So The New Year Is Upon Us

 

Now that 2010 is here, I am spending my day making a list of goals for myself.  I don't make resolutions. A "resoulution" is an "act of resolving or determining upon an action or course of action, method, procedure..", and what I am doing is by no means a determined course of action. I find that in my life, setting out on a course of action usually leads to something other than what I started out to do. So, if I set goals instead, no matter what course of action leads me to the desired result is ok.

Some of my goals are simple, direct things that accomplish a specific task:

I want to clean up my computer, and by that, I DO NOT mean dusting off the screen. I want to get rid of files no longer needed; bookmarks that lead to pages that make me wonder why I bookmarked them to start with; organize folders in some kind of order that make sense, and put the ones I use the most at the top of the list. If I accomplish that, it will make my days infinitely better and help me save time. 

I want to get organized in my life. I do so many different things that I sometimes just get overwhelmed with the list. I want to make myself a schedule, so that I have an hour a day to write; an hour a day to sew, an hour a day to play, and an hour a day to exercise. (Not that putting the hour a day on my calendar will actually make me do those things...)

 

I want to get a tripod and learn to take better photos. If I had done that last year, this photo of the gorgeous blue moon rising over Payne Lake on New Years Eve would have been better than this:

Other goals may prove to be a little harder for me to do, but not starting to work in that direction will assure me that they won't get done:

I want to move my blog to a hosted website with my own URL. I have some very specific and some other vague goals for myself for this blog, and have already started working towards them. I want it to be the most Fab blog, ever. (Now how is THAT for a goal???)

I want to get my Etsy store up to date, and get all the purty things I sew listed on there for sale. I want procrastination to be a thing of the past.

I have a goal to get all my gluten free recipes sorted out, typed up, and presented in some type of cookbook, whether it is an e-book or a printed one. There are other gluten free cookbooks out there, but I am a southern girl who cooks in a "southern" way. I want other gluten free cooks from the south to feel comfortable in the kitchen, making all those mahvelous southern comfort foods we grew  up on, minus the gluten.

I want to make myself a quilt with these fabrics. I have already started it, by cutting all the pieces. All I have to do now is the sewing (HA! that's easy to say!)  I have a baby quilt to make, and a couple of other big sewing projects that I want to finish by spring, but of all my goals, this one will probably be the easiest for me to accomplish.

So, there it is, out there for public consumption, and public scrutiny. Making these goals public will put me at greater risk of completing them. What are YOUR goals for the year 2010?

Fried Cabbage

Think you don't like cabbage? I didn't like it much when I was growing up, and I don't like it now in most restaurants. It always seems to be soggy and tasteless if I order it when I eat out somewhere. But, I like cabbage when I cook it at home.  This dish is flavorful, inexpensive, and gluten free (though not calorie free).

Fried Cabbage

3-4 slices of bacon OR 3-4 tablespoons bacon grease OR 3-4 tablespoons butter or margarine

1 medium head of cabbage, chopped

salt to taste

4 medium potatoes, peeled and chopped

1 medium onion, peeled and chopped.

2 cups water

Fry the bacon until crisp, set aside. Pour the bacon grease out of the pan, then measure 3-4 tablespoons of it back into it.  Add the chopped cabbage, potatoes and onion.  Toss them all around in the pan several times until they are coated with the bacon grease. Add the water, bring to a boil, then cover the pan with a lid. Turn the heat down to medium low and simmer until all the water has evaporated, about 30 minutes.

 

I watch it closely near the end of cooking to make sure it doesn't stick and burn. If you have fried some bacon, crumble it on top before serving.

This may not be the most healthy cabbage you have ever eaten, but it sure will be good!

Christmas Is Over

 

Sunset on Christmas day.

