Change 3 Things

Who is with me? When you accept the challenge (by liking their facebook page) post on their wall and tell them I sent you! (*Just for fun... I don't get anything from them at all. I just think it's a cool challenge that anybody with kids in diapers can do!)

Change3Things

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Another store-bought for homemade swap: Chocolate Syrup

We ran out of Hershey's Chocolate Syrup today. Almost a crisis. The kids don't seem to be feeling very well today and keep asking for chocolate milk.

I've been staring down the list of ingredients on the Hershey's bottle for quite some time now. Willing it to say sugar instead of High Fructose Corn Syrup. (HFCS) Believe what you want about HFCS, but I personally have read enough to be in the "it's not good for you" camp. I try to eliminate it from our diets as much as I can. (This is partly why we don't regularly drink pop. We get our "fizzy" fix from seltzer.)

So on a whim, to avoid a chocolate milk crisis, I whipped up a batch of homemade chocolate syrup.

I adapted my recipe from this one:

After reading a couple of recipes and the comments on those recipes, I learned that chocolate syrup really needs milk in it, so I did half water, half milk. I also saved the Hershey's bottle and put my syrup in it, just for ease of storing & pouring.


Homemade Chocolate Syrup


1/2 cup water
1/2 cup milk (I used 2%)
2 cups sugar
dash salt
3 Tbsp. baking cocoa (I used hershey's powder)
1 tsp. Vanilla

Whisk water, milk, sugar, salt, & baking cocoa in a sauce pan over medium heat until boiling. Set timer & boil 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat. Add vanilla. Cool completely. It will thicken as it cools. 


I'll post a picture as soon as I can.

It must be blueberry season in Chile. The fresh blueberries in our stores are not insanely priced right now.

I tried my hand at blueberry bagels this morning. Making bagels isn't that hard, but I definitely need more practice. I've tried a wheat bagel recipe & now the blueberry one. They taste good, but didn't rise like I thought they should.

Note, if you try this recipe, Make sure you read the "comment" about the recipe on the bottom. Also, I would not recommend using fresh blueberries like I did... it was one heck of a mess. I wanted to just quit, but I couldn't let myself waste the fresh berries so I pressed onward. Just beware. I will not make it again with fresh berries... only dried.

http://dairyfreecooking.about.com/od/breadsbakery/r/blueberrybagels.htm

Blueberry Bagels

User Rating2 Star Rating(1 Review) Write a review

By Ashley Skabar, About.com Guide

Bagels are one of those breads that are often--but not always--dairy-free, but, like so many things, making them at home is so fun and tasty, and they freeze and keep well for rushed mornings.

Makes 10 to 12 bagels

Ingredients:

• 2 cups warm water
• 2 .25-ounce packets dry active yeast
• 3 T. plus 2 t. white granulated sugar (I prefer unrefined cane sugar)
• 5- 5 1/2 cups all-purpose white flour
• 2 t. salt
• 2 cups blueberries, fresh or dried (I prefer fresh tiny varieties)
• Cornmeal, for pans
• 10-12 cups water

Preparation:

1. In a medium-large mixing bowl, combine the warm water, yeast and the 3 T. sugar, stirring gently until dissolved. Allow the mixture to stand for 5 minutes or until bubbly. (If no bubbles surface, this means that most likely your yeast is no longer "active"; discard your mixture and use fresh yeast.) Add in 4 1/2 cups of the flour and salt gradually until the mixture comes together into a soft dough. Fold in the blueberries gently. Add the remaining flour 1/4 cup at a time until the dough is stiff but not dry. Turn out the dough on a lightly floured surface and knead until the dough is elastic and no longer sticks to your hands, adding flour as needed, about 7-10 minutes. Place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl, turning to coat, cover with a clean dish cloth and set in a warm place to rise until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.

