Peanut Butter Pad Thai Chicken

Sorry for the dirty chalk board, I didn’t get around to scrubbing it. J

This is one of my favorite dinners. Its not authentic by any stretch but it is a far cry from our standard dinners. Often I make this with a pork roast in the crock pot but the chicken tenders make a great quick meal out of this. The sauce is so versatile as well. Thin it out with a little rice wine vinegar and it’s a killer salad dressing. Serve it as a dipping sauce for the kids with veggies and crackers. I even love it over cooked cauliflower or carrots. Yum!

3-4 Chicken Breasts or 6-8 Chicken Tenders

1 each Red and Yellow bell pepper chopped

¼ onion, chopped

1 bunch Cilantro

Ginger (1 tsp powder or an inch fresh – diced)

2 garlic cloves

Limes (1/4 cup lime juice plus lime wedges for garnish)

1 cup Peanut butter

½ cup Soy Sauce

1-2 tsp Hot Sauce

2 tsp Agave Nectar (or Brown Sugar)

In a large sauce pan, add some oil (olive is my choice) the peppers, onion, ½ the cilantro and chicken, cook on medium heat until cooked thru. If the chicken is frozen, add some broth or water to the pan to help steam it thru.

In a bowl mix the peanut butter, soy sauce, hot sauce, nectar and lime juice.

Once the chicken is cooked, add the ginger and garlic. Stir in ½ the peanut sauce.

Serve over buttered noodles. Garnish with a fresh dollop of sauce, cilantro, lime wedges and some red pepper flakes for the adult plates.

Yum!

And….STOP!

Phew! It’s been a whirl wind around here the last 5 days. Wednesday was BUNCO! My grandma hosted this time so most of the beginning of the week was spent at her house cleaning and setting up. The entire time we’re cleaning, painting over spots on the wall, re-arranging and basically exhausting ourselves we’re cursing at each other for getting this worked up over guests. Not even guests, family! It’s the same as I talked about before (the desire to be perfect) and even though we recognize it we can’t help ourselves. The bennifit? My G-ma has beautifully clean, organized and well manicured house for the next month or so. My house is next month and I can’t wait. It’s a Halloween themed BUNCO and I absolutely love decorating my house for Halloween, its my favorite!

The rest of the weekend was spent shopping on Craigslist and yard sales. We bought three dining room tables plus chairs, one sectional sofa, two rugs and three sets of bunk beds! Sadly, the partridge didn’t make with the pear tree. Everything was bought for a steal and we’re reselling almost all of it for double or more. The bunk beds were my favorite find. The guy had three sets (for each of his three daughters) plus each set came with another twin bed. So in total it was 9 solid wood beds. I kept one set to replace the girls old set (that I sold) and am selling the other two plus each individual single bed. Here’s a picture:

The other favorite was a Copenhagen table with 8 chairs. It’s perfect for someone’s Thanksgiving dinner. It’s really hard to not buy for ourselves when we’re looking. There are so many cute things! I did get a rug for my living room (courtesy of my G-ma, she bought it as a birthday present for me – which my birthday isn’t until November but we couldn’t turn down the good deal!) otherwise the rest is for resale.

My new rug (with the sofa I've sold but not moved out yet):

We’re having a bit of a storage issue but hopefully things will sell with in the next week or so. Tomorrow is our first Storage Unit Auction. I am so excited for it! Not sure if we’ll bid or just observe but I’ve been reading up on pointers all day! My only worry is where in the heck we’re going to store let alone stage things if we do buy. Staging items is half the sale. We have to make the items look appealing or they won't go for our asking price. Think about it, would you rather buy the sofa pictured above or the same sofa pictured in a stuffed garage upside down with boxes all around it? Plus you have to have a clean house when someone comes to view the item. Maybe some baking bread or cookies in the oven.

All of this on top of regular life: school, cooking, cleaning, crafting, reading stories, playing and sleeping at some point.

And…GO!

Weekly meal plan 9/26/11

Monday – Shredded pork quesadillas with side salad

Tuesday –  Pad Thai noodles with peanut butter chicken

Wednesday – Broiled Salmon with asparagus

Thursday – Abondigas soup

Friday – Unknown (haven’t figured out what we’re doing yet so no meal plan)

Saturday – Dinner at my inlaws – I’m making the dessert: Peanut Butter spice cake

Sunday – Shredded Pork (left-over) enchiladas

Depending on my day tomorrow, I plan on posting pictures of the Pad Thai instructions. I'll also post the abondigas soup and enchiladas as I make them. Yum!

I’m a mean mom

I’m a mean mom, I’ve accepted this fact and I guess, my kids will too. I can hear my mom telling me “Be careful what you say, if you say you’re mean, your kids will think you’re mean, if you say you’re nice they’ll think you’re nice. To an extent she’s right and I usually try to live by that but in this case, I think I’m ok with being a mean mom.

Anthony’s mid-term grades came in Friday. I knew something was up when he greeted me at the door with head hung low. “Hi, Mooooom.” (You know, that long drawn out ‘O’ that’s accompanied with a frown.) He handed me a packet of paper and said that it was grades. Obviously, being one of the sharper pencils in the box, I figured out that they weren’t good but he’s always hard on himself so I still had high hopes.

Yea, I should have listened to him. They were bad. Really bad.

(Ok, don’t panic.)

Me: “Anthony it’s Friday night, you’re spending the night at Grannie and B-pa’s and me and Dad are going on a date. We’ll talk about this tomorrow after the party.

Nothing like putting off today what you can do tomorrow. Plus I needed a bit to read thru it and compose my response.

Fast forward to Saturday afternoon after the party for my niece and nephew.  

(By the way, the Oreo Truffles turned out great again.

I’m getting this down to a science! I whipped out 80+ in just a few hours. I even had time to tie cute little rainbow colored ribbons on the end of the sticks.)

The grades were actually a bit better than I thought. The letters were still bad (D’s and F’s) but it’s not because of lack of understanding it’s from not turning in papers. I was worried that somehow in the few weeks of school and homework I’d been missing some major struggles somewhere. I was relieved that the individual papers he has turned in were all A’s or B’s but seriously disappointed that it all went down hill because of not turning in work. Work I knew he’d done because his teacher and I check off his daily log every day. So, we set an organization plan in place to help him find his work and get it turned in on time as well as a plan for the teacher to keep me informed if something’s missing so I can help hold Anthony accountable.

