Easter Things

Easter was lovely.  I spent the Thursday before baking Hot Cross Buns, but they didn't turn out quite like I expected--more dense, like a bagel.  I will tweak the recipe a bit for next year.  While I baked I had the film Chocolat on in the background, which was seasonally appropriate.  I also dyed eggs that day, using a plain Paas kit that was on sale at CVS.  I always like to see the "imperfections" in the dying--the whirls and splotches, that I think are more beautiful than most things you would purposely do.  Nathan's little Easter basket didn't have any candy in it this year, but he did get some new pacifiers and plastic link toys, which he has been enjoying very much.  

My skirt came out nicely.  It has box pleats and pockets and a lining, and I will be making more.  We spent Easter weekend back home with our families, passing Nathan from one grandparent to the next.  Sunday morning was church, and then dinner at my grandmother's.

The week has been nice, but not very productive. Jordan and I have been catching up on past seasons of Mad Men, which we had not seen in a very long time.  That show is depressing and funny and provocative.  

We had doctor's appointments on Wednesday, where we found out that Nathan is indeed a big boy, in the 98th percentile for height.  Afterwards, I stopped in at JoAnne's Fabrics where Nathan very sweetly napped and let me wander around for a very long time.  I ended up getting a fat quarter of fabric, some jingle bells, and jump rings to make a mobile for him.  I also bought pinking shears, a purchase I had to agonize over a bit, since they were shockingly expensive, but, like my mom said, I'll have them for the rest of my life.

Today, I attempted to jump back on the productivity wagon.  I stopped at a local store to get some fresh strawberries.  Oh my goodness.  Nothing like the kind from California that you get in the grocery store.  These will mostly become freezer jam, and the rest will probably be eaten out right.  I also got in some work time, editing the course I am teaching online this summer.

All in all, a good week, but I can't believe how fast the days are going.

Waiting for Spring

The weather lately is enough to drive anyone crazy.  Saturday was gorgeous--low 70s and sunny.  We worked in the yard (more on that in a bit) and generally enjoyed ourselves.  Yesterday, it was snowing (again)!  It didn't lay, but the rain, sleet, snow mess was rather depressing and made the doctor's appointment/ grocery store run fairly miserable--I don't like being wet and cold and I certainly don't like for the little fellow to be wet and cold!

He has been getting so big!  He is holding his head up more and more and reaching during tummy time.  We have begun to let him sleep unswaddled, and when I go in to him in the morning, he smiles (his smile is just like Jordan's--minus the teeth!) and puts his hand on my arm, and I am left a melted puddle in the floor.  When he yawns sometimes he lets it out as a little yodeling coo.  And he sings.  I kid you not.

So, the work in the yard.  We are re-doing the flower bed in the front yard.  It is an oblong island with a lamp post on one end and a bird house on the other.  When we moved in, it contained a crepe myrtle (which we moved a while back), zebra grass, lavender, Mexican heather, blackeyed susans, daisies, Chinese fringe flower, a yellow bell, an azalea, a butterfly bush, a rose, and a camellia.  And it was a mess.  So, we spent Saturday removing most everything--sickly shrubs and weeds were rooted up.  We still have a bit more extracting to do, but in the end, there will only be the Mexican heather (which is thriving--I think it like the sandy soil), the butterfly bush, and the camellia.  Then, we will replant with lavender, peonies, blackeyed susans, cone flower, and irises.  Pretty, pretty.

I am particularly keen to have this bed looking nice because it is what people see when they drive up, but, more importantly, it is what we see when we look out.  I chose flowers in the hopes that our little population of birds will appreciate them.  We have a whole community of cardinals and blue jays (who like hanging out in the Bradford pears), house sparrows (who have taken over the bird house), and house finches (who foolishly try to build nests on our porch each spring--really, we don't mind it, but they knock the nests down themselves when they fly off).  The sparrows are feisty little things--I have seen them defend the bird house against intrusive starlings and squirrels twice their size.  By the way, I found a neat website that helps with bird identification here: What Bird.

