cooking

The Girl is Crafty Like Ice is Cold!

by theresa on December 19, 2011

So I gave myself some time to cool off from my last post and I’m feeling much better. Now I’ve got my mind on Christmas, which I’m looking forward to cause we’re keeping it stress-free.

I’ve loosely planned out the menu for Christmas. It won’t be as big as Thanksgiving — I’m 32 weeks pregnant and starting to have a really tough time just walking around the house — but again, it’s just us and we’re just looking for the day to be mellow. We’re doing ham, just to have something to do. We’re (really, Huz is) also trying out scalloped potatoes and maybe some other mixed veggies.

I’m on a particular mission with the baking. Cookies seem to be everyone’s tradition, and I found a shitload of recipes in the last issue of Real Simple that I’d like to try, including one citrus sugar cookie and one white chocolate peppermint brownie. Also, I have another score to settle — this time with a Filipino sweet rice dish called Bibingkang Kanin. I used a different recipe last year, and while the cake turned out okay, the topping did not — it wasn’t as pretty and not having it right definitely made it taste a little bit off. We ate about half of it before I couldn’t even look at it anymore. I posted about this on Facebook a couple of weeks ago, and my friend Christine reminded me that we also tried to make this dish when I visited her up in Oakland years ago, which means I actually failed at making this dish twice.

This is the year I will finally get it right.

In other news, I got a couple of Christmas gifts early from my mama. She actually took me craft shopping so I could pick out exactly what I wanted, and I ended up with the two SMASH journals and a Project Life kit in Amber! I’m so excited!

The big crafting intiative is to basically get in the habit of taking pictures off of my camera and computer before Baby #2 is even born. I am so behind on Hugga’s photo books that I’m not entirely sure I have hope recovering the mess that’s on both mine and Huz’s hard drives.

I already took a stab at SMASHing and, let me tell you, scrapping is way easier and more fun to do when you have a functional printer (especially one that works with wireless iPhone printing). I’m saving the Project Life kit for the start of the New Year, but I already put the photo pages in the binder and took a look at the cards that came in the kit, and I can tell I’m going to have a lot of fun.

All of this being said, I’ve decided that my one little word for 2012 would be Create. From scrapping to cooking to the regular old writing I do, I’m certainly in the crafting spirit. And what’s awesome is that Hugga’s in the spirit too. Over the weekend, I helped her write her first book:

It’s an awesome story about a princess who shares birthday ice cream and cake with a monster. Compelling stuff.

Anyway, if you celebrate Christmas, hope you all have a nice holiday and if not, then hope you will enjoy the time off. =)

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The Morning After.

by theresa on November 25, 2011

Well, Thanksgiving at home was a raging success, if I do say so myself. I can finally say I cooked an almost entire Thanksgiving meal, didn’t give anyone food poisoning (it was actually really tasty!), and I was SEVEN MONTHS PREGNANT, no less. Like. A. BAWSE.

First of all, our 10 lb. turkey was fully defrosted by go-time, so for future reference: BUY IT ON SUNDAY AND LEAVE IT IN THE FRIDGE. The turkey recipe I mentioned in my last post was dead simple and the meat came out super tender and juicy. It was a huge hit with the family. I definitely plan to use the recipe again next year, as it basically required no overnight prep. I just might try to season it more next time.

Paula Deen’s Crockpot Mac & Cheese recipe was also a winner, though I’m still torn between that and my normal go-to recipe from an old Betty Crocker cookbook. It was definitely much easier to make, and I’ll keep it in my arsenal for regular meals. Sometimes it’s just nice to switch it up with some bleu cheese and asiago.

I’ll likely skip the broccoli casserole next year. Like I said, it’s a tried-and-true recipe at home but because I make it so often already, we ended up with a comical amount of leftovers. We’ve got food to last us until Christmas and we can’t fit one more thing in our fridge. I’ve also neglected to mention the shitload of bibingka we bought at the Filipino store the day before and the fruit salad my mom made, which I am hoarding and refuse to give away to anybody (sorry, friends).

