over the top blog award

Thank you Connie for this "Over the Top" blog award! Connie blogs at Living My Glamorous Life. She makes you want to shop with all the beautiful and glamorous stuff she finds and she also posts lots of yummy food and recipes. She's happy and fun to *be around* so go check her out!

These are the rules:
1. you can only use ONE word
2. pass this along to 6 of your favorite bloggers
3. alert them that you have given them this award
4. have fun

The Fun Part:
1. Where is your cell phone? LOST
2. Your hair? PONYTAIL
3. Your mother? KIND
4. Your father? SMART
5. Your favorite food? MEXICAN
6. your dream last night? SCARY
7. Your favorite drink? CRANBERRY-LIMEADE
8. Your dream/goal? TRAVEL
9. What room are you in? OFFICE
10. Your hobby? FOOD
11. Your fear? DEATH
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? EUROPE
13. Where were you last night? HOME
14. Something that you aren’t? RELAXED
15. Muffins? PLEASE
16. Wish list item ? LASIK
17. Where did you grow up? CALIFORNIA
18. Last thing you did? FED BABY
19. What are you wearing? JEANS
20. Your TV? HULU
21. Your pets? NONE :(
22. Friends? GENEROUS
23. Your life? BUSY
24. Your mood? TIRED
25. Missing someone? TIFFnTODD
26. Vehicle? MINIVAN!
27. Something you’re not wearing? JEWELRY
28. Your favorite store? WILLIAMS-SONOMA
29. Your favorite color? ORANGE
30. When was the last time you laughed? MINUTES AGO
31. Last time you cried? TUESDAY
32. Your best friend? ROSEMAY
33. One place that I go to over and over? GROCER
34. One person who emails me regularly? JENN
35. Favorite place to eat? BAJIO

halloween lunch

Witch's Broom: Pretzel rods, string cheese, and black licorice rope. I cut a string cheese in half and then finely peeled it. I took a bunch and squished the top 1/4 of the pieces around the bottom of the pretzel rod and secured it with the black licorice. I thought it turned out like a broom! What do you think?
I made Witch Fingers: baby carrots with slivered, toasted almonds as fingernails. i used a teeny dab of cream cheese to secure the almonds. The palm of the hand is a slice of a side of a Sonya apple. Sonyas are my favorite.
I let the kids put black olives on their fingers to make Monster Fingers. They loved that.
And Halloween wouldn't be complete without Mummy Dogs. I left the cheese off.

no bake cherry cheesecake

My family loves cheesecake. All kinds. Then I married HF, who is a major cheesecake man. My mom made this no bake cheesecake often through the years. Probably because it was so easy. I think she got it originally from the back of an Eagle Brand can of sweetened condensed milk. I've changed it a little by doing one thing. I leave the vanilla out. I think it's so much better without. I also am a brand snob sometimes. I use Philadelphia cream cheese, Eagle Brand sweetened condensed milk, and I always use juice from a real lemon. Makes a difference in my opinion. Especially the lemon juice. Watch out, this is super rich and sweet!

1 (8oz.) package of cream cheese, softened
1 can of sweetened condensed milk
1/3 cup fresh lemon juice
graham cracker pie crust
1 can cherry or blueberry pie topping

Let cream cheese sit out until softened. Mix with beaters until smooth. Add can of sweetened condensed milk. Mix until completely smooth. Add lemon juice and mix completely. Pour into graham cracker crust and refrigerate for several hours. I usually refrigerate overnight. When ready to serve, spread can of pie topping over entire surface. Cut into wedges and serve.

recipe cards

This is a somewhat labor intensive project, but this year for Christmas I am making recipe cards of our family's favorites for family members and some friends.

Here's what you need:
1 package of 4x6 index cards
glue stick
variety of scrapbook paper cut into 4x6 pieces (same as the index cards)
metal rings for holding the cards (i don't remember what they are called, but they open so you can slip more cards on or take them off)
hole punch
stickers and other embellishments if desired to stick on your recipes

Directions:

1. First of all, I am not a person that is a scrapbooker or even knows where to begin, but we have a big craft store that had 50% off all of their scrapbook paper. So I picked up A LOT of paper for just around $4 or $5.
2. After cutting up all my colorful paper into the same size as the index cards (4x6), I took a glue stick and glued a scrapbook piece to the front of the index card and one to the back. You can also use photo squares or some other method, but I found a glue stick was best. This isn't supposed to be professional, and the little imperfections give it a cute folksy look, I think.
3. Then you will take your hole punch and punch 2 holes about 2 cm from the left and 2 cm from the right and 1 cm from the top on each side.
   
