Carolina Slaw

The other night we had some people over for wings, and I happened to have half of a head of cabbage. I thought a nice vinegar-y cole slaw would go well with the wings, celery, and blue cheese. It didn't hurt that I was trying to keep it light since I'm on Weight Watchers. This slaw turned out fabulous. I doubt I will make another vinegar slaw recipe ever again. There is just no need.

Believe it or not, I got this recipe from About.com. And I changed it very little, other than halving it and omitting the bell pepper. I probably will try it with red pepper at some point, but I was in a hurry and didn't have time to finely chop a veggie that I knew it would taste great without.

Carolina Slaw

1 large head of cabbage, finely shredded

1 medium onion, finely chopped

2 carrots, grated

Dressing:

1 cup sugar

1 tsp salt

2/3 cup sunflower oil oil

1 tsp dry mustard

1 tsp celery seed

1 cup cider vinegar

Combine veggies in a large bowl. For the dressing, combine remaining ingredients and whisk together. Allow a couple of minutes for the sugar to dissolve. Toss together with the vegetable mixture. Allow to marinate in the refrigerator for at least two hours.

The original recipe called for regular veggie oil and sweet onion instead of red. I halved the recipe and it was enough for 6 adults. I had two helpings. There may have been some who didn't eat it though, I didn't notice. This was delicious with wings, and would be great with any sort of grilled or barbecue dish.

Let me know if you use this. I would love to know what you think!

I Seriously Embarrassed Myself

In my Midweek Confessions, I referred to an embarrassing moment that deserved a post of it's own. Nothing like an embarrassing story, a la Melody Aylestock.

On Monday, Joshua and I made the spur of the moment decision to start attending this class I wanted to go to. We heard about it and decided to go about an hour before we had to leave. In our rush to eat dinner, get ready and get out the door, I left a pair of nail clippers in my pants pocket. Whatever.

Two hours later...we are in the midst of class discussion and we know no one. I feel something in my pocket and wonder what is. I pull out the clippers and start fiddling with them. The discussion gets around to me and I'm feeling chatty. In the midst of this moment, every eye on me, I reach up to scratch my head, with the same hand holding the nail clippers. And somehow the clippers get stuck in my hair, right above my ear. I'm in the middle of a sentence, but I'm getting distracted and feeling really silly. I have my hand over that spot so no one can see it yet but I'm working pretty hard to get it out without ruining my ponytail. So I say, "Um, I don't know how I did this but I just got nail clippers stuck in my hair. And Joshua's going to have to help me get them out. So I guess I'm done."

I stand up, and Joshua helps me get it out. But of course they don't move on. They all stare silently while he tries to get it out. So I just try to awkwardly explain how it happened and why I even have nail clippers in my hand. And still no one moves on. I sit down. And there is silence. So I decide I'd better get this train back on track and picked up the discussion where I left off. Anyway, super embarrassing but funny.

Am I the only person things like this happen to? I'm pretty sure I am. I would love to be proven wrong though? What's your embarrassing story?

I'm Back and I'm Confessing

I need to start blogging again. Malachi is 19 months old and every day, he does the darnedest things. I've got to remember them somehow. So, what better way to get back into blogging than by participating in my friend Elizabeth's blog link-up:

Let's get started, shall we?

- Joshua and I started attending Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace class this week. I admit it. We need help. Kind of embarrassing, especially since we already had a good bit of debt and paid it off once in our first 18 months of marriage. So awesome that we did not learn our lesson. Especially since its way easier to pay off debt with two incomes and no kids than on one income plus kids. Let this be a lesson to the childless!

- At said class, I embarrassed myself wholly. This deserves a post of its own. Let's just say, don't carry random grooming items to church. They may end up attached to embarrassing places on your person, leaving you to sheepishly explain yourself.

