Old Meatloaf and Pinewood Derby

Well, since the onset of Facebook I haven't done much blogging. But I thought I would post a quick update.

Nicholas, last week won his pack pinewood derby race. Yippee!! He worked and worked on his car. He changed his design this year a bit too.

Here is his car:

And here is him and his trophy.

He had a good time though I think he made the assistant cubleader a bit upset that his child didn't win. I told Kenneth that he shouldn't have been surprised that Nicholas won because the cub leader was the judge at districts last year where Nicholas won.

Allie and Caroline are cheering now. They are having a good time but don't seem as "into it" as they were last year. Last year they had a fun squad and really fun coaches who were high school students. They knew what they were doing and they were really organized. This year we have two moms (on of which has been coaching for a few years) but they really aren't very organized. For instance last week at practice they are working on a dance routine and they were literally making it up as they went along teaching it to the kids. Oh my! It was really frustrating.

Nicholas is playing basketball for a more competitive league and again we have frustration in that area. We were given false info about the team we requested to be on and we are suffering the consequences. We thought the coaches knew what they were doing and they don't. We are the losingest team in the league I think . We have only won one game! And the kids aren't learning any skills. They haven't learned any thing really. So it makes it really frustrating for us sitting and watching the games and seeing the other teams stomp all over us. Next year we will know though.

Okay, now for the meatloaf. I received a bunch of really fun to look at patterns from my mother in law. These patterns are for crochet and knitting. She cut them out from magazines from the early 1970's through the late 1980's. The styles are so much fun to look at particularly once you hit the earlier years. Anyway, I found in these patterns some recipes for meatloaf. I thought I would share a few with you all, but you have to go here to find them. Once you get there click on Meatloaf on the sidebar to find them.

Update on today's goals:

Okay, first let me just say that I have accomplished much today.

I have half the laundry done and put away right now. The pile is dwindling but it has now been pushed to the front door and away from the steps. This was to deter the kids from "stair surfing". Yes, your images were correct. They go down the steps on their bellies head first into the pile of clothes at the bottom.

A more reasonable goal for laundry complete will be tomorrow or Tuesday night. It may end up waiting until next weekend. We will just have to see how the week goes. I don't mind doing laundry but I like to do it all in one day. I hate doing laundry everyday. I need a reprieve so I attempt to do it all on a Saturday or a Sunday. Whatever doesn't get done in that time will wait until the next laundry day.

My desk hasn't been touched at all. That will have to wait at this point. However, I did accomplish this:

And this:

Yes, homemade donuts!! It is super easy and you will impress your friends, family and anyone else who stops by. Click here for the recipe!!

Random Thoughts, Book Reviews and a Picture

If you haven't been to my cooking blog recently you may want to mosey on over there. Whitney's Cooking! I just put up a super great broccoli salad recipe and below that is an entry on my husband and I cooking at our church last Sunday. I think it is worth reading!! Comment away over there also. I never get any comments!

If you haven't been to my Idle Hands blog I also suggest you find a half a second and venture that way too. I have been busy with sewing and have posted a bunch of pictures of the projects that I have finished recently (in the pat two weeks).

Now for the book reviews. I have been totally in to Debbie Macomber recently. She writes series novels but you don't have to read the series from start to finish. You can pick up any book and start reading. But if you want the whole story and not just little snippets of the back stories of some of the characters it is worth it to start from the beginning. She has a lovely website with recipes, knitting patterns, and information about her books and a monthly contest.

Her Cedar Cove series starts with 16 Lighthouse Road and continues on to 74 Seaside Avenue. It is a great series about a small seaside town in Washington state just outside of Seattle. It is filled with romance (not the smutty stuff) and great stories of women and their lives, friendships, and the men they love. I started reading this series two summers ago and in one month had read all up to the end of the series. They are quick reads and I think anyone can relate to the characters.

Macomber's Dakota series is being republished now and they are cute novels about a small dying town in North Dakota called Buffalo Valley. This town actually is mentioned in the Cedar Cove series too, as one of the characters moves out to Buffalo Valley and falls in love with a man there. The series begins with Dakota Born and then Dakota Home. Always Dakota will be republished in June,2008. It is a wonderful little story about a small town and their plight to bring it back to life, of course along with love, relationships and women's friendships.

