primary easter activity

Still the P. Prez, shocking I know. We had a great activity this weekend for Easter. It was a Easter egg hunt and service project. We collected little toys and treats from the ward to make grab bags for the food bank. So when families go to the food bank to get food, they can take home a little surprise for their children. So we had the children decorate some white gift bags with stickers and markers, then we filled them with the treats and toys. Before we did the Easter egg hunt, I talked to them about Jesus and His sacrifice. I asked them after the Easter egg hunt if they would be willing to sacrifice some of their eggs to children who would otherwise not have anything fun for Easter.  So after they ran all over my Mom's backyard most of the children gave up some eggs, and some children gave up all their eggs. With 40 kids at the activity, we had over 200 eggs sacrificed. 

So the next morning realized the food bank doesn't operate on Saturday. The eggs would be pretty pointless after Easter, so I called the food and care coalition where they serve hot meals, and they said they could use them as tray favors for the meal on Easter. So I ran them down to them. When I walked in, they were very excited for the eggs, because they didn't have anything like that for Easter. Just as I was about to go, the woman who was taking the donations got a phone call. It was a very sad mother who was calling to ask if they had anything she could give her children on Easter morning. She had been waiting for money to come in and it didn't, so she had no money to do something special for her kids on Easter morning.  So she told the mom they just had some eggs donated and she could come down and get some. So if it wouldn't of been for my primary kids, she would have been turned away with nothing. So I thought that was pretty great! We should give our kids opportunities to sacrifice!

Deviled eggs

Turning these into . . . .

These!

Ah the dying of eggs, so fun yet so painful. Boiling the eggs (Martha Stewart says cover the eggs with cold water by one inch. Bring to a boil and cover, remove from heat and let sit for 13 minutes.) My kids were so excited for the whole process, I just hate it. The mess, the prep, the pointlessness of it all. I however was excited the next day to make deviled eggs.

My children love deviled eggs, almost all children love deviled eggs. It is one of the few healthy things children like, so we should all make them more because they are so inexpensive and good for you! Now I hate mayonnaise, a lot.  So I make my deviled eggs with sour cream, and it is oh so good. I know there are lots of recipes where you put all kinds of crazy stuff in a deviled egg, and those actually sound really good, however I have never tried it. My kids would probably cry their eyes to see their blessed deviled eggs and bite into them only to find a jalapeno! So these are basic, but delicious.

Boiled eggs (how ever many you have)

spoonful of sour cream

season salt

fresh pepper

couple pinches of dry mustard

milk

Now you will have to season according to how many yolks you have. Same with with the sour cream and milk. I use a hand mixture to make the yolks smooth, and add milk a tablespoon at a time till the yolks are smooth, but still stiff. Just to be fancy pants, I like to pipe the yolks back into the whites with a pastry bag.

Grecian Chicken

I don't know what exactly makes this dish "Grecian" isn't not like there is any feta cheese or kalamata olives in it. It may not be Grecian at all, but that is what my mom called it, so that is what I will call it. This is a recipe that was taught to my mother, by her mother-in-law, aka my grandma.  It is in the top twenty greatest family recipes, for sure.

Grecian Chicken

1 chicken cut up (I always just buy one cut up, who knows how to cut up a chicken the right way anyway? Not me!)

2 big cans diced tomatoes

1 big onion diced

2 green peppers diced

3 cloves garlic minced

5-6 bay leaves

1-2 T curry (if you recall, I told you the best and cheapest place to buy good flavored curry is the Mexican spice section of wall-mart)

salt and pepper 

1 T chicken base

olive oil

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Place your cut up chicken in your roasting pan drizzle it with olive oil (I then brush it with a pastry brush, just to make it even) Then liberally season it with salt and pepper (I go with fresh ground, just get the big grinders from Costco).  Brown the chicken in the oven for about 45 minutes until the skin is browned. Meanwhile, dice up your onion and pepper and saute it in some olive oil, season with salt and pepper. You don't have to cook them throughout, just enough to let them release their fragrance. 

Add the tomatoes, curry (add 1 T if you aren't big with curry flavor, add 2 T if you are, if you hate curry, add turmeric, but then of course the recipe is dead to me) garlic, bay leaves, chicken base and season with a little more salt and pepper.  Just mix it together, no need to heat it. 

When the chicken is browned, pour the tomato mixture on top, cover it and return to the oven. Bake at 300 degrees for at least 2 hours until the chicken falls off the bone and the vegetables are cooked down. Serve over rice, this will feed a lot of people, like 10 people. So if you are not 10 people, it freezes really well.

note: yes I served it with white rice. . . . I am so ashamed . . . .

KITCHEN TOOL OF THE WEEK: this awesome brownie pan

You have admit, you love the sky mall magazine. You look at it on the airplane because you have nothing else to do, and you manage to see a ton of things that you realize you totally need even though 10 minutes before you didn't even know they existed.  Lucky for your bank account you are on a airplane therefore have no way (Internet, phone) to actually purchase those things, and you get off the plane forgetting everything you are dying to have.

This brownie pan I saw in a sky mall magazine when I flew to Seattle and I knew I needed it. However, I did not purchase it from the magazine, but I also did not forget about it.  I still wanted it even though much time had passed. 

We were in Seattle with a nice couple and I mentioned it to my friend Sherrie. Well today the wonderful FedEx lady brought one to my house and it was sent to me by Sherrie! Isn't that sweet? It completely made my day, and I immediately made some brownies (sorry folks, just the box kind, I have no recipe for you, I have never eaten a brownie better than Betty Crocker anyway, if you have, send me the recipe!)! I haven't even thanked Sherrie yet, I just thought it was so kind and thoughtful. 

