Saturday, May 25, 2013

The Kalua Pig and a proud mama...a food story.

I've made this recipe three times so far. Kalua pig is so delicious, but it's hard to just up and roast a whole pig. This crock pot version is absolute perfection on a plate. It seems a little crazy to have it cook for 16 hours, but seriously it's worth the wait!!

Our roast ended up being about 6.5lbs, but still 16 hours was plenty of time. Here's a picture of a third of the roast and the bone, so tender that it fell out of the roast without any effort! In fact, I had to take the roast out in sections because it fell apart so easily.


 It didn't take anything to shred the meat. In fact, I had to be careful not to over shred the meat. Here is the whole roast, it all it's delicious glory!


I had all intentions of going to the store to buy some Kings Hawaiian rolls to serve as buns for our sliders. I even went into the store, and walked out remembering I had forgotten to get them. I was talking to my son about forgetting them, and we'll have to get them later. My four year old responds, "We could just make the rolls. That would be better than buying them." 

Super proud of my kids all the time, but for that moment I was proud of myself for teaching my kids that making things yourself is something to be proud of. I make a lot from scratch because I find the challenge fun, and it's a great way for me to make healthier food for my family. To have my four year old proclaim with pride that we can make it ourselves, and offer help with excitement, is truly a proud mommy moment. 

So off to Pinterest I went to find a sweet roll recipe. I wanted to work within my pantry, so a hawaiian roll copycat recipe was out, since most require pineapple juice and coconut milk. I stumbled across this recipe for Soft and Sweet Yeast Dinner Rolls. I had all the ingredients, but I wanted to make a little change. The oil that it calls for in the recipe I used coconut oil. 


Having a KitchenAid is such a lifesaver, and was always a dream of mine growing up. We got lucky last year, and bought the floor model at Lowe's and saved quite a bit of money. But anyway, yeast doughs are super easy with a dough hook! Check out the swirling bowl of doughy deliciousness!!


The recipe called for oil in the dough, and to oil the pan. I used coconut oil for both and it smelled amazing!!


The recipe was a little time consuming, but worth...every...step.


I also tried a new recipe for Apple Cole Slaw. I really only used the dressing part of this recipe, because  it was simple and I had the ingredients on hand. 

Looking purdy!


I added some celery seeds and cracked pepper, but it was still too much mayo flavor for my taste. 

Dinner done! I was so excited to try my pulled pork that I forgot to take a picture before I started eating, so excuse the bite. 


This meal I was excited to share with our friends the Rimke's and Joe(Thanks for letting us borrow him Amie!!). We fed a group of 9 easily, but I must say I could have eaten my weight in the rolls. Next time I'll be making a double batch! The coconut oil was just the Hawaiian touch we needed for our Kalua pig. 

Thursday, May 23, 2013

This week's shenanigans...

This week my awesome sister in law showed me this amazing blog tutorial. A-Frame Pup Tents!!! I had to make this one!! I love power tools:) Tuesday we went out after dinner and looked around Home Depot to get an idea on price.



We had a few changes we wanted to make. In her preschool room these would get a lot of use, so being able to remove the sheet was a must! We decided to replace the bottom wood supports with PCV piping and plastic caps, so the sheet could be unthreaded and thrown in the washer. In a room full of 4 year olds, it's going to be a welcome change!

With every project there were some hiccups. I can't listen, the blog says a 3/4" drill bit would be ok for the project. You would just have to wiggle the bit to widen the whole since 3/4" PCV refers to the inside diameter. Well my sister in law suggested we get a bit that would be the diameter of the outside hole. Which ended up being 1 1/8" however I figured I should just follow the directions and try the 3/4" bit......WRONG!! After going back to Home Depot to get the right bit, I did it again thinking I should get a 1" since I don't want the whole too loose otherwise the frame might not be as sturdy.

Hind sight is always 20/20. Learn from my mistake, and get the 1 1/8" drill bit!! I broke out the power sander to get rid of the splinter hazard. Yay another power tool!! The sheet was just a twin size flat from Walmart. I hemmed it to fit, but neglected to take photos. You'll live ;-)

Check out our finished product!! Claire calls it her "princess castle" so with the little I trimmed off of the flat sheet I tied a bow on it. It's big enough for me to sit inside and have a picnic with the kids. AND it folds flat for storage.

Corbin checking out the finished product!

Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Power tools!!

Sneak preview of what I'm working on this week.....Any guesses???


It's not delivery...

Oh pizza, where do I even begin?!? We love pizza in this house! It's a rare treat because it's so expensive at a restaurant or to get it delivered. Until I discovered this amazing recipe, Fail-Proof Pizza Dough.

I made three batches of this dough for a pizza party we had for my son's 4th birthday. All three batches came out beautifully! In fact, I put half a batch in the fridge over night and used it the next day and it was still perfect. The recipe is super easy, and just like the title, fail-proof. 

Yesterday's creation was a chicken and spinach Alfredo pizza. Make the dough according to directions and let it rise.

