Dinner on the Last Night of Spring

Gardening is paying off! The work that began in February is now beginning to culminate. 3 quarts of yellow squash is the most obvious iteration, but there is much more as well!

For this post, I thought I'd go through recipes and how I made tonight's dinner with a hooray when appropriate to celebrate that an ingredient came from the garden:

Eye of round:
4 eye of round steaks, cut into strips and sprinkled with pepper and onion powder
1 sprig of fresh basil, chopped (HOORAY!)
juice of 1/2 lemon
1/4 c. vinegar

Heat up lemon, basil, and vinegar to a boil, place steak strips into it and cook until done. Reserve the juice, as this is the basis for the gravy. Reserve the steak, as this goes into the green bean dish.

Green beans:
1 quart green beans (HOORAY!)
2T butter
1/2 onion
1 clove garlic, minced (I have garlic growing, it's just not ready yet)

Saute all until green beans are done. I added 1/2 cup of water at the end to steam the beans. Add the steak strips at the end and serve together.

Gravy:
Steak juice (see above)
1-2 T flour
1-2 cups milk
Salt and pepper to taste

Put flour into steak juice and whisk until hot and bubbly. Add milk and whisk until thick, about 10-15 minutes. Salt and pepper to taste.

Mashed Potatoes:
1 yellow potato per person
Milk, sour cream, butter, salt, and pepper to taste
Fresh garlic snips (the green bit off the garlic growing HOORAY!)

Cook potatoes, add other ingredients to taste. The snips give a mild garlic flavor that is delightful.

Roasted squash:
Zucchini (HOORAY!)
Yellow squash (HOORAY!)
Olive oil
black pepper, sea salt, and Parmesan cheese to sprinkle on it.

Roast at 425 on parchment paper on a baking sheet until it starts to brown on top. I put it in the oven to cook while everything else was going.

Believe it or not, there were no leftovers. Go figure.

Hand Soap/Body Wash DIY

Recipe and tutorial source: http://www.thefarmersnest.com/2011/11/liquid-hand-soap-diy.html

Ingredients: 1 gallon distilled water, 1 8-oz bar soap (NOT Dove or any "moisturizing"), 2T liquid glycerin (band-aid section at Walmart)

Nutshell version: Grate bar of soap. Add everything else. Melt in pot. Let sit 12 hours. Beat if necessary.

Cost: Liquid glycerin costs about $4.00 for enough to make around 10 recipes, so $0.40/recipe. Distilled water costs about $0.80/recipe, and the other variable is your soap. I spent about $3.80 on a bar of goat milk soap that smelled glorious and not too girly so that my husband can enjoy the body wash and hand soap as well. This brings my total per recipe to $5.00.

*I do have to note that I bought less than 8 oz of soap, so it made a little over 1/2 a gallon, whereas getting a bigger bar or two bars would have cost a little more and yielded more. If you get a cheap bar of soap you like, you can make this cheaper.  I wanted a luxurious soap, so I paid a little more.

This whole project is perfect for a rainy day and smells tremendous! I used Goat Milk Red Jasmine Rice soap, which is a rich red-orange color and has a slightly sweet, clean smell. I bought it at World Market and used my birthday coupon to bring down the price a little. The hardest part for me was grating the whole bar of soap on a grater not entirely made for that kind of punishment. I dumped everything in a pot on the stove, making approximate adjustments for the fact that I was using under 6 oz. of soap instead of 8. I heated it up until it was all melted, really only a couple of minutes, then took it off the heat and the waiting began.

In a couple of hours, it started to cloud. When we went to bed, I brought the whole pot in the bedroom and set it on my printer so that I could wake up to a wonderful-smelling room. Though it did smell great, the consistency when I woke up this morning was downright odd. The soapy part had separated from the watery part and settled on the bottom to cool, making for a pretty goo. I heated it up for about 30 seconds on the stove, then blended it with an electric mixer on low for about 30 seconds. That did the trick, and I had a pour-able liquid soap that smelled great and made my hands feel nice and soft. It's not very thick, but each soap works differently, and I would rather have a thinner soap than a thicker one, anyway, so I can squirt it from our existing body wash bottle with ease.

David's mom washed the dishes in the pot I had used, and the remaining soap on the beaters and funnel I used to pour the soap into the used milk jug was enough soap to clean the dishes and leave the kitchen and her hands smelling fresh.

