It's a rainy Saturday afternoon, and here's the scenario: I'm blogging and proofreading my previous post before publishing. The Monetize ad thingy at the right is flashing with an ad for shoes! I'm a shoe girl people and I have to tell you that I couldn't believe my eyes at these beautiful shoes from "Shoe Dazzle". Don't go there if you are at all tempted. Gorgeous, albeit impractical shoes everywhere! I think it's a shoe club...you know where you give them your size, etc. and they mail you shoes monthly. Move over Amelda!
I confess I have a fabric habit like that called "Sweet Treats" which I usually do for a few months each year. It's been a very hard and stressful last couple of months and I love the treat of opening the mail to see what gorgeous bundle of fat quarters (a quilter's term) they have sent me this month. I have to add that I use these to make baby quilts for our little darling new arrivals at Church so I consider this to be charitable work. Justification at its finest!
I digress.
My point is: temptation is everywhere!...whether it's in the grocery store (I don't shop hungry), online shoe ads or fabric ads. It takes strong resolve not to cave and buy, buy, buy. I didn't even think twice about joining that shoe club in case you were wondering. I'd have a LOT of explaining to do and a bunch of fingers wagging in my face. I also must mention that I did exercise self-control just for the sake of reducing debt. It wasn't just the fear of wrath from the family and fellow war-on-debt army members. I know I did the right thing. The point here is to say to you...watch out people! You never know where that minefield is going to pop up. You could be innocently blogging then 'bang'...there it is! Stay strong friends!
Now I must go and think about whether or not I can really justify my 'sweet treat' fabric program. I think I know the answer but for today I'm going to go and fondle my fabric and dream about a quilt for a new baby in our congregation. What a great feeling!
Oh yeah...and then I'll go and peel those potatoes for dinner tonight which was supposed to be the topic of this blog. Forgive my rabbit trail dear readers.
Until next time,
Mavis
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Calling it Day 8
Last night I had hoped to cook a small ham that was in the freezer and combine it with some yummy scalloped potatoes. It didn't happen. Tired happened.
So we ate our leftover salmon, brown rice and frozen peas from the night before. Cute comment by the hubs..."how thoughtful". He was referring to the addition of some baby gherkin pickles that I found in the fridge. AND we found some tomato chutney in the larder which was a gift from someone a few years back. It was delish! The only complaint from the first night of the curried salmon was the overpowering of the curry flavour. Funny how adding this chutney enhanced the flavour and subdued the curry.
Enjoyed some Cabernet Sauvignon from the wine cellar (DH is a winemaker so this was from his 'stash'). Felt pretty fortunate to have such an excellent dinner without doling out the money for it this week.
Tonight will be the baked ham, scalloped potatoes and probably some canned corn or carrots as those are the veggies we have left. I'll probably have to shop for fresh stuff tomorrow but the bank account has been VERY happy this week!
Until next time, frugally yours,
Mavis
So we ate our leftover salmon, brown rice and frozen peas from the night before. Cute comment by the hubs..."how thoughtful". He was referring to the addition of some baby gherkin pickles that I found in the fridge. AND we found some tomato chutney in the larder which was a gift from someone a few years back. It was delish! The only complaint from the first night of the curried salmon was the overpowering of the curry flavour. Funny how adding this chutney enhanced the flavour and subdued the curry.
Enjoyed some Cabernet Sauvignon from the wine cellar (DH is a winemaker so this was from his 'stash'). Felt pretty fortunate to have such an excellent dinner without doling out the money for it this week.
Tonight will be the baked ham, scalloped potatoes and probably some canned corn or carrots as those are the veggies we have left. I'll probably have to shop for fresh stuff tomorrow but the bank account has been VERY happy this week!
Until next time, frugally yours,
Mavis
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Day ? - blogging absence
Hello fellow foodies!
I've been sticking to my program (promise!) but haven't been blogging about it much. It was a busy weekend and week. I can hardly believe tomorrow is Friday!
