. Up until now, I've only seen it used in the past-tense or as a noun(?). But recently, I've been reading a LOT of canning blogs**, and in that culture, they use it in place of "blend," "chop," and "process" depending on which kitchen appliance they are talking about. I just read about Someone who said this about some apples in a recipe she was making: "I whirl mine through the food processor." I've seen it several other places, but this is the one I had open at the moment that made me think about this weird word.

I just find it interesting. That is all.

PS, I think next summer I may join the crazy canning community, it looks like a whirl of fun.

get it?