Easter is coming, and I am preparing my Easter dress.  Which won't actually be a dress because they are too difficult to nurse in.  I decided to wear a skirt this year, but couldn't find anything I liked when I went shopping--an excellent excuse to break out the sewing machine, and a skirt is so easy.  I am not even really using a pattern--I found so many good tutorials on Pinterest, and some lovely fabric on sale at Joanne's (I couldn't choose one, so it looks like I am making at least three skirts!).

The wrap pictured above is Avocado Egg Salad.  I know that this will disgust most people--Jordan couldn't believe I ate it, but I thought it was delicious.  I found the recipe from Never Homemaker on Pinterest as well.  It is tasty.  And seems right for spring.

"They Grow Up So Fast" and Other Truths

A little over two months ago, I had a baby.  One thing I have discovered about being a parent is that all the platitudes and cliches are true.  Everyone always says, "they grow up so fast, enjoy them while they are young."  They say, "The days are long but the years are short."  They say, "It's the best thing you'll ever do; your life will never be the same."  When I heard those things as a non-parent, and even while pregnant, I would think, "Well, of course."  I could appreciate the idea that children grow up fast--my niece and nephew seem feet taller every time I see them.  So, really, I always understood that these things were true--obvious even--and couldn't understand why everyone felt the need to repeat them endlessly.  Now I get it.  Not only are they true, but they are now central facts about my life.  I have a son.  He is growing.  Too fast.

This leads me to the other thing I have discovered about parenting--for every emotion, there is an equal and opposite emotion.  I feel my entire experience has become a paradox.  On the one hand, I am delighted that Nathan is growing so well--and by well, I mean almost off the charts.  After each doctor's visit, I call my mom and crow about how much weight he has gained.  I spend his awake time each day helping him learn to hold his head up, smile, reach for things, and we proudly show off his progress to Daddy when he gets home.  On the other hand, this is all entirely devastating--how can he change so fast?  And why can't I drink in each feature of his little person quickly enough, before it's gone and transformed into something else that will be equally wonderful, but not the same?  I wasn't prepared for the confusion of emotion that comes with parenting, and I wasn't prepared for the intensity either.  His sweet, slow smiles bring tears to my eyes, and (again, the paradoxes), his cry, moments after I put him down thinking he was asleep, pierces me like a red hot poker of despair.

Our days are pretty quiet, red hot pokers not withstanding.  Feeding, changing, dressing, playing, reading, singing, and napping (if I'm lucky).  He loves music, so I sing to him constantly--"This is the Day" for when he wakes up, "Alleluia" when he is going to sleep, and "Arky, Arky" and "This Little Light of Mine" in between.  My favorite is "Give Me Oil in My Lamp"--he likes it, I think, because it is quick and has some high notes; I like it because it is a true prayer for me--I need all the oil in my lamp I can get!  For books, we are liking Dr. Seuss and The Poky Little Puppy and Little Blue Truck.

I have been doing some reading myself, since it's something I can manage to do while he is feeding--at first, it took him upwards of 40 minutes to eat and he ate every two hours, so I had to have something to do!  He's become much more efficient now, taking only about 20 minutes, but I still sneak in some reading.  Over the past year, I have been working through my bookshelf, committed to reading all the books I own but have never read before.  In the process, I have made some wonderful discoveries and can't understand how I never got around to some of these books before.  Ironically, three of the books I have read have had to do with the coming of age of boys: Lloyd Alexander's Taran, Wanderer, Forrest Carter's The Education of Little Tree, and the one I finished today, T.H. White's The Once and Future King.  All of them sad, in a way (I read Little Tree just after Nathan was born and wept hot tears onto the top of his head at the end), but all good.

Knitting, cooking, and cleaning (and laundering cloth diapers!) round out the rest of my activities.  The knitting project is a sweater I started at the end of my pregnancy, and is by far the most advanced thing I have ever tried, but it is coming along pretty nicely, with beautiful grey tweed yarn I salvaged from another sweater.  I have been making lots of dishes using rotisserie chicken.  I hate cooking chicken, so having that part already taken care of is wonderful, and it is so easy to shred the chicken and use it in chicken salad or casseroles or soup, like the one pictured above, a new favorite: Moroccan Chicken Stew with couscous and zucchini and sweet potatoes.  We have been eating it with pita bread torn into triangles, slathered with olive oil and salt and toasted--oh my goodness, so crisp and chewy at the same time.

