Deckin' the Halls

We have a Christmas tradition that Mark and I started way back in 1994 for our first Christmas together. Every year when we decorate the tree, we exchange ornaments. Mark and I pick out ornaments for the boys, and then we each take the boys out to get ornaments for each of us. We try to find ornaments that say something about the year - something the boys were into, a trip we took, or maybe just something really cool looking. Like the Lunar Module ornament Mark got me the year I was sooooo into the From the Earth to the Moon series. Or Daniel's soccer ornament from the first year he played. Or all those Harry Potter ornaments. It is so much fun to get the ornaments out every year and remember when we got what ornament and why. We put the tree up last night, and I thought I would share with you this year's ornaments:

First up, Ben got the Snoopy/Woodstock at Camp Snoopy ornament, because it reminded us of all of his scouting adventures this year.

Daniel was the happy recipient of the Iron Man ornament, as this was one of his favorite movies this year. (Iron Man was intentionally hung in front of the Peace ornament, because Iron Man stands for peace, apparently.)

Mark got a major award this year - the Leg Lamp from A Christmas Story. This is one of the most watched and most quoted holiday movies at our house.

And mom got this lovely country church. It looks quite a bit like our church, with the steeple and the windows. Extra lovely at Christmastime.

We also picked up a couple of ornaments from our travels this year.

I'm slowly getting other decorations up, and I may post other photos as we go. I love Christmastime!!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, Thanksgiving 2008 has come and gone. I am happy to say that I hosted the big meal this year! If you told me two years ago that I would be cooking Thanksgiving dinner for ten people, I would have laughed in your face. And then passed out cold. Let's face it - in the world of food preparation, Thanksgiving is a big as it gets. It's the Show. The Big Dance. The biggest meal of the year. But I did it. I DID IT!!!

We had Mark's parents over, and his brother Scott's family. Mark's mom brought a Pratt's ham and her world famous deviled eggs. These eggs will ruin you on any other deviled eggs. Seriously. It must be something she does during the "deviling" phase. They are spectacular.

I roasted a turkey and made cornbread stuffing, maple sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, my mom's cranberry apple crisp, spinach and hazelnut salad, zucchini and onions, gravy, cranberry dipping sauce, and rolls. The stuffing was a little rubbery, but otherwise, everything turned out pretty well. No one got sick at least.

For dessert, Mark made an awesome pecan pie, and I made a pumpkin spice bundt cake. Lisa brought a rockin' pumpkin cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory.

My nephew brought his saxophone, and all the boys serenaded us with their instruments for the post-meal entertainment. We are now fighting the sleepies and watching the Cowboys game.

All in all, it was good times. I'm glad I stepped up. It feels like I have crossed a culinary threshold of sorts. And now I think I'll have some more pie.

Oh, and I didn't get any pictures. Sorry. I was a little preoccupied.

Low and Slow

OK, so I've had a request, and a second, for crock pot recipes. I don't do anything too elaborate in the crock pot because, let's face it, you have to do most of the prep work before leaving for work in the morning, which is when you're the most time-crunched.

But there is something magically wonderful about coming home on a cold night and being greeted with the spell of wonderful all the way out in the garage. So these are my favorite recipes for the crock pot, keeping in mind that you can always add potatoes and/or carrots, if you feel like all that chopping and peeling first thing in the morning. Or skip the peeling if you need the fiber.

All of these recipes should be cooked on low for 8-10 hours. If you need it quicker, heat it on high for 4-6 hours. I also always taste for seasoning right when I get home, so if it needs more salt and pepper, it has some time to work with it before serving.

1. Bottom round roast, salted and peppered. Top with one large bottle, or two small bottles, of Russian dressing. Serve it over rice.

2. Bottom round roast, salted and peppered. Top with two cans of cream of mushroom soup, mixed with one packet of Lipton onion soup mix. Serve with mashed potatoes (which, I've found, I can make the night or even the weekend before, and just heat up in the microwave - I add some heated milk if they dry out.)

3. Pork roast, any will do, but one with a bone it is fabulous. Drizzle with a little oil of your choosing, salt and pepper it. Crock it all day. When it's done, remove the bone and as much of the fat as you can. Shred the pork and mix with a bottle of your favorite BBQ sauce (I recommend Tennessee's Best Apple Butter BBQ Sauce, but this is not helpful to those of you outside of Tennessee.) Serve with whatever you eat with BBQ, or make sammies.

