9 posts tagged “theredkitchen”

One of the things we were excited about doing on a longer vacation down to see Eric's family was to cook them a meal.  I posted the 3 recipes we want to make on TheRedKitchen in preparation: Kristine's Ravioli Extravaganza, Vegetable Cheese Soup, and Yogurt Rolls.  We'll also do Apple Crisp, but I have that pretty down where I don't measure this new healthier version.

It's fun to write these up since I've been just going from notes on various pieces of paper up until now! :)

Note: This is the second in a series of posts looking back at 2007, in some key areas of my life that were important to me. 

I cooked this year.

Even though I've been cooking for years, I had a very limited array of things that we ate.  A lot of boxed meals and frozen pizzas were the base foods of our diets, with a few other more special or homemade plans around them.  This year, I learned how to cook more things than the previous 5 years combined.  This came from reading cooking sites online and cooking magazines and books for inspiration. 

We got several kitchen tools that make it easier to cook - the George Foreman Grill - with different plates for waffles even - (post) and a blender that actually blends, as well as E's immersion blender he got for a gift.  New frying pans - they are purple - are a joy, too.

I have never been a big fan of vegetables, but some of the meal ideas really made for a yummy way to eat them that I wouldn't have thought to try.  I've worked with a variety of squashes, zucchini, onions, lots of broccoli, corn on the cob, parsnips, carrots, green beans, plenty of potatoes, various things with peppers, and more.  As part of an effort to appreciate the things available in the area, we went to the Farmer's Market to purchase fruits and veges locally grown.  We started spending more of our grocery shopping time in the produce section than ever before.    

Cooking meat has always been hard for me because I don't like handling it.  Since E is a vegetarian, this wasn't a big boundry for me, I just got prepackaged things or didn't eat meat in the home.  But when I think of the foods I enjoy eating out, I really wanted to try more to make some of them in the home instead, and started to learn to cook meat.  I still don't enjoy handling the meat, but I've gotten better at it.

This all meant we ate out less.  And we had specific meal plans, knowing what was going to be for which day, and planning for the freshs veges to be eaten first in the week, and so on.  Grocery night turns more into a fun trip when I have a list and a plan in hand, because it's less stressful, and that makes me happier.

And I've started updating theredkitchen with the creations I've come up with.  That site has been neglected for too long, and I'm happy to see posts with this 2007 on them for a change.  I also made use of AllRecipes (profile) and their Recipe Box quite often to save lists of the things I've made or plan to make.  The Reiman magazines I receive - as well as the previous stockpile - were a big help (Simple and Delicious, Cooking for 2)

I've used several of my cookbooks this year, but Betty Crocker is still the most helpful.  Besides that, I've been making use of my Cake Mix Doctor book to think of new and creative desserts.

I haven't kept up with writing up all the meals I made on Vox like I had hoped, but I do have a pile of my weekly plans here in my office, and I'm going to use it to make a comprehensive list of meal ideas to help me in my planning this coming year.

My favorite new thing that I learned to make this year is actually making good homemade yeasty Dinner Rolls (on theredkitchen).  It takes a couple of risings, but it really takes a main dish and turns it into a meal.  Add that to some Mac and Cheese, fix up some carrots, and some sparkling cider, and I am a happy girl while cooking AND while eating (photo above from August).

Bonus, a Vox Tip: If you have a favorite recipe, add it as a link using Vox This! and put a tag for "recipe" on it.  Then you can browse other people's links tagged "recipe" in Explore.  Easy as PIE! ;)

Eric's birthday is tomorrow, but we are celebrating with the family today with a big birthday party!  I told him Friday was the beginning of his birthday celebration and he keeps laughing at me.  We went out and watched the Golden Compass on friday and had Old Spaghetti Factory for lunch, and it was a really nice date.

E's mom is actually coming, because she flew up for a funeral in Walla Walla yesterday.  We're sad for the reason, but it will be great to see her, since we aren't flying down this holiday season ourselves.  Of course, as we get closer to the event, people are dropping off of the list, which does tend to happen because E's bday is so close to Christmas and people having other responsiblities.  But it will still be great, we'll have somewhere between 9-14 people I think!

I've been doing a bunch of cleaning throughout the week and yesterday, we finished up most everything.  How does dust and dirt get on ever surface of the house?!  It's sure shiny now at least.  A few weeks back, we rearranged the couches, and even though the couch sitting area is a smaller area now, I think I'm going to leave it this way even with company and hope that nobody feels like there's nowhere to sit. (we are only one chair short because it was Megan's and she needed it).

