Recipes – The Welcome Home

Pamela’s Guacamole Dip

mixingbowllg In light of Cinco de Mayo, mañana… here you go – a guacamole recipe to go with whatever you’re fixing (you can make it with lower/no fat mayo and it will work just fine). O, and don’t forget to get a bag of *Juanita’s Chips or fry your own *flour tortillas that you’ve cut into wedges. *These are not THM 😉 ♥

Guacamole

Recipe Type: Dip

Cuisine: Mexican

Author: ♥ pamela

Prep time: 20 mins

Total time: 20 mins

Serves: 8 cups

Guacamole dip for chips, taco salad, etc.,

Ingredients

5 Large Avocados
2 tomatoes
1 small yellow onion
2 cans olives
1-1/2 cups chunky salsa (your preference mild or hot) *
1 T. minced garlic
2 tsp. Tajin Clasico Seasoning
1 tsp. garlic salt
2 tsp. Worchestershire sauce
1 cup Mayonnaise
Salt and Pepper – to taste

Instructions

Mash avocados in bowl—if using small avocados, then you’ll need to get a few more.
Put the Salsa into a screen mesh colander over a bowl to drain off liquid. Save that liquid for adding to Mexican rice, taco soup or taco/burrito/enchilada meat.
Finely dice tomatoes and kinda squeeze them out as you lift them into the bowl.
Finely dice the onion and the olives.
The salsa should be drained enough at this point to add to the avocado mixture.
Add the minced garlic, Tajin seasoning, garlic salt, Worchestershire sauce and mayonnaise
Add salt & pepper as needed for personal taste.
Eat and be happy!! 🙂

Baby days: ‘Groaning Cake’

teacuppamela

These are exciting days as we eagerly anticipate the call that labour’s begun for the newest grandbaby. I feel as though I, too, have been nesting as I’ve been gathering things for the birthing day, excitedly anticipating, along with our son and daughter-in-law, the birth of this little one.

Kate and I were talking the other day about things she’s still needing for the upcoming birthing day… and she mentioned Groaning Cake. I’d not heard of the cake by that name, specifically, but it sounded a lot like ‘energy muffins‘ I’ve made for labouring and beyond. After a brief search, I found the recipe and saw that the ingredients were quite similar. So, in the next couple of days I’ve be preparing Groaning Cake for Kate.

This, from Ami McKay’s The Birth House, ““The tradition of a groaning cake, or kimbly, at birth is an ancient one. Wives’ tales say that the scent of the groaning cake being baked in the birth house helps to ease the mother’s pain. Some say if a mother breaks the eggs while she’s aching, her labour won’t last as long. Others say that if a family wants prosperity and fertility, the father must pass pieces of the cake to friends and family the first time the mother and baby are “churched” (or the first time they go to a public gathering) after a birth.”

Groaning Cake

— Aube Giroux, Kitchen Vignettes

3 cups whole wheat or spelt flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tps salt
Spice mix: 1 Tbsp cinnamon, 1 tsp ginger, 1 tsp nutmeg, 1/2 tsp cloves, 1 tsp ground fennel seeds, 1 tsp ground fenugreek)
3/4 cup butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup honey
2 Tbsp molasses
4 eggs
2 Tbsp rum (optional)
1/3 cup whole milk yogurt
1/3 cup whole milk
1/2 cup grated apple (loose, not packed in)
1/2 cup grated carrot (loose, not packed in)
1/2 cup grated zucchini (loose, not packed in)
1/2 cup grated coconut
3/4 cup chopped walnuts (optional)
For the cream cheese icing:
1 x 8 oz package of cream cheese, at room temperature
3 Tbsp maple syrup

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350F. In a large bowl, whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, spice mix, and walnuts (if using).
Put the butter in a medium metal bowl and place it in the hot oven until it begins to melt a bit. Remove from the oven. Add the honey and molasses and whisk until blended. Add the rum and mix well, until heavy and silky.
In a separate mixing bowl, beat the eggs until frothy. Add the yoghurt, milk, grated apple, grated carrot, grated zucchini, and coconut. Add this to the honey-butter mixture and mix well. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and fold gently, until the batter is homogeneous. Be careful not to overmix.
Pour into an oiled and floured 10-inch springform cake pan and bake for 35 to 45 minutes in a 350F oven. The cake is done when the top is golden and a toothpick comes out clean. Cake should be cooled for about 10 minutes in the pan, and then removed from the pan to continue cooling on a rack.
To make the frosting, blend the room temperature cream cheese and maple syrup, using a hand blender or electric mixer. Refrigerate until cake has cooled. Once the cake has cooled, butter the frosting on top of the cake. Slice and serve.
This cake can be made ahead and wrapped in plastic wrap or aluminum and kept for 1 to 2 days at room temperature. The cream cheese icing should be kept in the fridge until ready to use.