2. Preheat the oven to 400 F. LIghtly oil a large baking sheet.

3. Punch down the dough and divide it into 10 to 12 pieces, depending on how large you want your bagels. Shape each piece into a ball and then, using your fingers, make a hole in the center, gently stretching the dough until the hole is the size of a large coin. Place the bagels on the prepared sheet as you work, then cover with the clean dish towel and let rise for an additional 25 minutes.

4. Lightly oil another large baking sheet and sprinkle lightly with the cornmeal. Bring the 10-12 cups of water to a boil in a large pot with the remaining 2 t. sugar. Working in batches (about 3-4 at a time), gently submerge the bagels into the boiling water and boil until they rise to the top, about 3-5 minutes. Transfer the bagels to the prepared baking sheet and repeat until all of the bagels have been boiled. Bake for 35 minutes, flipping after the first 5, until golden brown. Serve warm or at room temperature.

User Reviews

 2 out of 5

Good ingredients, poor instruction, Member pineapple.express

While the end product tasted good, the entire process of making these bagels was incredibly stressful, mainly because the directions were very unclear and also gave a very inefficient method. I have a few recommendations: 1) Use high rise yeast. I found that the dough rose a twice as fast as the recipe said and made the job go by somewhat faster with the same end result. 2) Before you put the dough in an oiled bowl to rise you MUST mead it with a lot of flour. I'm not sure this recipe calls for enough flour in the initial mixing process. 3) Instead of punching the holes with your fingers, roll the dough out into strips and pinch them together into an O. This is much easier and it is how they do it in bagel shops anyway, I have now clue why this recipe wants you to do it differently. 4) Separate dough into very small sized bagels. Trust me, they with rise a lot! I also found that when you boiled the dough, it did not sink to the bottom of the pot. I was kinda confused about this, but it didn't seem to have a negative impact. Also, this recipe appears to be a little out of order. You want to mix the dough, mead it, put it in a bowl to rise, punch it down, separate and shape it, let it rise again, boil, and bake. I was a little confused about how it was written, but it wasn't to hard to sort out. I also put an egg glaze on top and sprinkled them with sugar before baking.

Since Monday

I've been tracking my foods that I eat & trying to stay under a certain number of calories shooting for weight loss, taking into account that I'm breastfeeding right now.

I've been doing quite well, minus lunch yesterday when I was convinced the horrible headache I'd had since Tuesday was "diet" related. (So I ate a "big" lunch of leftover beef & noodles & my headache went away...huh.)

Anyway, it was cold and snowing this morning, the kids are all snotty, and I *really* wanted to make cookies. And eat them.

Oh and I also discovered a "friction" hole in the crotch of my ONLY pair of blue jeans. My Tommy Hilfiger jeans. The size up Tommy jeans I bought just after Aaron was born to replace the ones I wore a friction hole in the crotch of two years ago. (I now have just 2 pairs of pants that are non-maternity and non-yoga-type. This is not good, people.)

You know what the friction hole means? It means for the past 2+ years my non-pregnant self has been slowly creeping up on the scale. My thighs are wearing holes in blue jean material, --not delicate, thin material! Denim!--, just from rubbing together while I walk. Really. This is not good. Not good. It was gradual so not very "painfully" obvious. I knew it was happening, but with everything else going on around here it is hard to put myself first. Much easier to eat a lot and make comfort food when I'm perpetually exhausted from sleeping in 4-hour-or-less intervals at night for the past 4 years.

Oh the excuses!

Instead of making cookies, I got everyone dressed, weighed myself & found a 3/4 pound weight loss, and went to Sam's club to buy the things on our list... mostly just to get out of the house so we wouldn't eat all morning...

It worked. My desire to make cookies has waned and I'm still good on my calories.

When you're addicted to food, every day is a battle. I'm taking it one day at a time.

Someone* tweeted yesterday:

Being overweight hurts. Being on a diet hurts. Choose your hurt. 


*I apologize I don't remember who...


GOSH, I WANT SOME BACON. AND BROWNIES.

Did I mention?

