I love CARROTS!

A friend had this as her facebook status today.  It reminded me that I, too, love carrots!  I love them raw.  I love them steamed with butter and maybe some tarragon.  I love them roasted, maybe with honey and almonds, or maple syrup.  I love them pureed into a curry soup or a cream soup or a ginger soup!  I love carrots tempura, carrot cake, carrot muffins (I put shredded carrots into most of my muffins)...  The list goes on.

For me, winter is an awesome time for cooked carrots.  They contain so many nutrients, including harder-to-come-by copper.  They, and other root vegetables, provide so much comfort and health benefits.

So...

I want your carrot recipes!

Foraging for Scraps

Andrea Tidrow's blog reminded me of a yummy recipe I created with stuff I found in my refrigerator.

I used leftover slow cooker chicken, but rotisserie would be very yummy, even grilled. Shred it. Combine Vegannaise or an oil-blend mayo with a garlic vinaigrette, like Annie's Naturals Roasted Garlic Vinaigrette, to create a yogurt-like texture. Quarter red grapes. Combine chicken, dressing and grapes, roll in a tortilla and enjoy!

I wish I had a picture for you, but I was so excited that I ate it without thinking.  I've made it since, and every time I'm too excited to eat it.  Maybe next time...

Now, be sure to check out Andrea Tidrow's blog for other inspired dishes of desperation.

Menu Plan Monday

Meaty Monday - Eh...dining out
Tasty Tuesday - Chicken with Apples and Onions and cheesy broccoli
Wild Card Wednesday - Slow Cooker French Dip and Crock Pot Applesauce
Spaghetti Night - Simple Slow Cooker Picante Chicken with extra veggies (yeah...I know it's not pasta)
Free-For-All Friday - Leftovers, anyone?

Operation: Freezer Cleanout (A.K.A. Lessons in Menu Planning)

We are going on a trip, and our freezer - and pantry, for that matter - is full of things that won't last until we get back.  I kinda forgot about this until this week, so now I'm desperately trying to creatively construct meals - preferably with nutritious element from our culinary collection.

The first day, I cooked a frozen cheese pizza with fresh pepperoni and a pepperoni broccoli stirfry.  I also threw a box of yellow cake and a box of raspberry Jello together to make one of my favorite desserts ever, it was incredibly tasty and just as moist and wonderful as the blue cake I made for my mother-in-law.

Last night we had frozen chicken strips, frozen chicken nuggets, the sad leftovers of a bag of frozen onion rings, frozen tater tots, a box of frozen veggies and a can of baked beans.  Ellie and I had a nutritious meal.  My husband?  Well, he did eat a single onion ring along with his strips and tots.  Onions are veggies, right?  Oh!  I rounded out my meal with Martinelli's sparkling apple-grape juice.  Yum!  I followed the meal with some of the yummy raspberry cake.

For lunch, my mom requested frozen Hebrew National pigs in a blanket, so I reheated some of the baked beans and cooked frozen peas and carrots with butter, shallot salt and garlic pepper.  It was a rather tasty meal.  Of course, I also had a piece of raspberry cake.

Dinner tonight was frozen P.F. Chang's beef with broccoli and frozen spring rolls.  The P.F. Chang's meal is not the cheapest, about the same price as getting it at the restaurant, but it sure is tasty, and we can round out the meal for much cheaper than dining out.  I also baked some frozen tropical fruit with some honey.  I produced a yummy fruit concoction resembling a crisp without the crisp topping.  I'll have to remember this.

I knew we had a lot of food in the freezer, but I really had no idea.

Blue Rose of Birthday

(Okay...I know.  Bad play on words.)

My mother-in-law has a birthday this month, and we celebrated last weekend.  We don't generally do big birthday celebrations for adults, so I wanted to do something to make it special.  My mother-in-law loves blue food, the brighter the better.  I decided I was going to make her a blue cake with blue icing.

