Week 16: False! Black Beans

Recipes to Go: 507 351

Weeks to Go: 52 36

Recipes Made This Week

Balsamic-Glazed Tuna Steaks

Flavorful Rice Salad

Bacon 'n' Cheese Stuffed Potatoes

Chili for a Crowd

Pumpkin Gingerbread Trifle

Mother Lode Pretzels

Yeast Corn Bread Loaf

Fruit Smoothies

Caribbean Quesadillas

Spooky Spider Cake

Pumpkin and Spice and Everything Nice Muffins

Monster Cutout Cookies

Vegetarian Stuffed Peppers

Since Johnny was out of town for most of this week, it was a bit challenging to get caught up on recipes. I spent Sunday and Monday trying to eat through leftovers. But the missionaries were coming to eat on Tuesday, so it gave me a perfect opportunity to make some food that I wouldn't have large quantities of. So I made 3 tuna steaks and four baked potatoes. After I put the potatoes in the oven, I thought things through and since I had to cut them in half to stuff them, I probably only should have made 2, but it was okay since we only ended up with one when dinner was over. And the missionaries took the leftover rice salad, which was so good I made it again on Thursday. They also helped me finish up the berry cheesecake pie.

Everything was delicious except that the fish was frozen when I started broiling it, so it need a few more minutes. It was still fine, just more pink than most people would like. Luckily, one of the sisters loved sushi, so she didn't mind. The other was very polite, so she didn't say anything, and still managed to eat it all. What a trooper. As for the potatoes, well who doesn't love twice baked potatoes? Who doesn't love bacon? How could that be a bad combination? I was lucky to be very successful when scooping them out. And mashing them with butter first made things much more smooth. Seriously, why have I never done that before? And the Beans and Rice salad featured black beans, which ended up being the ingredient of the week.

Wednesday night was our Ward Halloween party. It was a soup and salad potluck, perfect opportunity to make a potluck recipe and the Chili for a Crowd sounded good. It also had black beans in it, though not as many. Confession, I didn't try this till after I got back home, but it was supposed to have 24 servings and there were maybe 3 left when I got back. I tried some when I was putting it away. It was definitely the best chili I've ever made. Nice and spicy, not too watery. I want to make it again.

There was a dessert competition at the party too. Apple or pumpkin desserts. Luckily for me, there are plenty of pumpkin desserts in the book. Luckily for me, I've made one of them before. So I made it again--Pumpkin Gingerbread Trifle.

Kasey will vouch for me that it was delicious with lumpy sweet potato pudding, and it was even better with smooth pumpkin pudding. So good was it, that I actually one in the pumpkin category. Amazing since I haven't won anything in ages.

Thursday I was planning on making the Yeast Corn Bread Loaf to go with all the leftover chili I imagined we would have. We didn't have much chili. In fact, we had surprisingly little food at all, which is why I made the salad again. Johnny got home late. I had dinner waiting, but while I was waiting for him, I decided to get started on the Mother Load Pretzels. I almost had the caramels melted when he got home. I didn't finish the pretzels that night. I did make the Fruit Smoothies. They were delicious.

Friday didn't go so well for me. Car troubles, phone problems, then in the process of finishing the pretzels, I ruined one of my measuring cups and left a big mess in the microwave. But they turned out great.

Worth a few burned fingertips. They are highly addictive. Good thing I made so many. It's hard to pass by them without eating 1, or 3.

Better than that was the Caribbean Quesidillas.

Johnny thought there was meat in them, but they are vegetarian quesidillas. They tasted a little like fish, which we determined must have been due to the cloves. Anyway, they were delicious. They came together pretty easily as well. I also forget about quesidillas when I need to make a quick dinner, but I'll try to do better at remembering in the future because they are more fun than burritos. And did I mention, the main ingredient was black beans? These have sweet potatoes in them. I don't have enough recipes for sweet potatoes. And they are so tasty. Don't worry, there are plenty more in the book to come.

Game night treat this week was the Spooky Spider Cake. I just made the spider part.

It was just a cake mix, so I didn't enjoy the cake part very much. But the frosting was delicious. It got rave reviews from everyone else as well. It was fun to make legs out of licorice. Luckily for me, everyone ate most of the cake, so I didn't have to finish it myself.

Saturday morning I made the Pumpkin Muffins. I used wheat germ instead of wheat bran because I couldn't find it anywhere. I know, there are the opposite parts of the wheat, but it made the muffins hearty. And the chocolate chips made them sweet.

Then we went out all day and things got crazy. I made Johnny make the Monster Cutout Cookies with the intension of decorating them and distributing them to our neighbors. Well, they got made, but not decorated.

In fact, they didn't get out before Halloween. But at least they were delicious, so I'm sure that will be looked over. My decorating skills are sub-par at best, so let me just say that they are supposed to be moons, pumpkins, ghosts, and mummies.

