I'm Just Here for the Validation

You know how it is when you accomplish something relatively small but nonetheless satisfying and you just know no one else is even going to notice, much less congratulate you on your accomplishment?

That was today, when I finally climbed up and down a chair many, many times to scrub off the disgusting combination of grease* and dust that was furring all the high edges of cabinets and the ceiling fan in the kitchen.

No one will notice this in my house except for me. Therefore, I'm just going to share this minor accomplishment with the Internet at large so as to feel appreciated.

Have you accomplished anything unheralded but satisfying lately? Please do share so I can congratulate you.

* I fry things a lot. Mostly meat. I have often thought that my kitchen would be a lot easier to keep clean if I wasn't feeding so many militant carnivores every day. 

Friday Food: The Elk Is Back

Friday

Short version: Mutton backstrap, pasta, frozen green peas

Long version: The backstrap is one of the best cuts of meat, which means I don't have to do anything with it other than slice it, season it, and fry it. Which I did. And it was good.

The pasta had random sauce I made from some pureed tomatoes (the tasteless Sysco ones that I cooked a bit and then pureed in the food processor, skins and all, before putting small containers of it in the freezer), the last two cubes of pesto from the freezer, and some heavy cream. Sometimes those kinds of thrown-together sauces work, and sometimes they don't. This one worked.

Probably it was mostly because of the pesto. I really hope the eleven basil plants I have to plant out soon make it and produce a lot of basil for pesto this year.

Saturday

Short version: Ground beef tacos with homemade corn tortillas

Long version: Standard taco meat and tortillas, with the exciting addition of hot chili sauce for A. I make taco meat pretty mild--I could claim it's because of all the small children I'm feeding, but really it's because of me and my wimpy tastebuds--and A. has said he would like some hot sauce to put on tacos and chili and so on.

I was going to buy some hot sauce, but then I decided that was stupid when I had a huge bag of dried red chilis A. bought at the store a couple of months ago. All I did with them was soak them in hot water until they were soft, then puree them in the food processor and add some salt and vinegar. It was pretty hot, and A. was very pleased with it. As was Cubby. His tastebuds are far tougher than mine.

Random photo break! A. took this one down in the canyon at a place they stopped to fish (unsuccessfully):

This looks unreal to me, like a movie set or something.

Sunday

Short version: Pork, breads, squash, frozen green beans, graham cracker cookies

Long version: Pork butt cooked carnitas-style (that is, slow cooked, then fried in lard), more of the garlic bread dough that I cut into individual portions and allowed the children to season as they wished, and the very last of the frozen squash from last year.

The cookies are a recipe I got from the lady we used to buy milk from. They have only whole-wheat flour and the main sweeteners are Sucanat (the lady gave some to me, which is the only reason I have it) and honey. That makes them practically health food. I make them in small squares and call them cookies. They're pretty good, actually, although calling them cookies is a stretch.

Monday

Short version: Split-pea curry, leftover pork, leftover rice, frozen green beans, arugula salad

Long version: My children sometimes engage in what I call "mob eating." That is, one of them gets so enthusiastic about a particular food that they all jump on the bandwagon and eat multiple servings of whatever it is. In this case, it was the curry.

It was just a yellow curry of split peas, with some random pureed tomatoes I needed to use up, and a bit of heavy cream, but the children, led by Cubby, ate SO MUCH CURRY. They all ate two servings of  rice and curry and, when the rice was gone, started on bowls of just curried split peas. I put a stop to that after a couple of bowls each. I feared for their digestion.

The arugula was starting to bolt and will definitely finish that process in the multiple days this weekend when we're supposed to be over 90 degrees (WHAT?), so I pulled it up. I'm sad to say good-bye to the arugula. It never lasts as long as I would like it to.

I helped Jack do one of the crafts his preschool teacher sent home:

It's a chick. He did not like it, hence the sulky face.

And then, of course, Poppy wanted to make something, so I stretched my creativity to the limit and helped her make a pig:

You think I'm joking, but this really is the limit of my crafting ability. I would be the world's worst preschool teacher.

Tuesday

Short version: Leftover curry, boiled potatoes, fried eggs, frozen green beans

Long version: Despite his enthusiasm the night before, Charlie elected to not have the curry over the potatoes. Everyone else had it, though, along with the eggs and the inevitable green beans.

Wednesday

Short version: Pizza, cucumber slices with vinegar and salt

Long version: I decided to make pizza mostly because I needed to trim the basil plants that are really getting too tall for the grow box in the kitchen but can't go outside just yet. Also, it was going to be cool enough to crank the oven up for pizza without wanting to douse myself in ice water.