There’s a fine line between hand-holding and supporting. We try really hard to help Anthony be successful but not do it for him. He is the type of kid who has serious organization issues, serious! I could dump out his folder every day, organize it and go thru each paper with him but I don’t. It’s his job. My job is to look at the tracker and help with the homework. Honestly though, it’d just rather do it for him. I know he would get much better grades if I did but that’s not the point. (Right?)

That solved the issue but we still had to deal with the consequences. That’s why he was hanging his head on Friday, he knew those grades weren’t acceptable and he was going to be in trouble. (At least I’m a predictable parent, right?) So, grounded it was. Grounded from video games, lap-top (other than homework) and choice in T.V. The last one is a bit sketchy because its not that he’s grounded from T.V. because its always on in our house (yea, I know, I know) its that he does not get a say in what’s on or get to turn it on when we are not watching it.  Regardless, he accepted his punishment and the terms: Grounded until grades improve to above at least a ‘C.’ His teacher assured me that if he stays on trend with the quality of his work and turns in everything from here on out, his quarter grades will come up easily. Still, he has a long road to go.

We’ve talked about grades for years, discussing what would happen if he got bad grades. I’ll admit that I don’t really want to punish him for this; I think his work is good it’s just the missing assignments. I kind of envisioned the whole punishment for grades thing would be for lack of trying or being too distracted to study and do homework appropriately, thus grounding would solve the distraction issue. But, because we’ve said for the past 3 years that bad grades are punishable offenses in our house I kind of had to follow thru.

Yesterday, he came home from school, did his homework and had to do his daily chores. Yes, he has daily chores. Not to be confused with weekly chores. Daily he’s responsible for emptying the dishwasher, taking out the trash, cleaning the rabbit cage and switching the loads of laundry. Weekly he has to clean his room. (I mentioned I’m a mean mom, right?) We don’t pay for chores either. He can do extras around the house to earn money but we’ve always said that regular chores are part of life, (no one pays adults to keep a clean house) so no money for chores.

Anyways, mid-chores, he started talking about a friend at school who’s “so lucky!” Said friend (supposedly) never gets grounded no matter what and gets paid (Paid!) for every chore he has to do. All this was said with that oh-so-sly sideways glance. That one that all pre-teens master that both sneaks a peak at parents as well as gauges if that parent is buying any of the b.s. spewing from the pre-teen. Obviously, I figured, this was a ploy to see if I felt sympathy for poor grounded Anthony and as a doubly whammy, to see if I could be guilted into paying him for chores. Thankfully his peripheral vision is right on and he could see that I wasn’t buying it. I was smiling that closed lip smile, raising my eyebrows and shaking my head yes. (Come on Mom’s – you know that look – the , oh-yea-right-nice-try look) I was mentally gearing up for the same discussion we’ve had before about these subjects figuring I’d have to once again reiterate that dad and I’ve chosen our parenting style based on our believes on what’s best for our children and we can’t judge what other parents decide nor can Anthony compare his childhood to another kids. (Blah, blah, blah) Before I could begin my soap box speech, Anthony said: “But I know mom, it’s just who you and dad are. You’re preparing me for real life and teaching me about responsibility and all that junk.”

Aside from the “junk” I was totally impressed. He even said it serious and with out the eye roll. I fought the urge to defend the other parent, not wanting Anthony to think that the parents of the other kid were not preparing the kids for real live and teaching their child about responsibility but I had to remember this was a 10 year old. He wasn’t making that mental leap; it never even crossed his mind. So, I held my tongue, told him he was right, I ground him and don't pay him for chores because I love him. I then reminded him he still needed to take the trashes out.

Maybe being a mean mom isn’t so bad at least its not if they get why I'm mean.

Rainy days

Rainy days are rare around this part of the desert so it's hard to not stop and enjoy them when they occur. The past 10 days or so have been off and on rainy and although I was sick a few of those days I have not yet had a chance to cuddle up and enjoy. Today, I took that chance. Kenna was extremely whiney from the moment she woke up so to appease her and pamper my inner laziness, we cuddled on the couch all day. It was blissful. We watched cartoons, ate junk food, played and took a long nap with the window open to the drizzling rain.

I woke this morning with determination in my step. I drank my coffee and wrote my daily list. (Does anyone else do this? I'm a huge list person, if I have to motivate myself or just organize my head, I make lists.) Todays list included sewing, clipping and organizing coupons for a mega shopping trip, taking pictures of Anthony's room and sanding my crafting hutch.

I accomplished none of them.

Instead I made my big kids (Anthony and Alana) laugh, snuggled my little girls, read a steamy romance and enjoyed a blissfully lazy day.

Tomorrow, oh tomorrow, Friday. I get to run full speed into yesterday's list, add in 50-60 Oreo truffles, laundry and cleaning up for the weekend. Plus, Brad and I get a date night so somewhere in there I have to wash away the housewife and primp myself into date material. If I hadn't been lazy all day today I'd be exhausted just thinking about tomorrow!

Lemon-licious!

Yesterday I mustered up the courage to tackle the girls room and actually accomplished the task. (Somewhere in there I forgot to start the lemon curd so we had stirfry last night instead.) I cleaned it all out and took out a whole box of donation toys. Seriously, I don’t know where these toys came from, I swear I just cleaned it all out a month or two ago and yet there was still an entire box full of things to donate. I haven’t figured out a storage solution for their stuff yet, its still too easy for them to make a mess. I need something for their million baby dolls and something else for their toys. Either way, I got it all cleaned up and semi organized into some bins in the closet. I did have a bit of motivation considering someone was coming at 7p to look at the bunk beds. What ever works right? The person liked the beds and will be back to pick them up on Sunday since it was pouring down rain last night. I sold it for double what I bought them for. Yea! Now I’m searching for new, new, bunk beds for them.

Today, I started the lemon curd (yea for remembering!) and worked in Anthony’s room all day finishing the painting. The only thing left is to sew his curtains and that’s first on my list tomorrow. After that I’ll post some pictures, I think it looks pretty awesome and he’s super proud of it.