4. Loop the cards on to the rings and clasp shut.
   
5. On Word, I set it up so that the recipes would print out within a 3x5 space on each card front and back. Once you've glued your recipes on the cards, let dry. Then finish up with any embellishments such as stickers, and other scrapbooking decorations you prefer. You can include a table of contents on the back of your top card where you've put the name of your family's favorite recipes as a title.
   

guest blogger: mrs. Officer's pumpkin bread with brown sugar glaze

*It's that time of year. Time to whip up the pumpkin recipes. This is a guest post from a fellow police wife, Michelle, aka Mrs. Officer. She blogs over at MRS OFFICER 2 U. She posts lots of yummy recipes, talks about her husband, family, and their daily adventures together. She has a happy life and you can tell just from reading her blog. A couple of days ago she posted this pumpkin bread picture on her blog and mentioned that this family recipe is coveted by friends and family and that she's lucky if she ends up with one loaf out of six. I knew I had to have this recipe when I saw it. It looks and sounds so delicious. Thanks for sharing Michelle!

PUMPKIN BREAD WITH BROWN SUGAR GLAZE

• 3 cups sugar
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 4 eggs, lightly beaten
• 16 ounces canned unsweetened pumpkin
• 3 1/2 cups flour
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1 teaspoon allspice
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon cloves
• 2/3 cup water

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour 2 9x5 loaf pans. Stir together sugar and oil. Stir in eggs and pumpkin. Combine dry ingredients in separate bowl. Blend dry ingredients and water into wet mixture, alternating. Divide batter between two loaf pans. Bake for 30 to 40 minutes or until cake tester comes out clean. Let stand 10 minutes. Remove from pans to cool.

Glaze
3 Tbsp. water
3 Tbsp. butter
4 Tbsp. brown sugar

Place in a small sauce pan and stir until butter is melted and sugar is dissolved. Then drizzle over pumpkin loaves!


*Do you have a favorite Fall or pumpkin recipe you would like to share? Email me at apolicewife@gmail.com and be a guest blogger!

italian salad

The salad looks kind of bland and dressing-less in the pictures, but it's covered in a delightful mixture of seasonings and oil.

This is one of those test and taste recipes. There are no specific measurements.

Ingredients:
2 heads of romaine lettuce
2-4 cloves of garlic, minced
olive oil
rice vinegar
salt
basil leaves
grated parmesan cheese

Directions:

1. Mince fresh garlic and spread on the bottom and sides of your bowl (1-2 depending on the size of the bowl/salad)
2. Wash and chop romaine lettuce, put in bowl
3. Sprinkle olive oil over entire salad
4. Sprinkle rice vinegar over entire salad
5. Sprinkle salt
6. Sprinkle Basil leaves (you can probably use dried if you want)
   
7. Mince at least 1 clove of fresh garlic on top of lettuce
8. Toss salad, taste. Add more oil, vinegar, salt, basil or garlic as needed
9. Right before serving, add grated parmesan cheese on top

Add chicken to make a complete meal.

bentos nos. 21-23

daddy bento: pb and honey sandwich with cucumber face, cheddar cheese cubes, carrots, grape tomatoes, red grapes, and a mix of raw almonds, fried chow mein noodles, and giant chocolate chips.
carrot sticks (from our garden), banana cut in half, 2 babybel cheeses with flower shape cut out of the wax, 2 mini blueberry muffins.
almond butter and honey sandwich on wheat cut in triangles, strawberries, a babybel cheese, and a cup of milk chocolate moose munch (Harry & David's) Have you tried the white chocolate and cranberry? TO DIE FOR.

pesto-chicken italiano

I discovered this wonderful little recipe on the back of a KRAFT shredded cheese bag. The Italian five cheese blend, to be precise. It was so good. This is my picture of it above, but there is also a picture in the link. I will be adding this recipe to our keepers. It was simple, fasy, and delightful! I bought pre-made pesto from Sam's Club or Costco, and everything else we pretty much had on hand.

Pesto-Chicken Italiano

In case the link gets dodgy, here's the recipe:

1 Tbsp. oil

1 lb. boneless skinless chicken breasts, sliced

1 clove garlic, minced

1 large red pepper, cut into thin strips

1/4 cup pesto

1 lemon, cut in half, divided

1 cup KRAFT Finely Shredded Italian* Five Cheese Blend

2 cups hot cooked angel hair pasta

HEAT oil in large nonstick skillet on medium heat. Add chicken and garlic; cook and stir 4 to 5 min. or until chicken is evenly browned. Stir in peppers; cook 3 to 4 min. or until chicken is done, stirring frequently.

STIR in pesto and juice from 1 lemon half; top with cheese. Cover; cook on low heat 2 to 3 min. or until cheese is melted. Spoon over pasta.

SERVE with remaining lemon half, cut into wedges.