For dinner on Saturday, I did the smart thing and put together a slow cooker recipe so we could trick or treat and have hot dinner waiting for us when we got back. I managed to put together the stuffed peppers before we left. The peppers I picked out were so big that I only have room for 5 in my slow cooker, but that was okay because they were big enough that all the stuffing fit in just 5 peppers. Oh, they were so tasty. Full of black beans and rice. So delicious I didn't get a picture.

Boo!

For Halloween this year, we basically came up with two good ideas for G.

A)

and B)

Because I knew I would ended up with only a few days to throw it together, I was leaning towards A (despite everyone voting for B). But luckily for, well everyone, Johnny was gone to Mexico and couldn't even call me, so I had plenty of time to sew. Are you adequately prepared for the cuteness?

Presenting: G the Destroyer

Don't make him mad

Or he'll pick up your car like it's a child's toy

Here's a close up of the hat

And a shot of cuteness (hopefully this will do you for awhile)

G loved his costume, and me for making it.

Actually, I'm pretty sure he just loves me cause I'm Mom, but I'm taking the hug as payment, none the less. Because it's all I get.

Happy Halloween everyone!

Week 15: Butter

Recipes to Go: 507 364

Weeks to Go: 52 37

Recipes Made This Week

Carrot Oatmeal Cookies

Zucchini Patties with Dill Dip

Sirloin with Blue Cheese Butter

Creamed Peas and Carrots

Scalloped Potatoes 'n' Ham

Buttery Hot Wings

Southwestern Nachos

Berry Cheesecake Pie

Gnocchi with Thyme Butter

Goblin's Oragne Popcorn

Chees-enstein

Toasty Pumpkin Waffles

Chicken Cordon Blue

Because we didn't have any desserts last week, I made cookies on Sunday. Unfortunately, I forgot to add the chocolate chips. I'm ashamed to admit this because I am the queen of adding chocolate chips. Be that as it may, they were still delicious and they made 7 dozen plus a few more.

G loves them, they made great breakfast, and there was carrots in them, so if you ignore a cup of butter, a cup of shortening, and 3 cups of sugar, you could say they were healthy.

To go with the cookies and the wonderful weather we had on Sunday, we made the zucchini patties.

They also had carrots in them, which I will shred next time instead of chopping because the chopped carrots did not stay together in the patties. Fortunately, they were still delicious. The green tomatoes we fried, however, were not.

They were very sour.

On Tuesday, we made steak and potatoes, and veggies. And thus began our week of butter. I guess the cup of butter in the cookies counts, so I guess Sunday began the week of butter. But in this case, the butter was homemade. Not shaken from cream, but mixed with the cheese and spices. The blue cheese butter was delicious, but the steak was pretty bad. That's because it had been in the freezer for too long. The recipe made lots of butter, so now I had a log of butter in the fridge with nothing to do.

The scalloped potatoes were everything they promised to be. Like funeral potatoes without the sadness. I was pretty proud of my chopping skills putting these together. Maybe there's hope for my knife skills after all.

The creamed peas and carrots were delicious. I know, you would think we were getting sick of carrots by this point, but surprisingly, no. They were still good. Johnny didn't fully appreciate them, of course, because they were peas, and neither did G, but I loved em.

On Thursday, we had a manly-themed dinner with Buttery Hot Wings and Southwestern Nachos. Too bad Johnny doesn't have poker nights. The nachos were excellent due to the fact that the beef was slow cooked all day. And I'm normally not a fan of Velveeta.

The name makes it sound so wonderful like velvet, like it will make all my food smooth and creamy, but it tastes rather gross. I feel like I should be a fan, kind of like the Beatles and U2, which fall in the same category.

But in this instance, Velveeta was actually a good choice because these were nachos and nothing says nachos quite as well as processed cheese food. The stuff that real cheese eats for dinner.

The hot wings were good, I thought.

I'm not a huge fan of meat on the bone, and they were closer to undercooked than over so they were more difficult to rip off. (Or it could just be that my canines have been filed down . . . ) I like the spiciness that still had flavor. I didn't like having to melt 1 1/2 cups of butter into the sauce. Johnny agreed and said that they were too buttery and declared himself to be a hot wing purest. Luckily for him, I think this concludes our hot wing recipes for the year.

I started on the Berry Cheesecake Pie on Thursday, but didn't get to finish and enjoy it until Saturday. But because it was the fourth recipe on Thursday, disaster fell in its wake. The recipe called to put foil around the edges to avoid over-browning. This sounded like an excellent idea, but was easier read than done. After fiddling with the foil for ten minutes and worrying G with my angry tone, I decided it would be easier to fix it if the pie was in the oven. I'm not sure why I decided that, because it's obviously stupid, and I hate hot things, but it was frustrating me. So, in the process of not getting burned, my hot pad (not the silicone kind) came in contact with the heating coil and started a small fire. Nothing was permanently damaged, and we ended up figuring out the pie/foil situation, but I have just come to expect disasters when three or more recipes is involved in one meal. But the pie was worth the wait to Saturday to eat.