As if I really need reasons to make pizza.

These were particularly good, too. One was just cheese, and one was half bacon with anchovy paste and half roasted bell pepper and onion/green garlic/thinly sliced raw onion.

I ate the one with the variety of alliums, which was one of the best pizzas I have ever had. More alliums, more better.

And why did we have bell peppers and cucumber? Because A. went to the grocery store. For the first time in seven weeks. I was SO EXCITED.

So were the children. They dove right into the grapes as soon as he got home. I had a seltzer. And there was much rejoicing in the land.

Thursday

Short version: Elk bites, leftover potatoes, green salad with ranch dressing

Long version: You thought the elk was gone, didn't you? THINK AGAIN.

There are still at least three bags of elk in the freezer. I figured enough time had elapsed since we last ate it that the children wouldn't be too displeased to see it on their plates.

I was right. They all went back for seconds of meat. The ketchup I allow them to have it with it might have something to do with that.

Charlie ate all of his salad without comment, which is how I discovered that it's not the salad he objects to, but the vinaigrette I usually make for a salad dressing. It doesn't take much longer to make the ranch dressing, so I guess I'll be doing that more often.

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

Welcome to the Hatchery

I'll just start off with the picture everyone is waiting for: The fluffy chicks.

Taken right after I put fresh paper towels down in their tub, because otherwise it's just too nasty to show the world. Birds are gross.

I've never used an incubator before to hatch eggs, but we have fertilized eggs, thanks to our mean rooster that terrifies the children, but apparently fulfills his natural duties. A. was starting to talk about making a homemade incubator, but the temperature and humidity have to be within a very small range for the chicks to form correctly, and I was worried about cooking the chicks or something in a homemade incubator.

So then I looked into buying an incubator, but I could see right away that you definitely get what you pay for with incubators, and I did not want to spend hundreds of dollars on a good one.

And THEN, Jack's preschool teacher mentioned she was thinking of borrowing an incubator from one of the other teachers. This is one of the incubators they use at the school to hatch chicks with the kids every year, but obviously, that was not happening this year. So I offered to keep the incubator here and take care of the eggs given to me by the preschool teacher, along with thirteen eggs of our own.

It seemed sort of unlikely that putting the same eggs I eat for breakfast into a heated styrofoam box would result in chickens, but I took the leap of faith that is artificial incubation.

This incubator was a really nice one. Not only does it have a thermostat and temperature regulator, it also has a humidity read-out (although it required some experimentation to figure out how much water to put in at what intervals to keep the humidity at the right level). 

And most importantly, it turns the eggs automatically.

The eggs have to be turned so the forming chicks don't stick to the side of the egg. Without an automatic turner, I would have had to turn every single egg at least three times a day.

I could do without that kind of commitment. I found it hard enough to keep the humidity levels at the right place.

Anyway.

After ten days of incubation, the eggs can be candled. This is just shining a light through the egg, and is how you determine if the chicks are actually forming in there or if the egg is a dud. As you might guess from the name, this was originally done with an actual candle, although the best method in the modern day is using the light on a smart phone.

I found that really funny.

Anyway again.

The light from the phone showed us that all thirteen of our eggs seemed to be developing, and only two of the preschool teacher's eggs were. I removed the non-fertile eggs, leaving 15 eggs still in the incubator. And then, ten days later, I woke up to cheeping in the kitchen.

CHIIIIICK!

Chicken eggs are supposed to take 21 days to hatch, and that little dude (or, I hope, dudette) was early. It spent a lonely day in the incubator with nothing but eggs for company until the next chick started to break out just before the children's bedtime.

Of course, I let them stay awake to watch it hatch out all the way:

It took the chick about half an hour to get all the way out, by which time I was reeeeally tired and the children were reeeeally hyped up.

By the next morning, there were three more already hatched out and one more working its way out. We watched that one hatch out all the way, too.

Newly-hatched chicks are really not cute. They're pretty wet and unappealing, actually.

One more chick hatched out later that day, bringing our total to seven. 

They're supposed to stay in the incubator until they're dry, so I left them in there until that night and then transferred them to their feed-tub brooder in the kids' bathroom, leaving the remaining eight eggs in the incubator.

It's possible for chicken eggs to hatch as late as 25 days, so I'm going to leave those eight in there until tomorrow, although I don't really think they're going to do anything.

Two of the seven chicks are going to the preschool teacher, leaving us with only five chicks. I was planning on putting new eggs into the incubator and doing it all over again, but now one of our hens appears to have decided to go broody.

So maybe she'll do it for me. But if she doesn't, I can go broody myself, with the help of some modern machinery.