- We hosted our church small group in our home this weekend. We decided that we should get the toilet, vanity, and door installed in our downstairs bathroom so it would be usable during that time. We totally took on too much, and had to finish the project and clean our absolute disaster of a house by 4pm on Sunday. We ended up not going to church, and running around like crazy people until 4:04 (when the first people arrived) to finish up. Don't look in my closets. We were literally tossing piles of stuff into laundry baskets to hide in our bedroom. Um, I can't believe I'm writing this. I also was in my pajamas and didn't brush my hair until 3:55 when I got in the shower. How awful would it have been if someone got there early?

- I have overused the word "embarrassed" in this post. I have also spelled it wrong every time. How embarassing. Thank goodness for spellcheck.

- Sometimes when Joshua and I both want to sleep in, we shut 19-month-old Malachi in the bedroom with us and let him go crazy while we lay there and pretend to sleep through it. We give him a banana and water to eat if he gets hungry, and lift our heads and open one eye if we hear a crash. Last Saturday when we did this, he removed a drawer from the dresser, emptied it of all the clothes and sat it in, unwrapping feminine products which he later strew across the room. I also let him try to eat a menthol cough drop during this time. In my defense, I figured he would spit it out after tasting it, which was true.

- Joshua and I stayed up way too late watching Breaking Bad on Netflix on Sunday night. Wayyyyy to late. I am still recovering from it.

- Malachi is crying at my knees for me to pick him up and I'm pretty much ignoring him so I can finish this. What's worse is I'm positive that I smell a poopy diaper and I'm still ignoring him. How horrible is that? Now he is crying in earnest, and has thrown himself on the floor and is kicking. Seems like a good time to stop confessing and start paying attention to my child.

Let's link of to Friday Confessional at Mamarazi, while we're at it, eh?

Lemon Blackberry Pancakes

Lemon Blueberry Pancakes have shown up around the Internet in a variety of places lately, and they've had me salivating. So on Sunday morning, when I realized I had extra lemon to figure out what to do with, it seemed like the perfect time to try this recipe. I would have tried Pioneer Woman's recipe, but it calls for evaporated milk, of which I had none. So I did my typical thing and smelted together some other recipes to come up with this one.

Some recipes out there only call for lemon zest, and not the juice. In my opinion, the I added the juice of half a lemon. It probably added 2-3 tablespoons of liquid, which was perfect because the batter was a little thick. And it added a lemony flavor to the pancakes that was ah-mazing. I also used blackberries instead of blueberries because it was I had available. I'm telling you, these pancakes were the best I've ever eaten. The combination of lemon and blackberries was to die for. I'm sure it would have been at least that good with blueberries.

photo credit

Here's the recipe:

Lemon Blackberry Pancakes

1 egg
1 tbsp freshly grated lemon zest
2-3 tbsp fresh squeezed lemon
3/4 cup milk
1/4 cup loosely packed brown sugar
2 tbsp melted butter
1 cup all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup blackberries

Whisk together egg, zest, lemon juice, milk, brown sugar and butter. In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder and salt. Add the milk mixture to the flour mixture and stir together just until combined. If your batter is a little dry, add more milk. I added more lemon juice to mine, just because I couldn't get enough. Stir in the blackberries.

I like to heat my griddle to 325 degrees. But if you don't have a temperature gauge, your griddle should be hot enough for water to sizzle when you splash a few drops on it. Butter the pan, and pour in your batter. I poured about 1/4 cup at a time, and it made us about 8 pancakes.

It took me of messy pancake making to figure out the secret of when to flip. If you are still working on it, here are a couple of tips. First, only flip once. Second, wait until the edges of the pancake seem dry, and there are bubbles in the center. Third, make sure your flipper is big enough to get most of the pancake on it.

As soon as I tasted these pancakes, I knew I had to share this recipe. I went around to my family and made them all taste it. It is lemony, and the lemon goes perfectly with the berries. I will be making these over and over again. PLEASE try them. You will not be disappointed.

Simple Beef Stew

Do you believe I had never made beef stew, except from crock pot roast, until yesterday? But I bought some stew beef that was on clearance a couple weeks ago. Yesterday I dug it out of the freezer and started looking for a recipe.