For dinner, we are going to have fabulous food.  I created this recipe for Pasta Bake (theredkitchen) a few months back when I didn't have any lasagna noodles, and have perfected it and then added a vegetarian version.  I've never made it on a bigger scale than single-service+leftover, though, so this ought to be exciting.  We'll also be having yummy dinner rolls (theredkitchen), which I love to make because they are all yeasty and fresh tasting.  And then broccoli with butter and mizithra cheese (like Spaghetti factory) and Apricot Glazed Carrots (allrecipes) or something like that - I didn't get an orange to zest. 

Yesterday's cooking prep included a new recipe for snacking on, Peppermint Cookie Brittle (bettycrocker).  This looked like an easier version of peppermint bark that I made last year because the base is cookies instead of chocolate.  We still need to break it up into little pieces, but it's done.  E picked a cake out of the Cake Mix Doctor, and Almond Chocolate cake that smelled SO good last night and I can't wait to eat it! :)

So today will involve a bunch of cooking to try and be done and ready to bake it before people start coming early to gather and play.  I'd rather not be stressing about finishing anything but the vegetables once people get her, truthfully, because that's a little more anxiety-inducing!

Along with the birthday party planning, I finished Christmas decorations, and started wrapping Christmas presents (E's mom may be able to stick a few in her suitcase, otherwise we'll bring them to the mail on Monday).  This coming week will be mostly relaxing because gifts are almost all done and just waiting to be wrapped.  And Christmas cookie baking will happen towards the end of the week to bring them for Christmas Eve with the family.  We'll go to church on Sunday with Leonard and Sarah, which really gets me in a good mindset for Christmas (speaking of which, I dreamt last night that I found an adventist church I actually wanted to attend and didn't have people who I'd rather not see at it.  I wish that was true!)

Ohhh, and E found a cable for the entertainment center downstairs to plug my iPod into.  Now we can listen to the 8 hours of Christmas music on my iPod instead of having to use the CD rotator and be limited to 5 CDs and listen to the ugly noises it makes when switching between ;)  I ripped his Mannheim Steamroller to alternate with my regular Christmas Music.  I can't help but sing along, even if my voice leans towards singing the harmony too often!

Have a beautiful day, friends!

We always divide up the cooking between all the couples in our family when it comes to Thanksgiving.  My dad gets the core things that have been cooked at their house, and the rest of us divide up the rest.

So this year, like the last few years, I'm making the following:

• Green Bean Casserole.  We are going to try something new with it this year, though, and hopefully it will be better.  We watched Good Eats: Bean Stalker where he made his own sauce instead of cream of mushroom soup, and that looked so much better.  So I'm combining the two recipes, where I'll use storebought fried onions (French's), but make the sauce from scratch.
• Corn Casserole.  E's mom usually makes this, and so we've been adding it each year too.
• Coconut Cream Pie.  This is my fav pie, besides pumpkin, so I like to add it to the pile of pies we have.  The betty crocker cookbook recipe.  I usually buy a premade crust, but this year, I'm going to try something different.  I saw the idea in my Real Simple this last time (recipe) where they took shortbread cookies and almonds and butter and made a crust that way.  It looks like shortbread cookies are really easy to make, so I'll do a batch of those, and then use some of them for the crust.  I'll bring the rest to snack on.

Some years, I've made my Pumpkin Bread, but Sarah's got that covered, and hers is really good.  I'll just bring cookies instead as a snacky thing.

I'll be doing the pie today, but the other two have to wait till tomorrow morning, which is slightly stress inducing because I worry doing things right at the last minute.  But these dishes are much better when they are fresh, so that's how it has to be.  E's going to help, though, it will be okay.

Thanksgiving dinner is always fabulous, I'm looking forward to it so much.  (So much that I went and had an open face turkey sandwich last night at Boppin' Bo's, I couldn't wait for Thursday to eat turkey!)  And it should be a good day with the family, too :)

I've got a pile of recent meal lists and shopping lists that I haven't written about, but the pile was so large that it was overwhelming me, so I'm just writing up the last two weeks :)

• Corn on the cob and veggie hot dogs/turkey sausage - roasted garlic butter for the corn
• Shells and Cheese (like theredkitchen: Macaroni and Cheese), dinner rolls (2nd try of allrecipes: Unbelievable Rolls, with cheese and leftover garlic butter), and butternut squash (from Farmer's Market)
• Crepes with cream filling (allrecipes: Creamy Strawberry Crepes), but with apples (allrecipes: Apple Cinnamon Syrup), with Hashbrowns on the George Foreman grill with some swiss melted on top.
• Uncle Randy Nachos (family favorite with a mix of hamburger and refried beans on top of corn chips with cheese and green onions (olives for E)
• Bow-tie pasta with Alfredo sauce, served with grilled chicken/grilled vegemeat and steamed broccoli - the alfredo sauce recipe was one Sarah had suggested (allrecipes: Chicken Fettuchini Alfredo), but modified a bit with the chicken done separately, so I started out with more garlic and no onion/mushrooms, and colby rather than colby jack.  DELICIOUS.
  