We Have Chicks!

And I hatched them myself!

Okay, so I didn't actually sit on a clutch of eggs myself until they hatched, but I did manage to successfully use an incubator for the first time ever to hatch chicks.

We have seven. They are very cute. Pictures and story to come when I don't have to spend the day on Zoom school meetings . . .

Until then, you can go read this thing I wrote for Kristen-with-an-"e" about going grocery shopping less frequently. (Of all the things I ever thought I would become an expert on, that was not a thing I had ever considered. Life sure is funny like that.)

Friday Food: Cheap Chicken and Disappointing Cookies

Friday

Short version: Sheep chili, tortillas and cheese, carrot sticks

Long version: I was planning on making corn muffins, but ran out of motivation. So I squandered some of our last precious store-bought corn tortillas for this meal. When we're almost out of corn tortillas--which I buy in 80-count bags--you know it's been a long time since we've been to a store.

This day was five weeks and one day since the last visit to the grocery store, for those who are interested.

Saturday

Short version: Chicken drumsticks, garlic bread, coleslaw

Long version: A. bought a bunch of cheap chicken drumsticks when he was at the store over a month ago. The last time I cooked some of it, I threw together a very random sauce for it that everyone loved. Even A., who does not love drumsticks. He asked that I do that again.

Sure! If . . . I can remember what I did. I think I managed to replicate it, though. After browning the chicken--which was coated in salt, paprika, and garlic powder--I put it in a 400-degree oven to start cooking. Then, in the chicken pan, I cooked a bit of diced onion, then added some ketchup, mustard, vinegar, and more garlic powder. This was poured over the chicken to reduce while the chicken was cooking.

While I was making the coleslaw in the morning with the last quarter of a cabbage and a few of the last carrots, the children swirled through the kitchen and devoured the remaining carrots. And that was the end of every last fresh vegetable in the refrigerator.

Sunday

Short version: Leftovers, potatoes, eggs, oatmeal-raisin cookies

Long version: We went on a family excursion to this canyon and didn't get home until later than I had anticipated. And then, as soon as we got home, I had to plant out some of my overly large tomato plants in the beds A. had prepared the day before. So I was kind of late getting going on dinner. We were still eating by 5:30 p.m, though.

The kids ate leftover chicken, coleslaw, and the potatoes, which were the par-cooked and frozen potatoes. I put them in a cast-iron pan, still frozen, with some leftover hamburger grease and fried them until they were hot and crispy all around.

I had just a bit of ground beef left from making hamburgers a few nights previously, so I made one hamburger patty for A., and then he ate some fried eggs too.

I had fried eggs and some random leftover vegetables with soy sauce and vinegar on them.

The cookies were the remains of a marathon of cookie baking I did on Wednesday for the students at the school. We had a "pick-up parade" on Thursday, during which all the students drove to the school curb and we handed them all the things they had left at school. I figured it was a bummer to drive all that way (some people are driving as far as 90 miles to get to school) only to pick up some dirty shoes and water bottles, so I volunteered to make cookies for everyone.

There are less than 50 kids on campus, so that's less than 100 cookies.

I'm out of chocolate chips but have lots of raisins, so I decided on oatmeal-raisin. Unfortunately, oatmeal cookies are apparently somewhat tricky at high altitudes, as I discovered when I made this recipe for "thick, chewy" oatmeal cookies that absolutely flattened in the oven. They were as flat as cookies can be, and overly crispy. They tasted good, but I was not about to distribute those things to the community at large.

When I made the recipe a second time, they were somewhat better, but still too flat and brown. And not chewy. It was the MiL, who used to live in Albuquerque and is a much better baker than I am, who diagnosed my altitude problem. Oatmeal cookies have much less flour than, say, a chocolate-chip cookie, which I guess is the issue. She told me to add extra flour and half the amount of leavening next time.

Meanwhile, every student got a baggie with two crispy oatmeal cookies, and my kids got all the really flat ones. I actually froze about half of that batch as balls of raw dough, so I wouldn't have to spend the time baking them, and I baked them from the frozen balls right after dinner for our Sunday dessert. They were actually much improved by the freezing time (which the recipe author mentions in the recipe), so they were slightly less flat. Though still by no means thick and chewy.

Monday

Short version: Potatoes/bacon/cheese/peas

Long version: This day got a little complicated, with some extra meetings that made my workday go longer, and then we had to go rescue the van, which had to be left at the canyon we visited the day before because of a flat tire.

Anyway, in between those two things, I made a very fast dinner of some of those par-cooked potatoes fried with small pieces of bacon. Then I added some cheese and, at the last minute, peas to make it an all-in-one meal.

