Pea Pesto!

I am a huge fan of hiding vegetables.

I know I sound weird. We are supposed to consume 2.5-3 cups of veggies a day. I dont know about you, but that is generally pretty hard for me to do on any given day. Fruit I can do. Fruit I really love - I can have it raw, bake into a muffin or scone, blend it into a delicious smoothy, or make a salad. Veggies are harder for me to consume by themselves.

So I have taken to doing for myself what many moms do for their kids - I hide it. I know its in there, but its jazzed up a bit, and therefore far more satisfying. :)

Dinner last night is a great example.

I made a recipe for Sausage and Tortellini soup, but added half a bunch of kale chopped up. It was tasty, an added serving of veggies, and cheap! (Kale is super inexpensive and filling at the same time).

But this was not enough for me, oh no, I was watching Giada De Laurentiis on Food network while I was at the gym last week and saw this little jewel of a recipe. Pea Pesto Crostini. I thought immediately, "that is a perfect recipe for us." I am sorry I didn't take a picture, but I will tomorrow (there are leftovers for lunch!). I piled our toasted ciabatta bread high with pea pesto for another serving of green veggie. What better way to down 1/2 cup of peas than with ciabatta, parmesan cheese, and olive oil?

I highly suggest hiding your vegetables if you are wanting to up your daily intake. :)

Blueberry Muffins Part II

Just thought you might want to know, the Blueberry Muffins turned out great. So great in fact that they are all gone! I will definitely be making more soon.

Here is my recipe if you would like to make them, its a variation on this one

1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup all purpose flour
2-3 tsp. orange zest (whatever you get from a small orange)
2 tsp. baking powder (I like them fluffy)
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt
2 cups fresh or frozen blueberries (dont forget, lol!)

1 stick butter, softened (this is the worst part, everything else is healthy)
3/4 cup sugar (I am going to try just 1/2 cup next time, they were plenty sweet with the blueberries)
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
sugar, ground flaxseed, or granola

Stir all dry ingredients together, except blueberries. Gently add blueberries to dry ingredients (unless they are frozen, like mine, and you can be more firm). Preheat oven to 350. Cream together butter and sugar. Add one egg at a time until thoroughly combined. Add milk to wet mixture. Add wet mix to dry and gently fold together. Spray muffin tin and distribute batter evenly. Top each with your choice of sugar, flaxseed (good source of protein and omega-3), granola or whatever else you think you might like. Bake for 25-30min. Turn out to cool 2-3 minutes after removing from oven.

Blonde Moment

I was just making up a batch of Blueberry Muffins in the kitchen and had a real blonde moment. I was trying a new recipe (I have yet to find a blueberry muffin recipe I really like that is not from a box and uses real blueberries) and talking to Drew while he was working out (don't we sound like an over-achiever couple? sorry).

I got distracted and forgot to put in one ingredient...I bet you can guess what it is.










The Blueberries.


I would like to chalk it up to being totally distracted by my husband's rippling muscles flexing as he lifted weights...he is pretty hunky. ok sorry, but really, it was me having a blonde moment. I gave him a real scare when 5 minutes after putting the muffins in the oven and cleaning up the dishes I gasped in realization of what I had done. He thought the oven was on fire. :)

I quickly took them out and tried to stuff some blueberries into the individual muffin tins. I put them back in the oven and had a good laugh about it, until 15 minutes later when my REALLY blonde moment occurred to me. I had turned off the oven when I took the pan out to add the blueberries, set the timer, but forgot to turn the oven back on.

So, here is a pic of how they turned out. I have not tasted them yet (they are for breakfast tomorrow). However they taste I think, to be fair, I will have to try this recipe again.

Hope youre keeping it as honest as I am (but maybe a little less blonde). ;)

At Home

As much as I like to think of myself as a really great multitasker, I am really more of a work-hard-get-one-big-project-done-at-a-time kind of a gal.

So, I have been saving up a bunch of posts on cooking and baking. While I had some time at home over Christmas and New Years I enjoyed being able to cook and bake at a leisurely pace. It really is one of my favorite things. And I had several new cookbooks to try out. Drew had to rein me in around the second week when I was getting ready to try my hand at shortbread cookies, gingerbread men, and mexican wedding cookies (snowballs).

Men.

They just dont understand the fairer sex's obsession with sugary baked goods...and a close second, feeding people.

He is concerned with things like health and weight management. Bah!

No, really I am glad that my husband really enjoys my cooking AND helps me make wise, healthy food decisions. To be fair, I had already made two desserts the week before and we had just returned from Christmas with family (can you say Coconut Cream pie? how about Cinnamon Rolls?)

Anyway, expect to see a few recipe reviews, dinner suggestions, baked goodies, and the like on here the next few days. I hope they inspire you to make something new or just enjoy being in the kitchen. I know I need a pick me up every once in awhile.

What the?!?

What the heck! I come back home from an InterVarsity staff conference in St. Louis expecting to find some more reasonable weather and  my Google homepage says its currently 18F outside!! Darn it!!!

I drove Drew to the hospital at 8am this morning and it was NOT pleasant. Even inside, where I have been working on a few things here at home (planning retreats, Bible studies, and prayer meetings) I am wearing 4 layers to remain in working order. Think

I dont particularly enjoying sweating all through the summer months in Texas, and I do enjoy when it gets cold enough to dig my scarves and mittens out of the back of the closet, but seriously the teens?

I dont think I can handle this much longer. Please pray for it to warm up...or dont expect me to move out from under my blanket and Weezer snuggie or go anywhere outside the apartment. Drew might just have to find himself a way home this afternoon, because I definitely do not want to go out again.