4. Boneless turkey breast. You know - the kind you get frozen, about the size of a cantaloupe - Butterball makes them - I'm guessing others do too. Thaw it for 24-hours in the fridge (it won't be completely thawed), then salt and pepper it and crock it all day. It comes out surprisingly juicy, and makes awesome sammies.

5. Stew meat, salted and peppered. Cover with beef broth and a sliced onion. Add a slug or two or red wine if you have it. Serve over rice.

I hope those of you looking for these find them helpful. Robin Miller made a sweet-looking gumbo on her show today, which I may try in the near future. I'll let you know if it works.

If others of you have any fabulously delicious (and easy) crock pot recipes, leave them in the comments. Much-appreciated.

John Adams

Mark and I have started watching the John Adams series that ran on HBO last spring. We are two episodes in, and I am loving it.

I'm a big fan of Paul Giamatti, and he is excellent in this role. I have never been much of a Laura Linney fan, but she is excellent as well. David Morse has been made up to look more like George Washington (before I knew he was George Washington, I thought Morse must have been hit in the face with a two-by-four shortly before filming), and the guy playing Ben Franklin (who ironically played General Howe in The Patriot) is wonderful. Franklin is getting all the best lines so far (to paraphrase, "Anyone who does not practice moderation should be castrated.") No one appears to be wearing any makeup (or, at the very least they have been made up to look like they aren't wearing makeup), and the filming has a very realistic look to it. It's a completely top notch production.

I've learned a few things (who knew that John Adams was legal counsel for the British soldiers after the Boston Massacre?) and seen some other things from new angles. It's really, really good. If you haven't seen it, rent the first DVD and give it a shot. I think you will enjoy it.

And if you've already seen it, please don't leave any spoiler comments. I've already read one spoiler saying that John Adams later becomes president, apparently, so that's ruined for me now. Great.

Snug

Global Warming?

Nope, not seeing any global warming around here...

Birthday Recap

I know it seemed like any other day, but Thursday was kind of a big deal around here. It was my birthday! I turned 38, but we chose not to focus on that part. Instead, Mark took me to lunch at the Crazy Tomato - I had the Manicotti - it was crazy good. Mark, Ben, and Daniel made breakfast for dinner, and wrapped it up with a delicious Oreo pie. Daniel even serenaded me with his recorder while I took my bath. And the gifts....I cleaned up in the gift department:

A new caddy for my kitchen utensils. The black spatula on the left and black spoon on the right are also new:

I got two cool sealing plastic storage containers. I've already started keeping salt in the small one:

I got three new cookbooks. Can you guess who gave me which book?

I got the 7 in santoku chef's knife I've been coveting for about six months:

Mom sent me a sweet check with which I bought all of this for holiday entertaining:

And look what God gave me for my birthday:

(OK, so technically it didn't start snowing until the 21st, but it's the thought that counts!)

I had a wonderful birthday! Thanks to Mark, Ben, and Daniel for making it extra special!

Just a Little Cold Weather Humor...

Operation Christmas Child

It's that time again! OCC shoebox collection week starts this week, and our church is having their annual shoebox dedication tomorrow during morning worship. I have blogged before about how meaningful this experience has been for me. I totally let this year's drive slip up on me, and we didn't get our boxes put together until just a few minutes ago. But we got it done! Have you packed a shoebox yet?

Random Thoughts

I haven't blogged all week. It's not that I have nothing to say, I just can't get a post around any of my thoughts right now. They all seem so....random. So in lieu of a week's worth of blogging, I thought I would share with you some of the seedlings that never grew into full-blown posts. Enjoy.


1. The advertising campaign for high-fructose corn syrup had to be developed by the cockiest guy in the advertising firm as part of an elaborate "as a matter of fact, I CAN sell anything" challenge.

2. My husband has never, not ever, never even once paid for his own cell phone service.

3. Bill Paxton has been killed and/or beaten by an Alien, a Predator, and the Terminator. It's the sci-fi tri fecta.

4. High Fidelity is one of the worst movies ever made. (Like anyone could possibly know that, Napoleon...)

5. Remember the guy on Heroes who could create vortexes, and then threw himself into one a few weeks back? I think he will ultimately end up on Lost next season.

6. How does Claire have pierced ears?

7. If you were a jumper who robbed banks as your sole source of income, wouldn't the IRS find you long before Samuel L. Jackson even thought to look?

8. The Galactic Empire must not have had a very good dental plan.

9. Do you think the hotels around the Globe theater have their guest services information in the form of Haiku poetry, or rhyming couplets?