We had a pleasant, relaxing day. Although we don't give gifts to each other, we do give them to other people--our children and grandchildren. I made all those bags--the girls loved them! The last one was delivered today.  I received an adapter cable for my cellphone, so I can use my Wilson antenna. The cell service way out here is not that good. I only get one bar, and I have been having to put the phone on speakerphone and lay it on the counter and not move it to be able to use it. Having the adapter cable makes it so that I can use the phone anywhere in the trailer. Yay! Someone sent FabGrandpa a new video game, and someone else sent us some gift  cards. 

I cooked a roasted chicken and some potatoes, nothing else, but we were happy with just that. We had the leftover chicken today as chicken a la king with noodles. I was surprised at how good it turned out. To make a gluten free white sauce for a la king, I use corn starch instead of flour.

Gluten Free Chicken A La King

3 tablespoons butter or margarine

salt to taste

1/4 cup corn starch

1 can evaporated milk

1 can water

1/2 of a roasted chicken, deboned and diced

Melt the butter in a saucepan. Add salt and corn starch, stirring to prevent burning and sticking. Add the can of water, cook and stir until very thick. Add the evaporated milk, continuing to stir.  Cook on low heat until creamy, smooth, and to desired thickness. Add chicken and cook a couple minutes more. Serve over rice,  gluten free noodles, or toasted gluten free bread.

Gluten Free Banana Pudding

My neighbor gave me a bunch of ripe bananas today, so I decided to make some gluten free banana pudding. It turned out really good--FabGrandpa ate two big bowls full. To make it:

1 cup sugar

3 cups milk

1/4 cup corn starch

1/8 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla

4 eggs

5 ripe bananas

1 box of KinniKritter Animal Cookies

Mix the sugar and corn starch in a 4 qt pot. Add milk and salt, cook and stir over medium heat until thickened. Separate the eggs, set the whites aside. Beat the yolks well, then add a small amount of the hot mixture from the pan to the eggs, stirring well. Add the egg yolks to the pan, stir and cook until thickened, about 3 minutes. 

Layer the cookies and bananas in a large bowl. Pour the pudding over the bananas and cookies. 

Beat the egg whites until stiff. Add 1/3 cup sugar a little at a time, beating until stiff peaks form. Spread the meringue over the top of the pudding. Put the bowl into the oven and bake for 15-20 minutes, until  the meringue is browned.

For a review of KinniKritter Cookies, click here.

Chicken Corn Chowder Revisited

Back in 2007, I found a recipe for Chicken Corn Chowder, that I thought was pretty good.  However, it was a somewhat complicated recipe, and I have never made it again.

Tonight when I came home from work, I realized I had not set anything out of the fridge for dinner, so I needed something I could throw together quickly, with things I already had on hand. One of the things I had on had was 3 ears of corn, that needed to be used today.  After poking around in the cupboard, I found enough things to make a pot of Chicken Corn Chowder that is just as good as if not better than the previous one and was way easier to make.  And that canned chicken made it a snap to prepare.

This version of corn chowder has these ingredients:

3 ears of corn, scraped from the cob

3 medium potatoes

1 large red pepper, chopped

1 jalapeno pepper, chopped

3-4 cloves garlic, minced

1 small onion, diced

1 12.5 oz can of chicken, with juice

2 cups 2% milk (or rice milk

2-3 tablespoons corn starch

salt and pepper to taste

3 tablespoons olive oil

Peel, dice and cook the potatoes in a small boiler until soft, drain.  IN a dutch oven, heat the olive oil, then saute the peppers, onion, and garlic until soft. Drain the chicken, but save the juice. Add the chicken to the dutch oven, and continue to saute for a few more minutes. Add milk, chicken juice, salt and pepper,potatoes,  and corn to the pot. Cook on medium low heat until thickened. Add 2-3 tablespoons of corn starch if needed to thicken the soup.   Serve with buttered toast or cheese toast. Mmmmm, goood!

Shrimp Stir Fry

When we were in Flagstaff last week, I bought a refrigerator full of veggies, including some bok choy. I have never bought or eaten bok choy before, that I know of, but it always looks so good in the store. So, when I got home tonight, and wanted something quick and easy to cook for dinner, I thought about that bok choy in the fridge.