• Baked Potatoes with broccoli and carrot alfredo for E/cheese on mine, with an acorn squash
• Fajitas with grilled red peppers and onions, rice, beans for E and Chicken for me
• Baked Potato Soup (theredkitchen) with breadmaker bread

Definitely click through to some of the recipes if you are looking for inspiration.

We planned our meals last week around potatoes being on sale and the alfredo recipe  we knew would be more than we could eat one night (I ate it for lunches a few days too).

This coming week, I have another dentist appointment with multiple fillings, so I'm trying to paln some meals that are going to be soft for the few days after that :)

We had a big family dinner this weekend here.  We have a big family dinner almost every weekend, but this week, Megan was craving some of my macaroni and cheese, so we did it at our house.  I just use the betty crocker recipe, but with a few tweaks, and it always is SO good.  It's my favorite thing I cook, truthfully.

So we had mac and cheese (3 batches worth), and Sarah brought stuff for a big salad, and broccoli (which we served with a little butter and parmesean, similar to how Old Spaghetti Factory does with mizithra), and garlic bread which dad helped a lot with, and Megan brought Peach bread pudding.  Add in a chance to use all my pretty dishes and get a bouquet of pink spray roses, and it was a great occasion!  We have to squish a little to get all 12 people between our 3 tables (our normal diningroom table, the old round one, and a card table, all in a row), but it's okay.

Anyhow, there were a few leftovers. :)  So the last three meals (yesterday for lunch and dinner, and today for lunch), I've gotten mac and cheese, some salad, garlic bread, and bread pudding.  What a nice treat, it has been delicious.  My tummy is happy for the rest of the workday now!!!

When we were at dinner last night, we brainstormed some meals we hadn't had for a while.  I came up with Spinach Casserole, because that's always good, but it's been a very long time since we had it.  And when we walked through the store, they had a huge pile of acorn squash and it reminded me that it's almost fall and I wanted to get good at cooking squash.

This evening, I went looking for a recipe that was most similar to how I remember having acorn squash in the past: on cooks.com.  And with E's leftover french bread, we tried out something similar to Parmesan Garlic Bread (we stuck with the herbs in the cupboard that we had rather than some of the other stuff in the recipe, but used this concept).

So wow, we had big wonderful meal (and I finished the rest of the wedding cake, too).  My tummy is fully and happy!

I added my newest favorite salad recipe to The Red Kitchen: Watergate Salad (aka pistachio fluff).

Since Brandy was so helpful to point out the name of it in my comments here, and Zalary was interested in the recipe when i posted a picture of it, I figured I'd cross-post and point it out here too.

My family was so excited about this last weekend at our family dinner that I even heard Sarah say that she liked this more than 5 cup salad, which is one of our family's staples.  Woo, that rocks!  I do love it, a lot.  There's just a teeny bit left in the fridge, but I doled it out to myself all week instead of eating it all at once!

E and me were looking for meals we hadn't had for a while (which contrasts with my earlier-this-week repetiveness), so tonight I got things ready and made Jumbo Stuffed Shells.  It's a great dinner, even though it's a bit messy to stuff the shells.

Unrelated... earlier today, I saw a podcast with Mena that I was curious about, with Leo and Amber.  I don't normally have a chance to listen to podcasts, but I downloaded it anyhow.

Soooo, I was thinking... and I downloaded it to my ipod and listened while I was cooking!  It took me just about that long to cook the shells, come back up and check my email, and then stuff the shells and then it was over.  Perfect!

It was a great interview too.  They really did a good job spotlighting Vox, and Mena had great stuff to say.  I enjoyed it.

And then I was thinking back and it made me happy to remember the first time I saw Leo Laporte.  It was the first interview he did with Ben and Mena back in 2002 on The Screensavers.  Robyn taped it and mailed it to me!  Later on that week, another TechTV show did a spotlight on TheRedKitchen.  Which brings us full circle back to cooking. :)

I've definitely got to listen to more podcasts this way.  During laundry, maybe bouncing on my exercise ball, somethin'!  I've got some of Carla's sitting here waiting and it's just such good stuff, I can't help but want to keep hearing.  Yay!