Unfortunately, those frozen potatoes didn't re-heat well in the skillet. They were still a bit under cooked, which is never good for potatoes.

You know what is good, though? Poppy's Easter outfit. Her floofy dress had no sleeves, so she accessorized with a cropped denim jacket.

More fashionable at two than her mother will ever be.

Tuesday

Short version: Roasted Italian sausage, potatoes, frozen green beans

Long version: In my rush to make dinner and get out the door to get the van the day before, I put the bag of frozen potatoes into the refrigerator instead of the freezer. So I figured I'd better use them up. I put them right on the pan with the last package of Italian sausage the MiL brought from Albuquerque (sad day), and later, some of the frozen green beans went right on that pan, too.

Roasted frozen green beans don't get as brown and crispy as roasted fresh green beans, but I much prefer the frozen ones roasted rather than cooked in water. They taste much less, well, water-logged.

The boys ate their green beans still frozen.

The potatoes were perfectly cooked this time. Everything is better roasted.

Wednesday

Short version: Mutton backstrap, personalized garlic bread, frozen green beans

Long version: The backstrap is one of the most tender cuts of meat, so all I did was slice it into medallions and sear it on a hot griddle with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and paprika. It was delicious.

Cubby was hovering around the kitchen earlier in the day while I was making bread and asked if he could have some of the dough to make something. I was planning on making garlic bread, anyway, so I took the dough for that and divided it in to four pieces and let the children choose their own flavorings for their own piece. I put out pepper, garlic powder, oregano, basil, and dill, figuring they would choose one or two. Instead, they all chose all of them.

They really loved their breads, though, so more power to them.

Thursday

Short version: Bunless cheeseburgers, sauteed onion, oven fries, squash, frozen peas

Long version: My new method of making hamburgers with the cheap Sysco ground beef is to simply press the meat down over the whole surface of my griddle pan. As they cook, the meat shrinks and I cut it into patties. What this does is create very thin burgers, which is a good thing with that wet meat. Kind of gross while it's cooking, but the burgers were pretty good.

The squash was the very last bag of last year's squash from the freezer. A. planted the saved seeds from that very squash in the backyard garden two days ago. Fingers crossed they grow and produce more squash for the freezer.

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

Let's Get Crazy

It's been awhile since I could honestly claim to be in the throes of The Tomato Crazy. But I think this year might be the year.

Sunday night I planted out five quite large tomato plants that were too big for the box in the kitchen anymore. A. prepared a very nice spot for them. He divided half of the more-sheltered backyard garden into what he calls "flooding cells." They're square and have berms of earth all around the sides, to hold the water so he can just put the hose in there and, well, flood it.

We found that this is the only way to ensure tomatoes get enough water in our somewhat arid climate. Sprinklers don't cut it.

In addition to those five, I have seven more plants that aren't big enough to go outside. So that's a total of a dozen tomato plants. With the possibility of more from the giant Sysco Roma tomato seeds I asked Cubby to shove into an empty seed-starting container. Those are just starting to sprout.

Okay, so it's a far cry from the 120 seedlings I ended up with one year at Blackrock, but I'm still pretty excited to have those dozen+. And if I can actually get them to produce (unlike last year), that could well be a large quantity of tomatoes.

Dare I say maybe even a shitload? Yes, I dare. And dare I say that I'm even looking forward to sweating copiously in the kitchen while I can jar upon jar of homegrown tomatoes? Yes, I dare say even that. (Though I'm sure there will be some complaining right about August if that does come to pass.)

In addition to the tomatoes, I have way more pepper plants than I was anticipating having. The first planting was so slow to come up that I planted some more. And then, as I might have expected, they all came up. Mostly thanks to the heating pad I put under them.

So now I have eight bell pepper plants in pots, plus the paprika peppers the MiL sent us are just starting to come up now. There are two of those so far, with a possibility of three more to come.

So there, again, we're going to have about a dozen plants. And again, I am excited. Bell peppers are one of those things I always buy when I get to a store, but they're kind of expensive and, well, almost 100 miles away. If I can manage to have dozens of bell peppers right in my backyard? I will be living the dream.

Maybe that's not everyone's dream. And maybe I'm crazy, but it's a kind of crazy I'm willing to live with.

Friday Food: Easter Gyros

Friday

Short version: Scrambled eggs, pasta with tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese, leftover green beans

Long version: Sysco food is not the most flavorful food. I got a 25-pound box of Roma tomatoes from the school Sysco program, and they were the hardest, palest, most flavorless tomatoes I have ever encountered. I used some of them to make a sauce for the kids' pasta. It was uninspiring, but serviceable.