What I'm Reading Now

Abundance, by Sena Jeter Naslund.

This one is an historical novel about Marie Antoinette. She's not one of my favorite characters from history, to be sure. I'm reading this one because of the author. Sena Jeter Naslund wrote Ahab's Wife, which was a fantastic novel. And I haven't read anything else of hers (I haven't seen anything else of hers until now.)

So far, Marie is a fourteen year-old dauphine, married and clueless. She's fairly likable - just young and inexperienced. In an author's note, Naslund says that Marie Antoinette has not been represented accurately by history; in fact, she never even uttered the "let them eat cake" line. Naslund promises to represent her much more accurately in this novel, even though, technically, it's fiction. Let's just hope it stays interesting...

Chicken Stock - Update

So far so good:

(Now that's one big bowl of chicken stock.)

Chicken Stock

You know how I like to play in the kitchen on weekends? Well today, I'm trying something I've never tried before: making homemade chicken stock.

The Barefoot Contessa RAVES about the glories of making your own chicken stock. It makes such a difference, yadda, yadda, yadda. She makes hers with uncooked whole roasting chickens. This seems to me like a waste of a perfectly good eating chicken. I imagine it's also pretty low on the chicken aspiration list as well. (I picture chickens out on the farm, talking to each other - "Did you hear what happened to Lou? Stock. Yeah. His parents were devastated.")

But seeing as I roast a chicken about once a week, I find that I'm tossing out a lot of carcasses. So why not try making stock with them? I've also got some carrots that need to be used pretty soon.

So I put last night's carcass in the biggest pot I have (which is not big, but it will do) and tossed in: carrots, onions, pepper corns, salt, bay leaves, fresh parsley, and cilantro (not your classic chicken stock herb I know, but it's here and I figure, why not). I had planned on tossing in a head of garlic, but I put garlic in the chicken cavity when I cooked it last night, and it was smelling pretty strong when I got the chicken out this morning, so I thought it best not to risk making garlic stock.

I covered the whole thing with water and brought it to a boil. Now I'll bring it down to a simmer, and let it stay that way for about 4 hours. After that, I strain it, and let it rest in the fridge. Tomorrow morning, I'll skim off the fat. Then I'll either use it or freeze it, depending on how much I get out of one carcass and some veggies.

All I can say for sure is the house smells wonderful right now. Wish me luck!

Scouting for Food

We spent our morning scouting for food with the scouts. Mark went with Ben's troop, and I accompanied Daniel and his cub scout pack. Those of you who live in a neighborhood probably already know what this is all about, but for those who don't: Scouting for Food is the Boy Scouts/Cub Scouts annual food drive. Each troop/pack is assigned a neighborhood, where they go door to door leaving plastic bags. Printed on the bags are instructions for filling the bag with canned goods, and leaving the full bag on the porch the following Saturday. Next Saturday, we will go back and collect all the food bags and take them to a local food pantry. It really is a creative service project, I think, and a great way to spend a brisk fall Saturday morning.

After putting out bags, D and I met up with Mark and Ben at Starbucks for hot chocolate and grande lattes. Good times.

(Right after this picture was taken, Daniel took a big swig of his hot chocolate, not realizing how hot it really was. He spewed it back out, and experienced what can only be described as a hot nose burp.)

Sweet Potato Steak Fries

OK, so in my last What’s for Dinner post, I mentioned sweet potato steak fries, but I didn’t go into any detail. This was my first time trying sweet potatoes this way, and I used the last two sweet potatoes in the house to do so. I have been CRAVING these things ever since. So now, I feel that I have short-changed my readers by not sharing the recipe for these. I aim to correct that right now.

I got the idea from Robin Miller – she made a savory sweet potato steak fry a few shows ago. I had tried fried sweet potatoes at TGI Friday’s, and didn‘t care for them. Mostly because they were too savory. Maybe it’s just me, but I see sweet potatoes as either savory or sweet depending on how you cook them. Baked with butter, salt, and pepper, and I see them in the vegetable family – definitely more savory. But loaded up with maple syrup and marshmallows, and you have more of a dessert – definitely more sweet. Robin Miller tossed hers in olive oil, salt, and pepper, and while that certainly intrigued me, I thought it would fall on the savory side and I was in the mood for something on the sweet side.