I also had a bag of raw shrimp in the freezer, so I decided to make a shrimp stir fry. To make this, I used :

1 whole red bell pepper, cut into strips
2 small zuchinni, sliced
1 small onion, sliced
4 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 small bok choy, sliced thinly
1 pound raw shrimp, peeled
salt and pepper to taste
1 package bean thread noodles, cooked according to package directions

Heat a couple tablespoons of olive oil in a skillet, add all the chopped veggies, and stir fry until they are done to your liking (I cooked mine about 7 minutes). Add some salt and pepper, a couple of shakes of some gluten free soy sauce, and 1 pound of shrimp, peeled. Stir and cook about 5 minutes more, until shrimp is done.

I served this over bean thread noodles, with more gluten free soy sauce. It turned out very good. FabGrandpa said for me to put bok choy on the shopping list more often.

Stuffed Cabbage Casserole

A while back, I wrote about my Mother's stuffed cabbage recipe. She won Recipe Of The Year from the Greystone Power folks, for her version of it. Stuffed Cabbage, or Galumpkis, has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. Mama's heritage is from Russia and Austria. She grew up in a Polish neighborhood in Detroit. It was only when she married my farm boy dad that she came to Georgia and learned how to cook butter beans and corn bread and fried okra. Those Galumpkis were a family tradition in her family, and soon became one in our branch of the family, too.

I read about a stuffed cabbage casserole on a Yahoo forum a couple of months ago, and filed that little tidbit away for future reference. So, yesterday, I was sewing away on my quilt project, and for some reason I started thinking about Galumpkis. And I thought to myself, "There is no way I have time to make them Mama's way today." But, oh, the taste of them called to me.

I got up and went to look in the refrigerator, and sure enough, there was that cabbage sitting in there. So, here is what I did with it:

1/2 lb ground meat (your choice, I use a mix of 1/3 beef, 1/3 turkey, and 1/3 pork)
1/2 lb sage breakfast sausage
1/2 green bell pepper, chopped
1 large onion, chopped
5 cloves garlic, minced
1 cup uncooked rice
1 small can tomato paste
1 16 oz can diced tomatoes
1 1/2 cups water
salt and pepper to taste
1 small head of cabbage, shredded

In a large dutch oven, cook the ground meat, sausage, bell pepper, onion, and garlic until meat is browned. Stir in all the rest of the ingredients. Pour into a 13 X 9 casserole dish. Cover with aluminum foil and bake for 45 minutes at 400 degrees.

This tasted a LOT like the stuffed cabbages my Mother makes, but not EXACTLY like it. And it probably won't win a recipe contest, but hey, if you want the taste but don't have time, it is a pretty good second. (Don't tell Mama I cheated, ok?)

Kale and Sausage Soup

I have served kale and black rice together in the same meal before, but not in a soup. When I got home from work today, I knew I had some kale in the fridge, and I knew I wanted to make a soup. So, here is what I made:



2 1/2 Italian sausage links
1 large onion
3-4 cloves garlic
3 medium potatoes, unpeeled, diced
salt and pepper to taste
3-4 tablespoons olive oil
1 tsp basil
1/2 tsp thyme
1 bunch curly kale, chopped
1 cup black rice (or white rice)
6 cups water

Peel off the casing of the sausage and crumble up. Chop the onion, dice the garlic and potatoes. Heat the olive oil in a dutch oven. Add the sausage, onion, garlic and potatoes, and sautee until the sausage is browned.

Add the seasonings, the chopped kale, the rice and water. Bring to a boil, and boil on medium heat for about 5 minutes. Reduce heat to simmer, cover, and let cook for 25 minutes, stirring occasionally.

I served this with gluten free biscuits, and boy was it ever good! This recipe will serve 4-6 people, or two hungry adults two dinners. The soup is naturally gluten free, tastes very good, and is relatively inexpensive. What more could you want?