Johnny, who I didn't think was a cheesecake fan, had two slices in succession and would have had a third if his stomach had permitted.

Thursday was about the time that I discovered I was so far behind in my recipes, so despite the over abundance of leftovers, I was forced to make more recipes. Friday we made Gnocchi with Thyme Butter. But I didn't exactly want more butter floating around, plus I was out of butter, I had to mooch a stick from my neighbor, so instead of messing around with that, we just used the blue cheese butter from earlier in the week.

It made things much more flavorful, which is good because gnocchi take entirely too much time to make. 70 minutes of prep was inaccurate because I had two other recipes to put together, so it was almost 7 when we got to eat. It was ridiculous all the steps that had to go into something that ends up looking like a mushy mess. Like I said, it was a good thing it ended up tasting yummy.

So, originally I was not going to worry about making the Goblin Popcorn for Halloween, but was going to change the color and use it some other time, but since I needed some extra recipes, I popped it in. (Pun intended.) I couldn't get a hold of a popcorn popper, and I have no intention of buying one, so we used microwave popcorn and crossed our fingers. It helped that I accidentally made kettle corn for the first batch. It did not help that I pushed the potato button instead of the popcorn button for the second batch. Smoke was the least of our worries, though there was plenty of that. I still smell horrid burnt popcorn every time I use the microwave.

The chees-enstein turned out pretty awesome. Cuter than I was going for, since I was going for scary.

But cute is good, and so was the cheese ball. I should know because we were alone for Game Night and we ate half the chees-enstein and half the popcorn. Both were addictive.

Saturday morning I made Pumpkin Waffles and guess what the recipe called for . . . homemade cranberry butter. I was not prepared for that again, so we made cranberry syrup instead.

The waffles were good, though not as crispy as I normally like with my waffles. That's because of the pumpkin, I know. And cranberries, I will be freezing many, many of you while I can find you fresh this season because you are delicious and I have about 10 more recipes to make that involve cranberries.

I had to make dinner on Saturday, too to catch up as much as I could. So we went with something simple, chicken cordon bleu.

Not sure what is blue about the chicken, or what the heck "cordon" means. I'm sure it's some remote place in France that decided a chicken and a pig should mate and merge in some twisted way. Anyway, I only made two and they were delicious. They would have been better with some sauce and if I had used cornflakes instead of breadcrumbs, but I don't like cornflakes and I don't want to buy them to use them in two recipes a year, so we made due.

Hmm, Velveeta and cornflakes, not likes. But maybe I should. Maybe I should whistle "Yellow Submarine" too, but I don't see that happening in the near future. With or without you.

Just the Other Day

This happened when we finished lunch.

I missed the really cute picture of the plate right on top of his head, but you get the idea. Unfortunately, there were some spaetzle residue on the plate, so he ended up with food in his hair. Good thing our bathtub is working.

Week 14: No Desserts

Recipes to Go: 507 377

Weeks to Go: 52 38

Recipes Made This Week
Vegetable & Cheese Focaccia
Steak Potpie
Sage Meat Loaf
Seasoned Mashed Potatoes
Pork Chops in Orange Sauce
Sicilian Salad
Brussel Sprouts with Water Chestnuts
Traditional Scones
Mushroom Asparagus Quiche
Jack-o'-Lantern Cream Puffs
Ham 'n' Swiss Rolls
Strawberry Breakfast Shakes

The focaccia was supposed to be made on Saturday, but as per usual, things got away from me. So I made it Sunday. It was surprisingly unmemorable. I probably should make this again since I forgot to put olive oil in the dough and it didn't rise so well. I guess I need to start putting them in the oven to rise.

Monday I made Steak Potpie because we ran out of leftovers to eat. Man, this was good. And thanks to Pillsbury Crescent Rolls, the crust was fast.

Baked just like it should and made us all very happy. It didn't leave us with much leftover, either, for that reason. So I had to make dinner on Tuesday, too, but it was just pasta and not in the book, so I don't have to write about it.

Wednesday we had meat loaf. Johnny doesn't like meat loaf, but he siad this is a meat loaf he could stand behind. It was so tasty and I have no idea why. Next time I will double the sauce on top, just because it was tasty.

The mashed potatoes were a little disappointing. I think I've been spoiled with Alton Brown's recipe for garlic mashed potatoes. These were basically flavorless, so I won't be using them for Thanksgiving this year.