So I took two medium sweet potatoes, peeled them, and cut them in half. I cut each half into thirds, giving me twelve total steak fries. (If you don’t already have sweet potatoes on hand, try to find some that are on the straighter side. I had never cut an uncooked sweet potato before, and it was none too easy. Had they been longer and straighter, I might have fared better.)

I poured a very small amount of vegetable oil (because it is less flavorful than olive oil) in a baking dish. I tossed the potatoes lightly in the oil, then sprinkled them with cinnamon, freshly-grated nutmeg, and cardamom (only because I had some – I think you could use any pie spice you have around). Then I tossed them again to distribute the spices, and spread them flat in the dish.

I put them in a 400 degree oven for 35-40 minutes, tossing them once while they cooked.

They came out nicely browned, crisp on the outside, but tender like a steak fry on the inside. And the spices were PERFECT.

This one’s a definite repeater.

What's for Dinner?

Eye of round roast with a vanilla-lime glaze.

Sweet potato steak fries. (Not much to look at, but they were awesome.)

We had apple sauce and leftover baby spinach salad on the side. And for dessert:

I call it a reverse Reese's cake. It's the Barefoot Contessa's Beatty's chocolate cake and peanut butter icing (both recipes can be found in the Barefoot Contessa At Home cookbook.)

Good meal. Good dessert. Good times.

Voting

Well, I've done my civic duty. I arrived at my designated voting place at 9:30 and was on my way home at 9:50. I've never voted so fast in my whole life. The boys were out of school, so I took today off. (And I had scheduled the day off WAY before Barack Obama told everybody to take the day off - I've got the email to prove it.) I timed my trip to the polls to miss the folks voting before work, and to beat the folks coming to vote at lunch. I think I did pretty good!

Daniel gets an extra 100 in social studies for voting with me. (I told Ben we might have to wait in line a while, and he wanted no part of it.) While we waited, an older man was leaving and as he walked by Daniel, he leaned down and whispered "McCain". Daniel looked at him and nodded.

I talked D through the process, and even let him complete my ballot and press the "cast vote" button.

Good times at the polls.

And now, we wait.

What I'm Reading Now

Testimony, by Anita Shreve.

Actually, I just finished it today. I really, really like Anita Shreve. She has an understated writing style that uses very few words to say a whole lot.

Testimony is her latest. It opens with a prep school headmaster viewing a tape of what will become a huge sex scandal that greatly damages the school and many of the students. Rather than relay the events in chronological order, Shreve gives voice to many, many narrators, all of whom are touched by the scandal in some way.

What I found most thought-provoking are the voices of those who are pulled into the aftermath not because of anything they did, but simply because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. You have four kids who did one really, colossal, stupid thing, but the impact of that one thing was bigger than anyone anticipated.

The male students involved were all star basketball players. Because of their association to the crime, the coach is fired and the rest of the season is cancelled. Because the season is cancelled, many of the players who counted on being scouted for college scholarships will not have that chance. Does anyone ever think that their selfish acts will affect other people in that way? I wondered more than once if Shreve wasn't at least partially inspired by the Duke scandal from a few years back.

And then you have the parents' perspective: watching your child make a life-altering mistake, and knowing you can't do anything to fix it.

I didn't think I would like this one at first. Based on the description, I expected a little sensationalism. But it turned out to be quite good -more about the characters and less about the plot.

Two thumbs up.

The Hotel Indigo

Hotel Indigo

The place we stayed this weekend

Was unique for sure.

All Guest Services

Information was displayed

In Haiku poem form.

I took some pictures

But they capture just a few.

Dude. Seriously.

Wicked

Back in the summer, my mom and I got tickets to see Wicked in Atlanta this weekend. Then, three weeks ago, mom broke her arm in a bar fight. (Actually, she fell down at work and broke her arm, but the bar fight makes a better story.) Anyway, she had to cancel, so Ben stepped in and my mother-daughter trip to Atlanta turned into a mother-son trip instead.

We went to the Saturday matinee, and had really good seats. I had been to the Fox before, but I guess I never went up into the balcony. This was the first time I really saw the ceiling in that place - awesome!!! The show was pretty amazing too - I heartily recommend it. It didn't have that immediate "WOW!" factor that The Lion King had with the staging, but it had some really cool effects (the witch flying was awesome), and the story and music were fantastic. Really, really good story.

Afterward, we ate at the Broadway Diner, where Ben consumed the largest piece of chocolate cake I'd ever seen, and spent the night right across from the theater at the Hotel Indigo.

All things considered, it was a lovely trip. We even stopped off to see Paul, Natalie and Sam on our return trip.