The Man Helps Around The House, How Could I Not Love Him?

What a week---work work work. But thank the Lord, I have a job. And a job I love, at that. I worked the late shift every day last week, so I was not doing the cleaning and cooking for the most part. Yesterday FabGrandpa was off and I had to work, so he cleaned house from one end to the other. It was soooo nice to come home and not have to worry about doing all that.

He has been doing the cooking all week--I leave all the ingredients out on the counter, with detailed instructions, and he puts them together and gets dinner ready. He has been doing a pretty good job of it, too.


He has made chili, goulash, and beef stew, all according to directions from me, and all I have had to do was come home and eat. I am liking this set up---I am liking it A LOT. One night he even baked some chicken thighs and made some rice. Since he follows my directions to the letter, and there are no wheat products in the house at all, everything is gluten free, too.


The beef stew he made was especially good. Of course, I cut everything up and got it all ready for him, and all he had to do was put it all in the crock-pot at a certain time, but HE did do that so he gets the credit for making it. Here is the recipe:


1 lb cubed steak, cut up into bite sized pieces
1 large onion, chopped
olive oil
4 potatoes, unpeeled, cut up in bite sized pieces
4 carrots, peeled and sliced
2 portabella mushrooms, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
Aunt Cora’s seasoning
½ tsp garlic powder
1 tsp black pepper
1 tsp salt
1 16 oz can crushed tomatoes
enough water to cover all in the crock-pot


Sprinkle the cubed steak pieces with Aunt Cora’s seasoning. Heat a couple of tablespoons of olive oil in a skillet. Add the steak pieces and onion; cook until the onions are clear and the steak is browned. Pour into crock-pot. Add all the rest of the ingredients, and cook on high in crock-pot for 4 hours. Simple to make, yum to eat, gluten free for your safe eating.

Forbidden Rice and Sauteed Kale

We drove up to Yarnell on Sunday afternoon and spent the night with Gaelyn, of Geogypsy because FabGrandpa had an appoinment at the VA in Prescott for his physical and yearly bloodwork. More about the trip tomorrow, but tonight I want to tell you about this yummo meal.

While in Prescott, we went to the Frontier Natural Foods store. Among other things that we bought, we got some Forbidden Rice and some lacinato kale. I have been reading about the forbidden rice on some vegetarian and gluten free forums that I read, and have been wanting to try it. But because it is relatively expensive, I didn't want to buy a one pound bag of it and then find out we didn't like it. To my delight and surprise, the bulk food section had some of it and also some Red Bhutanese rice. I got about a cup and a half of each one.

Our dinner tonight was the black forbidden rice, kale sauteed with garlic, and a nice tomato-fresh basil-fresh mozzarella salad. The rice was very good. It was not at all like the black wild rice, which I really don't like. It took a little longer than white rice to cook, about thirty minutes. The flavor was a little bit "nutty", but mild, and it had a little bit of "chew" to it, not exactly like al dente, but not as chewy as wild rice. We will be buying some more of it.

To cook the kale, I sliced it about a half inch thick in shreds, and steamed it for four and a half minutes in the microwave. Then I peeled and sliced up about half a head of garlic, and added it to about four tablespoons of olive oil in a large skillet. When the garlic had cooked for about three minutes, I added in the kale and sauteed for about four more minutes. Salt and pepper to taste, and it was done. The kale was still a little chewy, too, but I think that really made up for there being no meat in this meal.

The salad was made up ahead of time, and refrigerated. It was the other half of the head of garlic, diced up; a ball of fresh mozzarella, diced up; a can of diced tomotates drained, a few leaves of fresh basil cut up, salt and peppr to taste; and about a 1/4 cup of olive oil. Mix well and refrigerate for at least an hour.

Tomorrow I am going to try the Red Bhutanese rice with some pork shoulder steaks. And then I'll tell you the rest of the story about our trip to Prescott.