With the lemon curd I made lemon chicken for dinner and a lemon and dark chocolate tart as a sweet treat. I really need to stop cooking. Every time I find a new recipe, like this one, I cook myself out of a dinner out. Brad’s theory is why go out to dinner when I can make it so much better at home. I really need to be a bad cook, then we’d go out to dinner more often and I’d get a break. Oh well, regardless, it was a delish dinner. One I guarantee I’ll be making again and tweeking, like maybe orange curd into orange chicken. Yum!

Luscious Lemon Curd in the Crock Pot

(Curd is not as gross as it sounds, its basically a lemon jam/jelly)

3 Large Lemons

6 tbsp butter room temperature (or nuked for 10 seconds)

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

2 egg yoks

Zest all the lemons.

If you don’t have a zester, use a very sharp knife and take off just the yellow part, the white is bitter. (Get a zester, totally worth it) Juice the lemons. In your mixing bowl, or with a hand held mixer, blend the butter until soft, add the sugar and blend for 2 min’s. Add the eggs and egg yokes, mix until incorporated, being sure to scrape the sides of the bowl so everything gets mixed. Next add 2/3 cup lemon juice. Reserve the rest for use later – like lemon chicken! The mixture will curdle, don’t stress, it’s suppose to. Pour the entire mixture into your crock pot and put on warm or low.

This is not something you can “set it and forget it” but it’s not nearly as intensive as regular lemon curd. Just stir every hour or so until it’s thick enough to coat the back of a spoon or 175 degrease. Mine took a little over 5 hours on warm. Transfer to an air tight container, mix in 2 tbsp zest and cool. It will keep for a few weeks in the fridge.

It’s perfect over toast, great swirled into cheesecake, wonderful with shortbread or perfect with a spoon. J

Lemon Chicken (adopted from a Rachel Ray recipe) No fancy pictures - sorry

3-4 large chicken breast diced

¼ cup flour

2 tsp powder ginger

1 tsp salt

1 tsp black pepper

Vegetable oil

1 tbsp rice wine vinegar

½ cup chicken broth (1 Knorr broth cube and ½ cup water)

1 cup lemon curd

2 tsp lemon zest

2 tsp lemon juice

1 lemon sliced into rings (I used the left over lemon from juicing)

3 green onions diced

In a zip lock bag combine the flour, ginger, salt and pepper. Add the chicken, seal the bag and shake to coat. In a wok or large pan, heat the oil, add the chicken and cook until brown. Remove the chicken. Add the vinegar and broth. Mix in the lemon curd, juice, rings and zest. Add back in the chicken, stir to coat and cook for 5 min’s. Serve over rice with the diced green onions.

Shortbread

2 cups flour

½ cup powder sugar

2 sticks butter softened

Dash of salt

1 tsp vanilla or almond extract

In your mixer bowl add the softened butter, mix until fluffy. Add the sugar, (slowly!), mix until combined. Add the salt and vanilla. Scrape down the sides and mix for 1 min. Pour out onto a strip of saran wrap.

Using your hands compress into a disk and cover with more saran wrap.

Refrigerate for at least hour.

Roll flat and cut out cookies or press into a buttered tart pan. Bake at 375 until just starting to brown on the edge.

Dip in chocolate or serve with lemon curd….or both! I made a tart, spread the remaining lemon curd over it and drizzled it with dark chocolate. Yum!

Weekly meal plan

Weekly meal plan 9/12

Monday : Spaghetti with Sicilian Sausages
Tuesday: Lemon chicken over rice with stir-fry veggies
Wednesday: Beef Fajitas (Safeway has London broil steaks on mega sale)
Thursday: Cranberry pork tenderloin with brussel sprouts
Friday: Dinner out - potential Date Night!
Saturday: B-Day party for my niece and nephew - I think I'm making Oreo Truffels
Sunday: Dinner at my parents

Tomorrow I'm making fresh lemon curd to use in the lemon chicken so I'll post the recipe for it tomorrow once I make it.

Camping trip - take 2

After over a week of sickness we were all feeling a bit cooped up so we really needed to get out and get away even just for a bit. Hailey’s fever finally broke Thursday so we decided to go thru with our original plans for a camping trip this weekend. We booked the reservation a month ago and had several extended family members that were going. I had previously volunteered to cook breakfasts for the group for the two days but had done nothing to prep for it the entire week. So, between late Thursday afternoon and early Friday morning, I whipped together crust less quiches, French toast casseroles, a few loaves of banana, cranberry-walnut and chocolate chip quick breads and packed enough eggs to scramble one morning. We keep all of our camping stuff ready to go in a few camping boxes so all I had to do was throw them into the truck, add our pillows, a few extra blankets and the ice chests and we were ready to go by Friday afternoon.

I had hoped the girls would nap on the way to the lake but, no such luck. The lake is a small canyon lake about 1 ½ miles away from our home. We got 30 min’s away when I realized I forgot Haileys antibiotic so we had to turn around. The girls were asleep, but woke up as soon as I pulled back up into the drive. After that there was no hope of a longer nap.

The lake is one I went to often with my parents when I was a kid. Since it’s so close to home it’s an easy get away, plus it’s about 15 degrees cooler. On the drive Friday, I thought I had taken a wrong road and was concerned that I had my directions wrong. That was until I turned one corner and was instantly an 8 year old little girl riding on the top bunk of my parents cab-over-camper. I had an instant déjà vu experience and it’s ironic because the little spot that was so vivid in my memory is really not even close to the lake nor is it a significant spot in the road but I assume it was close enough to the lake that my brothers and I would either wake up or just take notice and start watching for the lake itself. We use to compete to see who could glimpse water first.

We got in around 3pm, my mom-in-law was already set up with her camper so she helped me put up the tent, cot’s and air matterss. (I said I liked camping, doesn’t mean I like roughing it!) We then headed over to the beach for a swim. The water was crisp but not cold. The beach area was the exact same as when I was a kid, I bet the buoys are the same. As we were coming back from the beach the clouds started rolling in. It was a magnificent site to behold. I wish I had remembered my camera. The clouds were a beautiful deep blue fading to a cream tipped with bronze. They were rolling in looking like a gigantic wave from the south. It was almost like one of those end of the world paintings where the four horseman of the apocalypse ride in on a wave of clouds from heaven. Poetic huh?

