Friday Food: Away

Friday 

Short version: Ham and potatoes, leftovers, raw radishes

Long version: We had been thinking this day we might cut up the ram lamb that had been aging for a couple of weeks, in which case I would have cooked some of the backstrap for dinner. But then A. was busy most of the day preparing for the awful weather coming our way, so we didn't do the butchering.

I had prepared for this possibility by taking out of the freezer the last few cups of ham left from Christmas. I added that to some microwaved and chopped potatoes, fried it all, added cheese, and that was for the children. 

Last-minute food.

A. had the last of the lamb and chickpeas from the night before, plus the last of some leftover rice. I had a salad with hardboiled eggs in it.

Saturday

Short version: Italian sausage, pasta with pesto, frozen green peas

Long version: When I was at the overwhelmingly abundant grocery store in Albuquerque awhile ago, I found a store-brand version of Italian sausage. I bought four packages, which was all they had. I cooked two of them this night. Because, again, we had not gotten to the butchering and I needed something quick to thaw and cook.

Italian sausage is the only kind of sausage everyone in my family likes. I thought these were just okay, but the rest of the family as thrilled and told me I should always have it on hand. Sorry, guys. Two hundred miles is a little far to drive for sausage.

The pesto was the cubes I had frozen from the garden basil. A nice taste of summer on what was for sure a very wintery day.

Sunday

Short version: Green chili elk cheeseburgers, oven fries, squash or cucumbers, baked strawberries and rhubarb with cream

Long version: I was baking bread this day, so I used some of the dough to make buns. And then I made elk burgers to put on those buns. Plus some of the pureed roasted green chili from the freezer to make them that icon of New Mexico: The green chili cheeseburger.

All the male family members elected to have the green chili. Us girls are wimps and stuck with ketchup.

I used frozen strawberries from the store, rhubarb from the garden, and peach jam I had canned this summer for the baked fruit. My original plan had been to make a cobbler with it, but I figured with the buns, we had enough bread in this meal. So it was just baked fruit and then we poured cream on it.

Monday

Short version: Elk and bean chili, strawberry/rhubarb cobbler with whipped cream

Long version: The day before I had thawed about four pounds of ground elk. I used about three pounds for the burgers--and yes, they were all eaten that night, welcome to my life--leaving me with a pound to use this day. Chili works well to stretch a pound of meat into something that will feed the ravenous hordes in my house.

Also, it was snowing, blowing, and way below freezing all day, so the woodstove was cranking. And that meant I could simmer the pot of chili on there.

Woodstove chili.

This was the very first day since we've lived here that I've cooked on this woodstove. I'll tell you all about that later. But I did cook on it, first simmering a pot of pinto beans, most of which went into this chili.

Also in the chili: The rest of the pureed squash, some pureed green chili, and the liquid and fat from cleaning out the pan I had broiled the elkburgers on the day before. Thrifty. And delicious.

There were actually leftovers of the previous night's baked fruit. To that, I added a few more frozen strawberries and more sugar, and then topped it with a sweetened biscuit dough to make a small cobbler in a pie pan. I had to use dry milk for the milk in the biscuits, as we were getting very low on milk, but I buy whole milk powder for just such occasions, so it worked out fine.

A heartening end to a day of the dreaded virtual schooling.

A. was at first taken aback by the idea of whipping cream to top this, telling me that ice cream was always served with cobbler when he was a boy. We had no ice cream, however, and he did say the whipped cream was a good substitute for the ice cream. I had no idea of what is traditional to serve with cobbler, because it wasn't something I really ate as a kid. But whipped cream has A.'s seal of approval now, so there you go.

Tuesday

Short version: Ham sandwiches, generic corn chips, and Reese's peanut butter cups on the road, Spanish rice and peanut butter cookies at home

Long version: The basketball player had an away game that was only about thirty miles from the town in which I can get the giant blocks of asadero cheese. Asadero is what I use in place of mozzarella. It's full-fat, slightly saltier, and much better than the part-skim, low-moisture mozzarella that is typically my only other option for pizza and things. This one store is the only one that carries the asadero, and we hadn't been there in awhile, so I had run through my freezer stash.