Forbidden rice may not save you from getting a mortgage bond.  But it will make you a favorite with everyone in your house. 

Tuna Salad With Avocado

In my opinion, anything is better with avocado. Tonight I made a fairly simple dinner of tuna salad, and made it just a bit better by serving it with sliced avocado and some of those yummo corn tortillas I got at the restaurant in Parker the other day.

Tuna Salad:

1 large can tuna, drained
2 boiled eggs, chopped
1/2 onion, chopped
12 cherry tomatoes, cut in quarters
salt and pepper to taste
1/3 cup mayonnaise

Mix all together well and serve on a bed of lettuce. If you like avocado, put some slices on top.


Here I am, a new self portrait, to show you how long my hair is getting. I let it air dry instead of using a hair dryer. I think it still has some natural curl left in it.

Pork Roast Two Times

Yesterday was a little warm here, with the temperature going up to 86 degrees. I was glad for the sunny warmth, but to keep the trailer from heating up too much, I got out the crock pot.

I had a pork roast in the freezer from our last shopping trip. I thawed it out, and seasoned it and put in the bottom of the crock pot. Then I got out my last pumpkin that I have been saving since November.

Those little sugar pumpkins are really good, either made into a sweet pie or souffle, or a savory vegetable dish. I decided to cook it along with the pork roast in my crock pot yesterday.

Here is what I did with it: Cut the pumpkin in four or five pieces, and clean out all the seeds, then scrape the inside of each piece to remove the stringy part:




Spray or brush each piece with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste. Arrange the pieces on top of the roast in the crock pot so that they sort of just sit there and lean against the sides of the crock pot. You don't want them sitting in the juices from the roast later on:



Cover and cook three to four hours on high. Take the pumpkin pieces out and put them in a serving dish. Then, take out the roast, and slice. We had steamed green beans to round out the meal. Yum, and yum.



Then today, I had some yellow summer squash and one zucchini that were going to go bad if I didn't use them up. I starting thinking about making squash casserole with them, but I didn't have any bread. I did have this new to me bread mix from kinnikinnick so I thought I would give it a try.



This was the easiest mix, ever! You just measure the mix, then add water, then mix with an electric mixer for 3 minutes, put the batter in greased muffin tins, bake 25 minutes. The result: Some really good rolls that taste like, "BREAD" ! Imagine that! Good gluten free bread from an easy mix! Why oh why have I not tried this mix before???



Here they are, cooling on the stove. A cup and a half of mix and a cup of water makes six large rolls. They rose up over the top of the muffin pans. They smelled good, look good, and taste good. I'll be ordering some more from Amazon.com for sure!



I ate one of these rolls hot from the oven with some butter. OMG! heaven. Then I used one and a half rolls in my squash casserole. The casserole was delicious. We added a tossed salad, diced potatoes, and the rest of the pork roast from yesterday. Same pork, different sides, another day done.


Gluten Free Squash Casserole:

3 yellow squash or zucchini or mixed
1/2 onion
salt and pepper to taste
3 eggs
3 slices gluten free bread or 1 1/2 gluten free rolls
1 stick of butter
1/2 package Glutino Gluten Free crackers

Scrape and cut up the squash. Chop the onion. Put them in a 4 qt pan, cover with water, add salt and pepper to taste, and boil until the squash is tender, about 20 minutes. Turn off the heat and add 1/2 stick of butter to the pot.

When the squash is cooled off, break up the bread into small pieces and stir into the pan with the squash. Add the eggs, and mix well. Add salt and pepper if needed. Pour into a greased 8 X 8 inch casserole dish. Break up the gluten free crackers into crumbs. Sprinkle on top of the casserole. Dot with remaining butter. Bake at 400 degrees for 25 minutes.

I love this squash casserole so much that I eat it for breakfast sometimes. MMMMMM.