I'm going to try and blog every day of 2011?  I already missed the first 2 days so I guess we wait and see how well I do. I had 140 posts in 2010. Shall we just shoot for 200 this year? I think you'll be awfully sick of me if I do 363...

Some things I've been thinking about lately:

A friend I've known for a long time... back to junior high school at least had something tragic happen over the holiday & while I don't know exactly what it was (nor do I feel like I should know) I have been thinking of her and praying for her.

My daughter is going to be 6 months old in January. My husband is going to be 31 on 1/11/11. This is the year I turn 30. My sons are going to be 4 and 3 this year. Insanity.

I probably won't actively wean Lauren, but I think by the end of 2011 I neither be pregnant nor breastfeeding a baby for the first time since 2006. I'm kinda looking forward to it!

Last year I knew 25 (at least) ladies having babies. This year so far, there are 5 ladies in our friends and family who are expecting, the first of those babies due to arrive in February.

I have resolved to eat better, keep a log of everything that goes in my mouth, and hope for weight loss! My pants are tight and I'm ready. My plan is just to log what I eat (keeping myself accountable just by being able to see on paper what goes down the hatch) and do what I do until the weather gets warm enough to get out with the tots and put some miles on the jogging stroller. Then it is time to rock and roll... Mondays & Fridays I'll have the boys in the BoB and Lauren in the Ergo. Tuesdays & Thursdays I'll have Lauren & Aaron in the stroller and Wednesdays I'll have to figure out what to do with just Lauren. Oh that's just until school is out in May, then I have to re-plan.

I have resolved to enjoy my kids more. To be slower to anger. To just take each moment and savor it. To not watch the clock, willing it to move faster to nap & bed times. To just smile, laugh, and be a champion of positive experiences with my children.  (For the record, I'm already pretty good a this, but my trouble times are in the morning when we're getting ready to leave and when I don't feel well.)

A post without a photo. I'm sorry!

Magic Soup

On the downhill slide to four years old, Ian has become much more difficult at the dinner table. Don't get me wrong, I have been blessed with two of the best eaters I have even seen! I believe children all reach a point when eating good food that is good for them is not a fun thing to do...so what's a parent to do? (Take them to Mickey-D's for some nuggets? NO!)

I can't speak for what works in every house, but Roger and I have learned that sometimes getting our kids to eat the food I made for dinner is all about creativity and spin. (and positive attitudes! Trust me, there are lots of nights when all we want to do is yell and give time outs and take away dinner, which always comes back to bite us in the rumps!)

I really should start keeping track of our ideas because nearly all of them are successful tactics for us, we just have to use them sparingly. We've done "dinner winner," where the best eater of dinner gets a special treat like a popsicle or "your choice" from the candy bucket. Or just dessert in general since we don't eat dessert every night. We encourage them to line up their peas on the plate, if that's what makes the peas interesting enough to eat.  We may have even discussed how much broccoli you'd have to eat in order to turn green like Luigi. We have a rule (as of a few months ago) that even if you don't want what we are having, you have to eat as many bites as you are old.  Most of the time, once the actual eating begins there is no more argument or mention of not liking or wanting dinner.

Tonight, I think was one of my most creative, successful moments yet! (I do say so myself...)

Tonight, we were having Italian Beef Soup for dinner. It's a tomato-beef soup that I made up many moons ago. It's a family favorite. We have it for dinner all.the.time. With the exception of the potatoes, Ian loves it. The potatoes are another story... he doesn't like potatoes in boiled, braised, baked or mashed form, but will eat them as wedges or fries. Eh. Not a battle I care to fight. He doesn't need the potatoes anyway if he's filling up on tomato soup broth and veggies. He'll come around someday.

So anyway, back to tonight. Ian was the first at the table after the dinner bell rang. He even said, "Wahoo!" after I told him what we were having, but as soon as his bowl was placed in front of him he exclaimed, "I don't wan't that! Mommy! Get me peanut butter and jelly!"