Navy Husband is a cute story about a woman who decides her relationship with a man is going nowhere. She breaks up with him and moves to Seattle where she buys a pizza and ice cream parlor. Her sister is a recent widow and has a young child. She is enlisted in the Navy and gets deployed to a ship in the middle of the Pacific. The child must go to live with the pizza parlor owner. In the midst of life changing events, both women find love and companionship in places where they least expect. This novel is part of a series but it is great on its own. I haven't read the others in the series yet.

Okay here is the picture of the day:

Caroline finding a bit of quiet in her shoe cubby to play her Game Boy!

Kick A spaghetti sauce and Storybook Maker

Oh my God! I made some awesome spaghetti sauce tonight. I usually make a meat sauce which is very good but tonight I decided to do meatballs but wanted a bit more than marinara sauce with a meatball so I made a meat sauce too. The meatsauce had sausage in it and it made a very nice flavor. Then I put in the meatballs after I cooked them in the cast iron pan. It was quite yummy.

So now for the next oh my God! I was scrapbooking last night at a crop over at my friend Gwen's house. She is a Creative Memories Consultant and as I was getting ready to leave I picked up a storybook that she had made. Now I had seen these before and wasn't really impressed with them. But her's made me do some inquiring. So I asked her how easy it was and she went into a ten minute speal showing me on her computer how easy it was. She told me to go home and download the free software and the free templates and play around. I did just that this morning and started playing around with our Christmas pictures from this year. I showed my husband and he was impressed too at how quickly I could make a book. He even told me to order it and see what it looked like. But then he asked if it would replace the traditional scrapbooks that I do and I said no way!! I love my scrapbooks and I love making them. So if you haven't played around with Storybook Maker, take a few minutes to go to the Creative Memories website and click on Storybook Maker Free download. Then once that is downloaded go back to the website and find the free templates and follow the directions to download them too, or at least the ones you like. Then spend an hour and play. It is a lot of fun!!

Dinner

If this looks good then go to Whitney's Cooking!

Dad's Recipes

I have begun sorting through my father's recipes. I started posting them on my Whitney's Cooking blog. Check it out. So far we have a Potato casserole trio and his world famous spaghetti sauce. PS. Click on the link on the sidebar!!!

Turkey Time

Last year in January, I came across a huge sale on leftover turkeys. They were 16 cents a pound and I decided to get one. The one I chose was 22 lbs and cost something like 4 bucks! Kenneth went through the freezer on Saturday morning and announced that the turkey was still residing in the freezer and suggested that we cook it. So we thawed it out and had it for dinner tonight. Man, the house smells amazing! Just like the holidays!! What a great start to the holiday season.

Here's how I prepared it. I cleaned him out and dried him off. I put him in a Reynolds Turkey Bag and melted a stick of butter, added a teaspoon of minced garlic, several sprigs of fresh thyme, a teaspoon of kosher salt, and a several shakes of pepper. After mixing it all together and letting it cook for a second, I poured the mixture all over the top of the turkey making sure that the thyme sprigs were all on the top. I tied the bag and stuck him in the oven for 3 hours until his button popped. I let him rest before cutting.

If you have never cooked a turkey in a bag you will find that he is juicy and delicious. He isn't dry at all and often when you attempt to move him from the pan to a platter he will completely fall apart. Now that is the sign of a juicy turkey. In the bag there is no more basting every 30 minutes and you don't open it at all while cooking. Now you can't really put more than vegetables in the cavity. If you put stuffing in it you will find that it just turns to mush. So leave the cavity either empty or just put some rough cut vegies in there like carrots, celery and onion.

I served it with red skin mashed potatoes, broccoli, and rolls. I didn't want to make a traditional Thanksgiving dinner because it wasn't Thanksgiving.

Update on "the experiment"

I tried it and the results were average. I put it in the oven on 350 for about 30 minutes. Cakes usually take about 40 minutes to cook so I figured that I would see something in 30 minutes time. 20 minutes into it I couldn't stand it so I checked and it still looked like dry cake mix on top and nothing going on underneath. At 30 minutes nothing had changed and I started searching for some recipes on line similar to this.

