Food?

I always tell myself that stressing about food too much is even worse for me than consuming some not so good foods, but I don't always listen. In fact I have a tendency to go overboard...

The other night as I was helping my husband unload the groceries and I pulled two cans of tuna out of the bag and gave him a lecture about how he must be trying to kill all of us with his radioactive tuna, rolled my eyes, and slammed the cans into the cabinet. I admit, I was being a bit of a drama queen.  Well, he snapped and went off on me for giving him a lecture over everything that came out of the paper bags (which I didn't even make any comments on him not using the stash of cloth bags in the back of the car).

Today the kids and I were reading from a book we found at the library, "Everything On It" by Shel Silverstein. One of the poems stuck out and had us all laughing so hard that I had to share. I think anyone that tends to get a little over paranoid about their food as I do will see the humor in it.

FOOD? by Shel Silverstein

I was settin' at this restaurant
When the waiter came up and said, "What do you want?"
I looked at the menu-it looked so nice
Til he said, "Let me give you some advice."
He said, "Spaghetti and potatoes got too much starch,
Pork chops and sausage are bad for your heart.
There's hormones in chicken and beef and veal,
Bowl of ravioli is a dead man's meal.
Bread's got preservatives, there's nitrites in ham,
Artificial coloring in jellies and jam.
Stay away from doughnuts, run away from pie,
Pepperoni pizza is a sure way to die.
Sugar's gonna rot your teeth and make you put on weight,
Artificial sweetener's got cyclamates.
Eggs are high in cholesterol, too much fat in cheese,
Coffee ruins your kidneys and so do teas.
Fish got too much mercury, red meat is poison,
Salt's gonna send your blood pressure risin'.
Hot dogs and bologna got deadly red dyes,
Vegetables and fruits are sprayed with pesticides."
So I said, "What can I eat that's gonna make me last?"
He said, "A small drink of water in a sterilized glass."
And then he stopped and he thought for a minute,
And said, "Never mind the water-there's carcinogens in it."
So I got up from the table and walked out in the street,
Realizin' there was absolutely NOTHING I could eat.
So I haven't eaten for a month and I don't feel too fine,
But I know that I'll be healthy for a long, long time.

I was debating about putting a disclaimer about how I do think some of the foods listed are actually amazing for our health when raised or prepared in the traditional way...but seriously, let's not be so serious and just have a good laugh over this.

My Nesco/Yogurt Maker!

     I have made some really yummy yogurt over the past couple years with my crock-pot and also experimenting with other methods but I have always longed to own a yogurt maker. The main reason is so that I could keep a consistent temperature and allow for a longer culturing and more probiotics in my yogurt, especially as we are preparing to go on the GAPS diet. Right now there are other expenses and honestly if I bring one more kitchen gadget into this house my husband might have a slight fit.

     I know that many people use their Excalibur dehydrator to make yogurt but when I was dehydrator shopping the Nesco was the one in our price range. Don't get me wrong, I love my Nesco and I think it is a great dehydrator. I have only wanted an Excalibur for its space but now I am even more in love with my Nesco. Two days ago I had an "Ah Ha!" moment and I can't believe that it took me so long to see the possibilities.

  I found a way to turn my Nesco into a yogurt maker!!!

     I would like to call this a stroke of genius but if I was a genius I would have figured this out last year. It was last summer that I was trying to dehydrate some peppers from the garden but they were too big. I took two trays that had a few broken spots and completely removed the inner portions with wire cutters to create spacers between the trays. As I was cleaning my dehydrator the other day, it just hit me..."will any of my jars fit in with spacers?" Well, no I had to go out and buy some but I am always up for buying more jars! I loaded up the kids and we went into town and I drove them crazy over my indecisiveness over which jars to purchase. I finally decided on the wide mouth half pints and they turned out to be perfect. While I was at the store I looked at prices and if I had not had the broken trays a pack of 2 trays for my model cost about $10 and the jars were $9, so to make a yogurt maker out of your Nesco would only cost about $20.