Verdict: I would totally make this again, it's just that I doubt we'll be finished with this much soap by the time we're too old to remember how to make it! How amazing is that?

Summer Pinterest Challenge

I absolutely love summer! I love the first warm days in March (we're in Georgia, so yes, it can get mighty warm in March) all the way through the last few afternoons in October before the cold really sets in. The rest of the year, I'm more just surviving than anything else.

This winter, I did something unexpected and conceived a child. So the entire summer this year will be spent in my 3rd trimester of pregnancy. Hello, activity restrictions. I have been tending my garden (which deserves its own post entirely) in short, 2-hour increments and keeping the tanning to a minimum, especially since it's been raining stinking every other day.

But I've come to face that, once the heat sets in and I get another few weeks along, doing much outside for extended periods is not going to be easy. After I mourned for my normal summer routines, I decided to give myself some challenges to look forward to. The internet came to my rescue!

My Pinterest has a list of things I want to do. These are all DIY projects I'd seriously love to give a good try, and I used a little money to gather some ingredients. My mom bought a few more for me and saved me a lot of money!

1. The first on my list was an easy one--I want to make my own cleaning products. It turns out that this is a bit too easy, because baking soda, vinegar, hydrogen peroxide, and lemon in different combinations will clean pretty much anything for ridiculously cheap. And, since my living space right now consists of one tiny bedroom, there isn't much to clean.

2. I want to make my own toiletries. This includes shower gel, hand soap, shampoo, and toothpaste. I have recipes for each of these things, and now the ingredients!

3. I want to make my own detergents. This will be laundry (liquid or powdered) and dish detergents, both sink and dish washer. Aside: God has randomly provided us with a free working dishwasher! How cool is that? This one may have to wait a little for me to have my own home so I'm not trying new products on my in-laws' appliances.

4. Finally, I want to make my own baby stuff. This will include cloth and paper towel wipes, shampoo, and soap. These I want to be fragrance-free as Raiden will likely have sensitive skin if he takes after his mommy. I have a pretty bad case of eczema and don't want my little bundle of joy to be a bundle of rash. Personal opinion, of course.

First up--hand soap/body wash

Speculoos has nothing to do with doctors

Speculoos, as I learned today, are actually Belgian spiced shortbread cookies. For those of us who fly Delta, think Biscoff cookies. Yeah. Delicious. This is the recipe I found online:

Ingredients:
2c AP flour
2 t. cinnamon
1/4 t. nutmeg
1/4 t. ginger
1/4 t. allspice
1/4 t. cloves
1/2 t. salt
1/4 t. baking soda
1/4 t. baking powder
1 c. butter, soft
1/2 c. sugar
1/4 c. brown sugar
1 t. vanilla
(it called for additional sugar to sprinkle on top, but I omitted that)

Instructions:
You combine everything before the butter in one bowl, then everything else in another, then add the two together. Roll out the dough and cut with cookie cutters or press it into a cookie sheet. Bake at 350: shapes bake for 12-15 min, a sheet for 20-25 min. Cool on a cooling rack and serve!

Because we don't fly often, I thought I'd try to make the cookies from scratch as a treat. My husband had a hop flight to Raleigh, NC from Atlanta for a conference. He remembered how much we enjoyed the Biscoff cookies we shared from our flights to and from Honduras last summer. So he brought me his pack of cookies and we shared them over cups of tea while listening to a sermon we had missed from church. <3 (Yes, I've been dubbed a "theological flirt" and it fits.) He said that he thought about eating them, but knew he'd enjoy sharing them with me more than eating both himself. So thoughtful!

Ok, before you all get sick from our sappiness...the verdict on these cookies?

They're make-you-drool delicious. Would I say they taste "just like" a Biscoff? Hmm, pretty close. They taste like the wholesome, not mass-produced version, which in some ways is actually BETTER than the processed variety. They're true-buttery, flavorful, and crisp. I'd definitely make them again, especially around Christmas.

Here's the original link to the blog where I got the recipe. http://matzoandrice.wordpress.com/2010/02/06/speculoos-belgian-spice-cookies/

Gravy: the good, the bad, and the worst for you

I grew up in the South. We often ate a breakfast of biscuits and milk gravy with the occasional sausage gravy. Whoever decided that this kind of substance was "good for you" probably deserved the heart attack they died from. But man, was that stuff delicious.

In honor, or I should say "memory" of whoever that was, here are recipes for three southern tradition gravies that are sure to send you to an early grave, but you'll go the whole way smiling!