We definitely used up the lemon wedges. I squeezed at least one extra wedge on while eating it.

how to use up the tomatoes

One of the places I miss eating at in Santa Barbara is Woodstock Pizza in Isla Vista. I'm sure there's better pizza in the world, but for some reason I loved eating there. I especially loved their cheesy wilde bread with Ranch dip and whenever we ordered pizza I would have them put fresh tomatoes on top when it came out of the oven. So good. So that's something I've been doing with our tomatoes when we have pizza. Good stuff.
Homemade tomato soup! I used this recipe here. This is actually HF's favorite meal. Grilled cheese with tomato soup. It didn't make a lot of soup. This was really good though. I think I am going to double or triple this recipe and freeze it flat in gallon freezer bags to enjoy in the next few months. I would for sure recommend putting it through a sieve after you puree it. I don't like chunky tomato soup. We get our kids to eat it by sprinkling goldfish on top, handing them a spoon, and saying, "Go fish!"
This was probably one of the best ways I've ever had pork roast in my life. I browned the picnic roast (it was about 3 pounds) on all sides in a little olive oil. Then I added a couple of freshly chopped tomatoes, a handful of fresh cilantro, a sliced green pepper, and a quartered white onion. I poured in 1-2 cups of water, and a cup of brown sugar and let it simmer all day. SO GOOD. I was just trying to use up what we had and use the stuff from our garden.
Homemade pico de gallo. I used Elise's recipe at Simply Recipes.
My favorite: The BLT. We spread mayonnaise on both sides of the toasted bread, put on 3-4 slices of bacon, 2 thick slices of tomato, and a lettuce leaf. I always add sliced avocado, coarse pepper, and then place the remaining slice on top. TO DIE FOR.

What have you been doing with your tomatoes? Any suggestions?

bentos nos. 15-20

fresh cooked tortilla rolled up with cinnamon and sugar. I cut it into 4 chunks to fit inside box. Golden Delicious apple, quartered, home made peanut butter dip made with natural peanut butter, honey, cinnamon, and apple juice, carrot from our garden, chicken pieces mixed with BBQ sauce, and home made potato wedges. These were good, but I breaded them. Next time I will leave the bread crumbs off.
strawberry yogurt, grape tomatoes from the garden, dinosaur footprint cookies, cantaloupe, fried chow mein noodles, and rolled up muenster cheese
bento for HF: cantaloupe, cucumber sticks, deli turkey rolled up, cheese chunks, package of Sauri cookies (mexican sandwich cookies), homemade hummus, grape tomatoes, carrots from our garden cut in flower shape, and pita bread cut into triangles.
bento for baby: This was a dinner for our 11 month old: grape tomatoes, halved, with cucumber bits, apple slices, hummus, and pita bread strips. He ate a little bit of everything. I made the hummus with cumin and I think I'll leave it out next time.
pita wedges, 1/2 apple, banana bread, hummus on top of a cup of cucumber sticks, carrots, and grape tomatoes.
not a very good picture, but this is pancakes cut into wedges with a little container of syrup, cantaloupe, Chinese Almond cookies, carrots, cucumber, edamame, and a little container of ranch dip. This was too much food to send for lunch, but she ate a little of everything. Too many containers also. Next time I would do the pancake with syrup, some fruit, and one type of vegie all shoved into one box.

friday nights: movie and a pizza

Every Friday we make or order a pizza and a get a movie to watch as a family. Our daughter has been wanting to watch James and the Giant Peach for a while now. Since I'm one of those (insert sarcasm) amazingly creative super moms, I try to come up with a treat that matches the movie the kids have chosen to watch. We also do this activity whenever we read a book that is also a movie. We will read the book first, then watch the movie with a themed treat. It's fun. So for tonight's feature film, I came up with this idea. It was fast and easy. I went to the grocery store that is just a block away and bought a giant peach. It seriously was huge. then I bought a bag of gummy worms. You've probably guessed by now what I did. Yes, I put the worm in the peach. If you haven't seen this movie, or read the book, James along with some other insects change when they eat a piece of the peach and they become the same size and they can talk to each other. It's been a long time since I've read the book. They travel together to get to New York. Anyway, there is a spider, a ladybug, a grasshopper, and a few others. Maybe a centipede. We actually have toy insects like that, but i couldn't find them. Otherwise I would've had them join this photo session with the peach. I think they turned out pretty cute otherwise, and the kids loved eating wedges off the peach while they watched the movie. Of course they did eat the gummy worms first.