Delicious and thick yogurt that has cultured for 24 hours at 110 degrees.

Ever Changing Amish Friendship Bread

I have a love/hate relationship with Amish Friendship Bread, it is fermented and kind of fun but have you seen the recipe that comes along with directions????  Not so great.  It includes a lot of sugar and instant pudding.

Each time I make a new batch I try something different in order to create a yummy treat that the family enjoys and something that doesn't make me want to scream as we consume it.  They have not all been winners...I tried one that I was treating as an actual sourdough and even though I did not add any additional sugar it was still too sweet to actually use as bread except with peanut butter or coconut oil spread on it, that was pretty good.

The last batch that I made was pretty awesome and I was even smart enough to write it down so that I could remember for the future!  I made a cinnamon and raisin version of this recipe and I cut out the added sugar, though it is still a nice sweet treat.

These were actually baked in 4 mini loaf pans to give as gifts.

These directions are for after you have fed your starter on Day 10 and split it to share with friends.  To the remaining batter you will add:

3 eggs
1/2 C melted butter
1/2 C milk
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 C flour (I use whole wheat)
1 C raisins

Mix all ingredients together. Pour the batter into 2 pans bake approximately 1 hour. Cool until bread loosens from the pan, about 10 min. Turn out onto serving dish. Serve warm or cool.

I would love to know what you think of this or even better share your versions of Amish Friendship Bread.

Spicy Carrots

     Wow, I have been wanting to post this recipe for quite some time but blogger has not been cooperating every since I moved out to the country and now have a less than awesome internet connection.  Oh well, better late than never.

SPICY CARROTS

5 C shredded carrots

3 large cloves of garlic, finely chopped

1 tsp of oregano

1-2 chopped jalapenos with the seeds 

(depends on how hot you like your food)

1 Tbsp of sea salt

1 C of water, divided

Mix all ingredients together except 1/2 cup of the water and place in a quart jar.  Pack tightly, bringing juice to the top.  Cover with the other 1/2 cup of remaining water.  Cover with lid and allow to sit for a week or more.  I tasted often and moved to cold storage after it stopped bubbling and was not so salty. 

One little side note...be careful about how much heat you add with the jalapeno as it seems to get hotter the longer that it sits.  My kids all ate this the first 2 weeks, then it sat for a little over a week in the fridge and they all spit it out because it was too much for them.  It is certainly will warm you up!

Uno!!!!

     Do you remember this game?  Perhaps it is something that you still play.  I can't even begin to get over my excitement for this game!  My oldest daughter received it as a stocking stuffer and we have all fallen in love with it.  It is always cool to remember playing something as a child and then to revisit it as a parent and Uno has just blown my mind.

     The first time we pulled it out I tried to occupy the two younger ones but they insisted on being at the table.  So I gave them a couple of cards so that they could have their own little side games while the big kids and I played.  Of course this did not appease them for very long and the next time we played they demanded that they be able to join in.  So, Zola sat next to Peylyn and I sat next to Taj so that we could help them.  I was blown away by how quickly my 3 and 4 year old got the concept of matching colors and numbers!  We have them lay all of their cards out in front of them and when their turn comes they quickly know if they have a match or not.  Of course we help them with the wild cards and other cards that wind up in there hand but beyond that they are taking care of their own cards.

     We love to play card and board games here but it is not easy to find something where the little kids can join in and the older ones aren't bored or the older kids are having fun but the younger ones just don't get the concept.  When dealing with kids aged 3-10 that is a pretty big challenge.  The best part might have been seeing the look on my 8 and 10 year old when my youngest, Peylyn, won!  She even did a little victory dance in her high chair.

    

Water...what to do???

     Water has been on my mind a lot lately...and I owe it all to my little bacterial buddies.  See, I recently received more water kefir grains after my recent many failed attempts to not only get mine to multiply but just keep the little suckers alive.  Now that we have moved and we are back on well water I thought I would give it a go on this water and guess what, they are doing better than I have ever experienced and this is what got me thinking. When I first started making water kefir we were on well water in the old house and then about a year later our landlords were forced to connect to city water.  Knowing that chlorinated water can kill the grains I started using the water in our water cooler that we drink, reverse osmosis filtered water.

