Cream of Veggie Soups

The children love to grab random vegetation at the store or market and have me buy it. half the time, I don't know what to do with it, or I get in one of my funks and it languishes in the fridge. This lovely broccoli has just been pulled from vegetable purgatory. Tonight, it ends up as Cream of Broccoli Soup. Nice.

Pasta

Since I've been off my feet, I've been an insomniac & just fatigued all day. My foot is finally feeling better. The bump near my toe joint (?) went down a day or two ago & I've been wanting to try this recipe for a while. It's been years since I made pasta!

Yes, I do prep work with the Little Guy on my back. He loves watching the mixer do its deed & has a much better view up there than on a chair where his fingers are at risk. This also happens to be the best way to get a tired baby to sleep when all needs are satisfied. I'm holding him. He's content, safe, in the conversation, and capable of seeing what's going on. After all, if I ignore him, I'm just a hair tug away! & I hate hair pulling!

So, pasta! The recipe is a basic egg pasta recipe, so perhaps the length of kneading time helps it more, or that substitutes not using the crank at the end. It does call for flavorings in the pasta, which most don't. I don't have the Italian pasta flour, so I'm trying this with cake flour (big no no? I don't know). If this doesn't go well, I'll give it a go with all-purpose. I like whole wheat, but figured that I need to learn the "art" before I get too crafty. Maybe I'll pull out the old pasta book I have & make green spinach pasta..

The girls are "doing teamwork" to work the dough. The dough seemed a bit dry, but with a good pressing, it's come together nicely. TJ put a stockpot of water on to boil & we'll be enjoying our "House-Made Pasta" in no time!

Delicious!

Squash Bread

Our neighbor stopped by the other day with some squash. The really big one was made into patty pan size zucchini breads, recipe from Too Many Tomatoes, Squash, Beans, And Other Good Things by Landau & Myers.

Yummy lunch!

Chili

I'm trying to live within my budget. I used to be pretty good at it, or so I thought, but we took a rather long break from having a strict budget. So, now I've got a week and I've spent nearly my last dollar. In the pantry are lots of cans of beans...

Chili seems easy enough, I stood for a moment looking at titles when Potpies seemed like the best cookbook. Sure enough, a recipe for chili (p. 122) with a cornbread topping. At my feet was a crying baby..

TJ wasn't feeling like entertaining Little Guy, so I asked him to make dinner. I explained the difference of instructions since we had canned and the recipe called for dried, and took the stroller to the store to pick up the bell pepper. Everything else we had, or so I thought.

When I returned, he had a pot of spiced beans and tomatoes simmering. I sliced up the onions and bell pepper and talked him through sautéing. Then I hunted for the cornmeal. We're out of cornmeal? I used it recently for dumplings.. But, we're out. And I have quinoa. Hehe, we subbed the quinoa for the cornmeal and I was a little concerned it wouldn't breadify.

35 minutes later, a strangely colored, but tasty quinoa bread topping rose from the chili. It was a little chewier than the cornbread, but very tasty. And frugal.

Bread & Tomato Salad

Yum! I was out of scallions/green onions, so for the children (who aren't so used to salads regularly yet) I omitted onion. The tomatoes are from our neighbor. I subbed mozzarella, which i had in the fridge, & had the basil & mint in the garden.

Croutons

Last night, I thoroughly enjoyed reading through a bunch of Poor Girl Gourmet. This morning, I used up the two day old sourdough bread: French toast for breakfast & croutons (recipe from the book) that will go with a salad. The crusts will be processed for crumbs, for stuffing or coatings.