ANYWAY, food aside, we had a great Thanksgiving. Had one of Huz’s BFFs, whom I consider my “other child,” over and we basically just ate, watched football, and played Monopoly Junior all day. That night we visited another of Huz’s friends, without the kiddo for a change, and I actually got to have a really good conversation with a bunch of like-minded ladies. It’s taken me a long time to feel embedded in his group of friends (he wants me to think of them as “our friends” but I’ve always considered them “Huz’s friends”), but I think I’m moving towards that place and it’s kinda nice.

Hope you guys had a great Thanksgiving, and that you stay warm and un-trampled if you’re going out for Black Friday! I, myself, will be staying at home with the kiddo, pigging out with leftovers.

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Gobble Gobble.

by theresa on November 21, 2011

Well, the epic party has passed so things are pretty much back to “normal” around here. We’ve still got a lot of craziness coming up — Thanksgiving, Hugga’s real birthday, Christmas, and of course the arrival of the new baby — but now I feel like I can relax and nest and be excited about it all.

As you know, I insisted on doing a real Thanksgiving spread this year, and while this is the kind of thing that would normally stress people out, it’s really only the four of us (me, Huz, Hugga, and my mom) so the pressure’s off. I never thought I’d say this, but spending a day in the kitchen with Huz actually sounds like it’s going to be a lot of fun — even moreso knowing that we’re going to do it right this time. It was fun even when we failed last year.

The only thing that wasn’t fun was the shopping. I wanted to get a head start on defrosting that turkey, so my mom, Hugga, and I went out in the rain yesterday (a hugely stressful thing in Southern California) to get everything we needed. I’m officially 28 weeks and in my third trimester now, so I’m at that point where I can’t be out in public for more than a few minutes without wanting to commit a homicide (and I’m cranky about a whole host of other things, but I’ll save that for another post). We got through most of the shopping trip okay and Vons was left relatively unscathed, but by the time we loaded up the car, my blood pressure was probably through the roof. Needless to say, I’m having everything delivered to my house between now and this baby’s birth.

One thing I am proud of though? I wrote my shopping list down on a piece of paper knowing I’d forget it at home, and sure enough, when we got to the store I realized the list wasn’t in my bag. Rather than drive all the way back, I decided to try to shop from memory (still had the rest of the week to buy whatever I forgot), and I actually remembered every last thing on the list. Mom-brain be damned!

ANYWAY, our fridge is stocked and I’ve got my recipes planned. Again, I took the corner cutting approach and accepted that a few of the sides would have to come out of the box (in particular, Stove Top Stuffing and the mashed potatoes), but I think the rest of my menu will make up for it:

  • Homestyle Turkey, the Michigander Way: This was one of the highest rated turkeys on AllRecipes, and it looks dead simple.
  • Broccoli Casserole: This is a tried-and-true recipe at home, and it’s the only way any of us are going to get any greens on Thanksgiving because I’d like to make our holiday as fatty as possible — the baby in my belly demands it.
  • Paula Deen Crock Pot Macaroni and Cheese: Because, like I said, FATTY, and I wanted to use my crock pot for something, and I needed the recipe to be relatively easy. I almost went for mashed potatoes or stuffing, but both recipes I found looked like they’d take too much effort. The last crockpot mac and cheese I made didn’t turn out as tasty as the baked one I usually make, but this one is pretty high-rated, and Paula Deen never let me down.

I was going to leave out the pie since half of our fridge is still full of cake, but Huz thinks it’s blasphemy to have a Thanksgiving without pie and he’s taken it upon himself to make one. My mom is tasked with making Filipino fruit salad (what American folks call “ambrosia” with lots of sweet island gummies I guess), but that’s mostly to keep me sustained until she returns in mid-December.

Who have I turned into? Not long ago, I swear I prided myself on being the kind of mom above all this crap, who got everything store-bought. Not that one is better than the other — I truly have fun doing this stuff, but I think back then I was caught up in the idea that I had to fit some “perfect wife” ideal. I’ve gotten to really enjoy this stuff, not because it makes me feel like I’m filling the Super Mom mold, but because it’s become another way for the fam and I to spend quality time together and share some responsibility, I guess. And I’ve been pretty good at calling my limit before I start going insane on my family.

What do you guys have planned for Thanksgiving? Recipes to share? Awesome store-bought or out-of-the-box foods you can recommend?

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