     As soon as I made the switch I was having issues, I wasn't getting fizz and they stopped multiplying.  I would get more grains from friends and add all sorts of things to try and put the minerals back into the water that had been stripped away by the filtering.  I have always known that this system completely takes everything out of the water but I always thought that I was fine by adding stuff back in.  I began adding clay to my grains and to our drinking water also, and still my grains were not doing so well.  Honestly, I wasn't even thinking about how the water was affecting us.

     Today when I strained out my grains and I saw that they had more than doubled, it really got me thinking about the water.  If these simple little crystals of bacteria can't thrive on water that is completely devoid of minerals and show little improvement even if a mineral substitute is added, what is this doing to my children?  Of course being like any modern mom I went straight for Google and did some reading.  First of all, I had no idea that this filter system actually wastes water!  Wow, here I thought we were being so earth friendly by not buying any bottles of water we just keep refilling the same jugs.  So, finding out that I am causing water to be wasted kind of sucks.  Also, I thought I was doing the safe thing by giving the kids water that had EVERYTHING removed.  Well, I learned something else...RO filters only removed things that are larger than the water molecules, like the minerals essential to our health.  They do not remove the stuff that is smaller, like fertilizers and pesticides.  So why am I making these extra trips to fill my jugs with this water?

     I know, there are things I could add and that I have added but if my grains did not do well even when I added minerals back into the water then how is this making any difference for us.  I wouldn't hand my kids a piece of fruit that had all of the vitamins and mineral removed and sprinkle some clay on it and say "Here, it's all the same."  I am not even quite sure what I am going to do with this information as I have 3 jugs of RO water sitting out in the mud room.  I did tell Perry that I thought we would be better off just getting one of those Pur filters.  If the grains are growing so well on this water it clearly is a superior water.  I only even really feel a need for filtering because of the age of the pipes.

     I would love to hear other people's thoughts on water and filtering.

Our Advent Calendar

  Each year around the Holidays I start to think about an advent calendar.  When the kids were younger I just went to Trader Joe's and picked up cheap ones, then a few years ago I started making my own.  One thing always remained the same, they all involved candy and they all involve the kids "getting" something.  Every year I try to keep my kids from the idea that Christmas is all about gifts but man it is seriously hard to compete with the marketing ploys going on right now.

  This year things are going to be different!  It all started with a cool idea that popped up on my Facebook news feed the other day.  I loved this idea of the advent calendar being about actions instead of treats from The Artful Parent, I thought this was so different but I wanted to take it a step further for my older children.  What we decided to come up with was a community service type of advent.  We have some pretty tall orders on ours, plus along with the fact that we are moving over Christmas and I have a new job we had to end our list at 15 but we plan on adding family events in to fill  the 25 day calendar.  Some of these family "events' might include driving boxes to our new place but that is ok.

  There isn't much point in decorating or getting a tree when you are moving so our advent will pretty much be our only decoration.  I thought what we came up with was pretty cool and we are excited to put our list into actions.

  Our list of Christmas doing includes:
          Pick up trash outside
          Make a meal for a family
          Donate coats
          Donate hats to a school
          Hand out homemade Holiday cards to strangers to help spread some cheer
          Visit with someone in a senior center
          Volunteer at a shelter
          Shovel snow for an elderly neighbor (if it snows)
          Make a care package for a soldier over seas
          Leave a small gift at a strangers house
          Raise money for a local charity
          Help a family in need
          Spread love through out the season and everyday (sounds simple, but this might be the most challenging
          Go caroling
          Call as many family members as we can (even the ones we haven't spoken to in years) and wish them a Merry Christmas.


  The list feels a little overwhelming but I know that if our family works together we can pull it off and really grow together in the process.  Happy Holidays!!!!