Thanks for reading today, by the way! Hope your day’s a happy one! ♥

THM ♥ mama’s recipes

teacuppamela

It’s a beautiful day here! Sunshine always seems to change my outlook — sort of, no matter what I’ve got to do, if the day’s a sunny one, generally, my attitude is sunny, too! It’s taken me all these months of ‘working at’ the Trim Healthy Mama plan to get confident enough to begin sharing some of the different recipes or how I’ve learned to use the different recipes in the book — but every day I learn something new! Ever a “free-styler” I have to really work at following the recipes. But I’ve come to see and really appreciate the beauty of the THM plan is that once you have the basic understanding of meal guidelines, you can adapt the plan to your personal tastes, etc — and the recipes can be tweaked to fit your personal THM-style. I have begun to call THM a method rather than a diet. A diet (for most of us) is a temporary fix that is repeat over and over with the same results — some weightloss and the inevitable return of weight. And then some.

Learning a method of doing something and having good results over a length of time seems to replace the old way of ‘behaving’ or doing things. Most of us cannot stick with a *diet* bcz we miss so many things or we are overcome with temptation, we cheat, we figure we can never lose weight, we give in to the temptations that made us fat and unhealthy in the first place and then, to make matters worse, we give up. And get fat. And unhealthy. And the cycle repeats. Over and over again, we recycle the same problem. The bizarre thing is that when we’re not dieting at all, we don’t call eating a cookie or candy: cheating. We’re just eating. We’re just eating cookies and candies… O, we might feel like we shouldn’t eat many of them, but we don’t generally call it cheating unless we’re on a diet.

That ought to spark a lightbulb going on in our minds! How can we stop dieting and start eating so that we stop the enticement of cheating? And stop loathing our food decisions? And our bodies? Intro: THM.

The beauty of the THM method, of eating and living is that you will learn and continue learning and exploring all sorts of new ways to prepare and eat healthful and satisfying meals. I wouldn’t tell you this if it weren’t so—I couldn’t tell you this if I hadn’t already been traveling this path. Perhaps that’s why I’ve waited this long to really delve into sharing specifics and, now, recipes. I thought it wise to start right in with: Candy!

skinnychocolates

In the book, the basic recipe is on page 371… I know, right?!?!
All the way to page 371 and you find out about (S) Skinny Chocolate?!?! Yes.

I make these and call them Mama’s Candies… The candies are in a jar (or two) in the fridge if you want one. Or two.

I make them in my “mini muffin” pans lined with mini-muffin papers. I do this primarily bcz it’s easier to pop them out of the pan with they’re set and it’s easier for me to take them where I’m having a cuppa coffee. :o)

I quadruple the recipe in the book and make 72 candies — they’re approximately 50-55 calories each. Though the THM plan is not a calorie counting plan, it’s wise to know approximately what the value is so that you don’t go overboard eating stuff. In this way, I know that I am perfectly, perfectly fine with having a couple of these each day with no worries at all. In the beginning, as with *cream* in my coffee, until I calculated the calorie content, I was a bit more freestyling! ~smile~ And am still okay with all that early learning… it all worked out fine.

So here’s my recipe — I line 3 24-cup Mini muffin pans with mini muffin papers or liners (thus the 72 candy size recipe). Determine a flat area in the fridge to set the filled pans.

And then, in a measuring bowl I place…
2 Cups very warm Coconut Oil
1 Cup Cocoa
4 Tblsp. *ground Truvia
1 tsp. Sea Salt
1+ tsps. Vanilla

I either use a whisk or my stick blender to thoroughly blend all the ingredients. Then, I pour the chocolatey-goodness to fill each lined muffin cup. Then you’ll see that there is still some chocolately-goodness left in the measuring bowl. Lick your fingers clean. Unplug the stick blender… yes, you know you wanna… then wash it, too.
Set the filled muffin pans in the predetermined level place in your refrigerator — stack, but stagger them so the cups rest slightly beside each other not *in* each other. I know. ;o)
In an hour or two, you’ll have “mama’s candies.” Proceed with caution. And… these are an *S* And you won’t feel well if you eat all you think you want.

* I grind Truvia & the Sea Salt in a coffee grinder I have dedicated solely to this (and herbs) purpose. When I don’t grind the salt, also, it’s kind of grainy in the smooth chocolate.
You can make these on a flat lined cookies sheet, too… but I found that the snapping off a piece here and a piece there was too much freedom for me. I needed the discipline of a couple of pieces – not part of a slab of chocolatey-goodness. I’ve also used candy molds, too. Choose your best method…

Next time, Good Girl Moonshine !

http://store.trimhealthymama.com/default.asp

♥

pamela’s cinnamon rolls

teacuppamela After I made a Cinnamon Roll Wedding Cake this past weekend, several people have asked me for the recipe. And so I thought the best way to do it was to try and concisely write it out here so that you could have it, refer to it and so on.