All this to say that I went to the store before going to the basketball game. I had asked the basketball player what he likes to get at Subway, since there is a Subway in the very small town his game was in. I figured I could get him a sandwich before the game and then we could just get in the car and drive home while he ate, so we'd get home earlier. 

But when he told me that what he usually gets is a ham sandwich with just cheese and mustard on it, I decided I would just buy the ingredients for a sandwich at the store. I could get ingredients for about four sandwiches for the cost of one sandwich at Subway. So that is what I did.

I had brought some of my own bread with me, originally thinking I would use that for his sandwich. But then I got him actual sandwich rolls, and I used the bread for my own. So I made sandwiches on my lap in the car before I went into the game.

Lap sandwich.

He also had the store-brand Fritos and I bought a package of snack-size Reese's peanut butter cups. He had two of those, and I gave one to everyone at home when we got home.

I had left a pot of rice mixed with leftover chili and cheese for dinner for the rest of the family, plus the remainder of the peanut butter cookies I had frozen earlier in the week.

Wednesday

Short version: Emergency Sonic on the road, lamb stew and garlic bread at home

Long version: I had made the lamb stew the day before, and the garlic bread when I was baking bread on Sunday. I figured it would make for a nice after-work meal. A. ended up serving this meal, because I was in the small city at the emergency room with a kid who got a piece of metal in his eye when he was grinding metal in shop class.

The doctor didn't see anything still in his eye, thankfully, but by the time we got out of there, it was 6 p.m. and we had an 90-minute drive still to get home. So we went to the Sonic near the hospital. The eye patient got a double bacon cheeseburger and onion rings. I got a kid's meal with a cheeseburger and tater tots, which is apparently only two dollars on Wednesdays. A happy coincidence.

Also, the Sonic guy handed us some random mozzarella sticks for free. I don't know if someone ordered them and then didn't pick them up, or if they made them accidentally, or what. But they got eaten. Most of them were eaten by the home crew, actually, because we shared when we got home.

Thursday

Short version: Dad's special bacon cheeseburgers, oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.

Long version: A. and I finally butchered the ram lamb this day. The cold weather allowed us to keep it all week until we finally got around to it. We ground some of the lamb meat, and while we had the grinder out, we ground some more elk, too. A. used some of the ground elk to make bacon cheeseburgers while I was at another basketball game. I had thought I would be home around 5:30, but the game was later than I thought. 

I brought the younger two to the game with me. They bought themselves a piece of pizza each from the concession stand. A. made a cheeseburger for one of them and the basketball player when we got home around 7 p.m. 

I had a rice cake with cream cheese and ham on it before I left. And then some cookies when I got home.

Refrigerator check:

The only way to get eggs for less than $6 a dozen right now is to buy them five dozen at a time. Then they're about $5 a dozen. Boo.

Okay, your turn! What'd you eat this week?

Winter Flowers

On Sunday afternoon, in anticipation of a long day inside on Monday because of wretched weather, I went for a run.

As I trotted around our ghost village, I passed some plants on the side of the road that I remembered noting in the summer. They looked like small corn plants, and I had guessed they had grown from some feed that fell out of our neighbor's truck. There were only a few of them, but they stood out because they had turned red as they died and dried out, and they still maintained their red color.

A lot of the plants here turn interesting colors in the fall when they die, mostly reds, oranges, and yellows. If I pick them earlier in the fall, they will stay those colors in the house. But if they stay out, the colors get much more muted when the very cold weather arrives. These corn plants (or whatever) had stayed quite red.

So I decided to pick one of them and make a winter arrangement with whatever else I could find. I gathered several different things on my last lap around the village, and when I got home, I put it all together.

I used sunflower seed heads as my anchor flowers, with dried kochia and grasses as the background plants.

The sunflower seed heads are a range of colors, from a darker orangish brown, to light brown, to even white.

Close up of the plant that started it all.

This is obviously a highly flammable arrangement, so we have to careful with the candles on the table. 