Anyway, the premise behind the pan is that every brownie will have the chewy edges that we all know and love.  Cool right? It is a standing rule in my house that only mom gets to eat the corners of the brownies,  so now I get to eat the whole pan! Yippie!

Whole grains, slowly but surely

I am always in a constant state of guilt by the lack of whole grains in my families diet. Feeding my children cinnamon toast crunch for breakfast isn't helping (hey its whole grain . . .) If I cooking I am generally cooking from the out edges of the grocery store.  Meat, dairy, fruit and veg. Real, whole foods. We eat good, but we can always be eating better. It is always and inner struggle for me because priority number one is that it tastes DANG good.  My whole self esteem is resting on this one concept, it can not be compromised. That being said, low fat, low sodium is COMPLETELY out of the question.  I will never cut butter or salt out of my cooking, NEVER. Sorry heart, it ain't gonna happen. It's not like I am going crazy with the stuff. Food is not good with out both of them, generally speaking.

I am going to start adding more whole grains. So today I bought a new rice cooker at Costco, so I can start cooking brown rice instead of white. This one is easy for me because I like brown rice, PF Chang's and Rumbi's, their brown rice is delicious.

I knew this was going to be a challenge for my husband, children, and father. I placed it in front of Porter, who is extremely picky.

"Why does this rice look funny"

"Its just like white rice, but it is brown. just taste it."

"It tastes like white rice, but I hate looking at it"

Not a bad reaction, he seemed to still like the taste. Then my husband says, 

"I don't like it, but I'm eating it anyway."

Jees Louise Fairb, you say that and its over for the kids. Maybe Porter didn't hear. My dad walks in and excited to see his favorite meal, beef curry then he sees the brown rice,

"You're making me eat brown rice!"

Porter took his plate to the sink immediately following. Thanks guys for ruining everything!

I personally loved the brown rice and will be replacing it for most rice dishes. Brown rice takes about twice as long to cook as white rice, but it is 4 times healthier!

Go get some brown rice today!

Next stop, whole grain pasta . . . . 

world wide ward cook book

I love to read cookbooks. I especially love to read ward cookbooks, because I like to know what people are cooking, and what they feel the best thing they cook is. So if you ever have a ward or family cook book you are getting rid of, give it to me! I love them! So when I saw the "Worldwide Ward Cook Book"  at Costco, I had to get it. Of course I loved reading it, but like most ward cookbooks, there weren't many "winning recipes" I counted 15 recipes that called for a can of soup. Find me another recipe book that has that many recipes that call for a can of soup besides the "Cambells" cookbook. If the recipe didn't call for a can of soup it called for a packet of dried onion soup of a pack of Italian dressing mix. Needless to say, it was terribly cliche with recipes like funeral potatoes, tater tot casserole and hot dog casserole.  I don't think there was an entree that even inspired me to make something new. I can say that dessert and bread recipes got me a little excited. In fact, I made some cinnamon rolls.  I kind of went off a recipe in the book, but it called for margarine, I don't do margarine. I kind of used the recipe on page 33, it wasn't anything special, I am sure there are better sweet roll recipes out there. (send them to me please!) what was good was the icing I invented to put on top!

Cinnamon buns

4 c bread flour

1 T instant yeast (the kind you can mix in with flour without proofing it, its the bomb!)

1/2 c sugar

1 t salt

combine then add .  . .

1/3 c melted butter

2 eggs

1 c warm milk

Combine with dough hook (or by hand) and knead till dough is smooth. Put in a greased bowl and let raise till double. Punch down and roll out into a rectangle about 21 inches wide and 16 inches tall.  Liberally spread melted butter over it, then liberally sprinkle it with brown sugar(I would say double what you do if you were making cinnamon toast) , then sprinkle with cinnamon. Roll it up tight like a sleeping bag and slice into about 12 rolls. Place on a cookie sheet lined with parchment (you will be glad you did when it comes clean up time) and let rise till double. Bake for about 15 minutes at 375 till nice and browned.

Sour cream glaze

Meanwhile, melt a 1/4 c butter and a big spoonful (1/4 to 1/3 c ish) sour cream. When the butter is melted (sour cream will be softened) add about a 1/2 a bag of powdered sugar. Combine, then thin out with enough milk to make it a little more runny than you would make regular frosting. Frost the rolls while they are still hot!

Don't go buy the cookbook, just come borrow mine, unless you are a BIG cream of chicken soup fan!

Try this

When you bake you potatoes (only place to buy potatoes is Costco, a big bag of nicely shaped ginormous russet potatoes) at 400 degrees for 1 hour try this . . .

Try rubbing them down with olive oil and sprinkling them with kosher salt. It makes the skin tender and tasty. Making it much more appealing to eat the healthiest part of the the potato.

Do you probe your potatoes with a fork before you cook them? I used to do that as well, then I questioned why I was even doing it. I was doing it because my mother did it. So I asked my mother why she did it. You know what she said? So they don't explode! Seriously? Have you ever heard of a potato exploding in the oven? Ever? First of all, that would never happen, and second of all, if it did, that would be freaking awesome!

So the moral of the story is, you don't need to stab your potatoes with a fork. In my opinion it just allows moister to escape, making your potato more dry. I haven't had a potato fatality yet, and I do a lot of baked potatoes!