Leftover Wednesday - not for the faint at heart

I have not stopped moving since 5:45a.m. this morning. After I got ready for work, I listed 2 items on eBay, packed my lunch and stopped by Starbucks to make the coffee run for Katie and me. (If you worked with us, trust me, you'd understand why we need it on Wednesdays especially).

Even though I work at a "desk" job, I hardly saw it today. It seems that everyone who came in required me to get up and walk around the office to figure out how to help them for one reason or another. After 8 hours, I headed home.

I promised Leah I'd help do the PR for our AWANA Grand Prix and car Shine n Show. This required me stopping by the church to visit Pasto (yes, the "r" is gone intentionally) Jim, and pick up a bunch of posters. I then went home to get the mail, eat a snack and unload the car from the day. I headed out to the library, put a poster up there, checked out some books and continued East on Grove St. I went to the Marysville Cleaners, put up another poster, stopped at Safeway to put up yet another poster and pick up some white wine vinegar for a recipe we'll be making this weekend, and then went to the Public Safety Center to try to get a poster up, but they were closed. After all that, I stopped at Schucks to put up another poster, but was told to come back tomorrow morning. I tried Napa, who took one with no promises, and Les Schwab, who enthusiastically agreed to put one up.

Finally, I came home to start dinner and dessert. Tonight's menu was simply leftovers with a casserole.

I guess I was a bit sloppy with the sides of the casserole dish, but the Hashbrown Casserole is a PERFECT golden-brown. :) I did have to start it on 300 degrees, with the lemon bars, because of timing. I so desperately wanted Robert to come home to a hot meal on the table, and everything had to be timed perfectly.

Initially, I was going to do chicken tonight, but I was so tired, and didn't have the skin-on chicken breasts that I needed. So, leftover soup it was, as well as zucchini parmigiana. Everything came out perfectly, though!

I know it's not the most appetizing dish, but it sure is great comfort food. Not only that, but Robert LOVED it! I think I totally got wifey points for this.

Not to mention that we still have leftover maple blondies from Monday night, so he's pretty happy.

I think tomorrow will be a nice break from cooking, because we're eating with Robert's parents.

After all this, I am going to bed!

Monday: Fried Brie Salad & Maple Blondies with a side of savings!

Last night, I asked Robert to make the Fried Brie wonton salad for dinner tonight. We had it at Lahaina Coolers in Maui on our first dinner out on our honeymoon. We're still trying to perfect it, and tonight's recipe was pretty quick & easy.

Generally, you use mixed greens, shredded carrots, onion, mandarin oranges and apples or pears, fried brie, and the vinaigrette of your choice. (In Maui, it was Passion Fruit).

  Tonight, we just used Romaine lettuce, pears, mandarin oranges and the Spiced Papaya Vinaigrette I purchased at the Farmer's Market on South Kihei when we were in Maui. But we were able to use our deep fryer for the 2nd time for the brie!

I thought it was incredible. Robert says he wished we had different wontons, because these ones tend to explode as they reach the cusp of golden-brown. :( So I suppose I'll be hunting those down this weekend sometime.

For dessert, I grabbed the Food Network magazine (are you surprised?!), and turned to the "Fun Food" section. I found a recipe for Maple Blondies, and decided to try it out, after I discovered that I couldn't make lemon bars tonight. (We'll do that tomorrow or Wednesday). You can find the recipe on the Food Network's website here.

It was really simple, AND - we got to use our KitchenAid mixer for the first time! No, we didn't need to fill up all 6 quarts of space, but it was really neat!

Here's me, getting all the food out of the mixing bowl! I was so excited!

Anyway, I finally got it in the Calphalon pan. For some reason, they call for it to be lined with foil, and then to butter the foil. This was easy with the butter at room-temperature, but I don't recommend doing it with butter right out of the fridge.

They came out perfect! I did substitute Special K Low Fat granola cereal instead of nuts on top, because I'm not a fan of them. I wasn't sure if my husband would like it, but since he cleaned his plate AND mind, I'm thinking he thought it was pretty good. Also, I used white chocolate chips instead of chunks of white chocolate.