Ahem. "First of all, that's not how you ask for something. Second of all, you can have peanut butter and jelly after you eat your 3 bites."

The scoffing continued.

Then he said, "Mommy? How do they make Buzz Lightyear?"

And in my stroke of pure parenting genius (haha) I said what popped into my mind, "Start eating your soup and I'll tell you. It's magic soup. It makes mommy and daddy tell stories."

He picked up his spoon and started eating. As I told him how they make Buzz Lightyears in a silly story, he kept eating. By the time I was done he was done. But he was not finished...

"Mommy? How do they make Barbies?"

"Do you want more magic soup while I tell you?"

"uh-huh!"

Bumpadabum! He ate all of his dinner. And seconds.

Creativity and spin. It's the key to parenting at the dinner table. It also has a lot of other applications when you have 3 under 4...but that's a story for another day.

Pineapple Pork

Here's a recipe for you to try.  Straight from my electric skillet.

1 small pork loin roast (1-2 lbs), cut into bite-size pieces
1 can pineapple chinks (or tidbits) in pineapple juice (not syrup), drained, reserve juice
1-2 tbsp. corn starch
3 Tbsp. rice wine vinegar
3Tbsp. lower sodium soy sauce
1/2 cup water
1 tsp. dark honey (or whatever you have, I have local buckwheat honey.)
salt
pepper
sesame seeds
rice
asian veggie blend (I use birdseye brand)
cooking spray

Sprinkle corn starch, salt, & pepper over pork & toss to coat while preheating a non-stick skillet sprayed with cooking spray (with a lid, I use my electric skillet).  Place pork into skillet on high heat in a single layer & brown on both sides.

Add pineapple juice, vinegar, soy sauce & water.  Simmer on medium-high, covered for 8 minutes.  Uncover & continue simmering until the liquid is cooked down & thicker. Add pineapple & honey. Continue cooking another minute or two to heat the pineapple through. Turn off.

Serve with steamed asian veggies & rice.  Sprinkle sesame seeds on top.

I know it sounds like a lot of ingredients that you might not have on hand, but I have found that we eat this for dinner several times a month and once you have the vinegar, soy sauce, sesame seeds, etc. you can make this as a "pantry meal."  We keep pork roast & asian veggies in the freezer all the time.

If you try it, let me how how you like it!  I threw this together one night after a long day out and about, hoping for a tasty, quick dinner.  It took several times to "perfect" it, but I personally think it is quite tasty.  I keep forgetting to take a photo of it, but next time we have it, I promise I will take one.  It not only tastes good, it looks really nice on the plate! The whole thing takes about 20 minutes to make- if you're cooking your rice & vegetables at the same time as the pork.  Yum!

Berry Picking of the Blue variety

On a whim today I took the kids to the orchard and we picked blueberries. Not a TON of them, but a couple of pints. (As long as I could tolerate the sweat running down my forehead and back...)

Ian actually posed for an adorable picture!

Here's Ian in the blueberry patch! (No funny faces, actually looking at the camera! Love it.)

The McDonald's Happy Meal

***WARNING! You might get offended by this post. I really go off about parenting and forming children's eating habits.***


CSPI Threatens Suit over Happy Meal Toys

What do you think?

As I said publicly a little bit ago, I believe it is NOT McDonald's fault that kids are "getting fat" from eating Happy Meals. Yes, of course the food could be healthier in the Happy Meals and yes, McNuggets could have just chicken and breading instead of 45 ingredients (eew... it's true, though, Google it.), but is it seriously McDonald's fault that our kids are eating it so much?

Nobody really seems to care that Disney does the same damn thing with their marketing and when you go to Disney World, look at the kids meals! They are pizza, nuggets, hot dogs, with fries (or apples/carrots), pop to drink, etc. If you looked at the ingredients in the meals, I'm sure it isn't any better than McD's. Oh then there's the special desserts that sometimes come with sit-down restaurant meals, the "bottomless" fries at Red Robin (and the balloons, and the *gasp* ROBIN). Other fast food restaurants have toys too... How is it any different?