Needless to say, we hunkered down in the camper and enjoyed the storm. The rest of my in-laws drove in around 7pm. We were all pretty exhausted so we called it an early night. Once the storm let up a bit I ventured out to the tent only to discover that the raging storm had soaked our blankets. So, back into the camper for a snuggled night of sleep. Thankfully, the camper was large enough to accommodate our extra bodies, with a little creativity. All in all, we had 9 people comfortably sleeping by 10pm. By 11pm, Hailey was up coughing and crying. She was non-stop off and on until 2am. I felt so bad for her and for everyone else being sleep deprived in our tent. If possible I think I would have packed her up and gone home but to quiet my lingering cough I had taken a swig of Niquil so driving was out of the question. Looking back, I think Hailey was more over tired than anything else. Skipping her nap, swimming and running around camp until we went to bed at 10 was just too much for her.

Saturday we swam, napped in the AC’d trailer (Yea!) and socialized with various members of Brad’s extended family that were camping around us. Hailey made fast friends with several little girls in a camp across the way from us. Makenna was found several times wondering away into strangers campsites asking for treats. She eventually suckered me into a root beer and was unfortunately rewarded with a bee sting on her lip. Poor girl! Thankfully she did not have an allergic reaction as both Anthony and I are allergic to bee’s. She screamed, cried and cuddled with me for an hour while I held ice to her lip and watched her closely. We were not graced with a visit from her alter-ego Commando Girl, just sweet, drive-her-momma-crazy, fun-loving Kenna.

Anthony and Brad had a Boy Scouts meeting they had to attend Saturday afternoon so they didn’t get to join us at camp until Saturday evening. The rain made a second showing Saturday night but not nearly as fierce. It settled down just as Brad was pulling in so we got to light up the camp fire, roast marshmallows and sit under the stars. I had secured the tent a bit better so everything was dry in the tent. Anthony didn’t want to set up his little pup-tent so he had thrown the futon mattress into the back of dad’s truck and slept snuggled in there. The rain drizzled on and off all night and Hailey slept sound all night. It was a magical night’s sleep. Waking up at 6 was easy after such a good night.

A good breakfast of French toast casserole and eggs, a last swim and quick pack up and we were on the road home by noon.

A bit soggy, a few whiney moments, one tough night sleep and one blissfull one all equils an overall great trip.  Much better than our first attempt at camping. I think we might actually be getting the handle on this. Maybe by next year we will actually be able to camp with out stress. (Yea right! What in my life is ever done with out some amount of stress!)

Back to reality tomorrow. I have to get the tornado-stricken house under control. Brad commented that although he completely understands why it happened, it amazed him how quickly our house goes to hell in a hand bag if I’m out of commission. I’m hoping to get Anthony’s room complete, start if not finish my new crafting cabinet and help my mom prep for her purge-all yard sale. More on that one later.

Labor Day Weekend

For this past glorious three day weekend, we planned to BBQ with friends, swim, do some yard work, go shopping, watch new movies and eat good food. Instead, I ended up with a very bad stomach flu and everyone but Anthony got an upper repertory cold. So far no one has gotten the stomach flu aside from me thank goodness. I don’t know if this is the bug from two weeks ago resurfacing or another bug that decided to take up residency but I can’t remember the last time I have had a stomach flu this bad. Poor Brad had to spend his whole three day weekend playing Mr. Mom.

What a wonderful Mr. Mom he is too. He may not be a Mr. Betty Crocker but he can still make some delicious dinners. (Not that I was eating anything but the kids were happy.) He went grocery shopping with both girls, did dishes, laundry, cooking and took care of the kids while I slept on the bathroom floor. Although I would have given just about anything to not have been sick, I love it when he’s so domesticated.

 I know he appreciates what I do but times like this give him a refresher course in walking life in my flip flops. He was appalled at how fast money went in the grocery store, watched the dishes pile up in an ever-dirty kitchen and witnessed my fornicating laundry.  Despite not feeling well himself, I think he was secretly a bit happy to go back to work on Tuesday. Now if we could only find a way for me to slip into his loafers for a day with out the tech world ending maybe I would get a better appreciation of his work stresses. As it is, I still need his help to set up my printer so I don’t think it’d be a good idea.

This morning is the first time in 5 days I haven’t woken up with a major headache so I’m feeling pretty good. My main concern right now is Hailey. She is still alert and taking in fluids but her cough is so bad that if she cries or tries to play, she can’t breathe. So, we’re going to the doctor this afternoon. For now, she’s confined to my bed with vicks vapor rub on her chest, ginger tea with honey in a travel coffee mug and the humidifier humming in the background. Somewhere in there is re-runs of Sponge Bob and a scattering of books to keep her entertained.

She won’t let me stray far from her, I think she’s a bit scared by the whole thing too, so I’m not gaining much ground on my very neglected house but she’s my priority. Some where in this week, I need to cook for our camping trip this weekend, that is if it even happens. I just don’t want to decide last minuet that everyone’s well enough and we are going and have nothing prepared. I’d rather cook it all and freeze it for later if need be. We are going with about 20 other people and I’m in charge of breakfasts for both days. Thankfully, I can make easy casserole quiches, cinnamon rolls and French toast casserole. I’ll cook scrambled ‘cheese eggs’ at camp to go with the French toast on Sunday.

When I get a free moment, I have to share with you my success in making plum sauce with the plums from Bountiful Baskets Plumy Paradise pack. I also figured out how to make homemade crab-cream-cheese rangoons that were to die for. I could have made an entire meal out of the rangoons dipped in the plum sauce.

Fresh roasted chiles

The markets are brimming with hatch chiles this time of year and if you’re lucky, your grocery store even fresh roasts them for you. Our local Safeway smells divine because of the roasting chiles out front. (That is if you don’t walk over by the floral department where they have the disgustingly over scented cinnamon pine cones on display in preperation for Christmas. Yes, Christmas already!)

If you purchased the Bountiful Basket 30# burlap sack of chiles or prefer to buy them raw from your local market you can easily roast them at home. The best way is to toss them onto a roaring hot bbq grill. Keep turning them until they are black and charred. If you don’t have a bbq or prefer not to use it, crank on your broiler and place your chiles on a baking pan on the second shelf. Turn often and remove once blackened. Put the blackened chilies directly into a zip top bag. Seal and place on top of a dish rag with another dish rag on top. Leave them to sit for 20 min’s or so. The steam will separate the skin from the chili flesh.