On the weekend, I was sewing with my friends at Church in the morning and can't remember a thing I made on Saturday. I just know I stayed the course of reducing bulk in the freezer/fridge/pantry...with no cheats! I spent the majority of the afternoon and evening doing bookkeeping so that I could sew again on Sunday.
As you know, it was the Superbowl on Sunday and I joined an online Superbowl Mystery Quilt day on Sunday, skipping out of church. My friend Pam came over and we sewed together from 10 a.m. to approx. 10 p.m. Talk about a marathon. We both finished quilt tops and had a great time together. Busy hands mean you aren't snacking!
She brought us some muffins and I made lunch (turkey soup from the freezer together with some foccacia bread from Cobb's Bakery which was in the freezer). My friend raved about my soup and secretly inside I was patting myself on the back...even with company I managed to share a fine meal without shopping. I'm loving this challenge more and more every day! Since we sewed until about 10 pm we also had to think about dinner. She wanted to order a pizza to share but my conscience was wincing! We ended up making a salad and baking a frozen pizza from the deep freeze. It was excellent and we sewed on until we were finished our quilt tops. Phew!
Monday night I made one of my favourite recipes...Pasta with Feta Cheese. It has so much more in it than just pasta and feta cheese but that is the official name. Actually, I think I will share the recipe here because everyone who has this at my house always asks for the recipe:
Pasta With Feta Cheese
Linguine to serve your number of family members (I've used both fresh and dried linguine and both are good). Of course you can use spaghetti or fettucine if that's what you've got and want to use up! Heck...we even had fettuguine! We had a little fettucine and a little linguine so we combined them!
While you are boiling the water and cooking the pasta, prepare the Al Fresco (served fresh, ie not cooked):
In a large bowl: (this serves 4 people so you will have to adjust for larger crowds)
3-4 chopped tomatoes (I prefer Roma but will use whatever we have. I have also used canned tomatoes - drained, but it's better with fresh tomatoes)
3-4 chopped green onions
1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese (I use lite)
1/3 cup parmesan cheese
3-4 cloves of minced garlic (or to taste)
1/4 cup (or to the consistency you like) olive oil
1 tsp dried basil (really good with fresh basil too)
Salt & Pepper.
Stir all these ingredients together. It should be kind of like the consistency of egg salad. It should stick together and not be runny.
You can either toss it with the hot linguine or place a spoonful of the sauce over top of your pasta on each bowl. I prefer the second way because that way everyone gets some of the veggies and cheese. I find with the first way of tossing, that some of the stuff falls to the bottom of the bowl or gets taken by the first served and then the last guy is left with noodles only.
One warning ~ because the sauce is al fresco and at room temperature, this cools off fast. Cooking the sauce totally changes it, so in my opinion, timing it just right produces the best results. You will never burn your mouth on this pasta. And guaranteed you'll make it more than once!
It is one of my kids' all time favourites. Try adding black olives! It's yummy too!
So that was Monday.
On Tuesday, I had to take my son to the hospital on the mainland for a monthly treatment. Rather than eat the ferry food, I took my home made granola (from Michael Smith's cookbook) and some yogurt and ate it inthe lineup waiting for the ferry. I also brought my coffee from home. Mike always looks forward to the Belgian waffles so I indulged him and bought myself another cup of coffee on the ferry.
For lunch I took from home some egg-salad sandwiches but bought coffee at Second Cup at the hospital. Since we missed the 5 pm ferry home, we went to White Spot and had dinner before heading out to the ferry. So I guess on Tuesday, we really cheated half the day but I think I should get extra points for taking my brekky and lunch with me.
Wednesday ~ hmmmm ~ Oh yes...it was my Weight Watchers meeting. My husband made dinner and at my suggestion we had tuna casserole made with the tri-colour rice pasta we had in the pantry, the tuna and cream of mushroom soup also from the pantry, an onion, and the rest of the celery. It was amazing. We topped it with the Panko crumbs and some parmesan cheese that we had on hand. So, for dinner, no cheats!
And Today - Thursday - Would you believe we had the courage to combine some salmon from the freezer with some Tandoori curry paste? Along with that we cooked up some brown rice and some frozen peas. It wasn't one of my better ideas as the curry paste kind of overpowered the salmon. But hey ~! we emptied that jar of curry paste from the fridge so I think that's worth some points right there!