;) Just kidding, you know I wouldn't leave him there by himself...but it might require this kind of preparation:

Hope you are warmer than I am.

Christmas Traditions

Since we are a young family (going on 2.5 years!) we think often about the traditions and routines we want to start and what value/meaning they have. Christmas is definitely a season I think a great deal about what traditions to adopt and what to say no to. There is just so much to consume even on this level during this season! Its hard to know what to accept, what to adopt, and what to reject.

This year we got an artificial Christmas tree (thank you Grandma Judy!) which is beautiful and doesn't cause Drew to sneeze. :) After learning more about the traditional Christian liturgical year and holidays (Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, etc) reading Living the Christian Year by Bobby Gross (IVP) there was one tradition in particular I wanted to adopt.

You see, Christmas is actually preceded by Advent - traditionally a season of waiting & hopeful expectancy. Advent was often commemorated by fasting, simple living, and definitely no celebratory parties or decorations.

So I decided that at home we would celebrate Advent by putting up our Christmas tree, but waiting to decorate it until Christmas Day. Christmas is not just one day, but a season of 12 days (hence the song) lasting until January 6th. Having our Nativity scene figurines out and a bare Christmas tree was a great reminder of what was coming, but not yet here.

This might seem sad, but it really changed my perspective. As Christmas neared more and more decorations went up around us, the frenzy to buy more increased, and seeing all this my expectation was not heightened but halted, consumed even. There were few places outside my own home where I felt I could find that quiet.

I think, as a well-off well-educated 21st century American I often rob myself of waiting, expectancy, and quiet. I can have or get anything I want at anytime - even Christmas...even the Savior?

There is good reason Jesus made himself in the form of man and moved into our neighborhood as a babe. He had to take the same 9 month journey in his mother's womb that we all do. Mary and Joseph had to wait for this promised child. Israel had to wait for him for hundred's of years.

I think of how often people lement missing that "childish" feeling of expectancy on Christmas morning because the magic of Santa is gone or we know what is under the tree or we know there are no more surprises. But what if the magic is still there? what if there were surprise gifts for each of us under the tree each and every year?

I think there are. I think the magic is in Jesus' birth, the fact that the most powerful being in all the universe chose to become a lowly infant to Middle Eastern parents who would soon be refugees so that we might know how vast his love is. And I think there is a gift for us each year, each day, that no one can change - God loves you.

I think too often I let my desire, my want, and greed to take away my own opportunity to wait. And that is when the surprise is lost. I lose out on the opportunity for the Lord to speak to me anew, to reveal his love for me, in his way, in his time.

Thanks for Advent Lord. Thank you for knowing I need to wait on you.

Here is our celebration, and offering of thanks to the Lord on Christmas Day 2010:

On Apple and the Importance of the Apology...

I have been musing lately on apologies. I think they are important.

Marriage has been a great learning ground for the art of the apology…I have yet to master it. J I have learned though that the simple and heartfelt words, “I am sorry” and “I forgive you” are SUPER powerful!

So when my husband overslept for work on January 2, 2011 because his iPhone 4 alarms failed to go off, and other people missed flights and work appointments for the same reason,  I kind of expected an apology for the blunder.

We weren’t really that upset over it. Thankfully, by strange and blessed Providence I woke up at 5:30am that morning, looked at the clock, and wondered why my husband was still in bed (his alarm was set for 4:20am and he should have already been at the hospital). He ended up rushing to the hospital and arriving in enough time to finish rounds and escape being yelled at. Huzzah! 

But, at hearing the response from Apple (CNN story about alarms and Apple statement)

We did get upset. We were let down. I thought they were a good company, who seemed to care about their customers and consumers (we are, afterall, the ones who pay their bills).

I realize their statement was an attempt to save face after royally bungling, and there are probably very good legal reasons for not coming out and directly acknowledging they messed up.

I would just like to say (since I can, and this is my own little slice of the public sector) I would have far more respect for Apple if they had said something like:

“We apologize for this oversight. It shouldn’t have happened. We are working on fixing the problem. Here is what you can do for now if you still wish to use your iPhone as your alarm. We will have a software solution by X date.”

Or something like that.

Instead, I heard “This is not a problem…you as the consumer can fix this if you all turn your alarms to repeat. Issue solved. Aren't we clever?”

As it is I still forgive them. But, I gotta say I think they missed out on the apology. 

New Years Resolution 2011

Happy New Year!

I usually avoid these. If I make resolutions, turn a new leaf, or repent (to turn from something) of something its usually at random times throughout the year. This one happened to come out of a few conversations with Drew (supplied by ample time to chat on our drives during the holidays) and coincided nicely with the New Year...so my New Year's resolution 2011 is:

To be more committed to blogging. I am going to attempt to post at least once a week. Hopefully more.

I think it will be a good opportunity for me to keep developing my writing skills. I have not ruled out the possibility of writing a book one day and while I am no longer in school I have found ways of developing my scholarly inclinations in other ways (primarily reading, watching documentaries, and asking lots of questions). Writing has been lacking.

Also, I would like to be better about keeping my friends and family updated on our lives, and the blog helps...if they read it. :)

Finally, my last reason is that I am developing into a better cook and baker. Not great, but better. I have been inspired by a few other food blogs. I would like to have a running account of my progress and what I have tried the I liked, and if other people like them too. And if anything I make helps my fellow man, thats great too. I can only assume there are others out there like me whose time and budgets are tight, but who love tasty, healthy food made in the comfort of their own home.

So, feel free to keep me accountable...or just expect to hear from me here more often. BTW, Drew said he would try to contribute every-so-often as well.