Fast Food

Tali uses just five ingredients to make a great breakfast sandwich that you can be feasting on within five minutes of walking into the kitchen.

You need a couple of eggs, a slice of ham, a slice of cheese, butter and an English muffin.

Break the eggs into a small microwave safe bowl, and stir them with a fork.

Then, put the English muffin in the toaster.

Now put the eggs in the microwave and cook for about a minute.

Slice the cheese.

When the English muffins are toasted, butter them.

When the eggs come out of the microwave, they are in a cute round shape, perfect for an English muffin sandwich. You can melt the cheese a little by putting it into the bowl with the warm eggs for a second or two.

Then, assemble your sandwich. Eggs, ham and cheese on the buttered English muffin.

Fast! Easy! Tasty!

Busy

He's grown about 10 inches and gained nearly 20 lbs.

He's learned to pick up tiny objects using his thumb and forefinger, and has invented a language of his very own.

All in just one year.

Happy Birthday Wally!

One In One Out

Do I love it? Does it fit? Have I used it lately?

I’m cleaning out my closet, and what doesn’t make me happy is going out. If I haven’t used it, if I don’t feel great in it, if I don’t love it, out it goes!

Parting with my clothes is painful! Especially things I’ve enjoyed but that aren’t useful anymore. But at the same time it’s a relief - I enjoy a neat closet and when I clean it, I usually find some long lost stuff.

My husband has a one in, one out policy in his closet. When he gets something new, he gets rid of something old. His side of the closet is balanced. I want mine orderly and color coordinated! I might be in the one in, three out state of closet organization, but I'm determined to find out if less is more.

As I’ve been sorting through my clothes, I started to get the idea of sorting through my habits. How about tossing out the thoughts that don’t make me happy, or just aren’t what I want to be like. Too bad changing habits is a bit harder than changing a shirt!

OK, what habits should I toss? Complaining. No, criticizing. No, worry. Being mean. Being sarcastic. Well, I have a nice list of negative thinking to choose from.

Usually I don’t even notice that my mind is full of dark/sad/mean thoughts, and then I suddenly find myself in the middle of a sad day and I might even be making it a sad day for somebody else!

So how do you wake up and throw out those thoughts and non-thoughts? Waiting for them to show up and then using hand to hand combat to toss them out seems like a slow way to make changes. What if I don’t have a chance to get mad today? Or nobody makes a mistake for me to criticize?

The one in one out idea might be just the thing for my dark thoughts. What would happen if I get my mind so full of the positive that there’s no room for darkness to sneak in? In with the happy, out with the sad!

I’ll try Alex Haley’s motto, “find the good and praise it” and apply it everywhere, to people, to the weather, to whatever happens today.

I knew of a man who hummed a hymn to himself when he felt angry. He looked like a happy guy. And he was. He was a guy who was keeping the door locked and bolted against emotions and thoughts he didn’t want.

Instead of fighting negativity, I’m going to keep my mental closet so full of kind, cheerful and optimistic thoughts that there’s no room for whiney, mean, sad ones.

There really is so much good all around every day, it shouldn’t be hard to find it. That quest actually sounds kind of pleasant.

So it’s one in one out for me. With clothes, habits, thoughts, whatever I feel like changing.

another ratatouille moment

Spade recently came across another favorite treat from his childhood and this one is courtesy of Angie also. It seems some of his favorite foods had skipped a generation, from his mom, past me and showing up again with our daughter-in-law. (Not that I didn't try!)

Here are Angie's Ginger Cookies

Measure these dry ingredients into a large bowl:
4 ½ Cups flour
4 teaspoons ground ginger
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 ½ teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
¼ t salt

In a mixing bowl, cream together:
1 ½ cup shortening
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
½ cup molasses

Add the dry ingredients to the creamed mixture.
Form the dough into balls about an inch in diameter.
Put about ¾ c sugar in a bowl and roll the cookies in the sugar before placing them on a cookie sheet.

Bake at 350 for 8-9 min. (Mine seem to take a couple minutes longer than that.)

This makes a big batch of cookies. After I cook one cookie sheet full, I form the rest of the dough into balls, roll them in sugar and place them on waxed paper on a baking sheet, then put that in the freezer for a couple of hours. When the cookie dough is frozen, I put all the frozen dough balls in a large zip lock bag and keep it in the freezer.


Then, when we're in the mood for cookies, I just put the frozen cookies on a cookie sheet, pop it in the oven and cook it for a minute or two longer than unfrozen dough would cook.

Having a bag of frozen cookie dough in the freezer is a great thing that lets you go from hungry for a cookie to eating a warm one in about 15 minutes time.

now you tell me

When I was growing up, macaroni and cheese was not on the menu. But since it is was a favorite in Spade's family, I've made it often for the last 32 years.








I've used the same recipe, with minor variations, these past many years and never felt a need to venture from it. Then last week I came across a recipe that Angie had copied for me from the New York Times a couple of years ago. It had been sitting in my notebook untried when I came across it and I suddenly felt like doing something new.

Everyone loved the results and later Spade told me that that was just like his mother used to make and he liked it more than my faithful recipe that I've been using for three decades. :)

It's not the creamy dish I usually make, but it's plenty cheesy with a nice crispy cheesy crust on top.

I don't have the link to the original recipe, I'll just copy it for you the way Angie did for me.

Crusty Macaroni and Cheese

Time: 1 hr 15 minutes
Yield 8 to 12 servings

3 tablespoons butter
12 ounces extra sharp cheddar cheese, coarsely grated
12 ounces American cheese or cheddar cheese, coarsely grated
1 pound elbow pasta, boiled in salt water until just tender, drained and rinsed under cold water
1/8 teaspoon cayenne (optional)
salt
2/3 cup whole milk

1. Heat oven to 375 degrees. Use one tablespoon butter to thickly grease a 9 x 13 baking dish. Combine grated cheese and set aside two heaping cups for topping.

2. In a large bowl, toss together the pasta, cheeses, cayenne (if using) and salt to taste. Place in prepared pan and evenly pour milk over surface. Sprinkle reserved cheese on top, dot with remaining butter and bake, uncovered, 45 minutes. Raise heat to 400 degrees and bake 15 to 20 minutes more until crusty on top and bottom.

The menu we eat is pretty simple and we do it almost the same time after time. We have the macaroni and cheese along with broccoli and canned stewed tomatoes. (or canned diced tomatoes or one of the variations of canned tomatoes). It sounds so boring when I write it out, but it's really a favorite meal and doing it just this way is a familiar ritual we always enjoy.

Except that now I don't have to make the white sauce and melt the cheese! After all these years! I'm loving the change!

happy birthday joelle

the world is a brighter place since you came along

friends

Let us be grateful to people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.
Marcel Proust