Before I forget, I wanted to write briefly about my frugal expenditure today. It started yesterday, sitting on my Auntie's couch, going through coupons. We got a bunch that she wasn't going to use (manufacturer's coupons). I already had some for various stores, but Albertson's was offering 3 coupon-matching (for manufacturer's coupons) offers from Sunday to Tuesday this week only. Today, on the way home from work, I stopped and text-messaged Robert to see what I needed to pick up for dinner in addition to the few things I was purchasing with the coupons. I got everything I needed. The total bill was $29.67 after $15.19 in coupon savings! WOW!!!! I was thrilled. The lady at the checkstand was not, because apparently it took too much effort on her part, but I didn't care. This is very much worth it to me, because we only had just over $34 left on our food budget for March. (Don't worry; I shopped ahead for the rest of this week!)

 I took this last picture to show that 30 minutes exactly at 350 degrees yields perfectly flaky, golden-brown moist batter. YUM!

Maple Blondies: 

Ingredients

For the Blondies:

• 10 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature,
• plus more for the pan
• 1 cup walnut pieces
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 cups packed light brown sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 2 tablespoons vanilla extract
• 6 ounces white chocolate, cut into chunks

For the Topping:

• 1/3 cup maple syrup
• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1/4 cup heavy cream
• Vanilla ice cream, for serving
• 1/2 cup walnut pieces

Directions

Make the blondies: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 9-by-13-inch baking pan with foil, leaving an overhang on two sides; butter the foil. Pulse 1/2 cup walnuts in a food processor until almost fine (do not overprocess). Whisk the ground nuts, flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl.

Beat 10 tablespoons butter and the brown sugar with a mixer on medium speed until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, scraping down the bowl with a rubber spatula. Beat in the vanilla. Gradually beat in the dry ingredients until just combined. Fold in the white chocolate and the remaining 1/2 cup walnuts.

Spread the batter in the prepared pan and bake until the blondies are light brown around the edges and spring back when pressed, about 30 minutes. Cool slightly on a rack.

Meanwhile, make the topping: Place the maple syrup and butter in a small saucepan over medium heat and cook until the mixture bubbles and thickens, swirling the pan, about 6 minutes. Add the cream and continue to cook until the mixture is the consistency of caramel.

Use the foil to lift the blondies out of the pan, then cut into large bars. Serve warm topped with ice cream, the maple-butter sauce and the walnuts.

A relaxing yet productive Saturday goes out with a bang!

Today, my friend T2 came over. She got here at about 9:30 to work on Journey stuff for AWANA with me. I'm behind on my work towards my citation, and so is she. We made an agreement to keep each other accountable, and work together as much as we can on this. Unfortunately, this morning, I was dealing with not feeling great, and wasn't very involved. We did get some progress accomplished, though. :)

After T2 went home this afternoon, Robert and I seriously attacked the dining room mess. We're 90% through all the gifts, paperwork and my Etsy mess that engulfed the table previously. I fell that this is significant progress, since I also cleaned the guest bathroom today, as well as the coffee table. As far as my aforementioned goals for the week, most were pushed back, due to circumstances that came about unexpectedly this week. (Grandpa Crombie was in the hospital on Tuesday, I ended up having my nephews Isaac and Brenden for 4 hours on Wednesday which included AWANA, and closed out a 49-hour work week). But, I'm just happy and thankful for the work that was accomplished. As Michelle Duggar says, "At least there's a goal!"

After all that, I was pretty wiped out. Robert vowed to make the Carrot-Ginger Soup that I picked out from the Food Network magazine (to which we now subscribe!), and since we'd already done the meal-planning last Wednesday and purchased all the ingredients (with the last of the food budget for the month), it was all set to go. But our busy week prevented us from doing it sooner.

It turned out great! I decided that I felt badly that I hadn't contributed to the meal, even though I was working practically all evening on listing things on eBay, and maintaining previous listings.

So, I whipped up my Zucchini Parmigiana! It's a pretty quick little recipe, so it was no trouble, and paired nicely with the Carrot-Ginger soup!

We've both decided that since the soup has a very distinct consistency, and noted that instead of tofu (which neither of us care for, but the recipe calls for), we used Polenta, and could have used croutons or something like that as well. 