I found a recipe for Jello cake online.  I also found a recipe for Kool-Aid glaze, but I didn't really follow it.  If you need a recipe, follow the one with the Jello cake but substitute milk for water.  My wonderful husband went to five stores to find both blue Jello and blue Kool-Aid.  I can't believe it was that hard to find.  In the end, he still had the wrong Kool-Aid, but at least it did turn the glaze blue.  The cake was blue berry flavored (note: not blueberry), and the glaze was blue raspberry lemonade.  It took a ton of powdered sugar to tone down the lemonade tang.

My husband (did I mention he's wonderful?) suggested using a Bundt pan, and I elected to use the rose-shaped pan that my mother-in-law gave me in honor of my middle name: Rose.  The cake cooked up beautifully, and hubby completely drenched it with the glaze.  When cut, it wasn't as blue as I had hoped (and the camera makes it look really yellow green), but you could tell it was supposed to be blue.  The cake was moist and subtle, and the glaze added a slightly crunchy, tangy-sweet contrast.

Review of this week's recipes

Meaty Monday:
Gluten-free pasta w/ sauce from a jar and crumbled spicy sausage - Always depends on the sauce; our new sauce didn't cut it
Did Sesame Garlic Broccoli tonight instead
Garlic Bread - sprinkled with toasted sesame seeds for added crunch and nutrition...yum!
Tasty Tuesday:
CrockPot Tuscan Chicken from Saving Dinner served over rice - served with Italian green beans (sauteed green beans tossed with Italian dressing)
Wild Card Wednesday:
Old Chicago!
Spaghetti Night (Well, since we did Spaghetti Night on Meaty Monday, we'll do Meaty Monday on Spaghetti Night):
Morton's Roast from Costco on the grill
Sesame Broccoli (like this recipe) - had to switch to sweet potato fries

Yummy Slow Cooker Lunch 12/30/09

I had no idea what to make for lunch, but I knew I did NOT want to pack both kids into the car just for some fast food. So...I pulled out some frozen hot dogs (Nathans - the good stuff) and put them in the fridge to thaw. Then I had thought: slow cooker. I proceeded to do a search for "slow cooker hot dog recipe." I found a few things, most taking hours, of course. One, however, Hawaiian Hot Dog Surprise, only took 30 minutes, and I had the ingredients (at least I thought)! Working with what I actually had, I subbed half the hot dogs with leftover ham and left out the beans (which I amazingly didn't have - I ALWAYS have baked beans!) and the white sugar just because I figured it was sugary enough. I also cooked it on high for 30 minutes because it wasn't bubbling like the recipe implied it would. The end result was SO YUMMY! The Nathans hot dogs are salty, which gives a nice contrast to the sugary sauce and pineapple. The ham was good in it, too. I highly recommend this recipe, though I would bet money that the white sugar is unnecessary. I served lightly-buttered peas with this meal, which sounds weird but complemented the dish well. Toddler approved.

Menu Plan Monday 12/28/09

(Sorry about the weird formatting; Blogger is acting up on me)

• Meaty Monday:
• Gluten-free pasta w/ sauce from a jar and crumbled spicy sausage
• Garlic Bread
• Tasty Tuesday:
• CrockPot Tuscan Chicken from Saving Dinner served over rice
• Wild Card Wednesday:
• Not sure yet - probably takeout
• Spaghetti Night (Well, since we did Spaghetti Night on Meaty Monday, we'll do Meaty Monday on Spaghetti Night):
• Morton's Roast from Costco on the grill
• Sesame Broccoli (like this recipe)
• Free-for-All Friday:
• Not a clue; no idea what we'll be doing

Menu Plan Monday 12/21/09

Menu Plan Monday

This week is all messed up, and not entirely because of Christmas!

Monday: Leftovers

Tuesday: Some slow cooker chicken dish I have yet to select (depends on my ability to get to the store today)

Wednesday: Freezer cleanout (I see chicken dino nuggets in our future...)