Like most things I make though, I consulted a few recipes without really following any. The end result is usually something I can call my own, and I am usually very happy with it.

I started out with a pound of stew beef sauteed in olive oil. While this browned in the soup pot, I chopped up two potatoes, an onion, two ribs of celery, and three cloves of garlic. I tossed those in the pot along with a pound of baby carrots, coated it in oil and let it warm through. I then coated it all in a 1/4 cup of flour. Once well-coated, add a four cups of beef broth to pot and bring to a boil. Add a bay leaf and a teaspoon each rosemary and thyme. Let simmer for about an hour and salt and pepper to taste.

I was really quite happy with the way this turned out. The beef was tender, the vegetables were soft, but not overcooked. The seasoning was just right. I'll add this to be recipe box.

Heirloom Tomato Salad

I have a hard time taking just one thing to a potluck. For the aforementioned potluck this past Saturday night, there would be a combination of foodies and normal people. So the thing on my mind was something that both would enjoy (and something a little more grown up than jello shots: a simple heirloom tomato salad.

I headed out to the farmer's market on Saturday morning to find a combination of colorful and flavorful tomatoes that would look and taste beautiful together in a salad. I also grabbed some fresh oregano while I was there, since mine has gone to seed.

I basically made Jamie Oliver's Mothership Tomato Salad, which lists all the ingredients, but you add them to your own taste. Here's what I did:

I started with three pounds of local heirloom tomatoes from one of farmer's markets. My tomatoes resembled these lovelies.

photo credit

As suggested, I cut them in a variety of sizes and chunks to add visual interest. I liked his suggestion of salting the tomatoes and letting them sweat out the extra liquid. I normally don't do this for my tomato salads, and there is a lot of extra juice that waters down the dressing. Of course, he says to discard the juice, but I added a bit of salt and drank it. I will not admit to the juice dribbling down my chin anywhere but here. That fresh tomato nectar was honestly the best part of making this recipe. Chef's privilege!

I added probably 1/4 cup fresh oregano, a diced clove of garlic, 1 part balsamic vinegar to 2 parts oil (I did 1/4 cups) and salt and pepper to taste.

I served this at room temperature, because somehow, tomatoes taste better to me that way. Like I just picked them off the vine and served them up.

I personally felt I didn't add enough vinegar to this, but I got some good comments on it at the potluck. It was enjoyed by both the food connoisseurs and the unwashed masses. Happy day!

Lemon and Lime Wedge Jello Shots

I recently joined Pinterest, and it has given my menu planning the lift that it needed. Many of the recipes I've been making lately were either found on Pinterest, or inspired by recipes found there.

This Saturday for a cookout, I made lime and lemon wedge jello shots. How grown up of me, I know. But how can you resist such an amazing photo? It was time consuming, and in the moment I was frustrated. It didn't help that Malachi kept waking up from his nap and each time I had a mini-freak out that I wouldn't get them in the fridge in time to set. The payoff was worth it though because they were so good and they really do look just like this:

photo credit

Here's the recipe I used:

Lemon and Lemon Wedge Jello Shots

Dissolve one 3 oz. packet of jello in a cup of boiling water. You can use any red flavor. I wanted to use watermelon, but they didn't have any, so I made one recipe with cherry and one with strawberry. Turn off the water and add 4 oz. Vodka and 4 oz. Sour Apple Schnapps. I let this sit while I wrangled 20 lemons and limes out of their rinds.

For this step you cut each lemon or lime in half, then score between the fruit and the rind with a paring knife. Use a spoon to pull the fruit from the peel, being careful not to break a hole in the peel. It gets easier as you practice.

Set the rind halves on a tray and fill each lemon or lime with the jello mixture. Let them rest for three hours in the fridge. Before serving, Cut each half in half again to make wedges.

Stand back and listen to everyone ooh and aah over your amazing creation. These were a huge hit.