Thursday was a three-recipe meal. This was a problem because I also had to make a treat for Seminary, since I was told we wouldn't have a treat there on Friday. So I made the salad early to avoid the chaos of trying to make three at once.

It was tasty and easy and something I could throw together in a hurry. That's always important.

The pork chops came together quickly. I'm still on the fence about pork chops. This recipe was descent, but I'm still sitting. There are more pork chop recipes, so maybe I'll make up my mind later in the year.

I had brussel sprouts when I was little and didn't like them. That's because I didn't have this recipe. If they weren't so expensive right now, I'd make this all the time. Clearly lots of love and butter went into this. And the water chestnuts just go so perfectly. There is a hint of sweetness to this recipe that helps to combat the bitterness of the brussel sprouts and the crunchy water chestnuts balance the sogginess of the soaked sprouts.

I remembered after G was in bed that I needed to make a treat, so I looked through the book for something I had all the ingredients for and something that wouldn't take too long to make. I settled on the scones.

They were simple. I got to use my new dough cutter, which is awesome, by the way (bought it on my anniversary. Totally worth $4.) After they were done, I realized we didn't have any jam in the house. So I didn't get to really enjoy them until later in the week.

Because after all, we did have treats in Seminary, and no scones could compete with chocolate chip muffins. At least where teenagers are concerned. So I got yummy leftovers.

Friday I made the Mushroom Asparagus Quiche. It called to spread the bottom with musard and bake it. I've never baked mustard before, but it was delicious.

I like asparagus . . . maybe.

The cream puffs for Game Night were easier to make than I thought, but they did take some time. I got started in the afternoon with the shells. The filling was so delicious. Pumpkin-y and good and creamy. Then I attempted to decorate them using only a ziplock bag and some scissors. It worked out okay sometimes. These three were the best.

Then the frosting would gum up and explode out in big bursts. Luckily taste and decorative skill are not directly related.

Saturday morning I made the Ham 'n' Swiss Rolls. They were so easy thanks to the refrigerated crescent rolls. I think this was the fastest breakfast I've made. Okay, maybe the shake was faster, but I still had to pit strawberries for that one. And I made a shake with this.

It was sour mostly because I didn't have milk and had to improvise. It wasn't bad, just wasn't amazing like it might have been.

But at the end of the week, I realized I hadn't made any desserts. Cream puffs, yes, but 12

and they were gone that night. So first on my list for next week was a cheesecake pie . . .

1/4 Way There

Week 13 marks the quarter way mark of this goal. To be on track I need to have made 127 recipes by now. I have made 118, so I have 9 to catch up with before the half way mark.

In order to celebrate the occasion, I thought I'd make a list about what I've learned, and what I now know I don't know. Also, the first Top Ten List.

• I am not good at crumb coating.
• Always take time to scrape down the sides and beaters at least once when creaming cream cheese.
• There is only so much you can do with a hole in a ziplock bag when it comes to decorating. I guess I need to invest in some bags and tips.
• My oven works in the middle of cooking times, so if the recipe says 20-25 mins, I can count on 23.
• I'm starting to get the hang of when I can substitute and when I can't.
• I don't like coriander
• Attempting to cook 3 or more recipes at once inevitably leads to disaster.
• I eat 5 lbs of sugar and flour just about every two weeks.
• Gingersnaps do not make crumbs easily.
• Cookies usually yield less than stated, and muffins more.
• Some people can take 5 ingredients and create magic. Luckily for me, they write it down so I can follow. Good thing I'm good at reading recipes.

Top Ten Recipes Thus Far:

Spicy Wanton Stars

Onion Sausage Quesidillas

Sweet 'n' Tender Cabbage Rolls

Chicken Fingers with Lemon Sauce

Holstein Crinkles

Chow Mein Chicken Salad

Black Forest Cake

Crumb-Coated Spaetzle

Ham 'n' Swiss Rolls

Hearty Sausage Sandwich

September's Dress

This is the first dress that has been completely free for me. The pattern was a gift from a co-worker. The pink material came from my grandma, and the floral print was in a stash from my mother-in-law. So all I had to do was give a little time, and it didn't take much. Which was a blessing because I had a lot of side projects to work on in September and I was able to get most of them done.

This is definitely a Saturday dress. Great for cleaning, hanging up laundry, and such. Light and breezy for summer. Too bad summer is almost over.

My favorite thing about this dress is the pockets. I love it when they are a focal point so I don't have to squeeze them in on my own.

Things I Learned Making This Dress:

• Don't sew late at night. I already knew this, but I got tired and took twice as long because I had to unpick almost every seam. I sewed the front piece on, beautifully, I might add, before I remembered I forgot the pockets. Then I sewed the back before I remembered I needed to sew the zipper first.
• There's something that was a first for this dress: sewing in an invisible zipper by machine. I think I did a pretty good job.