The days are long (and wonderful and exhausting)--but, they are good days.

Morning Routine: How I Start My Day

Now that classes have started again, I have tweaked my morning routine.  Although I am a morning person, getting going can be a challenge (I prefer to piddle about aimlessly, instead of diving in).  However, I know that my day will go much better if I get off to a good start, so I have been rather ruthlessly disciplined about making this routine work.  I have found that the best way to get things done in the morning is to not give yourself options.  Don't decide, don't think about it.  Automatically get up and do it.  When something becomes a habit, you can circumvent the deciding process, during which you might talk yourself out of doing something that you know you need to do.  (I read a rather interesting book a while back that talked about this very process: The Power of Habit)

In order to achieve this, I do a bit of prep work the night before.  I lay out the clothes I will need first thing (on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday mornings, this means running gear).  I have my alarm set on my phone (I know, I know, an ancient flip-phone, but it works) and I leave the phone with my clothes on the bathroom counter.  When it goes off in the morning, I have no choice but to get up and walk over to turn it off, and there are my clothes, ready and waiting.  I don't even think about it--I just put them on.  I also have my nook out, and I do a quick check of email, Facebook, and the weather.  Even a couple of minutes of the bright screen time helps to wake me up, then I am out the door.  I love this.  The early morning run is something I savor.  No one except other runners and walkers are out at the park, and the sun slowly comes up as mist burns off the pond.  Fantastic.

On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings, I have an 8am class, so I get up, turn off my alarm, and head straight for the shower (after a quick check of the internets!).  When I get out, there are my clothes waiting for me.  I get dressed and fix my hair and makeup.

Once I am finished getting ready, or once I get back from my run, I eat breakfast and have my quiet time.  Bible study and prayer are habits that can be difficult to form, but I know they are crucial.  The best trick I have found is to tie them to something I know I will do without fail--which is eating breakfast.  Recently I found a resource offering different daily Bible-reading plans that could be sent to your email.  I chose the "Every Day in the Word" plan, which sends passages from the Old Testament, New Testament, Psalms, and Proverbs.  This works well for me as a daily supplement for my more intense Bible studies that involve commentaries and lots of note-taking.

For breakfast, I try to eat a combination of complex carbohydrates (high-fiber cereal, oatmeal, or whole-grain waffle) and protein (scrambled or hard-boiled eggs, peanut butter, yogurt, or kefir), with some fruit or veggies as well.  I also almost always have a cup of decaf Earl Grey tea.

I love my morning routine, and it works for me.  I know that this is subject to change.  Recently I have been thinking about how different things will be once the baby gets here--he'll have his own ideas about when things will be done.  But, for now, I am enjoying my peaceful (if predictable!) mornings.

Vacation Meal Planning: Making the Most of Your Vacation Rental's Kitchen

Last week, I spent a week at the beach with my family.  We stayed in an ocean-front condo with a kitchen.  Since the group included 10 people, including a toddler and an infant, eating out every night would have been nightmarish.  So, my sister and I planned meals for five nights and divvied up the grocery-buying and equipment-packing.  The results were pretty great, and we were greeted each evening with exclamations of "oh, yeah!" from my teenage cousin and his buddy.  It's nice to have an appreciative audience!

The backbone of our meal plan was the crock-pot.  My sister and I each brought one, and one night we actually ended up also using the one that came in the kitchen.  Only two nights were non-crock-pot meals.  Here's what we made:

Night One: Taco Salad

This is a family favorite and very easy: ground beef browned with taco seasoning, served on tortilla chips with lettuce, tomato, sour cream, salsa, cheese, onions, olives.  Doesn't get more simple than that.

Night Two: Barbecue

I think many people are surprised to find that you can make barbecue in a crock-pot, and I am sometimes hesitant to release that detail.  We come from a barbecue-cooking state, and regional lines are thickly drawn--everyone has an opinion on how barbecue should taste and how it should be prepared, and I am sure that many would be horrified at the thought of calling something that came out of a crock-pot "barbecue," but my family sure enjoys it!