Adopt A Gluten Free Blogger: Simply Gluten Free

The Book Of Yum is hosting an Adopt A Gluten Free Blogger event this month. I chose Simply... Gluten Free as my adoptee. The purpose of this event is to try out a recipe from the blog you choose. I made Gluten Free Smore's Cheescake.

I was a Girl Scout leader for many years when my daugthers were growing up. I took the troop camping about four times a year. At each camping trip, we made the smores, roasting our marshmallows over the campfire until they were good and hot and sticky, then plopping them between graham crackers with chocolate bars. So good! and so full of gluten.

I followed the recipe to the letter. I wasn't so sure about making the crust out of roasted peanuts, as I am not a big fan of peanuts; AND because I had never thought about peanuts being in smore's. But, that crust is a streak of genius! It has many potential uses for other recipes, and surprisingly tastes very little like peanuts.

I used Nestle Special Dark Chocolate Chocolate Chips. They melted quickly and really made the whole thing so chocolaty good.

Here is what my version of the cheesecake looks like:

Oh, and that topping? it tastes a lot like the Seven Minute Frosting my mother used to make for her coconut cake. I know I will be using that again too, but probably as a frosting for a cake. It has all the sticky sweet goodness of that long ago recipe but is very easy and quick to make.

Thanks, Book of Yum! And thank you, Simply...Gluten Free.

Finally! I Have Cookies!!!

It only took them since February 11 to get my order to me, but it DID arrive today. Just in time for me to make some biscuits for dinner with the Pamela's Baking Mix I ordered. Everything I ordered was received in ONLY 21 days. They DID however, send me two of the items for free since it took them so long to deliver my order. I have to give them that. So, just so you'll know who they were, I'm not naming them here but I will give you this link. Order if you have time to wait.


Now to tell you that I absolutely LOVE Amazon.com. I have placed two orders from them since Feb 11 and have already received both of them. The stuff I ordered from them on Friday came yesterday. Excellent service from them, folks. I just wish I didn't have to order 6 of something to get it from them. I'll just have to look for other storage options. Maybe in my side of the wardrobe closet.


I know yesterday I talked about not having leftovers, but only to show how I try to make them different the next time. We do, sometimes, eat the leftovers, or previously cooked food, and there is not much I can do to change it. As in tonight, we had leftover stuffed peppers and eggplant parmesean. When I absolutely have to serve leftovers, I let him choose what he wants first. The whole meal tonight included another tossed salad, and some home made cheese biscuits made with Pamela's Baking Mix.


The salad was romaine lettuce, strawberries, zucchini, and green onions. A sprinkle of garlic salt, and some Wish Bone Bountifuls Berry Delight Vinaigrette. I don't know about the rest of the gluten free world, but whenever I see "new" on a product in the store, I don't usually get excited about it. Most companies just seem to not care about those of us who have to eat gluten free. But I picked up that bottle anyway, and just couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the words "Gluten Free" on the back of the bottle. This stuff is GOOD! I was making my own raspberry vinaigrette at home, but I may never make it again. It's that good. They have a printable coupon on their website good for 75 cents off. Get it while you can.

Steamed Brussels Sprouts

While I like to cook, and try new things a lot, there are some things that FabGrandpa and I keep coming back to--old favorites that we just love. Brussels sprouts is one of those things. Whenever I find them in the produce section at a reasonable price, I get enough of them for us to have for a couple of meals.


They taste so good just simply steamed with some butter and salt. I cut off the bottom end, and peel off a couple of the outside leaves, and put them in a microwave safe bowl.



Add about 1/4 cup of water. It doesn't take much water to steam these to perfection.



Put about three tablespoons of butter, cut in thin slices, over the top of the brussels sprouts. Add a shake or two of salt, and they are ready to go.



Cover the bowl tightly with Glad wrap, and place in the microwave. I push the buttons on mine to set for 9 minutes. Your microwave may be more powerful or less than mine, so you will have to experiment with how much time it takes for yours.