Looks cool, though.

I find this kind of flower/weed arranging to be the most satisfying. Making something beautiful from nothing special is my favorite thing to do. And I'm happy to have something pretty to look on my table again.

Snapshots: Winter Prep

I spent a few hours at church on Friday with some of the children, putting away the Christmas decorations, cleaning, and changing the altar cloths from the white of the feast days to the green of ordinary time.

Christmas church.

Ordinary church.

And the Infant of Prague in his ordinary green robe.

It was remarkably warm on Friday, much to the pleasure of the two lambs we have now.

Both female.

We knew, however, that some nasty weather was on the way, so we spent the rest of Friday preparing for it. I assigned each of the children a chore involving firewood.

Filling the wood holder near the door, splitting kindling, picking up kindling, and filling the wood holder inside.

The snow, wind, and cold arrived on Saturday.

Brrr.

There was a lot of reading by the woodstove.

Sharing the stove with the frozen sausages thawing.

Even colder weather is expected in the next couple of days, so we'll see if we end up going to school. 

There you have it! My life, snapshotted.

Friday Food: Elkloaf

Friday 

Short version: Oven barbecue chicken, roasted potatoes, frozen peas, calabaza, chocolate chip cookies

Long version: I took out two of the big packages of chicken leg quarters to thaw, knowing that would be more than we needed for dinner. So when I roasted them, I kept them plain except for salt and pepper, and then added (homemade) barbecue sauce to just about 3/4 of them at the end of the baking. That way I had some plain ones left over for something else.

I had used both my half-sheet pans to make cookies earlier in the day--chocolate chip with crushed almonds--and so I used one of those for the chicken and one for the potatoes without bothering to wash them. 

I had also baked one of the big calabazas earlier in the day and pureed it all, so we had some of that too.

And apparently I took a picture:

Of A.'s plate, I do believe.

Saturday

Short version: Elk meatloaf, garlic bread, mashed potatoes, maple carrots, chocolate chip cookies

Long version: We had some unexpected guests come stay with us, so the plan I had for the leftover chicken was not going to be enough food for everyone. Quick-thawing ground elk to the rescue! Which I used to make the meatloaf.

I let the kids eat the garlic bread while we were waiting on dinner, because we ate later than we usually do and they were very hungry. I had been planning on saving the bread for some other day, but I didn't have any particular plan in mind for it, so it seemed like appeasing hungry children was a good use for it.

The carrots were a bag of the blanched carrots that I stuck in the oven in a covered casserole while the meatloaf was baking until they were soft, then I just added butter and a small amount of maple syrup to them.

And I didn't even have to make a dessert, since I already had cookies on hand. Yay for on-hand cookies.

Sunday

Short version: Chicken and bean toasted burritos, raw radishes and bell peppers, vanilla ice cream with maple syrup

Long version: This was the leftover chicken I had been planning to use the night before. I just heated it up with salsa and spices, and then made toasted burritos with it, cheese, and canned refried beans.

Monday

Short version: Choice of leftovers

Long version: A. and two children had leftover meatloaf and mashed potatoes, plus either pureed calabaza or raw vegetables.

The other two children wanted the chicken and vegetable soup I had made on Saturday with the leftover chicken bones and some meat. They also had cheese with their soup.

I had a salad with some leftover chicken in it.

Tuesday

Short version: Lamb curry (with chutney!), rice, peanut butter cookies

Long version: I took out a bag of lamb steaks that came from the back leg. This means they were quite tender meat that didn't need to be cooked a long time. I cut off the bony ends of them and used those pieces to make a stock, in which I cooked the onions, potatoes, carrots, peas, and diced lamb that came from the rest of the steaks. And I always add cream at the end to curry. 

I also had some pureed squash in the refrigerator, because our elderly neighbor --the one with whom we had butchered the bull--gave A. an odd squash she grew that she said did really well here. 

Luckily, it just barely fit in my biggest pan on the diagonal.

I pureed the resulting cooked squash, so I threw a few spoonfuls of that into the curry. 