It is ridiculously easy: pork tenderloin in the crock with about a cup of water and a drizzle of barbecue sauce (there's not much point in using a lot at this point).  Cook on low for about 8 hours or high for 4-6 hours, depending on the size.  Once it's done, it shreds easily with a fork, and then I pour the sauce on.  We like Sweet Baby Ray's, but again, to each their own!

We eat it on a bun with slaw: homemade also, and we like it simple--chopped cabbage, maybe a bit of carrot, mayonnaise (Duke's, if you please!) and salt and pepper.  We ate it that night with corn that my parents had picked up at a produce stand on their way down to the beach.

Night Three: Hawaiian Chicken with Fried Rice

This was a bit of a mash-up: I brought the Hawaiian Chicken recipe; my sister brought the fried rice recipe.  Both originally came from Pinterest.  The Hawaiian Chicken is a fantastic crock-pot recipe, and the only one that I prepped before we left home--it involves combining the ingredients (chicken breasts, pineapple chunks and juice, vinegar, sugar, soy sauce, and garlic) in a ziploc bag and freezing.  I doubled the recipe, dividing into two gallon-size bags, and freezing--the next morning they went into the bottom of the cooler.  The whole frozen thing is dumped out of the bag and into the crock-pot, and then shredded, similar to the barbecue.  My sister made the fried rice, a recipe that I hadn't tried before, but it was particularly tasty, and went well with the Hawaiian Chicken, despite the regional differences (not that either are particularly authentic to begin with!)

Recipe for Hawaiian Chicken
Recipe for Fried Rice

Night Four: Ham and Sweet Potatoes

This was my sister's recipe: sweet potatoes are placed in the bottom of the crock pot, topped with sliced ham, and covered with a brown sugar/ dry mustard mix.  We finished the meal off with squash from the produce stand.

Night Five: Spaghetti and Salad

Simple, easy, everyone can make spaghetti--noodles, sauce, and ground beef.  However, this one didn't actually work out for us.  We found out that the meat had been recalled, so we decided to forgo the meal and eat up the leftovers instead.

Although we enjoyed the nights we ate out, cooking in was pretty special.  My sister and I live several hours apart, so it was great getting to do something like cooking together.  We are very much in sync and the whole process of preparing meals in that little kitchen flowed seamlessly, and almost without the need to discuss it--we just did it.  There aren't many people with which that can happen!

Orange Peanut Chicken Stirfry

I have finally finished reading Michael Pollan's newest book Cooked: A History of Transformation.  It has an interesting premise: he examines the development of the four basic methods of cooking by matching them with a classical element--fire for roasting meat, in which he shadows a North Carolina barbecue pit master; water, for cooking in pots, the foundation of most home cooking; air for bread baking; and earth for the work of fermentation, in which he learns the making of sauerkraut and pickles, cheese, and beer from die hard "fermentos."

The funny thing about the book is that among the several interesting things that I learned, one was that I had been doing many things in the kitchen without knowing why or that the same techniques and ingredients had been used in basically every culture since the invention of cooking.  For example, almost every home-cooked dish begins with what the French call mirepoix--a combination of onions, carrots, and celery that is sauteed in butter or oil.  Almost every culture has their own mirepoix, with the base vegetable varying slightly depending on region--an Italian dish is more likely to feature tomatoes and onions, an Asian dish might have onions and ginger.  Pollan was struck, as am I, by the ubiquity of the onion.

I have been making mirepoix all this time without thinking about it.  A friend once remarked that I put onions in everything, and, really, it is true.  Spaghetti?--saute onions, bell peppers, and mushrooms.  Pizza?--the same.  Frittata? Quiche?  Both onions, peppers, and mushrooms, although I might add something else, like asparagus, for fun.  Even meat loaf begins with sauteed onions, as does chili and most soups that I make.

So, in honor of the unconscious mirepoix, I bring you a little recipe that I developed a while back.  Although I call it a stirfry, it is in no way an authentic Asian dish.  But it is tasty.  And it does start with my favorite mirepoix. 

Orange Peanut Chicken Stir Fry

Ingredients:
1 lb thin chicken breasts

1/2 box thin spaghetti noodles
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes

2-3 bell peppers, cut into strips

1/2 box mushrooms

1 small onion, roughly chopped

for the sauce:
1 tbsp peanut butter
2 tbsp orange juice

1 tbsp soy sauce

1 tsp brown sugar

1/2 tsp powdered ginger

Directions:
Prepare your chicken however you like--grill it or cut into small strips and brown in a bit of oil in a pan.