Tonight we had the brussels sprouts with another standby meal, ground meat with mushroom gravy over rice. Talk about yum! And all naturally gluten free, naturally.

I Make A "Stab" At Gucamole

I accidently stabbed myself in the hand while I was trying to get the pit out of an avocado today. The good folks over at Avocado.org say:

"Remove the seed by sliding the tip of a spoon gently underneath and lifting out. The other common seed-extraction method - striking the seed with a knife and twisting - requires some skill and is not recommended." Guess I should have read that first, huh?

Fabgrandpa was outside washing the awning. He heard me scream and came running inside to see what happened. Don't worry, it isn't as bad as it sounds, just a tiny wound in between my middle and ring finger on my left hand. It didn't require stitches or anything. It DID hurt like hell, though

The remedy? An application of New Skin and Patron.

That New Skin stuff is great. As soon as you dab it on, it burns for a second, then the pain is gone. It is a sticky liquid that dries quickly to make a skin-like bandaid on a cut. I love this stuff.

I got that little bottle of Patron about two years ago. It has been living in my "office drawer" since then, waiting for just the right occasion. It was just right and just enough for today.

Dinner tonight was leftover blackeyed peas, cornbread, and fried spam. Not very exotic, but filling and good. And I didn't have to cook.


The recipe for the day:

Banana Pancakes

1 cup Bob's Red Mill Baking Mix or your favorite gluten free pancake mix
1 cup milk
1 egg
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 teaspoon sugar
2 bananas

Mix all ingredients except bananas. Heat a couple tablespoons of olive oil in a skillet. When the skillet is hot, pour pancake batter in. While the pancakes are cooking on the first side, put slices of banana on top. When the pancakes are browned on the bottom, flip over and cook on the banana side until browned. Serve with butter and syrup. The taste of cooked bananas is soooo good!

As Promised

But first, I wanted to talk about making a monthly menu. One of my bloggy friends, Terri, of Terri Terri Quite Contrary, wrote this:

"I wish I were so organized with my shopping. Sadly, for lack of more time and energy, I end up grabbing a few coupons and just tossing whatever looks good in the cart. Nothing lasts long with teenagers in the house anyway."

Now, I will confess that it does take some time, but not as much as you might think. You see, last winter when I was yet again in the off season, living off our savings until spring came and we went back to work, I made up four monthly menus, and saved them in my "Budget" folder. So now, when I need to make a menu for a month, I might use one of those as is, or I might use it as a starting point to make a new one. Another thing I did when I was sitting around doing nothing last winter, was make a complete shopping list for each of those four monthly menus. So, now that I have the menu and the shopping list ready and sitting on my hard drive, all I have to do is print it off, shop my pantry first, and go to the store.

I also admit that not everyone has the need or the desire to shop for an entire month at a time. I didn't used to do it. When I lived in a regular house and acted like a normal woman, I went to the store every week, and didn't even make a list. If I forgot something, there was a Publix Grocery Store less than half a mile from my house.

But now, I have this new life, you see. I live in a travel trailer, where the whole house has about 300 square feet, and the refrigerator/freezer is a whopping 8 cubic feet combined. And I share this space with another person. And both of us like to eat. We like to eat a lot. And one of us has to eat a special diet, that is free of gluten. Right now, we are living in a remote area, where the closest decent grocery store is at least 50 miles away. Wal-Mart is an 80 mile drive. Shopping for groceries is an all day affair. A love affair it is not. Hence the once a month shopping. Oh, and did I mention that all of the refrigerated and frozen things I buy have to fit in two coolers in the back of the truck for the ride home? I have to be organized to make it all work. What is the point of buying it if I can't put it in it's proper place when we get it home, I ask you.

However, if you would like to save both time and money, making a menu and a shopping list is very useful. It could also save you some time if you are the primary grocery buyer and meal cooker. If you post the monthly menu where everyone in the house can see it, someone might just make a meal for you one day. Without you asking them to.