I think it is nearly 100% the parents' fault their child is eating McDonalds "too much" or "so much" that it is negatively affecting the child's diet. I mean, you CAN go ahead and drive past. Your child might cry. Your child might scream at you and throw a huge friggin' tantrum, kicking the back of your seat and making your ear drums bleed. Oh well. By the time you get home and cook him some real dinner, he'll probably be over his tantrum... and maybe he'll have even worked up a real appetite for something delicious, nutritious, and homemade.

I'll never lie to you about Team V eating at McDonald's. We do. I do buy Happy Meals for my kids... occasionally.

I mean, maybe twice a month? Maybe once a week in the winter time when we go to the indoor playground just to get out of the house and make some friends? And if you count the indoor playgrounds at Burger King and Chick Fil-A, we eat at fast food places about 3 times a month. If we're traveling, maybe a little more than that.

Fast food is convenient and for the most part, it tastes good. Of course the kids love it. (Except... they don't love it. Unless my boys are starving, they eat way better at home than they do at fast food places...)

Why do we go then... other than the playground?

They love the toy in the Happy Meal. It's almost always a really cute something-or-other from a movie that they've seen or have seen commercials for and they play with those stinkin' toys endlessly!

They eat the food because it is there and I say they can't open the toy or play in the playground until they have eaten it. If it was up to them, they would play/open the toy and leave the food to rot in the little cardboard carton. Because I don't want to "waste my money" I tell them THEY HAVE TO EAT IT.

So whose fault is it? Is it McDonald's fault? Is it MY fault? Could I avoid the entire situation just by not going there? Of course I could! And would my children know any different if we didn't go there? Of course not! Would they continue to ask me to stop at "Donnie's" on our way past? Probably... Would they eventually stop having tantrums about me not stopping? I think so. Would I save money in the long run by cooking our meals at home and buying the occasional toy from toy aisle at the store? I bet!

In our lives, McDonald's Happy Meals are special treats that we occasionally get. Ian would never ask for dinner at McDonald's. That's just not how we do things around here. And if you asked him, "hey Ian, what's for lunch?" He'd tell you: soup, a sandwich, or perhaps a hot dog... and in saying it, he'd mean "at home" not "out." McDonald's is only on his mind if we happen to be passing one, or if I bring it up.

I like it that way.

I'm going to be really pissed if they take the toys out of the Happy Meals. I think that's un-American.

So now, after I re-read this, I realize I didn't really address the "real problem" that is pushing this lawsuit. The perceived problem of kids eating too much McDonald's and forming bad eating habits because of it. I still don't think it's the Happy Meal Toy's fault! How can it be? If your child is eating at McDonald's meals every day or several times a week or enough that they are getting fat from it, you need to reexamine what is really going on in your life!

Are you balancing your child's "junk food" intake with exercise opportunities? More importantly, are you feeding them chicken nuggets at home because that is all they will eat without having a tantrum? Do your children eat so many snacks that they're not hungry for the dinner you cooked? Do you cook "fast food" meals at home because that is all you think you have time for?

Did you know that it can take up to 70 times of introducing a food to your child before he will even taste it? Did you realize that means that you have to introduce new foods to your children in order for them to have an expanded palate? If you only feed your children McNuggets because "that is all they will eat" you are missing the boat on feeding your children.

I know, I've only been a mom for 3 years, and perhaps I've had it easy with my kids and their eating, but maybe it's because we've never allowed our children to "get away" with only eating the "good stuff" on their plates and leaving behind the veggies, fruits, meats, etc. (PS- I'm a total hypocrite. I'm an incredibly picky eater and my children definitely eat a more balanced diet than I do. Should I blame my parents?) I also know that there are just some things that some kids won't eat. It happens. Keep trying. Aside from potty training, it's probably the most frustrating thing that parents deal with...


Anyway, back to McDonald's Happy Meal toys...