In a saucepan, add the red pepper flakes to a bit of olive oil, and then saute the onion, peppers, and mushrooms until tender.  In the meantime, boil noodles until they reach your preferred level of doneness.

In a small bowl, whisk the remaining ingredients together until it reaches a smooth consistency.

Add the chicken and noodles to the sauce pan with the vegetables, then top with the sauce.  Use tongs to distribute evenly.  If you like, add crushed peanuts for extra peanut flavor and a bit of crunch.

Recipe Roundup

Lots of people joke about Pinterest being a great way to waste time.  I don't consider it time wasted--not when it gives you things like this.  Below are my results with a few recipes discovered on Pinterest.

French Breakfast Muffins from Velvet Lava.  I made these yesterday, and they are pretty amazing.  They have my favorite muffin texture, which is dense, slightly crispy, and crumbly.  They have a cinnamon-sugar topping that is fantastic, but they were actually quite easy to make.

Baked Avocado Fries by Baked In.  I love avocados, but can't find enough to do with them (other than guacamole), and they seem to go bad so quickly.  Enter avocado fries.  They are a bit messy to make (check out the author's hands in her post to get the idea), but the results are great--creamy avocado inside, crispy breadcrumbs on the outside.  I like them with ranch dressing, but Jordan thinks they are just fine on their own.

Creamy Tomato Tortellini Soup by Recipe Swagger.  Mmmm, I love tortellini.  And tomato soup.  So, here is the best of both worlds.  I think that the next time I make this, I might use the homemade tomato soup recipe I have from Martha Stewart instead of the Campbell's, but even with the canned stuff, this is pretty good.  A sprinkling of bacon pieces on top wouldn't go awry, either.

Banana Oat Breakfast Cookies by Watching What I Eat.  These were a bit of a miss for me.  They tasted pretty good at first.  But, then next time when I got another one, they were damp.  Like, not just moist, but damp.  Cookies aren't supposed to be damp (they were stored in a Ziploc container on the kitchen counter, by the way).  I like the idea of these cookies, though.  Jordan and I eat granola bars as an afternoon snack, but they kind of freak me out.  I suspect that they are really just candy bars masquerading as health food.  And, have you ever looked at the ingredient list?  The ones we were eating contained glycerin.  Like, soap.  So, I would like a healthy cookie/ bar recipe without a lot of sugar to replace the store-bought stuff.  Any suggestions?

Yay, for Pinterest!

Homemade Beauty: Dry Skin Scrub and Mask

Winter is famously rough on dry skin.  Mine is fairly parched most of the year, but becomes painfully dry during the winter--rough, flaky, red, and blotchy.  Dry skin is often also sensitive, and many products (even ones formulated for "sensitive skin") can irritate it further.  So, I've been hanging out in the kitchen.  The scrub recipe comes from my mom (also a dry-skin-sufferer).  It is quite simple--just mix a bit of plain sugar and enough olive oil to make a paste.  I take this into the shower with me and very carefully exfoliate my face.  Pressure is key here--very gentle circular strokes.  The idea is to polish away the dead skin, not sand off your epidermis.

I follow the scrub with a homemade mask.  I did a bit of research, looking at ingredients found in products formulated for dry skin, and I found that oatmeal, honey, and chamomile were mentioned frequently.  So, here is what I put together:

1 tbs brewed chamomile tea

1 tbs oatmeal

1 tsp honey

Mix the three ingredients together in a small cup and microwave 10-15 seconds.  Stir and let sit until it looks like the kind of oatmeal you would eat.  Apply to face and wait 30 minutes before removing.

I didn't want to be brewing chamomile tea every few days, especially if I only needed a tablespoon of it.  So I brewed two cups in a mason jar that I keep in the refrigerator.  When I want a mask, I just splash out a bit into a tea cup, add in the oatmeal and honey, and microwave.

The mask can be a bit tricky to apply--if the mixture is too runny, it will slide off your face; to thick and it won't spread.  While wearing it, you will look a bit leprous, but the results are worth it.  My face is smoother and less red.  I follow up with a good moisturizer (currently the Simple Replenishing Rich Moisturizer).

