Finally, a brown rice-fried rice that works

Here's the recipe I used (which is sure to be a repeater and can easily vary the veggies....I adapted the recipe from this site http://www.theperfectpantry.com/2007/08/brown-rice.html) here's my version:

Veggie Fried Rice (with Brown Rice!)


2 tsp olive oil
1 egg, lightly scrambled
1/4 cup diced mixed vegetables -- onion and red pepper
1/4 cup carrots and corn
1 cup cooked brown rice, any variety, chilled
1 1/2 tsp oyster sauce
1 1/2 tsp soy sauce
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 tsp sesame oil

Heat the oil in a wok over highest heat, and add the egg and vegetables, and stir. Add rice, oyster sauce, soy sauce, and salt and pepper, and stir for 1 minute; the sauce should be absorbed and the rice grains should be separate. Add the sesame oil, toss, and serve hot. Reheats well too!

I served it with my mock PF Chang's lettuce wraps (with cabbage as the wrapper)

My new utensil holder present

Usually there are more utensils in it, but a lot are in the dishwasher, which is currently running! It's so pretty and clean looking on the countertop! THANKS!!!

Really, we don't eat THAT much meat!

So....for a family who eats several meat-free meals a week (at a minimum) it seems strange that our freezer looks like a meat locker. This is for several reasons: (1) all the fruit and veggies are buried under the pile o' meat (2) we recently purchased a half of a lamb from a local family farm (3) I just picked up our 1/4 hog that was butchered from a different local family farm and (4) we found an amazing deal on salmon when we were in Washington for the holidays and so we brought back 5 whole fish with us (and have 10 more in the in-laws freezer!)

All this meat means that we're sure to be incorporating more meat into our meals, but it will be a fun challenge for me as I don't plan on meat being the "main" portion, but more an accent to some whole grains and vegetables. I have tentatively planned out the following menu for the following week:

Monday - Roasted Salmon with Lentil/Couscous/Herb/Veggie Salad (a favorite repeat around here!) (and tonight I will make some fish stock to freeze and make a salmon chowder later on)

Tuesday - Salmon Tacos with the leftover salmon....with a mexican cabbage slaw and some fresh cooked black beans. I am hoping to handmake some corn tortillas for this meal, but it all depends on if I get to the store to get my tortilla press before then.

Wednesday - Pork Chops in the crockpot with a jar of my home canned BBQ sauce (first time to try the sauce!)with roasted potatoes and squash

Thursday - Leftover pork shredded with sauce on homemade sourdough baguettes for a pulled pork type sandwich with a cabbage cole slaw type salad

Friday - Soup, possibly potato-leek or a squash soup from the freezer (something meat free for sure!)

Wonderful World of Sprouting

After a brief conversation with one of my brother-in-laws over the holidays, I was inspired to try sprouting again. (For history, I have only sprouted a couple things over the years, and while both were a success I just didn't continue for some reason.) So, it was serendipitious that while I was at our local natural foods store stocking up today I spotted some little sprouting screens with instructions and jars (regular mason type) on display....so for under $5 I'm going to give it another try! Also, they had a whole section (albiet small section) of bulk seeds/legumes that were specifically labelled for sprouting. I got a small baggie of both the sandwich mix and the salad mix - they look tasty. We'll be down at my parents for New Year's, but I'll get them going when we return!

(Oh, and it turns out that the sprouting screen is from a local company...even better!)

It's raining cookbooks.....

I decided that each of my new books from the holidays deserves its own post. Here's the first and my favorite thus far! I haven't cooked from it yet, but have been overjoyed to read it....lots of info and recipes.

I also discovered a website by the same author that has actual videos (with a humorous slant) of a lot of the recipes in the book. Very helpful for a visual learner such as myself!

Laptop Lunch Frenzy Begins

My kiddos got Laptop Lunchboxes for Christmas and they couldn't have been more thrilled! My 5 year old danced around the room and declared emphatically that she needed this because she is going to start having lunch at school. Her 2 year old sister jumped up and shouted "I needed it TOO!" I asked the 2 year old why she needed it and she looked perplexed, shrugged her shoulders and simply stated "I JUST needed it!" Who can argue with such impecable logic? Simply stated, I often "just need" things too!

You can check out these little creations at http://www.laptoplunches.com/ and see them put to great use (although much more creatively than I am sure I will be!) at http://veganlunchbox.blogspot.com/

Next week the actual school lunches start, so I wanted to do a trial run with said lunchboxes this week to make sure, among other things, that my child could actually open it when she was at school! Attached is a photo of some things from the fridge that I threw together for lunch today -- it's whole wheat penne with homemade marinara, pear slices, baby carrots, 2 late July crackers sandwiched together with nut butter, and yogurt in the dip cup, as this was the item that they were both most excited about). They were both SO excited to eat out of their lunchboxes.

Ahhh.....fresh produce!

After being pretty much stranded in the house for a week straight and not being able to venture to one of my favorite places....the grocery store....the Organics To You produce delivery was a much anticipated part of today. With the exception of convincing my husband to jump off the bus and run into the grocery store for milk, eggs and cheese one night this week, we have gone without any outside groceries for the entire week. Luckily I have quite the storage of both dry goods, frozen items and a very well stocked pantry....but fresh produce was one thing that was lacking. We were down to one head of cabbage and some carrots in the fridge, potatoes and squash in the garage and a bit of fruit (yes, we are well stocked!) but now...problem solved! A HUGE box of delicious fresh items....take a look! By the way, this is the first week we have gotten the "regular" bin, as we were still well stocked veggie wise from the CSA we had been getting fruit box in the previous weeks. The variety and amount of produce in this week's particular box was remarkable and I am impressed by how much of it is sourced locally. I look forward to seeing what the next bi-weekly box holds!