Once the 20 min’s is up, run the chiles under cool water and remove the blackened skin. I prefer to use medical gloves for this so I don’t smell like chiles for the next two days. That and I have a really bad habit of rubbing my eyes – yea, ouch! I typically pull the stem off at this point too. Most of the seeds come with the stem. Leaving some seeds is fine.

From here, the possibilities are endless! Dice and freeze them in 1 cup increments to use in dishes that call for a can of chiles. Freeze whole and flat on a baking sheet then transfer to a zip top bag for later chile rellenos. The frozen chiles will keep for 6 months to a year.

Here are a few of my previously posted recipes that call for green chiles:

Calabacitas - Mexican Squash soup 

Spicy Garlic Cashew Chicken -  The original recipe calls for jalapeños but the roasted hatch chiles make a great substitute.

Green Chili Corn Bread - perfect with chili (That's with an i as in the meat/bean stew made best over a campfire - preferably by hunky cowboys)

Also, you can:

Add to eggs for a southwest breakfast – good combined with chorizo, potatoes and cheese in a breakfast burrito

Add a cup of diced chiles with 4 cups of sweet corn, diced cilantro, juice of a lime and some salt and pepper for a great side dish.

Add a cup of diced chiles to 2 rinced cans of black beans, juice of a lime, 1 tsp cumin powder and 1 tsp onion powder. Another great side dish or addition to fajitas.

I have done a version of chiles rellenos before with poblanos from Bountiful Baskets but the recipe works with the hatch chilies as well. The hatch are a bit smaller so sometimes I layer it more like a casserole or lasagna than try to stuff the smaller peppers. I have never successfully made the stuffed, fried chiles rellenos you get in the mexican restaurants. They always fall apart on me and ooze all the cheesy goodness into the oil and although I'm a fan of good fried food now and then, fried cheese just doesn't work.

For an all in one casserole try:

1 chicken breast cooked and shredded or diced very small

½ brick of cream cheese - softened

2 cups cheddar jack cheese

1 cup Cotija cheese

2 boxes jiffy corn bread mix

1 can cream of corn

1 can corn - rinsed

1 bunch cilantro

2 eggs

1 cup milk

2 cups salsa or 2 cans of RoTel.

20 roasted chilies

Mix the chicken, cream cheese, 1 cup cheddar jack cheese, 1/2 cup of cotija cheese and ½ the cilantro, set aside. In a separate bowl, mix the jiffy, corn, eggs and milk. In a lasagna pan, pour the salsa/RoTel (I prefer to puree the RoTel, I’m not a chunky tomato fan) then pour ½ the batter. Lay 10 chilies, open, flat, layered over each other on top of the batter. Then, carefully drop spoonfuls of the chicken mixture all over the chilies. Add another layer of chilies on top then pour on the rest of the batter. Sprinkle with remaining cheese. Bake at 350 for 20-30 min’s until the corn bread is set and golden brown. Let the casserole cool down a bit before slicing. Serve with a dollop of sour cream and a sprinkle of cilantro and green onions.

Bountiful Baskets Organic Bananas Bread

It’s that time again, time to order Bountiful Baskets. I still haven’t used up most things from the last basket. I still have almost all of my plumbs from the plumby paradise pack. I plan on making:

Asian Plum Sauce

Plumb Tart

Plumb freezer jam (to use in jam thumbprints for Christmas cookies)

This week I’m going to make lettuce wraps and crab rangoons for dinner one night to serve with my homemade plumb sauce. Yum! That's about as far as I've gotten with meal planning so far. Check back tomorrow for the rest of the weeks meals plus ideas for the beautiful hatch chilies that the grocery stores are brimming with. Tonight I served an ultra intensive, gourmet meal...Tuna sandwiches on toasted buns.

For now, my organic bananas from the basket two weeks ago turned brown super fast, before we could eat them. (Which is a surprise considering how fast my monkeys go thru bananas!) So, I froze them for later.

Today I made ‘Bountiful Banana Bread.’

6-8 brown bananas (thawed if they were frozen)

2 cups flour

1 tsp baking soda

¼ tsp salt

2 tsp cinnamon

2 tsp vanilla

1 tsp nutmeg

½ cup butter

½ cup brown sugar

2 eggs

Topping:

1 cup oatmeal

2 tbsp flour

¼ cup butter (softened)

2 tbsp brown sugar

1 tbsp sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

Mix the bananas, vanilla, butter, sugar and eggs. Add in the flour, soda, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg.  Mix until just combined. Don’t over mix once you add the flour in otherwise the final product is tough not tender. Pour into greased loaf pan, muffin pan or mini loaf pans until ¾ full.

Mix (hand are best) the topping ingredients until combined. Sprinkle on top of the uncooked batter, pressing in only slightly to help it stick.

Bake in 350 degree oven.

Regular loaf pan – 45-50 min’s

Muffins – 25-30 min’s

Mini loaf pans 30-35 min’s

Till tooth pick inserted in the center* comes out clean.

*Last week was our best friends birthday. That particular day she happened to be working a double shift and her husband was in night school so we were babysitting her kids for the evening. Well, Brad was babysitting I was out for the night. Her oldest, my beautiful niece Alana, wanted to make a birthday cake for her mom to eat when she got home. Alana mixed up everything on her own and got it into the oven. The details from there are a bit sketchy. I’m not sure if a timer was set, for how long or if it was just ignored. Alana claims Brad said he checked the cake, Brad claims he told Alana to check it. Regardless, after blowing out the candles and cutting into the cake at 9 at night after a double shift, it was soup in the middle! Alana was so disappointed. It turned into a laughable forever memory as they picked out the cooked edges of the cake but I’m not sure Alana will bake a cake with Brad again.

What can I say, the man is married to Betty Crocker, he doesn’t have to be Betty. J

Craigslist = Starbucks

Sorry I’ve been a bit MIA this week. I’ve been fighting a very illusive stomach bug. No, not pregnant, just can’t seem to get on top of this virus. Needless to say, the menus around here have been broth for me and catch what you can for everyone else. Nothing blog worthy.