I really like the little jars that once held diced pimentos for containing the scrub.  What are diced pimentos for?  Glad you asked: check out the Pimento Cheese Recipe here.  Interested in other homemade beauty recipes?  Check these out.

Mini Pecan Pies

 

I think pecan pie must be my daddy's favorite.  Any kind of pecan pie.  When my sister and I were little, he would buy us the little packaged pecan pies--were they Little Debbies?--that came in tiny tin pie pans.  Part of the charm there was the idea of eating a pie all by yourself.

 

 

These were actually quite easy to make.  I can't remember where the recipe for the pie filling came from, but it is fairly standard.  It is, however, delightfully sweet and nutty, with no corn syrup.  And the mini shape means you get one (or two!) all to yourself.

Mini Pecan Pies

1 box (2 crusts) refrigerated pie crusts (I used Pillsbury)

2 eggs

1/2 cup butter, melted

1 cup light brown sugar

1/4 cup white sugar

1 tbs. all purpose flour

1 tbs. milk

1 tbs. vanilla extract

1 cup chopped pecans

1.  Preheat oven to 350.  

2. Roll out pie crusts until they are thin, but still workable.  Cut out circles using 3.5 inch round cookie-cutter.  Grease two 12 cup muffin tins with cooking spray and press a crust circle into each cup.

3.  In a large bowl, beat eggs until foamy and stir in melted butter.  Stir in brown sugar, white sugar, and flour; mix well.  Last add the milk, vanilla, and nuts.

4.  Spoon one tablespoon of filling into each cup.  Bake 20 minutes (or until down), rotating halfway through baking time. Cool for five minutes in tin. 

 I am looking forward to seeing how Daddy likes this version--perhaps it'll be an improvement even on the Little Debbies!

We Like to Eat Around Here

 Seriously, we love to eat.  I like to cook, so it all works out.  Here are some of the things we have been eating.  Above is the Lemon-Orange Chiffon Cake that I made for a church dinner (it won a Facebook poll for what I should make, over a banana-pudding).  I think it turned out great--the recipe was from Southern Living.  The icing was particularly spectacular, but nobody wanted to eat the candied orange slices.

 In the plate above is Herbed Chicken, Panko-Crusted Squash, and Creamy Russet Potatoes.  The chicken was a new experiment that turned out well.  I seasoned thin chicken breasts with a Mediterranean herb blend and pan-fried them a bit in olive oil until the outside browned, then transferred to a baking dish to roast in the oven with chopped garlic.  I poured some lemon juice into the frying pan and scraped up the bits that were left and then poured it over the chicken to keep it moist.

 Strawberry and Asparagus Salad: a mix of green leaf and spinach, roasted asparagus, strawberries, feta, walnuts, bacon, and a Vidalia onion dressing.

Roasted Veggie Quiche:  roasted asparagus, onion, carrots, and squash; eggs mixed with heavy cream, feta, mozzarella and Parmesan in a store-bought refrigerated crust.

I didn't take a picture of the blackberry cobbler I took to some friends' cookout last night, but it was tasty, though a bit of an adventure (way, way too much liquid in the berries, which Jordan helped me pour off).

I am so excited that summer is here and that vegetables are everywhere: we have been eating so much squash and asparagus and corn and tomatoes.  Love it!

What are your favorite summer recipes?

Favorite Favorites: Pimento Cheese and Strawberry Jam

Way back when I was in youth group, we played some kind of game that required us to choose the one food we would be happy eating the rest of our lives.  I don't remember the point of the game, but I do remember my answer: pimento cheese.  Back in those days, I was eating the spread on white bread sandwiches.  Since then, more wonderful things have happened.

First, homemade pimento cheese.  My grandmother and mother and aunts all make homemade pimento cheese, but for some reason, I had never tried it myself until recently.  It is ridiculously easy.  Although there are many different versions of the recipe, this is the one my mother taught me:

1 (8 oz.) block sharp cheddar (grated)
1 (8 oz.) block mild cheddar (grated)
1 (4 oz.) jar diced pimentos (drained)
mayonnaise
1 tsp. Worcestershire sauce
pepper

Mix the grated cheese and pimentos with enough mayonnaise until it becomes a thick, creamy spread.  Add in the Worcestershire sauce and pepper (freshly ground is particularly good).  Momma recommends grating the sharp cheddar with one size of holes on the grater and the mild cheddar with a different size, just to make the texture more interesting.

