Mozzarella

OK. I was asked if I'd post about making mozzarella. The answer is--not today. I have made it, but I'm currently out of the quantities of whole milk needed to do so (and it's very cold out. We'll make due drinking the 1% in the fridge, thanks). BUT, a good recipe from the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle can be found here.

Best of luck to you!

Zach's Latest Creation

I was brought this cute little sculpture today, with the challenge of guessing what it is. There is no way, in a million years, I would have guessed with the accuracy Zach was looking for. Stephen guessed a teddy bear, I guessed a playdoh cookie--so that I'd have the option of saying (after I was told what it was), "Oh, yes, that's what I meant, a playdoh cookie in the shape of...." * Anyhow, here's what it is, in Zach's words:

This is a snowman. But he forgot to use enough sunscreen. See how black he is? The red spots are the places he is REALLY burnt, because there wasn't any sunscreen there at all. Poor guy.

I wanted to say--"Wouldn't he have melted?" But I held my tongue.

*This technique of keeping your creative toddler happy, while finding out what you need to know is copyrighted. If you need to use it, please send $50 in the mail. Address available upon request.

Caption contest

If this were a photo for a caption contest, I would put "You know, you make a really valid point..."


What do you think?

Resolution #2, or Food--Glorious Food!

Today, I decided that we needed a lasagna, yet, the only ingredients I had on hand were 8 oz of mozzarella and some lasagna noodles. I was not in the mood to go to the store with three kids in heavy coats, but I wanted lasagna. My friend Cheryl stopped by and warned me of the lovely winter storm that is to come and stay til Thursday, and let me know that if my shopping wasn't done, I'd better do it. After she left, I looked at the kitchen, decided I had enough food if I got creative, and opted to be a hermit. So, onto making lasagna from more scratch than usual.

First, I needed ricotta cheese. Just to let you know, making ricotta is ridiculously easy. In fact, it pains me to see it at such high prices in the store--for two reasons: #1 Ricotta is a left-over. It literally means "cooked again", you get it from the whey after making mozzerella. #2 It takes 15 minutes of effort. Tops.

I did not make mozzerella first, I just wanted ricotta, so I followed a shortcut:

Dump 2 quarts of whole milk in a pot. Heat to 200 degrees (just about boiling), add an acid (about 1/3 Cup--lemon juice, vinegar, or I use 1/2 tsp powdered citric acid in 1/3 C water). Reheat to 200 degrees (takes seconds). Take off heat. Let sit 15 minutes while you do something else--like play with the kids, eat lunch, read, you get the picture. Then, line a colander with a thin cloth (clean pillow case works if you don't have fine cheesecloth lying around). Dump it in, let sit for a few minutes. DONE!

Here it is in the colander.

I gave it a good squeeze to get the rest of the whey out.

Then, I mixed it with egg, the mozzarella and some sea salt. Set aside to layer in lasagna.

Time to make sauce!!

2 quarts frozen tomato chunks (saved from the garden, when you weren't in the mood to can)


2 carrots, shredded


1/2 onion, diced


2 stalks celery, shredded (an electric shredder makes fast work of all of this!)


some garlic, basil and oregano.


simmer.

Layer noodles, cheese mixture, sauce, and fresh spinach. Yum.

Bake @350 f. Covered with foil. Mine stayed in for two hours, but less would have been OK. You just want to make sure the egg is cooked. You'll notice there is no meat in this lasagna--see the post about our fridge to discover WHY.

Then, to complete the meal, use the whey to make bread and rolls!

I had four cups of whey left when I was done, so I made two loaves of bread and one rack of rolls. This should last us the week, and if that storm makes it so I can't shop, we'll be eating some amazing PB&J (with a blueberry, strawberry, raspberry jam that I made this summer. Mmmmmm).

Dinner is served!

Really, it didn't take that long. Wonder what else I'll come up with in this snowy weather. They do say that necessity is the mother of invention!!!

I promise didn't inhale...