I'm beginning to see bare shelf space in the fridge. Very promising. The pantry doesn't look emptier but we're getting there. I expect for Saturday we will need some fresh veggies, fruit and some milk and maybe some more protein. I'll have to check the freezer.
And...as for the Weight Watchers...I am still managing to come down in numbers. This 'eating from the pantry' sounds very 'carb' rich but I lost another .6 lbs this week for a total weight loss of 15 lbs. Lovin' it!!
Until tomorrow friends,
Mavis
I've been sticking to my program (promise!) but haven't been blogging about it much. It was a busy weekend and week. I can hardly believe tomorrow is Friday!
On the weekend, I was sewing with my friends at Church in the morning and can't remember a thing I made on Saturday. I just know I stayed the course of reducing bulk in the freezer/fridge/pantry...with no cheats! I spent the majority of the afternoon and evening doing bookkeeping so that I could sew again on Sunday.
As you know, it was the Superbowl on Sunday and I joined an online Superbowl Mystery Quilt day on Sunday, skipping out of church. My friend Pam came over and we sewed together from 10 a.m. to approx. 10 p.m. Talk about a marathon. We both finished quilt tops and had a great time together. Busy hands mean you aren't snacking!
She brought us some muffins and I made lunch (turkey soup from the freezer together with some foccacia bread from Cobb's Bakery which was in the freezer). My friend raved about my soup and secretly inside I was patting myself on the back...even with company I managed to share a fine meal without shopping. I'm loving this challenge more and more every day! Since we sewed until about 10 pm we also had to think about dinner. She wanted to order a pizza to share but my conscience was wincing! We ended up making a salad and baking a frozen pizza from the deep freeze. It was excellent and we sewed on until we were finished our quilt tops. Phew!
Monday night I made one of my favourite recipes...Pasta with Feta Cheese. It has so much more in it than just pasta and feta cheese but that is the official name. Actually, I think I will share the recipe here because everyone who has this at my house always asks for the recipe:
Pasta With Feta Cheese
Linguine to serve your number of family members (I've used both fresh and dried linguine and both are good). Of course you can use spaghetti or fettucine if that's what you've got and want to use up! Heck...we even had fettuguine! We had a little fettucine and a little linguine so we combined them!
While you are boiling the water and cooking the pasta, prepare the Al Fresco (served fresh, ie not cooked):
In a large bowl: (this serves 4 people so you will have to adjust for larger crowds)
3-4 chopped tomatoes (I prefer Roma but will use whatever we have. I have also used canned tomatoes - drained, but it's better with fresh tomatoes)
3-4 chopped green onions
1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese (I use lite)
1/3 cup parmesan cheese
3-4 cloves of minced garlic (or to taste)
1/4 cup (or to the consistency you like) olive oil
1 tsp dried basil (really good with fresh basil too)
Salt & Pepper.
Stir all these ingredients together. It should be kind of like the consistency of egg salad. It should stick together and not be runny.
You can either toss it with the hot linguine or place a spoonful of the sauce over top of your pasta on each bowl. I prefer the second way because that way everyone gets some of the veggies and cheese. I find with the first way of tossing, that some of the stuff falls to the bottom of the bowl or gets taken by the first served and then the last guy is left with noodles only.
One warning ~ because the sauce is al fresco and at room temperature, this cools off fast. Cooking the sauce totally changes it, so in my opinion, timing it just right produces the best results. You will never burn your mouth on this pasta. And guaranteed you'll make it more than once!
It is one of my kids' all time favourites. Try adding black olives! It's yummy too!
So that was Monday.
On Tuesday, I had to take my son to the hospital on the mainland for a monthly treatment. Rather than eat the ferry food, I took my home made granola (from Michael Smith's cookbook) and some yogurt and ate it inthe lineup waiting for the ferry. I also brought my coffee from home. Mike always looks forward to the Belgian waffles so I indulged him and bought myself another cup of coffee on the ferry.