Another thing is, just beause you have a monthly menu doesn't mean you have to eat the meals in the order they are on the plan. I just print out the plan for the month, and mark off each meal as we eat them, so I know what I have still on hand. Adn I only plan the dinners, because breakfast is just breakfast. It will either be eggs, pancakes, or leftover eggplant parmesean. It has worked for me. Your mileage may vary.

And, to address the part about nothing lasting in a house with teens. Honey, you ain't seen how much FabGrandpa can eat! I solved the problem of him eating things I had planned to cook by giving him his very own cupboard. Yes, the FabGrandpa cabinet has nothing in it except for his snacky and lunchy things that he can eat any time he so desires. It makes him happy, it makes me happy, and so life is happy here. No more of him eating my special olives for that thing I wanted to make.

Ok, I think that about covers it. If anyone wants one of my monthly menus with a shopping plan atached, let me know. I'll think about it.

On to the recipe I promised. This morning (ok, this afternoon) we had scrambled eggs with zuchinni and onions. I chopped up a zuchinni and half an onion, sauteed them in some butter in a skillet, added three eggs, and scrambled them up. Yummy.

Dinner was Eggplant Parmesean with a side of this:



I made the bread using up some flours I had on hand, because my online order from hell has not arrived YET. Here is the recipe I used:

1 cup white rice flour
1/2 cup tapioca flour
1/4 cup potato flour
1/4 cup corn starch
3/4 cup milk
1/3 cup water
1 pkg yeast
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 pkg unflavored gelatin
1 teaspoon xanthan gum
2 eggs
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 cup olive oil

Heat the milk to lukewarm in the microwave, about 45 seconds. Add the brown sugar and yeast, set aside. Mix all the dry ingredients together well. Add the eggs, oil, water and milk. Beat well with electric mixer. Scrape all the dough into the center of the bowl, spray with olive oil. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise for 30 minutes.

Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil. Spray the foil with olive oil. Spread the bread dough on the pan into a rectangle about an inch and a half thick. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 45 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool. Cut the rectangle in half. Cut one half into six bread sticks.

I served the bread with home made pesto, fresh mozzarella cheese, cherry tomatoes, and garlic stuffed olives.

The main course for dinner was Gluten Free Eggplant Parmesean

1 large eggplant, peeled and sliced into 1/2 inch thick slices
1 cup milk
1 cup gluten free flour (you can use whatever your favorite flour is. Tonight I used half white rice flour because I was using up the rest of the box, and half buckwheat flour. but any flour is ok, as long as you like it)
salt and pepper to taste
olive oil
8 oz gluten free spaghetti noodles. (I used Deboles corn angel hair pasta, but you can use any gluten free pasta you like)
1 16 oz jar gluten free spaghetti Sauce. (I used Classico Traditional Sweet Basil. Again, you can use any brand you like, even make your own, just make sure if you buy prepared that it is gluten free)
2 cups Italian Blend shredded cheese or 2 cups mozzarella cheese.

Cook the spaghetti according to directions on the box, drain, rinse, set aside. Meanwhile, sprinkle the eggplant with salt, and let it weep. Rinse. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Dredge each slice of eggplant in flour, dip in milk, then back in flour. Fry in olive oil over medium heat until browned on each side. Drain on paper towels.

Spread about 1/2 cup of the spaghetti sauce in the bottom of an 11 X 13 casserole dish. Put the spaghetti in the casserole dish on top of the spaghetti sauce, and spread around evenly in the dish.

Place the eggplant slices in a layer over the spaghetti. Pour the remaining spaghetti sauce over the eggplant layer. Spread evenly over the eggplant layer.

Sprinkle the cheese evenly over the top of the casserole. Bake in a 400 degree oven for 35 minutes. Remove from oven and let rest for 15 minutes before serving.

This casserole freezes well, and reheats well. Serve with a tossed salad or with bread and pesto.