The mozzarella was also from the Sysco program. Pre-shredded, part-skim mozzarella is not my preference, but you know what they say about beggars choosing.

Saturday

Short version: Roasted Italian sausage, roasted potatoes, roasted tomatoes, roasted green beans

Long version: ROAST ALL THE THINGS!

Actually, the tomatoes were greatly improved with roasting. Cubby took a bite and said, "Hey, these tomatoes actually taste like something." Indeed. It didn't hurt that I added salt, garlic powder, and dried oregano to them, too. They were good with the sausage, anyway.

Sunday

Short version: Lamb gyros, french fries, bunny cake with ice cream

Long version: It's a Greek Easter.

So I marinated a leg of lamb that A. had boned with a bunch of tomato juice left from when I was cutting up the sad tomatoes to roast, olive oil, salt, pepper, and garlic. It sat in the refrigerator for almost 24 hours, which was a good thing. Then I tied it up, browned it, and threw it in a 400 degree oven with the french fries.

While that was cooking, I was making the pita bread*.

You know what P.I.T.A. stands for? Yeah, these were that. The dough wasn't particularly difficult to make, but then each pita has to be rolled out with a rolling pin, using a lot of flour so that it doesn't stick. But then all that extra flour goes on the screaming-hot griddle along with the bread and there, it burns. So the ENTIRE TIME I was rolling out and cooking the breads, every single smoke detector in the house was going off and Cubby was running hysterically around the house opening every last window.

They were good, but I'm not convinced it was worth it.

Anyway, I made french fries just because I always like french fries. And this is the bunny cake:

Even by my low standards, this is an Ugly Cake. A bit creepy, too. Delicious, though!

Monday

Short version: Leftover meat pizza-style, potato slices, green salad

Long version: There was a bit of lamb left from the night before, plus a couple of sausages, so I sliced both of those thinly, fried them, and added some tomato sauce I had made earlier.

I actually made Finny's Sauce with the terrible tomatoes from Sysco. I didn't have any wine, either, and just used a bit of balsamic vinegar. Even with terrible tomatoes and no wine, that sauce is still good. Maybe I'll re-name it Finny's Magic Sauce.

This is still salad from MY LETTUCE HOORAY! The excitement never dims.

Tuesday

Short version: Sheep lap, curried split peas, baked potatoes, garlic bread, carrot sticks

Long version: Man, this was the most random meal ever.

The lap is the breast of the sheep. It's a very thin, fatty, and quite tough cut. I had seen somewhere that it can be used to make a sort of bacon, so A. found a recipe somewhere that called for a dry rub of salt, pepper, and brown sugar, and we left it in the refrigerator for two weeks.

The resulting meat was quite sweet. Not much like bacon, but it was reminiscent of the lamb ribs A. makes sometimes. So I baked it at a low heat for a couple of hours, adding paprika and garlic powder to it. This made a chewy, crispy, very fatty meat. A. and Cubby liked it, Poppy ate it, but Charlie and Jack tried it and refused. They had some cheese instead.

I mostly made the curried split peas and baked potatoes for me, because I love curry and potatoes. Rafael had given us all those split peas, and I used to sometimes make dal, which is made with split lentils. Lentils split smaller than peas, but the peas still cooked up pretty quickly. All I did was cook some diced onion and garlic in oil, fry some sweet yellow curry powder in there, then add rinsed split peas, salt, and water. I ate mine over a baked potato with sour cream on top, and it was delicious.

Let us pause for a photo of this year's floofy Easter dress. Sadly, it went unappreciated by our church at large, but we all appreciated it very much.

And I didn't have to worry about the clashing striped pants underneath, so that's a bonus.

Wednesday

Short version: Bunless cheeseburgers, rice, frozen green beans

Long version: That cheap Sysco ground beef is much better as thin hamburgers rather than meatloaf. Not as wet.

Thursday

Short version: Grilled cheese sandwiches, frozen green beans

Long version: Those who wanted pizza grilled cheese had the remainder of Finny's sauce with mozzarella and, in Cubby and A.'s case, anchovy paste.

Speaking of Cubby, I decided to try to include him in the preparations for Easter dinner by asking him to make a centerpiece for the table out of some of the modeling clay they got in their baskets. I suggested a bunny. This is what he put on the table:

The beheading of the creepiest Easter bunny in existence.

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

* I used that recipe mostly because the author explained how her Palestinian grandmother used to make bread: She saved a small ball of dough from each batch and dropped it right into a bag of flour for the next batch. SEE? SEE?! No one is throwing away flour in places where food is hard to come by. (And where bread is made frequently.)