For lunch I took from home some egg-salad sandwiches but bought coffee at Second Cup at the hospital. Since we missed the 5 pm ferry home, we went to White Spot and had dinner before heading out to the ferry. So I guess on Tuesday, we really cheated half the day but I think I should get extra points for taking my brekky and lunch with me.
Wednesday ~ hmmmm ~ Oh yes...it was my Weight Watchers meeting. My husband made dinner and at my suggestion we had tuna casserole made with the tri-colour rice pasta we had in the pantry, the tuna and cream of mushroom soup also from the pantry, an onion, and the rest of the celery. It was amazing. We topped it with the Panko crumbs and some parmesan cheese that we had on hand. So, for dinner, no cheats!
And Today - Thursday - Would you believe we had the courage to combine some salmon from the freezer with some Tandoori curry paste? Along with that we cooked up some brown rice and some frozen peas. It wasn't one of my better ideas as the curry paste kind of overpowered the salmon. But hey ~! we emptied that jar of curry paste from the fridge so I think that's worth some points right there!
I'm beginning to see bare shelf space in the fridge. Very promising. The pantry doesn't look emptier but we're getting there. I expect for Saturday we will need some fresh veggies, fruit and some milk and maybe some more protein. I'll have to check the freezer.
And...as for the Weight Watchers...I am still managing to come down in numbers. This 'eating from the pantry' sounds very 'carb' rich but I lost another .6 lbs this week for a total weight loss of 15 lbs. Lovin' it!!
Until tomorrow friends,
Mavis
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Day 5 - Later that same day...
Well, I thought the memory card was in the camera! But I was mistaken.
Sorry folks ~ no pictures but I'll try and give you word pictures instead.
The muffins ~ I used a basic cheddar cheese muffin recipe from the Best of Bridge but did my own version. First I used the remaining buttermilk in the carton, a bit of milk and then added some Bolthouse Yogurt Dressing (Ranch flavour) to make up the balance of the liquid to match the recipe. I added cheddar cheese and chopped fresh spinach AND the Epicurian Foccacia bread spice. They were moist, fragrant and lovely.
The soup turned out great. I threw the remainder of the spinach in about 5 minutes before serving as the muffins were finishing in the oven.
My daughter made a delicious chocolate pudding cake to satisfy her chocolate craving...so we even got dessert from stuff already in the house!
First day of grocery shopping since Monday so that's not too bad. Just the essentials mind you. No extravagant expenses!
Bon Appetit and I hope you come back tomorrow!
Mavis
Sorry folks ~ no pictures but I'll try and give you word pictures instead.
The muffins ~ I used a basic cheddar cheese muffin recipe from the Best of Bridge but did my own version. First I used the remaining buttermilk in the carton, a bit of milk and then added some Bolthouse Yogurt Dressing (Ranch flavour) to make up the balance of the liquid to match the recipe. I added cheddar cheese and chopped fresh spinach AND the Epicurian Foccacia bread spice. They were moist, fragrant and lovely.
The soup turned out great. I threw the remainder of the spinach in about 5 minutes before serving as the muffins were finishing in the oven.
My daughter made a delicious chocolate pudding cake to satisfy her chocolate craving...so we even got dessert from stuff already in the house!
First day of grocery shopping since Monday so that's not too bad. Just the essentials mind you. No extravagant expenses!
Bon Appetit and I hope you come back tomorrow!
Mavis
Day 5 - Saturday...a more relaxed day.
Hello foodie friends,
Saturday is my favourite day of the week. I can slowly wake up without having to dash out the door to work, I can linger in my jammies and I can really enjoy my coffee leisurely. Today happened to be my quilting day at our church (my other blog has highlights of that: http://dayspringquilter.blogspot.com). I did have to shed the jammies for my casual Saturday clothes and still had to leave the house but it is fun! We have lots of babies on the way in our congregation so we have lots of sewing to do. So, we sewed from about 9:30 until noon. On the way home I stopped at the Red Barn Market, where I was able to grab some great fruit and veggies for $21.60. I had in mind to make some soup for supper.
