camp food

Just because your camping doesn't mean your food has to suck!  If you make a meal plan and a list of everything you need to prepare it; cooking real food while camping is easy and oh so worth it.

Here was our weekly dinner menu:

Wednesday:  Costco hot dogs (the best!) with all the fix-ins.  S'mores on the side!

Thursday: Tilapia fish tacos with homemade tarter sauce and sautéed green beans with onions.

Friday:  Teriyaki marinated chicken, cous cous, and asparagus.  Costco rolls with creamy honey.

Saturday:  Spaghetti with meat sauce and green beans.

Sunday:  Chicken fajitas with corn and bell peppers, sautéed cabbage on the side.  The boys also made cheesy potatoes.

I was really surprised how quickly the food disappeared.  I went on a huge Costco run before this trip, not knowing how much food four boys would eat.  But somehow I got it spot on, and we ran out of food right on the last day.  Huzzah.

a compliment

Last night while talking to Kevin, he says:

"I really miss your cooking."

This is probably one of the nicest compliments my husband could ever give me. Ok not really, but it is up there.

So he planned what he wanted to do for our Valentines dinner (and Hooray-You-Are-Home dinner), that we will be celebrating Wednesday night.
He wants to cook a meal together. So cute. This man never wants to cook.

So now I am even more excited for Wednesday.

the salad

I love to cook. But it's definitely not as fun when your only cooking for one. While Kevin has been gone I have been taking it easy on the cooking. I have eaten a lot of salads, since those are the easiest to prepare once you have all the ingredients you want.
I decided that this chicken is the best on my salads:

Slow Cooker Honey Sesame Chicken

3-4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (thighs would be fine too)
Salt and pepper
1/2 cup honey (I reduced this to a half a cup from a whole cup, that just seemed like a lot of honey to me)
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup diced onion
1/4 cup ketchup
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 cloves garlic, minced

I put frozen chicken breasts in my slow cooker, sprinkled with some salt and pepper. I then mix all the rest ingredients together, and pour over chicken. I usually cook on low for 8 or so hours. I start it in the afternoon, then have to work late.

When its done, I remove the chicken from the sauce (I just throw the sauce away) and shred it. Let it cool completely, then put it in a container in the fridge! Now you have awesome, flavorful protein to put on your salad!

Adapted from here.


Also in my favorite salad:
Baby lettuce
Pine nuts (Costco)
Craisins (Costco)
Feta cheese (Costco)
Balsamic glaze
Homemade olive oil/ garlic/ red wine vinegar salad dressing

Recipe: Baked Shrimp Scampi

My MIL got me some non-alcoholic wines to cook with for Christmas. So to test out the white, I made some shrimp scampi to use up a bag of shrimp in our freezer.
I found this recipe on the Food Network website. I subscribed to their magazine for Christmas; really excited about it.

Kevin gave this an A+, which is pretty spectacular. Me, I give it a B.







I served it with roasted green beans, probably my favorite side dish right now.
All you do is preheat the oven to 400.
Drizzle, or drench-you decide, olive oil and kosher salt on the green beans (or asparagus)
Roast for 10-20 minutes. Depends on your taste.

I also served it with my favorite easy homemade foccacia bread.



Baked Shrimp Scampi

1 pound shrimp, in shell-cooked or uncooked
2 tablespoons good olive oil
1 tablespoons dry white wine
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
3 teaspoons minced garlic (4 cloves)
1/8 cup minced shallots
3 tablespoons minced fresh parsley leaves
1 teaspoon minced fresh rosemary leaves
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
1 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 egg yolk
1/3 cup panko (Japanese dried bread flakes)
Lemon wedges, for serving

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

Peel, devein, and butterfly the shrimp, leaving the tails on. Place the shrimp in a mixing bowl and toss gently with the olive oil, wine, 2 teaspoons salt, and 1 teaspoon pepper. Allow to sit at room temperature while you make the butter and garlic mixture.

In a small bowl, mash the softened butter with the garlic, shallots, parsley, rosemary, lemon zest, lemon juice, egg yolk, panko, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon of pepper until combined.

