cooking for three

I've been making a bunch of food for the little one lately. He's a pretty adventurous eater. The only thing he has flat-out refused so far is banana. I've made carrots, peas, green beans, acorn and butternut squash, sweet potatoes and pears. Hank has also had rice cereal, oatmeal, peaches, prunes and apples. And of course bananas! It's been pretty fun making things for him, but I've been neglecting the adults in the house. I realized last night when I was making dinner that the only vegetables I had in the house were pureed! Oh well, at least one of us is getting his veggies...

I am a professional baker.

Yes, that's right. Professional.

It was an absolute baking spree this morning. I did a toffee bar for my dad's family's Christmas. It's one of about ten kinds of cookies my Grandma used to make every year. And they're good. I also did Millionaire's Shortbread via Bake and Shake's fantastic blog. They're cooling in the fridge as we speak. The chocolate on mine turned out not as shiny and gorgeous as hers, but I am quite hopeful that they will still taste as good as hers look. Cuz they're full of caramel. And there's a couple sticks of butter in there. So yeah. They should be alright. Seriously though, between the two baking feats I managed today, I went through 5, yes 5(!) sticks of butter. Nice. And I will have you know, I did it all with my $5.97 (gasp!) Wal-Mart hand mixer. So yes, I'll say it again. Professional. Watch out Martha, you have been warned...

Now bring on the stretchy pants!

dinner and such

I made a quick dinner tonight. Tamale Pie from Simply Recipes and a cherry crisp. Yum. I was a little skeptical about the tamale pie but it turned out well. I thought the cornbread topping would be soggy or undercooked, but it turned out OK. I'm a little worried about leftovers being soupy, but I'm sure it will still taste good.

Ugh. I was so sick this morning with a migraine. I've been having them really frequently lately. Not fun. I'm still trying to figure out what I'm going to do to fix them... Easier said than done I think. I really don't want to take a daily medication, but maybe I'm going down that road. Hope not.

In lighter news... I'm LOVING my new camera. It was one of those purchases that I really didn't need, but god did I want. I had a little buyer's guilt after I bought it, but it's making me happy. And lord knows you can't put a price on that. Right? Right. I also finally downloaded Picasa to mess around with my pictures a little and I'm having fun with that too (as you can see from the picture above). Who knew you could entertain yourself so well with a little blog and a little camera...

more from the pot

Made some Mexican rice tonight in the infamous pot. It's from The America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook. I got it from the library, but I ordered it online tonight (with free shipping, yay!). I'm very impressed with the variety of recipes and the cooking tips too. It's really a nice book.

And I really need to say Go Brewers! They're playing their asses off this week. I'm trying not to have a panic attack between watching them and the Cubs score. We're going to the game tomorrow so hopefully I won't have a stroke at Miller Park or anything. But really. Everyone just take a moment and say some words of encouragement for the boys... (and for me)

mmmmm bread!

Well obviously I'm a little behind the bandwagon with the whole blogging thing, so of course I'm behind the times with the no-knead bread. But I made my first loaf today and I just had to show it off a little. I baked it in the Martha pot of course. So without further ado...My loaf ended up more oval than round because it didn't spread itself out well in the bottom of the pot. I think it was my technique for dumping it in, but I imagine I will get more practice. I haven't cut it yet... So I may have to update this post with inside shots. But I couldn't wait to put up a picture or two! Hopefully it tastes as good as it looks. I also *love* the idea of taking pictures of all the things made in my pot like not martha, so I think I might start myself a set too. Mmmmm.... bread and pretty blue pot. What could be better?

rainy day

I had the day off today...

To go to the dentist! Yuck.

But I did find time to make these oh-so-good for your teeth cookies. Yum. Oatmeal raisin. I have been messing around with my camera's settings too, trying to get a better close-up picture. I don't think this one looks so bad, but I still would love a new camera... Oh well, I imagine if I wait I can get the one I want much cheaper. That would be nice.

It has been such a cold rainy day today... I went shopping after my dentist appointment and found 2 sweaters 1/2 off at Old Navy. Yay! I also found a pair of jeans that fit me sort of OK. I never find jeans at Old Navy, so that was nice too. But back to work tomorrow...

sewing day

Ooooh... Look-y here! A new little bag for me! I finally did a teeny bit of patchwork. I was inspired by this, and this, so I finally did my own. I absolutely love the tan outside fabric. I bought two yards of it on sale the other day at Hancock's. I love the way the pink thread looks in contrast to it on the straps and the top stitching. It is so soft too. Yay! I think I'm going to make a wallet to match. I'm also going to make something with this fabric. Maybe a purse lined with it? I was going to do a purse using it as the outside fabric, but I like the heavier feel of the thicker fabrics on the outside. I also added this scrappy little flower made with this tutorial. I'm trying to use up scraps if you can't tell.

Anyways...

I made pulled pork today in the crock-pot. I don't think I've seen Eric as happy about something as he was today eating pulled pork for a long time. He actually did the pulling too, and he was quite proud of himself... But it was quite delicious if I do say so myself.

happy day

I got my new Blueprint magazine (which I love) out of the mailbox today, and I opened it up and found this...

Which is funny, because I had just been looking at a fake Le Creuset (sp?) pot at Target earlier for $46. So I of course looked this baby up on the Macy's Martha Stewart site and found it on sale for $49. Well there you go. So I then see the free shipping offer for orders of $125... So I imagine you can see where this is going. Right. A $99 dollar set of Martha Stewart non-stick cookware of course! Now, in my defense I have been contemplating buying new pots and pans for quite awhile. The ones we have now are probably giving us some sort of cancer or something because the Teflon is scratched off so badly. I was going to try to wait until we got married and register for pots and pans, but since I don't see a wedding in the very near future... I get new Martha pans in 5-7 business days!! The beautiful blue pot is on order, so it will be a while for that one, but that's OK. I think that this whole Martha at Macy's thing may be a bit dangerous, but hopefully I can restrain myself from buying all the pretty blue accessories that match the pot.

I also learned about spray adhesive today. I covered our NASTY lampshades with gorgeous Amy Butler fabric. Good idea right? Except for the spray adhesive still stuck to my fingers. They are NOT kidding about not getting the stuff on your skin. So I gave myself a nice acetone soak and hopefully it will wear off soon...

And I made this...

A yummy, yummy lasagna (the picture doesn't do it justice). I made brownies too (from a box, but hey, get off my back, the lasagna's from scratch!). I forgot how satisfying it is to cook. I didn't cook much in our last apartment for some reason. I think partly because it was a bad space to work in, and partly because there was no disposal or dishwasher. Not that that's a good excuse, but I'm definitely going to start cooking more again. I need to be better about spending money on eating out. It's been a little out of control lately. I was forgetting how satisfying it is to make your own meal.

So it was a nice day. And I will have all the more reason to cook when my *gasp* new Martha stuff gets here!