I also have some bookkeeping work to do this afternoon, so there's nothing quite like a pot of soup simmering on the stove while I'm doing another task. The wonderful smell is the promise that at the end of the day there will be something enjoyable at the table.
I have some Foccacia bread spice mix on my shelf from Victorian Epicure. I don't have time to make some Foccacia bread to go with our soup, but I'm wondering what some savory muffins might be like with some spinach, buttermilk, and some of this spice. Sounds yummy to me. And muffins only take about 1/2 hour so I can think about that later.
While the soup is simmering, I must get down to some work. I'll post pictures later.
Ciao!
Mavis
Saturday is my favourite day of the week. I can slowly wake up without having to dash out the door to work, I can linger in my jammies and I can really enjoy my coffee leisurely. Today happened to be my quilting day at our church (my other blog has highlights of that: http://dayspringquilter.blogspot.com). I did have to shed the jammies for my casual Saturday clothes and still had to leave the house but it is fun! We have lots of babies on the way in our congregation so we have lots of sewing to do. So, we sewed from about 9:30 until noon. On the way home I stopped at the Red Barn Market, where I was able to grab some great fruit and veggies for $21.60. I had in mind to make some soup for supper.
I also have some bookkeeping work to do this afternoon, so there's nothing quite like a pot of soup simmering on the stove while I'm doing another task. The wonderful smell is the promise that at the end of the day there will be something enjoyable at the table.
I have some Foccacia bread spice mix on my shelf from Victorian Epicure. I don't have time to make some Foccacia bread to go with our soup, but I'm wondering what some savory muffins might be like with some spinach, buttermilk, and some of this spice. Sounds yummy to me. And muffins only take about 1/2 hour so I can think about that later.
While the soup is simmering, I must get down to some work. I'll post pictures later.
Ciao!
Mavis
Day 4 - How the Mighty Have Fallen!!
Friday night is a notoriously bad time for weakening my resolve to stick to healthy eating. I know for our family, if there's a night where it is going to be take-out, either Chinese food (around $35.00 for the family) or Pizza (around $25.00 for the family), it will be Friday, after Mom has worked a long week and lacks energy and enthusiasm.
I knew this would not sit well with my friends in the blogosphere so there was no way I was going to go the take-out route for last night, given my commitment and all! That didn't change the fact that I came home exhausted and had no creative juices flowing.
My previous nightly ride home on the bus produced a really great idea as I sat gazing out the window! Tony was different ~ my blank stare out the window produced this: "Do we have pork and beans?" was the email missive I sent from my blackberry to my husband. Sad, I know, but that's all I had energy for...beans on toast would work just fine, thank you very much!
Well, we didn't have any pork and beans but we did have some 97% fat free cans of chili in the pantry. Voila...dinner! He pulled a loaf of bread out of the freezer, I heated up the chili and no complaints from the family. And, it fit into the Weight Watchers program too...bonus!
Here's the picture, sad as it is, from last night's dinner:
Day 5 will hold a little more creativity, I'm sure. After all, it's Saturday. I love Saturday.
Until tomorrow,
Mavis
I knew this would not sit well with my friends in the blogosphere so there was no way I was going to go the take-out route for last night, given my commitment and all! That didn't change the fact that I came home exhausted and had no creative juices flowing.
My previous nightly ride home on the bus produced a really great idea as I sat gazing out the window! Tony was different ~ my blank stare out the window produced this: "Do we have pork and beans?" was the email missive I sent from my blackberry to my husband. Sad, I know, but that's all I had energy for...beans on toast would work just fine, thank you very much!
Well, we didn't have any pork and beans but we did have some 97% fat free cans of chili in the pantry. Voila...dinner! He pulled a loaf of bread out of the freezer, I heated up the chili and no complaints from the family. And, it fit into the Weight Watchers program too...bonus!
Here's the picture, sad as it is, from last night's dinner:
Day 5 will hold a little more creativity, I'm sure. After all, it's Saturday. I love Saturday.
Until tomorrow,
Mavis
Thursday, February 3, 2011
Day 3 - Very Excited!!