In between dying on the couch and random cleaning spurts, I’ve been shopping. Craigslist shopping to be exact. I mentioned before that we bought the girls a bunk bed and Anthony a loft bed, well, I also bought a sectional sofa. It was on a complete whim. I wasn’t really in the market for a sectional but have always wanted one. Our current furniture is old-school Craigslist, AKA- yard sale, and well loved. However, I was browsing the furniture section late Sunday night and found a sectional.

It was chocolate brown, only a few years old, had a queen hide-away-bed and a recliner on one end. No rips, no stains, pet, smoke and kid free home. $200 and it was mine! The guy lived a stones throw away from my house too. It was the meca of the sectional couch search.

Until the next morning.

See, we picked this sectional up at 8:30 at night. So by the time we got home, moved our current couches out of the way and unceremoniously dumped the sectional into the living room, we just went to bed.

In the light of the dawning day, this is what greeted me:

A PINK sectional. Mauve to be exact, but pink none the less. Because of the colors in my house and the way the light filtered in, the color shifted from the chocolate in the top weave to the underlying color of mauve. Bleh! I’m all for outdated values but I draw the line at outdated colors!

I moved forward, rearranging with the help of an unsuspecting friend who stopped by for morning coffee. (Aren’t I a good friend!) Only, once I tried to arrange it in my house, it didn’t fit right. I did my measurements before I bought it and although it did fit, technically, it didn’t fit actually. If I centered it in the bay window, we were too close to the TV, if I moved it back farther, it was oddly off center to the window and looked awkward.

We tried every different arrangement we could think of and finally decided on moving it back the appropriate distance from the TV and off center in the window. Dedicating myself to live with it for a day or so I moved onto my next project for the day. By day’s end, I swear it got more and more pink. Plus, after a long day, we collapsed into it only to discover that it was not nearly as comfortable as we thought it was when we first sat on it.

Life’s too short to not love a Craigslist couch!

So, before my monkeys could slime it up, I reposted it the next morning. Remembering that the guy we purchased it from mentioned that we were the 5^th caller in 15 min.’s since he posted it and that he had several more before he took the posting down, I decided to bump the price up a bit. I figured if it didn’t go for my asking price I could be talked down a bit or at the end of the week I could repost it for $200. With in 20 min’s I had a taker, after 3 hours, I had over 18 offers all willing to pay $350!

$350!

My final taker paid me $375 to deliver it to her. Her house, conveniently, was on the way to my in-law’s house where I had to return the trailer. So, I got paid to drive the trailer back plus, made $175!

I stashed the money away and have been trying to find the right sectional ever since. Guess what I found? The bunk beds we just bought for the girls:

 (we paid $200) listed by someone else for $800! I sent the seller an email asking them if they’d let me know what the final sale price was. Two days later he emailed me saying he sold it for $750! Yea, sorry girls, your bunk bed are going back on Craigslist. Momma needs a $550 profit. I promise to buy you another one really quickly!

I think I found a way to finance my Starbucks habit! J

She’ll run the house

I swear, this child never ceases to amaze me.

I never want one of my kids to be sick, but today, after puking in her car seat in the parking lot of the gym, Makenna is actually calm, subdued and cuddly. I kind of like it.

This past week, she has shown her IT prowess in full force.

Friday afternoon after nap, she was taking her turn on my Ipad for a bit. Next thing I know I hear Brad’s voice.

Me: “Brad?”

Brad: “Yes?”

Me: “Where are you?”

Brad: “Here!”

Me: “Yea, that helps”

Makenna: “Ipad momma, I call Daddy!”

She then hands me my Ipad on which she had opened up my Skype, found Brad’s contact (that does not have his picture so it’s not like she figured it out from that) then called him.

Later that night, Brad, Anthony and I were watching Star Trek (dorks, I know – we love it) on the living room TV and next thing I know, I hear Strawberry Shortcake on the game TV. I didn’t recall any of us getting up to put it on.

Me: “Anthony did you put on Netflix for the girls?”

Anthony: “No, I’ve been sitting here the whole time.”

So I walked over to the futon where the girls were perched with their blankets happily watching Strawberry Shortcake on Netflix for the Wii.

Me: “Hailey, did you turn this on?”

Hailey: “Nope, Kenna did.”

Kenna, holding the Wii-mote and nun chuck: “Bear-berry!”

She somehow turned on the TV and Wii, switched the input to the correct channel, maneuvered the Wii remote to the Netflix channel and selected Strawberry Shortcake. I’m not entirely sure I can do that! Guess next time I should just ask my 2 year old.

Then, on Saturday, before we took the kids to my sister-in-law’s, Brad let me sleep in while he picked up our Bountiful Baskets. In an attempt to keep Makenna busy and not poking me every 5 min’s, I told her she could play with my Ipad. Not an uncommon occurrence, she plays with it almost every day. I have learned to lock down the apps so she can’t delete them (I got tired of losing my facebook and such) and make it so she can’t purchase any apps either. However, when I did get my booty out of bed, I went to reclaim my Ipad only to discover that she was typing an email to Brad. She knew it too, I asked her what she was doing and she said: “Dad!”

Oy! This girl is going to rule this roost. Thank goodness we don’t have one of those fully automated houses (yet) or she’d, set the thermostat, auto cook some hotdogs, lock us all out and have a cartoon marathon!

Spicy Garlic Cashew Chicken

This is one of the meals from last week that I never got around to posting.

This is one of my favorite marinades/dressings for grilled chicken. You can control the heat by the amount of jalapeño’s you put in. *When the grocery stores are brimming with New Mexico Hatch Chilies and there is a guy out front of the store fresh roasting them, I usually substitute the hatch’s for the jalapenos. Taste as you mix to assess the heat level. It does decrease in heat when you cook it but you want the mix to be tolerable fresh as well because it’s good as a finishing drizzle over the top of the grilled chicken.

Recipe adapted from EliseA over at Simple Recipes : Spicy Garlic Cashew Chicken

Ingredients:

Chicken – bone in, bone out, breasts, thighs, wings – doesn’t matter, what ever you prefer

¼ cup Olive Oil

2 tbsp Soy Sauce

2 tbsp Brown Sugar

½ bunch Cilantro

1-2 Jalapeno’s (*see note above)

1 Lime - juiced

1 cup Cashews

With gloves on or with oiled hands, cut the tops off of the jalapenos and remove the seeds. (I typically use only one jalapeño but I leave most of the seeds in it. That heat is good for the kids once grilled but has enough of a kick when raw for Brad and I to enjoy.)