The girls were so excited by the bounty that they literally cheered for the broccoli and demanded that I steam some up right away and then they began carrying the leeks around the house and poking things with them. Oh, kids will be kids....

Let it snow, let it snow, let it SNOW!

We haven't done a very good job of taking photos while we've been outside in the snow/ice this week -- too busy *trying* to stay warm! But here are a few - we apparently didn't take any the days that we had the most snow and ice on the ground. Oh well, if the weather forecast is correct, we'll have another opportunity this weekend.

This was the first smattering of snow earlier this week (the girls were just excited to be able to wear their new snow hats):



Loving the snow!


The girls love being pulled around the lawn in the sled (but are too afraid to go down the hill on the sled)


Here's today snow play:

Opening up the ornaments

The oldest with her ornament:


The youngest with her ornament:


Posing by the tree for Grandma:


Ornaments on the head:


Although this is a bit dated, I promised I'd send these photos to the grandparents and then forgot (gasp!) so I am posting them here instead....Every year my mother-in-law gets the girls' a new ornament for the tree. The last couple years the oldest has even gotten to pick it out at a lovely Christmas shop near the beachhouse we have stayed at on the Oregon Coast. This year they opened their ornament presents as we decorated our tree. They were SO excited to get a bear and a bunny to add to the tree!

This was a family tradition of their's and my husband has a great box (and nicely organized list) of ornaments from each year of his childhood as well. Some are cute, some are handmade, some are from trips that were taken during that year (think Disneyland), some are symbols of sports teams or other activities he participated in (newspaper, band, etc.) but all are symbolic of a certain thing that was important that year - kinda like a time capsule. It's really a neat tradition and I am happy to pass it on to my kids....although I need to start that list of what ornament was from what year because my oldest is only 5 and I am already forgetting!!

Update on the Ginger Beer

Well, I posted a while back on the making of Ginger Beer, courtesy of the book Wild Fermention. I had promised an update when we got around to sampling it (after the fermentation process ended) and that time came last night. My husband said he'd try it if I took the first drink. I said I'd take the first drink if he opened the container (I had a slight fear of an explosion of some sort!) And, thus, a deal was made. He opened. I sampled. It didn't explode. It wasn't that good. That sums it up!

For more detail.....quite a bit of carbonation did occur, which I thought was pretty darned cool. The taste however was very "beer-like" to me, but not "beery" enough for hubby. He said that it smelled like beer, but didn't taste like much. Fair enough assessment. I thought that it tasted a bit like beer, but not much like ginger and certainly all the sugars had been eaten up, since it wasn't sweet at all! This was disappointing to me.

I don't think I'll make it again, and not sure that all of this batch will be consumed, some might be contributing to our compost pile. But it was a fun experiment!

Still alive....just snowed in!

Several people have asked why I haven't been updating ye ole blog lately and quite frankly it's just because I've been busy doing other things.....since school has been cancelled every single day this week (and the week before Winter Break no less!) it's been pretty darned busy around the house keeping my kiddos occupied without our normal activities!

I found this fabulous website www.mathwire.com that has all sorts of great math-themed winter activities that my 5 year old has been furiously doing (she is working on the quilt activity as I type!) One of her favorites is the gingerbread man game....so much fun! Oh, and we did the dice rolling, draw a snowman game so many times yesterday I can't count them all.

I have been furiously baking, here are a few pictures and links to recipes when appropriate from my baking spree.

The latest project was a coconut bread that I just got out of the oven (and ate 3 large pieces of already!) I was a bit nervous about the recipe as I had to use my kitchen scale and convert things from the Australian measurements (mostly grams) and it seemed to call for an absurd amount of coconut, but, let me tell you, it is TASTY!! It is supposed to be a great breakfast bread and is served at an infamous restaurant in Australia....I can see why! The recipe can be found here http://www.lifestylefood.com.au/recipes/36/coconut-bread



One I don't have a photo for, but that was fabulous and on the "to make again" list is a vegan blackberry crisp. http://www.seattlevegan.com/recipe.php?id=3&cat=desserts It was especially delicious with a dollop of greek honey yogurt!

Here are some coconut bon-bons that I made today. I had to use up almost my entire stash of dark chocolate to coat them, but it was much easier than I thought it might be. Here's the recipe I used: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/coconut-indulgences-recipe/index.html (Oh, and I had to make my own sweetened condensed milk, which I googled a recipe for)



Next up.....I've made about 4 batches of bread this week, including some stellar sourdough baguettes that are on the "to repeat" list too! Unfortunately I didn't get a photo of them before I cut and toasted one of them into crostinis and froze the other 2 for later use. Other breads I tried for the first time are 2 in the Peter Reinhart's Whole Grain Bread book - a oatmeal broom bread (REALLY good toasted with a boiled egg for breakfast!) and a power bread that used a raisin puree and a variety of grains and seeds and nuts - nice and hearty!



Next, not an edible project, but the kids and I made applesauce cinnamon dough ornaments early in the snow week....they turned out really well, were easy and kept the kiddos occupied for a while. What a winner!



Another project (this one didn't involve food OR the kidlets!) was that I have been doing a monthly quilting challenge at a local quilt store and this month's blocks needed to be completed before we left to visit relatives for the holiday. Luckily, being stuck at home due to the icy roads left a whole day I could devote. I am NOT a great quilter, but am giving it a try. It's kind of nice to challenge another part of my brain once in a while!



Finally, here's a fairly unattractive photo of some of the cookies (and fudge) that I made to take up to the relatives' house this next week. (Some of them were also from a cookie exchange that I attended this week, but sadly I made the majority of them this week!) When I get bored....I bake!



Well, off to pick up the produce bin this week, as we really could use some fresh fare. Hopefully it won't take me so long to post an update! Thanks to those of you who checked in on me!