Here's me, enjoying this wonderful soup!

(If you look carefully, you can see the HUGE basket of thank-you cards to my right, and the incredible progress on the dining room behind me!)

As promised in previous blogs, I'm posting every recipe we try, and our thoughts on it. So here they are:

* This soup was GREAT, but takes longer than 30 minutes to prepare for. 

* We also used fresh carrots and our juicer, which made the job easier, and tastier.

* Shop ahead of time for this recipe; you can't always reach into the crisper for cilantro and ginger!

* We give this dish 4 stars, as we prepared it. Perhaps Emeril could do better. :) 

* The Zucchini Parmigiana was a perfect coupling to the dish. We give it 4 stars also. 

Recipes:

  

Kimi's Zucchini Parmigiana

Ingredients:

1 Zucchini 

1 Tbsp. butter (not margarine) 

1/4 c. grated Parmesan cheese

Directions:

Preheat conventional oven to broil. Slice zucchini to desired thickness. Carefully grease each slice with a tiny smattering of butter. (You don't want too much, because the Parmesan will slide off!) Place greased zucchini on tray. Sprinkle Parmesan over all. Place in oven for 5 minutes, or until golden-brown. Remove and place on plate. 

Food Network Magazine's Carrot-Ginger Soup with Polenta

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1 1-pound bag frozen chopped carrots, thawed
• 1 small onion, roughly chopped
• 1 2-to-3-inch piece ginger, peeled and grated
• Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
• 1 star anise pod or 1/2 teaspoon five-spice powder
• 2 cups carrot juice
• 1 pound extra-firm tofu - We used Polenta! And we didn't need a full pound.
• 1/2 cup cornstarch
• 2 teaspoons curry powder
• Torn fresh cilantro, for garnish (optional)

Directions

Heat 2 tablespoons vegetable oil in a large pot over medium heat. Add the carrots, onion and ginger and cook until the vegetables are just soft, about 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Add the star anise, carrot juice and 3 cups water, then cover and boil until the vegetables are tender, about 20 minutes.

Meanwhile, cut the tofu into 1-inch cubes. Mix the cornstarch and curry powder on a shallow plate and season with salt. Pat the tofu dry and roll it in the cornstarch mixture. Heat the remaining 6 tablespoons oil in a large skillet over high heat. Add the tofu and fry, turning, until golden and crisp on all sides, about 5 minutes. Drain on paper towels and season with salt.

Discard the star anise. Transfer the soup to a blender and puree in batches, or puree directly in the pot with an immersion blender. Thin with water, if needed, and season with salt and pepper. Ladle into bowls and top with the fried tofu. Garnish with cilantro, if desired.

As I began typing this blog, Robert came out of the kitchen and said, "I pureed this soup 8 times....ONE carrot left!" LOL! I told him it was a memory. He's just thrilled about my new camera! :)  

Goals for the rest of the month

Now that we have our bed here, and all the furniture is in the correct rooms, we really have no excuses to keep us from actually getting things in order around here. :)

So, here are my goals for the last days of March:

3/22-3/26
* Finish picking up main living areas, vacuum and dust
* Follow through on 2 meal-planned days (grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning up after meals)
* Finish thank-you notes and send (96 written, 12 delivered already!)
* Finish 2 bags to put in the shop.
* Clean both bathrooms

3/27-3/31
* Tie up loose ends with previous goals
* 2 more meal-planned days
* Vacuum & dust rest of the house (guest bedroom, our bedroom and hallways)

One other goal I have is a personal goal. I've decided that in order to protect and safe-guard my heart and marriage, I'm going to have to be more careful about not allowing others to shift my goals, or how I do things in my home with my husband, based on opinions of others - no matter how strongly asserted they may be. The Lord has been teaching me that I'm susceptible to pressures coming in from outside influences, and that it is not pleasing to Him. He desires for my husband and I to walk together. Basically, I'm feeling guilty about falling short of expectations, and I know that's not the best.