And then last time I had cooked split peas, I made a whole pot and then froze some flat in quart bags for future curry-making. So I took some of those of the freezer to add to the curry too. The split peas and the squash thicken it nicely, as well as bulking it up and adding some more flavor and protein.

I am still very pleased to have the green tomato chutney again, even if only about half the family eats it on their curry.

These peanut butter cookies.

That recipe fills the cookie jar nicely.

Wednesday

Short version: More leftovers

Long version: Two kids had leftover meatloaf in sandwiches.

Very large sandwiches, as it turned out.

One had meatloaf with the last of the mashed potatoes. One kid and A. had leftover curry and rice. I had a salad with the last of the leftover chicken in it. 

Many containers removed from the refrigerator, which is always nice.

Thursday

Short version: Lamb and chickpeas, mashed potatoes

Long version: I had two big lamb steaks that I hadn't used for the curry. After simmering those so I could pull the meat off, I combined that lamb with already-cooked chickpeas I took out of the freezer, random pork stock from the freezer, duck stock from the freezer, some whole frozen tomatoes from the freezer, onion, garlic, and yogurt at the end. Plus some cornstarch to thicken it and make it saucy. That's what went over the mashed potatoes.

This is definitely the time of year when I shop my freezers heavily.

No, I did not forget to list the vegetable. I didn't make one. Oh well.

Refrigerator check:

Okay, your turn! What'd you eat this week?

Old Snapshots

I went into "New Post" this morning with absolutely no idea what I was going to write. So I thought, "Well, there's always photos."

And then I scrolled down my photos collection and started grabbing old ones to look at with you. Fun!

This, for instance, is exactly a year ago today, when we had terrible cold and rime.

This was the weather that froze our pipes for a few days. Good times. (Not really.)

We have a weekend of very cold, windy, and snowy weather coming up, and you'd better believe we're going to be extra careful of our pipes.

Here's a close-up of Cora from a couple of summers ago.

Glaring at me because I insist on putting children on her back and not letting her eat the delicious grass she's walking right past.

And here's Odin in the verdant grass of a wet summer a couple of years ago.

Well, as verdant as it ever gets around here.

Also from that summer: a gaggle of lambs.

Reclining at their ease in the sun. The lamb that was born yesterday morning has yet to experience this kind of luxury, poor thing. 

And I'll leave you with a dog photo:

Good old Jasper, always at my feet.

Snapshots: Winter Weather

 I put away all the Christmas stuff on Tuesday.

Getting all the nativity pieces back in this styrofoam holder was rather like a puzzle.

Wednesday didn't start out too well. I knocked over a jar of vinegar while I was turning on the light, and then I somehow managed to knock over my entire cup of coffee. I don't even know how I did that.

Cleaning it up required getting everything off this counter so I could mop it all up. And then I had to make more coffee.

The day improved when I got a call at 5:15 a.m. that we were going to have a two-hour delay because of fog. Hooray! Everyone can sleep in! No inspirational music necessary. 

It was pretty cold in my office when I finally got to school. Mostly because I don't actually have heat in there, except this very small space heater.

Which I park under my desk to trap as much heat as possible.

The next day, we had some really terrible wind in addition to cold. It was no weather to be out in. This cow at one of our bus stops agreed.

Pretty sure she was watching the house door, hoping to make a break for it.

There you have it! My life, snapshotted.

Friday Food: Soup 'n' Stuff

Friday 

Short version: Leftovers, rotisserie chicken, bread and butter

Long version: I got home from my night away just in time to put groceries away and then take the basketball player to his game, along with the two younger children. We got home from this around 5 p.m., at which point I heated up leftover lamb steaks, black-eyed peas, and the rotisserie chicken I had bought at the store. Bread and butter to round things out a bit.

Saturday

Short version: Salisbury steaks, mashed potatoes, leftover carrots

Long version: A. and I spent a couple of hours grinding elk meat, so I used some of that to make Salisbury steaks for dinner. I've never looked at a recipe for these. All I do is make essentially a meatloaf mixture--meat, bread crumbs, milk, eggs, onions, seasoning--and then form it into basically very big hamburger patties. Brown, cook until tender in some stock--I had chicken stock I had made from the rotisserie chicken carcass--then make a gravy with milk or cream. So good.