Thursday: Tenderloin roast (hubby's choice), cheesy potatoes, cheese dip, Spicy Sesame Green Beans (only half spicy, though, for the wee ones)

Friday: Ham, Jello salad (yes, I said Jello salad), corn, peas, scalloped potatoes, whatever else we add to the list...

Review of this week's recipes

Meaty Monday:
Morton's Pot Roast from Costco – Good but not as sweet as I’d hoped, since it contained sugar, and very fatty
Stir-fried corn – Turned out better than I’d hoped!

Tasty Tuesday:
Last-minute change of plans led to dinner out

Wild Card Wednesday:
Last-minute doctor appointment led to takeout

Spaghetti Night:
Spontaneous dinner out with friends, conveniently also Italian

Free-for-all Friday:
Erickson Family Christmas!!!

Menu Plan Monday 12/14/09

This week is an easy week for me. I deserve it!

Meaty Monday:

Morton's Pot Roast from Costco

Stir-fried corn

Tasty Tuesday:

Tuscan Chicken from SavingDinner.com (received in an email from Flylady...I don't feel right posting it, so if you want it, message me or comment with your email address) over rice instead of pasta (I love it when the veggies are part of the main dish!)

Wild Card Wednesday:

Cranberry Stuffing Turkey Breasts from Costco

Roasted green beans

Spaghetti Night:

Fancy pasta with sausage (haven't decided which fancy pasta or sausage yet)

Free-for-all Friday:

Whatever's left!

Review of this week's recipes

Review of this week's recipes:

Meaty Monday:
Easy Slow Cooker Meatballs – They were good, but the meatballs themselves could have used more seasoning (the only seasoning was in the breadcrumbs) and they didn’t hold together well. They have hope, though!
Roasted Parsnips – I also made some with cinnamon and sugar. They were ALL good!!!
Garlic Bread – Well, our bread molded spontaneously, so no garlic bread for us… :o(

Tasty Tuesday:
CrockPot Brown Sugar Chicken over rice – It was very good but tasted just like Picante Chicken. Since the Picante Chicken has fewer calories and more veggies and is less work, we’ll dump this recipe and keep that one.
Garlic Sesame Green Beans – Good as always, though I forgot the almonds and made the beans without red pepper flakes so that Ellie could eat them (I like them better that way, anyway). I also added chopped garlic to the oil (because I accidentally started to make my garlic green beans instead of Mike's). I give a huge thumbs up to veggie recipe that makes my toddler ask for more until there is no more.

Wild Card Wednesday: Changed to a meal out, since Mikey’s chiropractic appointment got in the way.

Spaghetti Night:
Spaghetti and Meat Sauce – Since I doubled the meatball recipe on Monday, I decided to just break up the meatballs into sauce. I’ll have to try this recipe another time.
Honey Mustard Broccoli - MUCH better with Ken's Steak House Honey Mustard dressing than with Safeway Honey Mustard
Garlic Bread

Free-For-All Friday: Whatever is left!

Family Dinner (Saturday or Sunday): Ditched the food plans when the family plans changed...had yummy brinner

Menu Plan Monday 12/7/09

Here I go with my first week of complete menu planning! I'm very excited!

(Oh, and be sure to check back at the end of the week for a review of this week's menu!)

Meaty Monday:
Easy Slow Cooker Meatballs
Roasted Parsnips
Garlic Bread

Tasty Tuesday:
CrockPot Brown Sugar Chicken over rice
Garlic Sesame Green Beans

Wild Card Wednesday:
Ham Sandwiches
Fruit Salad

Spaghetti Night:
Spaghetti and Meat Sauce
Honey Mustard Broccoli
Garlic Bread

Free-For-All Friday:
Whatever is left!

Family Dinner (Saturday or Sunday):
Slow Cooker French Dip
Sweet Potato Fries