While the dough is rising, I prepped the toppings. I just grilled up two chicken breast, no seasoning, and chopped them into small cubes. I also took my fresh spinach and chopped about a 1.5 cups worth. I also made my own Alfredo sauce (recipe here). I used a store bought shredded italian style cheese on the bottom layer and on top of the toppings.



The trick about upside-down cookie sheets instead of a pizza stone really does great!

In a preheated 500 degree oven, our pizza took about 10 minutes. I made two pizzas out of one batch of dough, because our oven isn't big enough for a full batch of dough in pizza form.

Fresh out of the oven here's grub!!


I had just pulled out some carrots from the garden the day before and wanted to do something with them. I ended up just roasting them with some olive oil, and salt and pepper. 


Fresh from the dirt in the garden. Don't worry, they were washed and peeled before we ate :)

Prepped and ready for the oven! No picture of the final product, sorry!

I ended up only using one chicken breast for the two pizzas. The two pizzas (I'd call them medium sized) fed 6 people comfortably. Really easy, really cheap, and it's something I'm proud to make for the family knowing exactly what ingredients went into making it. 

Monday, May 20, 2013

One-dish wonder s'ghetti!

Lazy dinners before kids were anything that delivered, most likely pizza. We ate out a ridiculous number of times each week. It really wasn't until our first born was at the eating solids stage that I really started watching what I was cooking.

It's take a while to get a groove into making dinners, and not falling into the "don't wanna cook" mode. There's a list of things I grab at the grocery store that make up quick recipes to avoid me being lazy and grabbing the Del. Even better when it doesn't make a mess!!

This is my one pot wonder s'ghetti! I grab my dutch oven (get your minds out of the gutter!) but I'm sure this will work with any large sauce pan.

1lb ground beef or sausage
1/4 cup water
1 25oz can of spaghetti sauce (I love Fresh and Easy's sauce, no artificial junk)
Spaghetti noodles (I've used angel hair, and regular with great success)
Fresh spinach leaves

Preheat the pan a bit and start browning the ground meat with 1/4 water. This trick helps crumble the beef and distributes better in the sauce. If you prefer chunkier meat sauce, omit the water. When all the meat has browned dump in the whole jar of spaghetti sauce. Fill the empty jar half way with water (I close the lid and give it a good shake to clean all the sauce off the sides of the jar) dump in the water and stir. It's going to seem really watery, but this is perfect.

Take your noodles, however many you need to feed the family, and break them in half (so they fit in the pot). Make sure they are completely covered by the sauce. Cover the pot and simmer about 15 minutes. Check to make sure the noodles are done and give it all a good stir.

We used spinach spaghetti noodles, so excuse the green mess in there :)

To make the dish even easier, the spinach just gets thrown in the bottom of the bowl, topped with the hot spaghetti, it wilts to perfection! Add a slice of bread fresh from the oven and it's a done meal ;)



Gimme Bread!!

Growing up we had a bread machine, we made a few loafs, but no one seemed to enjoy eating it. I remember starting a few loafs and being impressed that you could just dump everything in a push a button. We never made bread the "old fashioned" way though. It has always been a daunting task for me, that I've just gone to the store and bought bread.

One of my new years resolutions was to cut out the ugly "high fructose corn syrup" in our diet. Easier said than done obviously! We are not sugar free, or refined sugar free, but the simpler the ingredients the better. It's getting easier to find bread made without HFCS, but it's also getting expensive!

In Orange County, the loaf of bread that we buy is $1.99, on sale! And that's not even all natural, it's just HFCS free. It was getting ridiculous that I hadn't attempted to make bread. I really do have the time, I just needed to find a recipe I could live with. No powdered milk, just one more processed ingredient I don't want in out diet. No bread machine, can't get the texture right and always has a "machined" taste.

Pinterest to the rescue!! I came across this blog (awesome link here), and it's a winner!! I've made 5 loaves so far, and short of user error (busy mom tip: set a timer for the rising...super easy to forget!), it's been perfect!

Here's my recent loaf:

Hey look a bandwagon!!

I have had lots of people suggest I start a blog. My response has always been "I'll never have the time for that." At the time I really couldn't see that I would have anything meaningful to share. But after all the blogs that I've seen....maybe I could have something worthwhile to post after all! So look at me jumping on the blogging bandwagon!!

So into time! My name is Jessica, I have a husband and two children. I married Hubs when I was 18, we got lots of criticism but almost a decade later we're going strong. We've been through some really interesting adventures. He's the one that coined our moto "Life-Bentures" and truly they have been amazing!

I love cooking and sewing! Pinterest really did change my life! I cook healthier now, we don't use that many processed items and I'm an avid label reader. Though I won't turn down an Oreo!

I'm in such a happy place right now. I'm a Mom. My whole life I have wanted to be the stay at home Mom. I'm beyond lucky my husband supports me in my decision to stay home and just be a mom. It's been interesting, but the rewards are more than I could ever make outside of the home.

I'm not sure where this blog will lead, but it should be an interesting 'benture for sure!!