One recipe said to take a large can of mixed fruit, a dry cake mix and mix the two together and bake. Mmm... that sounded good and also gave me the idea that it needed to mix together a bit. Another said to mix the cake mix with eggs only and put on top. Eww. Another said to put butter pats on the top. I remembered that one of the guys said to pour some butter on top. So I went in the kitchen, pulled it out of the oven, kinda chunked the mix into the now-hot peaches beneath and I put a half a stick of butter in the microwave and melted it and then poured it on top and stuck it back in the oven for another 20 minutes. When I pulled it out it was looking much better. It was slightly crunchy on top and the cake mix now looked more like baked cake and the peach juice was bubbling all around the edges. I let it cool down a bit and after the kids went to bed I spooned some out and heated it back up in the microwave oven and then scooped some vanilla ice cream on top.

It turned out more like a cobbler than a cake. It was all gooey underneath with moist cake on the top with some crunchies from the butter.

Would I do it again, you ask? Yes, I would if I were serving it hot with ice cream that same night.

So here is the recipe...

One large can of fruit in juice
One box of yellow cake mix
1/2 stick of butter

Pour the fruit and juice in the bottom of a baking dish. Layer the dry cake mix on top evenly. Melt the butter and pour on the top all over. Bake at 350 for 35-45 minutes. You will know when it is done when it looks like cobbler. Let cool slightly before serving with ice cream.

An Experiment

I was talking with some co-workers and we were talking about how to make "Apple Betty". The conversation moved to an easy way to make a fruit cake. The men explained that you take a can of fruit in juice, put it in a baking dish. Then take a box of cake mix and pour it on top. (Yes the dry cake mix). Then put it in the oven and bake. The other gentleman said that he does it all the time with his boy scout troop in a dutch oven while camping. He said it works. The third gentleman then chimed in and asked me if I was going to make one. I said, "I'm game. Will you eat it if I bring it in tomorrow?". He agreed as he loves anything that I bring in to share. It is in the oven now. I will let you know how it turns out.

When all Else Fails...

use Italian Salad Dressing. Or if you like a good Ken's Caesar does well too. No, I am not talking about eating salad. I AM talking about marinades. Italian salad dressing is great on fish, chicken, tuna, pork and turkey. It is also great on shrimp! You can also marinade most kinds of vegetables if you are going to grill them. I am talking about zucchini, squash, onions, eggplant, and even fresh green beans. What a versitile item!!

Applesauce

Because we went apple picking two weeks ago, it seems that all I am cooking right now is applesauce. I have made a ton of applesauce in the past two weeks. It should keep my family happy until next summer.
Here is my recipe:
I take about 10 cups of apples peeled, chunked and cored, about 3-4 cups of water. Put all in a big pot and cook on medium high heat until the apples are soft. Stir often! Once the apples are soft mash them with a potato masher. If you like smoother applesauce then put in a food processor and mix until smoothness desired is achieved. Add about 1 to 1/2 cups of sugar and about a 1/2 TBS of cinnamon and stir. Taste. You may want to add a bit more water if it is too thick, you may want to go light on the cinnamon until you taste it and then add some more. Fill canning jars and process in a water bath for about 10-15 minutes.
The chunky style is great served warm with pork chops or ham. The smoother, cold stuff is great, well, anytime!

How to Cut Fresh Pineapple

Many people are afraid to buy a fresh pineapple because they don't know how to properly cut it. It is quite simple if you follow these steps.
1. Cut the bottom off about 1/2 inch from the bottom, then cut the top off. Now you are left with the spiny outside and a very flat bottom so it doesn't roll around.
2. Next start cutting off the spiny outside from top to bottom about 1/4 inch in. This way you get most of the seeds out too. Just go around the outside cutting in small strips the outer skin and spines.
3. Then, look at it from the top and you will see the round core in the middle. For chunks begin by cutting large strips one the sides from top to bottom cutting away from the core. You will cut 1/4 of it first then turn it 1/4 turn and cut again straight down, then turn and cut and turn and cut the last bit. This will leave you with a square core if you did it right.
4. Take the large chunks that you just cut and slice them as small as you like. Trim off any outer spines that you didn't get when you "deskined" it.
5. If you want circles then cut the pineapple sideways and then use a small knife to core out the inner core. If you have a small round cookie cutter that will work too but they are very hard to find.

OH My!!!

We went to dinner tonight over at my mother's house. We had tacos and fajitas. Mom made a corn salad that was to die for. It had corn (shaved off the cob), green pepper, onions, cucumbers, tomatoes, and Italian salad dressing and a bit of sugar. She said she got it off www.allrecipes.com. I will get the recipe and post it.