Then, my brother-in-law introduced us to grilled pimento cheese.  Again, this is so obviously good that I can't believe I hadn't tried it before.  The crisp buttery bread, the melty cheese.  Mmmmm.  However, the February 2012 issue of Southern Living took it a step further by adding bacon to the grilled pimento cheese and suggesting serving with strawberry jam--what?  Strawberry jam?  Let me tell you, it is unreal.  Jordan is not a fan, but then, he generally doesn't like sauces and condiments--such a purist.  For me, however, a thin slather of strawberry jam on top of a grilled pimento cheese and bacon sandwich is amazing.  I have always been a big fan of cheese-and-fruit eaten together, so this is tops.

It is especially good with the year's crop of strawberry freezer jam.  We picked two bucket-fulls not long ago, and I made enough jam to fill up a dozen half-pint jars (one of which went to work with Jordan and disappeared inside of four days!)  Here is my previous post on freezer-jam making.

But, the pimento cheese and strawberry jam goodness does not end there.  Also in the February Southern Living was a recipe for pimento cheese rolls.  Super easy, very tasty.

Pimento cheese seems to be a very personalized food.  Any other variations out there that are your favorites?

Early Easter Morning

 Citrus Spritz Cookies.  I usually make these at Christmas, but I had a cold and didn't get around to it then.  So, I decided that citrus was spring-like as well.  Especially since these are shaped like flowers.  I think I may have finally figured the cookie press out.  These also have a lemon glaze and tiny white nonpareils.

 My handsome husband getting ready for church.

 My Easter outfit.  Every since I was little, Easter was a special sartorial turning point.  I wasn't allowed to go bare-legged until Easter, and we never wore light colors until Easter.  I remember wearing some special Easter outfits as a little girl--hats, gloves, tiny lace purses.

My daffodils have finally bloomed!  I was afraid I had crowded them too much in the containers, but there they are, with their smiling, charming faces.

Our Easter Cantata this morning was one of the most powerful services I can remember.  Each song was so beautiful; the voices of those who spoke and prayed were overwhelmed with emotion; and it was uplifting to see the faces in the congregation clearly worshiping our Risen Savior.  One of the songs keeps playing in my head:

Living He loved me, dying He saved me
And buried He carried my sins far away
Rising He justified freely forever
One day He's coming, oh, glorious day, oh, glorious day

Lunch was so very nice, with friends who made wonderful things to eat.  I miss seeing my family today, but we'll be getting home soon.

Happy Easter, everyone!

Wham, Bam, Strawberry Jam

 Freezer jam is quite possibly the easiest thing in the world to make.  No kidding.  Making a sandwich involves more skill.

 First, I picked the berries.  I love the pick-your-own farm just up the road.  My bucket was so full that berries kept jumping out.  Back home, I sliced off the tops and hulled them.  Spread them on a baking sheet and mashed them with a potato masher until they are nice and pulpy.

 In another bowl, I mixed sugar and pectin, then mixed in the mashed berries.  This mixture gets poured into half-pint jelly jars, leaving a half-inch head space (the jam expands when it freezes).  Leave it for thirty minutes and then freeze or refrigerate.   That is it.  No fancy equipment, no boiling water--I didn't even turn the stove on. (Specific measurements are listed on the pectin container; I used Ball Instant Pectin).

 I gave a jar, along with a loaf of homemade Victorian Milk Bread, to my committee members as a thank you for helping with my dissertation.

We kept several jars for ourselves, and Jordan has been eating it straight out of the jar with a spoon.  I prefer mine on toast.  It is so delicious and tastes nothing like store-bought strawberry jam--it actually tastes like strawberries, even after it has been frozen.  We tried some last night on croissant bread pudding that I made with some very stale croissants: shazam.

Whole new possibilities have opened up: blueberry jam, blackberry jam, peach jam, quince jam.  Forget ice cream and frozen peas.  Our freezer will be stocked with jam!