In your food processer, blender or bowl for your immersion blender, add all the ingredients and pulse until a smooth paste forms. If the mixture is not coming together you can add in more lime juice or up to 2 tbsp of water.

Reserve 1/3 of the mixture for drizzling over the finished chicken.

Coat the chicken with the remaining mixture. Let stand for at least 2 hours but overnight is best.

Cook on the grill until done or in the oven, covered, for 30 min’s at 400 until done.

Serve with rice, black beans and corn on the cob. Yum!

Sorry I didn't take more pictures for this one, I was making it in kind of a rush and the pictures I did take are very poor quality so I'm just skipping them. You'll have to use your imagination...or better yet, make this and you'll know exactly how it looks. :)

Green Chile Chicken Enchilada Casserole

In the crock pot. (Phew! Long title!)

This is another noshtalgic food for me. My mom use to make a version of this when I was a kid. The only thing I’ve changed, I think, is adding in more veggies.

Ingredients:

3 Chicken breasts

2 cans Cream-of soup (what ever kind you like)

1 10pkg tortillas

1 lrg can Green Enchilada Sauce

3 small cans Green Chiles

1 can olives

1 pkg cream cheese

2 cups cheddar-jack cheese

1 onion

2 stalks celery

1 red pepper

2-3 carrots

2 cups corn (not pictured because I forgot)

1 bunch cilantro

*Cook the chicken in the oven at 350 for 20-30 min's until almost done. Dice.

Cut the tortillas into wedges.

Mix together the cream-of soups, cream cheese, enchilada sauce and diced veggies.

Add a cup of the soup mix in the bottom of the crock pot. Layer the tortillas next, then the chicken, some of the cheese and some of the cilantro. Top with more of the soup mix then continue the layers until the crock pot is 3/4 full. Top with remaining (or extra) cheese.

Cook on high for 4 hours or low for 6 hours.

To shorten the cooking time, sauté the veggies until tender and cook the chicken until completely done. Then you can cook it in the crock pot for only 2 hours on high just to meld everything together.

*I don't care for raw chicken cooked in my meals, so I always at least par-cook it first. If you are not opposed to it, then you can dump the raw, diced chicken in the crock pot. Increase the cooking time to 6 hrs on high or 8 hrs on low.

You really can't over cook this; it just gets better with time and crunchy cheese!

Weekly Meal Plan 8/15/11

Monday – Green Chili Chicken Crock Pot Casserole

Tuesday – Dirty Rice and Beans

Wednesday – Large Salad

Thursday – Ham, Broccoli and Cheese Quiche

Friday – Dinner on-the-go at my parent’s house

Saturday – Same as Friday

Sunday – Hamburger Sliders on whole wheat buns

Grocery List:

1 pack tortillas
2 cans pop-n-fresh biscuits

3 cans green chili
1 can olives
1 lg can green enchiladas sauce
2 cans cream-of soup (what ever kind you like)
1 lg can red kidney beans
1 can black beans
1 can white beans

2 bgs shredded cheddar-jack cheese
1 box feta cheese
1 small brick sharp cheddar cheese

2 lbs ground beef
1 bg frozen chicken breasts
1 ham steak

1 bg brown rice

1 bg frozen corn

Red peppers
Lettuce
Carrots
2 sweet onions
Garlic
Zucchini
Corn on the cob
Celery
Tomatoes
Broccoli
Cauliflower

1 dozen eggs

In the pantry
Flour
Sugar
Yeast
Seasonings

Projects, projects, projects!

My life has been over run with projects. I love and loath it all at once. I long for quiet days of nothing but 'regular' chores to do but after a week of that I start longing for a project to break up the monotony.

This week, I've deconstructed three rooms, put up a bunk bed, a loft bed and am, installing hard wood flooring and built a lego lamp.

We found a great solid wood bunk bed on Craigslist that we put in the girls room. It is T shaped, has a desk, built in dresser and several shelves. Hailey took the top bunk and Kenna wanted the cubbyhole bed. I still need to design a new light fixture (the old one is a head injury waiting to happen) and a shelf for Haileys night-night water. I also want to put some fun curtains up giving them a bit of privacy and adding a bit of whimsy to the bed. All of this of course doesn't include their disastrous walk in closet that somehow volcanoed into a gigantic toy mountain. That's a project for a time when I have more patience because right now I'd just purge it all!

Once Anthony saw the girls bunk bed he wanted a loft bed again. He had one several years ago but decided he outgrew it once he started second grade. It was relatively low to the ground for a loft bed, had a tent and a slide so I guess I understand outgrowing it. The new one we found for him (again a fantastic Craigslist find) is a full size metal bed frame, a bit over 6 ft tall, and has a gigantic wood desk underneath. Brad also hooked up a projector under the bed and a screen in his closet so he can now watch his movies and play his games in his room. (On a side note, when did he get big enough for that? We had to come up with all sorts of parents-suck rules to keep him - and us - in check.) The bed was a major pain to put up. It came disassembled with out instructions and had no identifying markers on it for us to figure out the maker. My step-dad and I put together 1/3 of the bed three different times. We would get to a point only to figure out that we had something backwards or on the wrong side and had to disassemble and start again. It took us an entire day to get it done, but, I love project puzzles like that and it was an enjoyable day.

His light is in the way as well so we built a Lego lamp to install on an off set chain. I have to say, it was fun and a relaxing way to spend the day. We watched a few movies and combed thru his huge Lego collection to find the pieces we needed. I'll post pictures as soon as its up.

Lastly, Brad and I signed up to be the installers for my parents new hardwood floors. Actually I think they're laminate but that’s beside the point. Its the click and lock type so thankfully no glue or nails but still tons of time crawling around on the floor. We started one room this weekend but due to a newly discovered leak in the closet, we had to stop 1/3 of the way thru. I have to say, laying the flooring is the easy part. Figuring out the staggered pattern was the most time consuming! Hopefully this upcoming weekend we'll be able to finish the first room and the second. My poor parents house is so displaced right now, we need to get the rooms done so we can move things back into their proper place.