It says in the article I posted up above:

McDonald's does use the healthier Apple Dippers in its advertising, the CSPI attorney acknowledged but once the customer actually gets to McDonald's, the apple side is almost always replaced--by default--with nutritionally inferior fries, unless the customer specifically asks for it. It's rarely, if ever, offered at the counter, he said.

Anyway, Apple Dippers are only relatively healthier, Cronin added, and send kids a mixed message: apples are only good if they're paired up with sugary caramel. Ultimately, he said, "They're forming really bad eating habits. Their healthiest meal still isn't good for you."

I think that places the blame SQUARELY on the parents, not on the Happy Meal, right? You know they have apples, so order them. And do like I do...take the caramel sauce out before you hand over the meal and toss it right in the garbage. Ian doesn't even know there IS caramel sauce for dipping. You're letting your child form a really bad eating habit. Just because McDonald's isn't stopping you doesn't mean they are to blame for your kid eating the caramel sauce!

I guess we could look at it this way... if you go and order the healthiest one (which I am assuming is a Hamburger, Apple Dippers, and White Milk, but I don't know that for sure) at least you're introducing your child to APPLES and you are getting them to drink white milk and you can use the toy as a bribe! If there isn't a toy anymore... you can't even do that.

If you made it this far, thanks for sticking it out... and sorry if I offended you. Sometimes it really is our fault, though, and we need own it. And try to change.

My Very Own Recipe: Lime Chicken & Rice

I'm finally doing it. Thanks to Molly Piper's call for low-fat recipes and my inability to find my already written recipe, I'm finally putting it right here for the world to see.

Backstory: Roger and I were working out a lot and trying to get healthy one winter. We were eating chicken and rice for dinner 3-4 nights a week at least and we were just plain tired of chicken with only salt and pepper. One day I made chicken fajitas and as I was making it, I thought, "hmm. I wonder if we could use the marinade for the fajitas to flavor the chicken bites we're eating all the time?" And thus it was born. Lime Chicken and Rice. Just ask Roger, it's one of his favorites! If I've given you this recipe before and the measurements are slightly different, it's because I never had a "recipe" for the chicken, I've always just dumped and poured and hoped for the best. The good thing is that you don't have to be very precise with this recipe. It comes out tasting good every time. (Well, except for the time I tried to sub lemon juice for lime juice because we didn't have any more lime juice... yeah, don't do that.)

Ingredients:

Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts (you can even use frozen ones w/o thawing them) The same amount as you would use to feed your family if you were grilling it.
Olive Oil- just enough to coat the bottom of the pan
Salt & Pepper- a dash of salt, couple grinds of pepper
Chili Powder- 1/2 to 1 tsp. (you want to cover the chicken and turn the lime juice orange, start with the 1/2 tsp the first time you make it, I think. I'll measure the next time and update this when I do.)
Lime Juice- 1/2 cup (you may need more depending on the amount of chicken you are using. It should come up about 1/2 way on the chicken, definitely don't cover the chicken entirely with it.)
Cilantro- cut up and sprinkled on top- optional.

Method:

Cut chicken into bite-sized pieces. Heat olive oil in a pan with a lid on medium high (I use a dutch oven, but a big skillet w/lid would work, too) Brown chicken in oil, add salt, pepper, chili powder, and lime juice, stir to coat evenly. Cover with lid and turn heat down a bit. (On my stove I brown on 8 or 9 and turn down to 7.) Let simmer in lime juice until it is evaporated, stirring occasionally. It usually takes 15-20 minutes. Turn heat off when lime juice is gone and let the heat of the burner brown the chicken a little bit again. (Be careful though because it burns easily at this point.)

Serve with Rice & topped with Cilantro.

Notes: You can increase the size of this recipe as much as you want. Just make sure you increase the spices and lime juice accordingly!

I start the rice in our rice cooker before I start cooking the chicken. It all finishes at about the same time.

Please let me know if you liked it or if you had problems with the recipe!r