Payge likes to crawl around with crayons, pencils, and Popsicle sticks in her mouth. Here reaction when we say "Payge, what are you doing????" is usually comical, but at times resembles Bill's response.

Home Ownership, and We're Baaa-ack!

So, we finally arrived home late last night. (If you didn't know, we've been playing around in the Idaho/Utah area--I didn't blog about it before we left, because the month long trip was a surprise to the family there, and the screaming/tears/laughter was totally worth keeping it a secret from September til December!)

Due to the fact that I didn't turn my cell phone on after our flight to Chicago, we arrived home to many surprises. First, our good friend Nadine was there waiting for us. At first, I thought it was just a pleasant surprise, until she said, "Oh, didn't you get the message?"
Turns out that our other friend had been calling us, trying to tell us that our van wouldn't start, so he couldn't get it from our house to the parking lot for us. Oh, and the garage door wouldn't open, either.

So, we get home, and think, "OK, we know that we can't fix that problem til morning, we'll just make some dinner and get to bed (it was about 10PM)." So, I opened the fridge and almost gagged to death. Oh!! The smell!! The root vegetables we'd put in there had gone bad. Odd, I thought, as in the cold, the root vegetables and apples should have been fine.

Then, I opened the freezer. Everything that was once stacked nicely was in one mushy heap. Yes, the entire unit had failed while we were gone. AND, it seems (warning, the following paragraph is gross, do not read if weak stomached!), that it must have been closer to the beginning of our trip that the failure occured, because the meats were moldy, the blood that had leaked had coagulated as it mixed with the berry juices (I'll spare you the photos, but if you want them, you can see them--but be warned), and the frozen (now thawed) collard greens were just black. I was saddened, as my raspberry freezer jam (made with berries I picked myself!), dried-frozen cherries (I don't think they'd gone bad, but the bag was sitting in blood, sooooo, also sad, as these were also from U pick--think 2 quarts of dried cherries=lots of picked fresh ones), home made pasta sauces, pork chops, pounds of ground turkey, cheeses...AARRGH!!

But, surprisingly, I was very calm. No real tears were shed, I just cleaned up the mess (gagged a few times) and went to bed. I'm surprised at the emotions I've had. I expected to be upset, worried, and snippy. BUT, on the contrary, I feel almost energetic, happy, and have an "all's-well-that-ends-well" attitude. I suppose that is a good thing, perhaps my striving to become more optimistic really is paying off. YAY! And, if this was my test from God to see how'd I do in that area, I'd say I passed. Whew. Let's just hope the tests don't get harder. ha ha.

This morning was better. We woke up, called the garage door fixer people, and they repaired the door (for a price, but still, it's fixed!). The van was jumped by a good neighbor, and so it's up and running again. We called around and found different ideas on how to fix the fridge ourselves. It's now up & running again (without paying Sears a $65 diagnostic fee, before they even try to fix the thing). Now, to fix the smell. We've run vinegar thru the entire automatic defrost system (since a lot of those yummy fluids I mentioned earlier had seeped through.), then rubbed the thing down with a chemical mixture (some corrosive stuff with chlorine in it), rinsed it, then rubbed it down with vanilla extract, rinsed it, and now have baking powder in it. It IS smelling better, my next step will be to put the lemon peels in my fridge (from the three lemons I'll be blending up tomorrow, as I follow some advice from another friend--more on that later*).

The really good news is that while we were fixing the fridge, we also figured out what was wrong with the ice maker, and now we have ice again. We've put a few things in the fridge, to see how they fare (you know, to see if they absorb that wonderful smell), and if all is well, we'll start using the fridge again. If not, well...we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

*My dear friend Lindsay told me that after a long trip home, where inevitably you will eat horribly, if you peel (not JUICE)three lemons (but leave as much white as possible) and blend them in the blender, and mix them with two quarts of water, then drink it all (over the course of a day), it'll clean you out so that you are at least back to where you started before the trip. She got the info from a personal trainer that she was using after beautiful baby #1. AND I must add that her hard work paid off. ;)

Remember that Law I told you about?

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-thrift2-2009jan02,0,2083247.story