1. Mom's Milk Gravy (all amounts in all recipes are estimates)
1 T bacon grease
1 T AP flour
6 c. milk
Salt/Pepper to taste

Heat the bacon grease in a large skillet until melted. Add flour and whisk to make a stiff roux, continue to cook until the roux begins to brown. Add milk "until it looks like you've ruined it." Continue to whisk constantly until the gravy thickens to desired consistency, about 10 minutes, then add salt and pepper to taste.  Serve on top of freshly baked biscuits.

2. Sausage gravy
Same thing as above, but with sausage grease and add 1/2 lb. cooked, crumbled sausage with the milk.

3. Red-eye gravy (also called Stricker gravy)
1 slice country cured ham
1 cup hot coffee

Fry the ham in its own juice. When done, remove ham and add coffee to ham fat, scraping the bottom to incorporate.

What are some other delicious but artery-clogging recipes you use to indulge?

I finally broke out my Christmas present...and made AWESOME!!!

My mom is too cool.  Even though I'm probably one of the most difficult people to buy presents for, she consistently comes up with wonderful gifts that brighten my life.  This Christmas, she waded through the Black Friday crowds to get a great deal on a Ninja (trademarked) blender.  Because its specialty is icy beverages, I waited until the weather warmed up to break it out and give it a thorough test run.

The recipe I made was frozen strawberry lemonade.  I used several large frozen strawberries, about eight large ice cubes, the juice of two Meyer lemons, and a smidgen of sugar, and put about one and one-half cups of water in the mix to round it out.

This is a very mean brew to make with a standard blender, with frozen fruit as well as ice cubes, and I think the new addition did very well.  I did have to remove the lid and poke a few of the topmost ice cubes down to where the blades could chop them, since they floated on top of the mixture halfway into blending, but I think an extra set of blades would have been the only way to get that to change.  It chopped both frozen things and made a drink with incredible consistency--we even had to break out the straws!

I'll probably still keep my old blender for a backup, but this one is much more powerful (and actually chops ice without making screeching death sounds and leaving massive chunks).

With summer on the way, it's great to be able to stop ogling those amazing smoothie concoctions on Pinterest and start making a few of my own!  We make lhassis, smoothies, milkshakes, and juice blends often, and this will be great for all of those things!

With a baby on the way, it's nice to know that I have a powerful, easy-to-clean blender to help me mix baby food on the fly.  I love the idea of offering Minja some nutritious, whole food blends that are fresh from the garden, rather than buying over-processed baby food.  I'm even planning on steaming/canning my own jarred baby food this summer so that I will have some ready to supplement whatever our table has to offer next season as well.

So, for those interested, here's the recipe in line form.  Crack out those blenders and enjoy this amazing weather!

Frozen Strawberry Lemonade
8-12 large, frozen strawberries
8 ice cubes
the juice of 2 medium lemons (I used Meyer, but normal is good, too.  1 1/2 large lemons should be fine)
1 1/2-2 cups water
1/4 cup sugar (to taste--we don't like much sweet, so we used even less)

Add all ingredients to the hopper of a good blender.  Blend until smooth.  Scoop into cups and enjoy immediately.  Yields 3 tall glasses of delicious strawberry lemonade!

Seed starting

I adore me some gardening. Though I'm in no way an expert and tend to try far more than works out, I adore the entire process.  I love weeding, I love seed starting, I love planting, I love watering, I love watching things grow, I love harvesting, and I love fertilizing plants.  I love summer storms when God waters my plants for me.

I decided that I would make gardening a priority this year.  One reason is that I'm pregnant and the exercise will be great for me.  The other is that I would love to have healthy, home-grown fuel to power this growing baby.  Another is that it gives me goals to look forward to.  Honestly, it can be a little dreary living in someone else's home with little responsibility when you're itching to enjoy family life.

So, about two months ago, I kept every kind of container I could think of so I could start seedlings.  Cardboard boxes, plastic boxes, tea boxes, cardboard and plastic egg cartons, toilet paper rolls, and one electronics box that I don't know quite what it is.

Those assorted containers are now filled with moist soil and there have been seeds germinating in them for about two days.

I'll blog later about which containers did well, how easy/difficult transplanting was, and which seeds win the sprouting prize!

Here's the starter list:
Muscadine grapes
Parsley
Oregano
Rosemary
Basil
Marigold
Phlox
Tomatoes