I took one worm and cut it in half. With a straw I made two holes and put half of the cut worm into each hole. The kids thought it was the coolest thing ever. The Black Forrest gummy worms have smiley faces. I didn't know that.

fried zucchini

The zucchinis that came out of our garden this year were humongous. It was amazing to check them one afternoon and see that they were still fairly small. The next day they had grown by leaps and bounds it seemed. The giant ones I shredded up for later use and stuck in the freezer in freezer bags. The smaller ones I cut at an angle into coins for fried zucchini. They were delicious! The measurements for the ingredients are just a guess. You may need more or less of the flour, milk, and bread crumbs. You will notice I didn't use any egg. It didn't need it at all.

1-2 zucchinis
2 cups milk
1-2 cups flour
1 cup plain breadcrumbs
oil for frying

First cut your zucchinis into desired thickness. Not too thin, but not very thick or it won't cook well. Place coins in container along with the milk. I let them soak for a few minutes, making sure that none of them are stuck together. Next I put the flour into a gallon ziploc bag or a large bowl. I remove the zucchinis from the milk using a slotted spoon and dump them into the bag of flour to coat evenly. You will probably have to break some apart as they like to stick together. Once they are coated evenly, you will dip them one by one in the milk once again and immediately coat with the breadcrumbs. Once all the zucchinis are breaded, they are ready for frying. Place a couple of paper towels on a plate and place a few zucchinis in hot oil. Fry on one side until golden brown, then flip over and fry the remaining side until golden brown. Drain on a paper towel covered plate. Serve with ranch dip if you like.

Here are some other zucchini recipes I might try to mix things up a bit.

Zucchini and Rice Casserole from All recipes
Zucchini Cakes from the Pioneer Woman's friend, Ryan. I think these are also called Zucchini Fritters.
Spinach and Zucchini Soup from 101 Cookbooks.
And last but not least, it's the Zucchini Weenie as seen on Al Dente. Fair Food. I think it actually looks pretty tasty! It would have to be a Hebrew National hot dog for me to eat it though. . .

zucchini bread with miniature chocolate chips

In my freezer right now are at least a dozen if not more of these ziploc bags of shredded zucchini. One bag is a serving for a batch of zucchini bread. And I still have a few more giant zucchinis to work with!


I adapted this recipe from one I found online at allrecipes.com.

3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
3 eggs (I always use medium eggs when baking now. For some reason it seems to work better)
1 cup vegetable oil
1 cup white sugar
1 cup light brown sugar, packed
3 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 -3 cups grated zucchini, do not squeeze or drain excess moisture or liquid
1 cup miniature chocolate chips, semi-sweet (optional)

1. Grease two 8 x 4 inch bread pans. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
2. Sift flour, salt, baking powder, soda, and cinnamon together in a bowl.
3. Beat eggs, oil, vanilla, and sugar together in a large bowl. Add sifted ingredients to the wet mixture, and beat well. Stir in zucchini and chocolate chips until well combined. Pour batter into prepared pans.
4. Bake for 40 to 60 minutes (mine is always at least 1 hour), or until tester inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pan on rack for 20 minutes. Remove bread from pan, and completely cool.

garden produce coming out of my ears

This is about what we get 3 to 4 times a week from our garden. And that's divided between 3 families. An amazing garden this year. So i'm going to be featuring a few things we've done with the produce.
This is usually what one side of our sink looks like. Full of vegetables.
I love our little carrots. They are so short and fat. I did not expect them to turn out like this. Did we do something wrong?! They still tasted good.

more bento (#10-14)

I repeat a lot of what I put in these. Especially now, during the summer when we have vegetables coming out of our ears from the garden. So grape tomatoes, cucumbers, and carrots are pretty much always in here.

This bento is a little more adventurous than usual. I've got the usual tomatoes, cucumbers, and carrots in the middle. On the left, those balls are what's called, Arancini, an Italian food consisting of risotto rice with mozzarella in the middle, covered in bread crumbs, and fried until golden brown. On the right are Banana Bites, chunks of banana covered in melting chocolate and rolled in sprinkles. Both the Arancini and the banana recipes were found in a children's cookbook by Annabel Karmel.
mini waffles, strawberries, mozzarrella cheese chunks on cute little animal picks, grape tomatoes, and cucumbers.
daddy bento: Arancini, cucumber, cheese, grape tomatoes, banan bread, strawberries, a mixture of cheddar bunnies, almonds, and pretzels, and some little Hershey's Hugs.
As you can see, I just use a regular Rubbermaid container for his bentos. It works perfectly.
another daddy bento: leftover roast with mashed potatoes and gravy, the same cheddar bunny mixture with almonds and pretzels, tomatoes, grapes, cheese, and some Ritter Sport chocolate with almonds.
grapes, Annies Cheddar Bunnies, banana bread slice, cheese, grape tomatoes, and a tuna fish sandwich on wheat bread, cut into fish shape with mini chocolate chip for eye, and pretzel piece for smile. Well, kind of smile.