As A. remarked, this whole meal was like a cafeteria lunch, except actually good.

Sunday

Short version: Epiphany tacos, gingerbread with whipped cream

Long version: The last celebratory holiday meal. I did not make tamales at all this year, but Poppy had requested tortillas, which seemed much more reasonable. I had enough leftover pork butt for the filling, so we had pork tacos.

We have tacos a lot, but these were fancy tacos.

Because of the homemade tortillas.

And I also thought ahead enough to get avocados and lime for guacamole.

The gingerbread was the extra I had frozen after making it for the FFA auction. We definitely did not need any extra treats at that time, but it was very appreciated this night. I microwaved it for a minute to heat it up, because gingerbread is much better warm. And with whipped cream, but that goes without saying.

Monday

Short version: Creamy chicken soup, salami and cream cheese sandwiches, ice cream

Long version: I had actually made the soup on Saturday just to have on hand for my lunch at work or whatever. And then I definitely did not think ahead enough for dinner after work. I'm just very tired of the kitchen right now, and planning dinner on top of going back to work at school was too much.

Good thing we had the soup! And salami. We needed the sandwiches, because there wasn't a lot of soup. And also, most of my family does not consider soup to be a meal unto itself.

I had a little bit of chocolate chip ice cream in the freezer that had gotten a bit icy and needed to be eaten. So I microwaved it a bit, which made it a little melty and took care of the icy problem. It was eaten with no complaints.

And yes, every part of this meal had something in it made with cream. What can I say? We're a dairy family.

The basketball player had leftover salisbury steak, mashed potatoes, black-eyed peas, and a banana when he got home.

Tuesday

Short version: Hunter's pie, cookies

Long version: This was pretty much shepherd's pie, but since I used the ground elk in it, I suppose it's a hunter's pie. Or something. I had to be gone right before dinner to pick up Poppy at cheerleading, so having something made ahead of time was a good idea.

It was baking while I was driving, so when I got home after 5 p.m., we could eat right away. I had thought there would be leftovers of this. There were not.

And I'm back to making cookies for school snacks. These were chocolate chip/peanut butter/almond cookies. I made that kind mostly because the child who likes to eat bowls of microwaved peanut butter and honey had left like half a cup of that when he got interrupted to do something, so I saved it and used it in the cookies.

Wednesday

Short version: Spaghetti and meatballs, fried potatoes and ham, raw bell peppers and radishes

Long version: These were some more of the meatballs I had formed and frozen some time ago. I just took them out thaw while was at work, then broiled them and baked them in the oven with some of my roasted tomato sauce from the freezer. 

Same sauce on the spaghetti, except I added some butter to it. I do this a lot in lieu of grating Parmesan cheese, which often just seems like the culinary straw that will break this cook's back after work.

Not to be too dramatic or anything.

There wasn't quite enough of the meatballs, so I also took out a small bag of ham I had frozen last week when we were down to the last of the leftover Christmas ham. I microwaved a couple of potatoes, chopped them and the ham, fried them both in butter, and added the last of the grated cheddar cheese from Sunday's tacos.

Thursday

Short version: Creamy sausage and vegetable soup, cheese quesadillas

Long version: I had to sub for a classroom teacher this day, but I knew on Tuesday that I would be doing this. So while I was in the kitchen making the hunter's pie and cookies, I used the rest of the chicken stock I had on hand to make soup with a package of smoked sausage, carrots, potatoes, frozen corn and peas, and some of the dried lamb's quarters I'm still trying to use up.

And some cream at the end, because my family likes pretty much all soups more with cream in them.

Quesadillas so it wouldn't just be soup. 

This was a very nice meal to have on a terribly windy and cold day at the end of a long first week of school back after break. Dare I say comfort food? Yes, I dare.

Refrigerator check:

The overstuffed Christmas refrigerator is a thing of the past.

Okay, your turn! What'd you eat this week?