Eating Dinner With My Family

I have one pork chop leftover and some veggies I could use up, so I decided to make fried rice. I didn't measure but I took pictures so you and I would know the general amounts. I did do something a little different, I added a good dose of turmeric. Now not exactly traditional, and it turned it a funky shade of yellow, but I had just read an article on all the things turmeric was good for and I figured it wouldn't alter the flavor too much. The husband loved it!  He ate thirds;). And it was a simple fast dinner. In addition to the ingredients pictured here, the turmeric, I used some vegetable oil, 2 eggs, soy sauce and a splash of sriracha.  I started stir frying the onions, carrots and celery, added the green peppers after a few minutes, add the kale and cook until wilted, then the garlic and cook a about a minute.  Throw in the rice and the soy.  (you can add a splash of stock if the rice seems really dry) and cook until the  rice has softened.  Add...

For throwback Thursday, my son got to choose, and he choose a family favorite: Spicy Corn Chowder.  Other than getting the corn off 10 ears, the recipe isn't hard.  I suppose a slacker solution would be frozen, but cutting corn off the cob isn't that hard, and we even did it the day before.  We froze the cobs and are going to make corn broth with them later.  This soup is really amazing.  My family likes to add a few dashes of  Tabasco Chipotle Hot sauce.  It is smoky and with some heat that really makes the soup outstanding.  We don't bother with the cheese because it really doesn't need it. Spicy Corn Chowder 1/2 Lb thick-cut applewood-smoked bacon (6-slices), cut crosswise into 1/2-inch pieces 1 medium yellow onion cut into 1/2-inch dice 3 scallions thinly sliced 2 celery ribs cut into 1/2-inch dice 1 red bell pepper stemmed, seeded, and cut into 1/2-inch d 1 Tsp fresh thyme 5 Cup fresh corn kernels (from 10 medium cobs) 1/2 Tsp pu...

My family has been grumbling that so many meals we absolutely adored are not made again, or worse, forgotten about. I had thought about doing throwback Thursday for a while now, but being miserably sick prompted me to finally have the boys pick an oldie but goodie. (With the caveat that it was easy for my poor sick self). My husband picked this baked orecchiette with pork sugo. I remember really liking it and it made a ton which will be breakfast and/or lunch for us so I can hopefully relax and get better. The good: it was as tasty as I remembered!  The pork was on sale so the huge (and I mean huge!)  pan of pasta cost about $10. Add a salad and you have 2 dinners for just over $10!  The ok: they didn't have orecchiette at the store (and being sick I wasn't making pasta!), so I opted for small shells. I think they got a bit overlooked and were too small for the sauce. I think farfalle would be a better substitution  I halved the original recipe (I'm giving you the po...

Another week in the summer that I haven't been able to blog, so I share with you my favorite of all the juices we have made so far, this "Original V-8 Recipe".  I know it can't be exactly like V8 for several reasons, not the least of which is that V8 has watercress in it or that it doesn't taste the same, but still really great!  I often up the amount of spinach; it still tastes good but looks very green. The picture is made the way the recipe says to.  I also like to add a splash of soy sauce for salt and a squirt of sriracha for some heat.  The glass pictured is less than half of what the recipe makes.  I either split it with my husband or drink it when I am hungry and have a lot of room.  You can refrigerate it for later, but the color looked unpleasant to me after some time in the fridge. Original V-8 Recipe   Carrots - 2 large (7-1/4" to 8-/1/2" long) Celery - 3 stalk large (11"-12" long) Cucumber - 1/2 cucumber (8-1/4") Pa...

I have been wanting a juicer; at the very least I wanted to make healthier juices for the kids, but I was also hoping to add a good bit of fruit and veggies to my diet. I know people become absolute fanatics about juicing, but I can't see that happening to us:). So this is my first "juice" I made. It was touted as good for beginning juicers. It was a bit odd and a bit to strong in the celery (I left out 1 stalk too!), but on the whole, not too bad.  The funniest thing was a little bit after drinking it, I looked over at my husband and said, I feel weird.  He said he did too.  The best description we could come up with was we felt like we were slipped some kind of drug. (Or slammed one too many red bulls:)  I asked him if this was what healthy felt like, and we both got a good laugh out of it.  I will update you as our experience progresses. Mean Green 2 granny smith apples 3 stalks of celery 1 cucumber 1 thumb of ginger 6 leaves of ...

Let me start with it was a bit of work.  Mostly the work is getting corn off 10 cobs, and normally I would say if you want a short cut, try frozen, but the original recipe says that fresh is essential.  It was totally worth the work!  (click here for a fast way of getting all the silk off corn on the cob)  We all loved it.  I do have some recommendations if you make this.  First of all, the bacon topping was really enough for about half the soup because this makes quite a bit.  My husband shredded up some deli ham on his second bowl.  The chipotle powder only adds spice at the end of the bite, the soup doesn't taste very spicy, so I suggest you do what we did, and let everyone spice theirs up individually.  (my son turned his pink with sriracha!)  Also, have extra of the broth and half and half on hand.  It might just have been we had a fairly large potato that sucked up a lot of the liquid, or that it wasn't supposed to have much...

I try to have each week a variety of proteins for my family.  I try to have chicken, seafood, beef, pork and a vegetarian meal and fill in the rest of the days with either vegetarian, chicken or seafood.  It doesn't always work out that way.  Sometimes the family makes a request, sometimes there is a good sale at Publix and sometime I just get lazy.  I didn't really have a plan when I bought a whole chicken but I knew there was plenty I could do with  it.  I decided to cook it like the 40 Cloves and a Chicken recipe we all love, but change it a bit.  It was well received, but next time I think I will double the herbs.  I originally planned on a full tablespoon, but it looked like a lot when I got half way through it and stopped.  As always, this method of cooking delivered juicy meat and crispy skin.  I didn't have a baguette and wasn't going out to the store, so I made some rice using some of the drippings from the chicken.  While...

I am finding yet another advantage to this blog.  If I write it down here I seem to stick to it better.  I guess a public declaration keeps me honest;).  I was sorely tempted to just pick a recipe from the to try file and forget my war on the kitchen clutter, but I said to myself, you said you would do this so do it and don't give up yet.  (hey if this works, maybe I should write that I am getting a supermodel figure, write a best selling novel, open a successful restaurant and will make a million dollars!:)  So, I hit the pantry and the fridge with a serious blow.  I started with the pantry.  I have some corn husks in there from the last tamales I made.  Half a bag of something, a specialty something, has to go.  I remember the collards from my Front Porch Pickings Thanksgiving basket.  The tamale  we loved had kale; why not make that recipe but with the collards.  Oh and it will almost finish off that bag of masa in the pant...

This recipe was easy to make.  I did feel that the "gravy" was a bit thin for what I expected when I filled the puff pastry squares.  They also looked a bit wonky when I was folding them in to turnovers. I also thought 2 teaspoons was a LOT of thyme.  (1 only used 1 tsp) What we ended up with was really good.  I boiled chicken breasts in the morning and chopped it up when I made this while the boys were at soccer.  It is from $10 Dollar Dinners , so it is inexpensive but still really good. Chicken Pot Pie Turnovers 2 T  butter 1/2    onion,chopped 1    carrot,chopped 1    stalk celery,chopped Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper 2 ea garlic,minced 2 t  dried thyme 1 T  flour,plus more for dusting 1/2 c  white wine 1 c  chicken stock 1 t  Dijon mustard 1/2 c  frozen peas 1 1/2 c  cubed or shredded cooked chicken 1    sheet frozen puff past...