Starting from the outer edge of a 14-inch oval gratin dish, arrange the shrimp in a single layer cut side down with the tails curling up and towards the center of the dish. Pour the remaining marinade over the shrimp. Spread the butter mixture evenly over the shrimp. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes until hot and bubbly. If you like the top browned, place under a broiler for 1 minute. Serve with lemon wedges.

How To: make your own kombucha

My mother gave me a SCOBY for Christmas! What is a SCOBY you ask? It's an acronym for Symbiotic Culture of Bacteria and Yeast. It is the living mushroom that is formed from living kombucha cultures during the fermentation process.

Kevin believes that this drink can heal anything. He is a real Hippie you see. No I kid, he just believes it can ward off a cold. Any time he has felt something come on, he drinks a bottle of this and it goes away. And I believe him. And me, I just like the taste of it. But since it is around $4.00 a bottle, we buy it sparingly. But look no further Malorie! Your mother has made it possible for you to make your OWN kombucha!! It is quite crazy. I tasted some of the liquid swimming around the 'Mother' aka SCOBY and it tasted exactly like the bottled kombucha. Awesome.

So if anyone wants a 'baby' from my next batch I am selling them for $1000, no $10,000! Kidding. For family its free. For all you random's its $5. This is hard work people!



This is what I got for Christmas. "Mother...what...is this?.."




The 'MOTHER!'




So if you want to learn how to make your own:

Here's a recipe.

Heres a video to watch that helped me a ton. I maybe watched it 3 times.



I just made my first batch. Now I have to wait between 5-30 days for the final product. I will let you know how it goes!

finally

I finally caught a little of the Christmas bug. It always takes me a while. But I will admit to listening to Christmas music right when Thanksgiving is over. I really love me some Christmas tunes.

I made chocolates a while ago, but this year I also wanted to try and make my mother-in-law's rocky road. So, since the bug bit me, I decided to make a small batch to give to my friends along with some chocolates. Lucky ducks.

I always laugh at my decorating ability. Its nonexistent. I thought I could be O.K. at decorating. But then I realized this was a lie when I got married. I like too much stuff. But I don't know how to put hues, textures and designs together. I did take a interior design class in high school, but the only thing I remember from that class was my teacher taking my phone away from me for the entire day. So maybe that shows how much I liked that class.
I also don't like spending money on decorations; but I like the expensive stuff. This means I just don't buy anything.
I told myself that with all the money being saved, once we move into our dream home, in who knows how many years, we can buy nice, expensive furniture and decorations and an interior designer to go with it.



So here are all my Christmas decorations:

1) A fake tree that my sister gave me when they got a bigger and better tree.
We really wanted to go and chop down a tree this year, but the permits for the area we wanted to chop one down in were all sold out. So hopefully that tradition will be started next year. Note to self: Buy permit in November.
I got the skirt, ornaments and bow on extreme clearance one year only because my mother and sister made me get them.

2) A christmas tree candle. yum.

3) A wooden santa my mom gave me.





Now onto shopping.

a new rule

We made a new rule for our household this week.

Never, ever make homemade pizza.

We have had it.

We have tried one too many times, get overly excited, and much too our disappointment, they never turn out.
All that cheese! All that homemade tomato sauce! All that homemade pizza dough!

I feel really bad for our future kids. They will never be able to taste the sweet taste of homemade pizza.
Sorry kids, mom is just not made out for it. And dad gets really frustrated when it doesn't turn out. But he will go and get you a Domino's cheese pizza when all else fails.
But just the cheapest one. None of that fancy stuff.

Thanksgiving: Part 1

For Thanksgiving this year we went down to St. George for the weekend. It was quite grand to have everyone together. It's even grander that we all get along.

On Thanksgiving day the girls went on a road bike ride and while we were preparing the food, the boys went mountain biking and golfing. The girls all picked dishes to make for the big meal. I chose stuffing, since that is my favorite thanksgiving dish, and creamed corn. I was really scared making stuffing for the first time for the entire family but it actually turned out good. The creamed corn didn't turn out how I wanted it to, since my moms recipe calls for dehydrated corn and I used frozen corn. Next time I won't be so lazy and will dehydrate the corn. But everything else turned out wonderful!




Me and Kevin had to sit at the kids corner because we aren't "producers" or "producing".



While all the boys napped, Jeremy decided to tie up Alta.