The bus ride home from work can be great thinking/planning time. That's just what happened tonight. I had no clue at 4:00 p.m. what dinner would look like. By the time 5:30 rolled around and I landed at my stop, I had a plan. I knew I had some fresh spinach that had to be used. I had some cheese ends that needed to be finished before they got 'furry'. (Don't laugh ~ you know what I mean and I know it's not only at my house!)
Here's a picture of the ingredients I pulled from the pantry and fridge. Any guesses yet?
I pulled out my baby Bosch machine and my Joy of Cooking cookbook (Christmas present at my request ~ thank you DH) and gathered my flour, olive oil, warm water, yeast, salt and sugar. You figure it out yet? It's Pizza Night! The dough is currently rising on the pizza pans.
My son chopped the black olives we found in the pantry (I love it when the family cooks together) and rolled out the dough for me. I grated the cheese and washed the spinach, peeled the garlic and made the garlic butter for the crust. I didn't have any tomato sauce but that works well for my plan because I happen to love the Spanakopita pizza at our neighbourhood Pizzaz Pizza and they use garlic butter with spinach and it's divine!! So my version also features melted butter with crushed garlic, brushed lightly on the crust.
In reference to my mention yesterday of Weight Watchers, the garlic butter doesn't impact the points plus value of the pizza much because I used only a teaspoon over the whole crust.
So now the crusts are sitting there, while I blog here, soaking in that wonderful garlic butter infusion, waiting to rise so I can add the remainder of the toppings ~ fresh spinach, black olives, chopped sun-dried tomatoes, onion, more sliced garlic (DH has a cold and it will be my contribution to his cure), and lastly the fine assortment of cheeses in my fridge.
It smells heavenly in here and all I've done so far is melt the butter and add the garlic. The oven is heating up with my pizza stone in place and we eagerly await the pizza masterpiece! I'm so pumped. My daughter just gave me a hi-5 and is SO very proud of me. It's nice to have the family behind you to the point of helping you chop olives and giving you a hi-5 when it's deserved...and apparently it's deserved!
So dear readers, I hope this inspires you. I'm inspired! I was exhausted on the bus and wondering how I was going to accomplish the evening's task of dinner and then some office work. I'm now totally rejuvenated ...by the idea, by my success of coming up with a dinner plan, but more by the creativity of producing a meal without a trip to the store, using what I had on hand and it NOT being Kraft dinner. Yay!
Here's some progress pictures:
Here's a picture of the ingredients I pulled from the pantry and fridge. Any guesses yet?
I pulled out my baby Bosch machine and my Joy of Cooking cookbook (Christmas present at my request ~ thank you DH) and gathered my flour, olive oil, warm water, yeast, salt and sugar. You figure it out yet? It's Pizza Night! The dough is currently rising on the pizza pans.
In reference to my mention yesterday of Weight Watchers, the garlic butter doesn't impact the points plus value of the pizza much because I used only a teaspoon over the whole crust.
So now the crusts are sitting there, while I blog here, soaking in that wonderful garlic butter infusion, waiting to rise so I can add the remainder of the toppings ~ fresh spinach, black olives, chopped sun-dried tomatoes, onion, more sliced garlic (DH has a cold and it will be my contribution to his cure), and lastly the fine assortment of cheeses in my fridge.
It smells heavenly in here and all I've done so far is melt the butter and add the garlic. The oven is heating up with my pizza stone in place and we eagerly await the pizza masterpiece! I'm so pumped. My daughter just gave me a hi-5 and is SO very proud of me. It's nice to have the family behind you to the point of helping you chop olives and giving you a hi-5 when it's deserved...and apparently it's deserved!
So dear readers, I hope this inspires you. I'm inspired! I was exhausted on the bus and wondering how I was going to accomplish the evening's task of dinner and then some office work. I'm now totally rejuvenated ...by the idea, by my success of coming up with a dinner plan, but more by the creativity of producing a meal without a trip to the store, using what I had on hand and it NOT being Kraft dinner. Yay!
Here's some progress pictures:
 |
| Waiting for the dough to rise and then we spread these yummy ingredients. |
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