Here you go… it’s less complicated than I think I’ve made it seem here… and for that, I’m sorry — I just wanted to attempt to include the different steps you’ll take for the prepping of these rolls. I’d suggest getting everything together first (including the pans) and I’d suggest allowing yourself plenty of time if you don’t regularly make bread and rolls and such. Bread’s a marvelous thing! But it mustn’t be hurried along! Bread’s a patient thing… you tend to it, you leave it alone, you tend to it, you leave it alone and so on. I hop you enjoy making and serving them! Our family and friends love these… though, seriously, I rarely make them any more… and very rarely make, as my friend Beth calls them, the “full fat version” of my cinnamon rolls. You know, they’re to die for ;o)

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Cabbage Patch Soup

teacuppamela I’m testing out a new idea here… using an old recipe.

As I migrate more things from AChristianHome website, recipes will be added here. This is just a test for now.

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Cake Pops

A little more traveling around… this time, I want to share with you a fun idea: Cake Pops!

You’ve no doubt seen these in shoppes and Starbucks… but you don’t need to pay the high price to try one of these or to share them with your family. You can make them at home — and, just the way your family would like them!

Here you go:

This woman is soooo fun to listen to — I watched a few more of her videos. Then, following the link to her site, I sure think she’s got a great site going there! I think you’ll like the ideas/methods, too. Especially if you’ve slid into a slump in the cooking and serving department! Sometimes all you need is a little nudge, a picture of creativity at work and some new ideas to spark enthusiasm for serving your family! If you’re in a slump, do not — I repeat — do not stay there. It’s homemaker suicide to stay in a slump and wallow there. Believe me, the price is too high – you don’t want to pay that price — wait, you CANNOT afford to do it!

You can view more of her videos *or* you can visit her site, Divas Can Cook for more great cooking tips, recipes and serving ideas. Go!

Dupers Duping

So, I’m drinking my tea… browsing the news (okay, yes, and checking in on Facebook), and I noticed an article about new food packaging. Arrggghh! If there’s a subject that’s really gotten me going lately, it is this!! Less food in “better” packaging for more money! Arrggghh!

Bought a box – bag – whatever, package of bathroom tissue from Costco — the marketing! Omy. These rolls were giant rolls = like getting two regular rolls in one. A week or so later, I’m standing there looking at the two packages. One package contained x number of rolls, x square-inches of tissue. This NEW!! giant roll (ahem, like getting two regular rolls in one) package had fewer square inches – for more money. But it FELT like more — that’s what the package said. I even took the time to jot down on my palm-pilot (well, okay, a post-it-note) the product content information. It wasn’t enough that I could see the lesser/difference – I wanted to have my written proof.

I was going to call the company – armed with information and give them my opinion. But I didn’t… I lost my little post it note. And then later, I lost my nerve/incentive to call.

Then, on a couple of different occasions I was baking and noticed the saltine crackers were smaller; I was making a graham-cracker crust and I thought: whatintheworld? These squares are smaller, too! I opened another box – this one, newer. Again, whatintheworld? Already broken squares in handy take along – stay fresh – stack-packs?!?! I do not want to take these along anywhere! This is not handy to me! This is not convenient to me and these are not economical stay-fresh stack packs to me! I’m thinking: They’re not going to be around long enough to need to be kept fresh. ;o)

So, today I decided I would call the company. On the line was someone I’m sure not born in Snohomish (but I digress). And so, I proceeded to tell her what I thought of the handy packaging and the convenient stack packs and the economical family size – they’re neither convenient nor family size. I told her that a recipe calling for a package of graham crackers is not going to produce same volume and so from now on, in addition to requiring the purcha$e of more boxe$, I will have to continually weigh the crackers – as I’m sure they’ll continue to repackage and reduce the volume.

I told her that consumers are not ignorant that all this handy and convenient packaging is a sly attempt to deceive consumers. I went on to tell her this great deception is, in reality, a great insult — actually mocking the intelligence of their customers — that they’re not thinking of the customer’s convenience at all, that their packaging is not green, it’s greed!

When she thanked me for calling today, I told her I wasn’t confident my call would matter much, but that I wasn’t just calling to rant, but that I wanted them to know that I’d rather pay more (exhibit A = already do) for an honest weight and measure. She assured me my call was important (I felt like I was on hold with GroupHealth listening to a recording). She said they were very interested in hearing customer’s views and then reminded me that there would be some settling in the packaging. I agreed but reminded her that I was talking about weight of the box of graham crackers, ritz crackers — not how a box of crackers or cereal looks when opened. I told her I got that one.