I would ask that you uplift me in prayer for this next week and a half or so, and to keep me accountable by asking how things are going, specifically with my goals. I'll try to have pictures of each goal to post, if I can. I know people have asked me to use more pictures :)

A wonderful Sunday lunch at home

After an incredibly busy weekend, and eating out almost every meal, Robert and I had a brainstorm during church today:

We were going to use our new deep fryer to make onion rings, and pair that with salmon burgers.

It turned out FABULOUS!!! We used this recipe - partially adapted from Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives - and partially made it up on our own:

Fieri / Crombie Onion Rings

2 Sweet Onions, sliced
3 cups of flour
2 cups of buttermilk
salt & pepper to taste
Cayenne Pepper to taste
Oil

Combine flour, salt & pepper(s). Mix well. Set aside. Pour buttermilk into pan or bowl. Soak onion rings in buttermilk, then coat in flour mixture. Repeat. Place each ring in deep-fryer. Allow each ring to turn golden brown. Remove carefully from deep-fryer, and set on a paper-towel covered plate. Serve & enjoy.

With our new dipping trays from Pampered Chef, this job was fun and easy. All we did was soak each ring in buttermilk, then transfer to the next tray for a coating of the flour mixture, repeat and fry. The double-coating produces an unbeatable crunch, and tastes fabulous. (Note: for food allergies, you could also substitute soy milk, which is just as thick as buttermilk, and rice flour).

For the salmon burgers, we just purchased those at Costco and cooked according to directions. We use a little mayo and some cheddar cheese on ours.

What a perfect lunch!

AWANA Games Day!

We are headed out to coach our kiddos in AWANA Games! I'll try to post pics later.

After we pick up Michael and head down to Edmonds-Woodway to compete, and the events of the day are over, we're going to Bed, Bath & Beyond to exchange our duplicate gifts. I'm hoping we can get over to Macy's afterwards so I can get the new makeup I've been without for several months.

Pray for our kids! We're already proud of them, but want them to feel proud of themselves at the end of the day no matter what the result is!

New bed here; more cleaning to do

After a long day, our new bed finally arrived. Thankfully, it didn't require either one of us missing out on work, because Robert took a 3:45 serving shift, and I didn't have to leave work early to come home and take over for Robert to wait for the Macy's movers to come!

So, when I got home, I saw our new bed, all set up and made. In the front of the room (I'm assuming temporarily), Robert finally moved his dresser. I say temporarily, because we can't open the bottom drawer, as it's too close to the footboard.

Nonetheless, it was great to come home and see some more work done. I made Hashbrown Casserole (recipe below) tonight, along with some meatless tacos. (I cannot do ground beef in a taco. Too much meat!) I also thought ahead (for once), and packed some extra casserole and a taco for my lunch tomorrow.

I've decided that Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays are the days I need to pay the most attention to myself. I'm so worn out and tired, I couldn't hardly finish cleaning the kitchen tonight. I almosttook Robert's mom up on the Fiesta offer at Grandma & Grandpa Byers', but thankfully God tugged at my heart, and I decided against it tonight.

Instead, I finished cleaning up my mess, cleaned the first 2 counters off in the kitchen along with the stovetop (but not the burners), and promptly plugged in my new footbath from Bryan & Katie. I plan on taking the jars out of my shop, and then heading to bed at 10pm. I just hope Robert comes home before then, so I can at least see him for a few minutes before I crash.

Please pray that I can finish the kitchen counters this week, so that Robert and I can tackle rearranging the kitchen this weekend. Also, we had an answer to prayer: Instead of spending a ton of cash on a new mattress and box spring, Robert's lovely cousin, Shannon, is giving us hers! Brand new; and free!

I'll hopefully be better about posting more often. I refuse to post pictures of our home right now because it's such a mess. I promise; they will come!


Hashbrown Casserole

 

Ingredients:

1 & 1/2 bag hashbrowns

1/4 cup butter

1 can cream of chicken soup

1 pint sour cream

1/2 cup chopped green onions

1 1/2 cups grated cheddar cheese

potato chips

 

Directions:
Heat butter & soup in saucepan

Add sour cream, cheese & onions,

Thaw & break apart hashbrowns,

Mix w/ soup & cheese mixture,

pour into casserole dish

crush potato chips

sprinkle on top

Bake 350 degrees for 45 minutes or until bubbling (longer if refrigerate