Alta then told me to take pictures of her. This was what I had to work with:

the chocolate factory

For a while now my mother, my sister and myself have been making and dipping chocolates for Christmas. It has become a tradition that I love. We, well really my mom, makes the cream centers (mint, lemon, lime, strawberry, raspberry, cherry, maple-pecan, coconut, peanut butter...the possibilities are endless here) and then we, me and my sister, dip them and make them look pretty. It usually takes a few days to do, especially now with two little nieces in the mix. We planned for last Friday as dipping day and set the whole day aside. Even with the whole day we barely finished them all. Since my mom is the Relief Society president we ended up having to take care of three additional kids due to the mom having to run to the hospital. A set of 5 month old twins and a 3 year old. Holy cow. We quickly put Hadley down for a nap, my dad watched Afton and my mom, myself and Chelsey looked after the candy-crazed three year old and the throwing up twins. I kid you not, just one twin threw up on me 4 times in a total of 20 minutes. Not cool. The twins also threw up on Chels. And the blankets. And the floor. I decided then I really do not want twins. Ever. Or a three year old who demands candy, juice and popcorn all at once. Kevin stopped by when all of this was happening and was glad he could only stay for a few minutes. He doesn't want twins either. Even though the twin girl could not take her eyes off or stop smiling at Kevin. That was the only cute part of this whole scenario.








We somehow managed to finish. And Chelsey loved her little Afton even more when all the kids left. She doesn't throw up. She's not a twin. She slept through the whole thing. Good girl.


After the chocolates were done, me and Chelsey went and saw Breaking Dawn with a bunch of her girlfriends. It was good. Everything I expected it to be; everything I expected it not to be. Kinda scary, lots of sexy, too much wolf talk. After all the sexy time, the girls next to me were like "Thats IT!!" Ha. Really? I thought. I barely made it through.

But I did love the preview for The Hunger Games. OH boy. It gives me chills every time I watch it. I have a thing for good previews you see. I love a good put-together preview. I love when the music matches the action and excitement; and I only have two previews that match this description:

1) Terminator Salvation



2) Hunger Games



Hunger Games rules. March 23rd can't come soon enough.

how to: tofu

I love tofu. I am not sure where this love came from, but whenever tofu is an option on the menu, I get it. At restaurants I loved the texture, flavor and density of their tofu. But I never really knew how to make it at home. I knew that you had to press it, but never wanted to really invest in a tofu press. Sounded silly to me. So I made it without pressing it, but it never was how I wanted it to be.

But then I decided to make my own press. Maybe after 500 pressings, my husbands textbooks will have been worth the money.

On second thought, this is a pretty expensive tofu press.

Yummy Tofu:

Buy the firm or extra firm tofu.
Cut into long slabs.
Place a towel on a baking sheet.
Place cut tofu on towel.
Cover with another towel.
Place a cutting board/bread board on top.
Place books, dogs, children, or husbands on top for 20 min to 2 hours.

Then marinate the pressed tofu in whatever marinade you like. Tofu marinates and holds onto flavor great. I used this:


Let it marinate for a few hours.
Then broil marinated tofu for 6-7 minutes per side.

It is sooo good.
Even Kevin really liked it and he hates any type of "healthy" food I try to make him.

Now I just need Costco to get tofu. I bought two packages of tofu from Harmons and we easily ate it all. I need this in bulk people!

the mother of all cones...

...the KONG cone!!
We love Maceys.
This huge piece of work was only $1.49.


My creepy "Look how far I got!" look. That's as much as we could handle. We took the rest home and put it in the freezer for a late night treat.

starting with a donut

Before we went on our morning mountain bike sesh, we decided to go and grab a donut for breakfast. I have been wanting to go to a new local donut shop near our house called Daylight Donuts. We both got the big bear claw. It was the biggest one they had. It was perfect before our big ride.
It was a bit chilly this morning (40 F) but it was a beautiful time to bike. The leaves were all over the trail and the dirt for riding was perfect. This might have been one of our best rides together just yet. We both were feeling good, and me extra good since all my bike training was paying off and I was able to keep up with Kevin uphill. Granted, his bike is a lot heavier than mine (its a great handicap), but I was still proud. I still quite can't keep up him with downhill; but I'd rather be alive at the end of the trail then not. Don't want this to happen again.