Upcoming this week I have a new (to-me) dresser to refinish and turn into a crafting/sewing storage hutch, two sewing projects plus all the things I mentioned above that are not yet complete. My favorite seasons are coming up quickly so I know this is just the beginning of my crafting blitz. I can't wait!

Stuffed peppers and tomatoes

This is one of my favorite meals! The girls don't care for the peppers so I stuff tomatoes for them instead. Anthony has an alternate meal on nights I make this. This is one of few meals I taylor to each individual. Brad likes more meat in his, I prefer more veggies, so watch the instructions below to see exactly which ingredients you may need depending on which variation you prefer.

Ingredients

1-2 peppers per person (I prefer red or yellow but green work the same)
1-2 tomatoes per person/kiddo
1 lb ground beef
1 sweet onion
2 cloves garlic
1 stalk celery
1 zucchini
Handful of baby carrots
Feta cheese
Colby jack cheese
2 string cheeses or boring 'ol mozzarella cheese
Croutons
BBQ sauce

Depending on the shape of the peppers, either cut the top off (if they're short and squat) or lay them on their side and cut a wedge into the face up side. Place the peppers in a baking dish that fits and preheat oven to 375.

Dice the onion, celery, carrot and garlic, sauté until soft then add the ground beef. Cook until done. Remove from pan.

Sauté the zucchini and the tops of two of the peppers with out the stem. Remove from the pan.

Sauté a diced tomato with 1/4 onion add 2 tbsp BBQ sauce. Combine with 1/2 cup of the meat, 2 tbsp crushed croutons and stuff two peppers. Top with cheddar jack cheese.

Combine 1/4 cup meat, the zucchini mix (withhold 2 tbsp) and stuff 2 peppers. Top with feta cheese.

Combine 1/4 cup meat, 2 tbsp cheddar jack cheese, 2 tbsp zucchini mix and stuff the tomatoes. Top with strings from the string cheese.

Bake for 20-30 min.'s until the peppers become slightly soft and the cheese is brown and bubbly.









Yum!

You’re only as old as you feel

…I feel OLD!

I’m not going to put a number to how old I feel because I’m sure there are readers out there who are that age and would be highly offended that I referred to their number as old. None the less, I have been feeling so old lately.

We took Anthony school shopping this weekend the same as we have done every weekend before the start of school for 6 years now. This year, however, was different. First, he didn’t even glance at the character themed back packs or lunch boxes, not even a sideways glance, he went right to the solid color, big kid ones. Second, his school list required college ruled paper, not wide-ruled paper. Logically I get that this is just a transition requiring the kids to write in cursive using smaller letters, but I will admit I pouted out my lower lip just a tad as we passed the kindergarten tri-lined paper and had to put something labeled “college” into the cart. Lastly, and this one actually had me, a non-sentimental person, choked up a bit. His school list did not include crayons. No crayons! Markers, highlighters, colored pens, but no crayons. Apparently, 5^th graders are too big to color with crayons in school. I had to throw a box into the cart anyways; I just couldn’t fathom back-to-school shopping without crayons.

A 5^th grader! I’m the mom of a 5^th grader! He still kisses me several times a day and randomly tells me he loves me, but, he wouldn’t hold my hand while we were shopping, he just gave me the eye roll when I reached for his hand. He plugs his ears and closes his eyes at any kissy-face scenes on TV. You know what that means? It’s the pre-curser to being interested in the kissy-faced scenes. When did he get so big? Do I really have to take him to 5th grade on Thursday? Can't I just take him back to kindergarden?

Said 5^th grader is also the pre-curser to my other ‘I feel old’ moment that happened last week. To set this up, I have to mention that while we were on our vacation I found these cool suckers for the kids as a treat. They had LED lights in them and flashed fun colors. I bought them because I thought they’d be fun entertainment for driving at night. I was right, except for one fact, the colors I bought were 2 blue and 1 red. Can you picture it yet? Brad was driving 80 mph down the highway in Texas at 8pm at night with flashing red and blue lights in the back of our car. Yea, not so smart on my part, but the kids thought it was hilarious. Anthony in particular became fixated with the idea of being pulled over for speeding. He has asked every driver for the last two weeks if they’ve ever been pulled over for speeding. Proudly, most of us have been able to say that we have not been pulled over for speeding in many years.

Untill last Friday that is.

I had just dropped Anthony off at my parents’ house for him to spend the night and was rushing home to finish preparations for a birthday party I was hosting. I saw the cop; he was coming at me in the opposite lane, just past the stop sign. I knew I was speeding, I immediately slowed down hoping that he wouldn’t notice given he was driving not parked. In my rearview mirror I watched him pull over and wait for traffic to pass. I went thru the stop sign and just as I passed the intersection, he pulled out, flipped on his lights, and came after me. I knew I was busted! This is not about my stupidity in speeding on a street notorious for speed traps; this is about the cop himself. He parked behind me and sauntered up to my window. He was 19! I swear! Well, ok, maybe not 19, but he was not an older man with distinguished grey hair and an out of date handle bar mustache. He was a young kid! To make matters worse? He called me Ma’am! “License and registration please, Ma’am.” Not that I’m one for ever trying to wink my way out of a ticket but if I had been so inclined this was absolutly not the sinario for that to work. Here I was, a 30 something mom with two kids in the back seat, my hair in a greasy sweat-streaked ponytail, a ratted tank top and gym shorts looking at a young, virile, 20-something cop. I might as well have had a walker sitting in the passenger seat. Knowing I had no chance of charming this ‘kid’ I took the bolder rout that can only come with age and just asked him flat out if there was any way he could just give me a warning. After making me sweat it out for 5 min’s, he did come back with a written warning, thankfully. I would have been more grateful had he not used the “ma’am” again. It just made me cringe, blush in what were probably patchy red splotches (as opposed to the flushed, sexy blush of youth) and thank him with my head hung low.

I promptly called Anthony and asked him if he knew what a “jinks” was. Did he know what it meant to jinks someone? I reminded him of his obsessive questioning lately about being pulled over. Before I could even explain, he busted out laughing. “You got pulled over for speeding didn’t you! Ha, Ha, Ha!”

Ok, maybe for that I will drop him off at 5th grade. 5th grade boot camp!