I think my boys have tried that one: Ma, there’s a lot missing?!?!?! O, it must’ve been due to settling during shipping. O yes, boys, that must be it – silly me.

We want to believe that food companies have the consumers’ best interest at heart. But, especially in this day and age, I’m tending to think that there’s a lot of duping going on. It seems advertisers are working like never before to spin information to make things seem much more desirable than ever before.

So the next time you go to the store to buy a box of graham-crackers (or just about any other product) if you haven’t noticed already, the weight/volume is less. Again. And, yes, the price has jumped up — on many things, quite a bit! Consumers really are noticing these seemingly little changes. All New Packaging! Less Food! Don’t be duped by the dupers… they’re telling you they’re saving you money — and you just might buy it. They’re keeping the height of the box the same or they’re introducing to you a new shape, a new, convenient, stay-fresh package, etc., etc. But take another look, the box is thinner. Those handy stack packs, those stay-fresh-stack-packs – inside are shorter. That juice may have a new handy grab and pour design. This only equals less volume. This isn’t new… it’s been going on for some time… as this article shows. In the end, they think you won’t notice anything but price.

But I know you, you’re smarter than that.

Here are a few numbers for you:

Nabisco: 1.800.NABISCO
Kellogg’s: 1.269.961/2000
Kraft: 1.847.646.200

Autumn’s ushering in Winter

It’s sure chilly-chilly here tonight!! The forecast even includes snow! Suddenly it seems to be just fine to give up wishing for warmer days and working in the garden for the year — for now, baking season is here! And around our home it’s time for “special requests.” By this, I mean that it’s time for everyone to submit this year’s favourites for me to bake — or, better said, this year’s update to the list of things “we have to have ________” for Thanksgiving and Christmas!

Confession: I simply cannot keep track of who likes what and who doesn’t like what for the traditional Thanksgiving meal. So, I decided a few years ago to sort of announce the menu (though the menu doesn’t change a whole lot) and that’s when I really find out this or that child doesn’t really like this or that menu item. And then, too, I have a few others who say something like: we have to have_______!

Some recipes never change and some have sort of evolved as children have aged, tastes have matured and new favourites have come into play. Some things I don’t make bcz they just don’t taste the same as they used to taste — for example, my dear mother-in-law always used to make the most delicious layered jello salad for both Thanksgiving and Christmas… she’s living far away now and so that dish is just one of those sweet lingering memories.

Some of the must have’s include turkey — of course, fresh cranberry relish, russian cream, potato rolls, sweet potato casserole and… pies. Lots of pumpkin pies — otherwise, what would they eat for breakfast on Thanksgiving morning?? 😉 Each year I’ve been working at making sure there are lots of things from the garden for the Thanksgiving meal. So, this year from the garden we’ll have carrots, potatoes, pumpkin, pickles, raspberries to top the russian cream, apples & walnuts in the salad and pies. I’ve been making walnut pies using a standard pecan pie recipe.

Since we have walnut trees and a bazillion walnuts, it doesn’t seem all that prudent to buy pecans — though I must say pecans are pretty tasty! So… Monday’s the first “pie day.” Besides those, this year I’ll be adding Swedish Pear and Almond Cream Cake and Hazelnut pie to the dessert menu. We didn’t have much of a blueberry crop this year and though the blackberries were plentiful this year, we were attending to other things and the blackberries didn’t get picked — so, no blueberry pie, no blackberry pie this year.

I’m so looking forward to this week in the kitchen… thankful for so many things… and the beautiful music in the background.

But another confession: I do not – do not – like the smell of turkey cooking in the oven. Or turkey broth simmering on the stove. But I like cold turkey the day after Thanksgiving. And simmering cinnamon, cloves and oranges make the kitchen smell soooo sweet.

Aebelskivers

My husband’s birthday was on Tuesday — we began the day’s celebration with aebelskivers for breakfast for him! I make aebelskivers for special breakfasts — but sometimes, when it seems it’s been ‘awhile’ since I made them, someone will ask for them for breakfast (or dinner!). We serve them with powdered sugar (as you see here) and raspberry or blackberry jam or maple syrup. I’ve been making these for many years — and though at first they are a bit tricky to make, after some practice, they’re a very, very easy and fun breakfast tradition. I have some more photos and the recipe here! My favourite pan is the SCI cast-iron aebelskiver pan — you can purchase from the Solvang restaurant here. They’re often out of stock, though. 🙁 You can also purchase aebelskiver pans from Williams Sonoma. And I wouldn’t bother with two ‘hand tools’ for turning the aebelskivers. Just get a #4 knitting needle and use it for turning the aebelskivers. Medium heat to medium-low heat seems best (but you’ll get the hang of it and what temp works best on your stove). And use 1/2 butter-1/2 oil for the ‘cups’ of the pan. Too much butter makes them brown too easily and too much oil is… too much oil. :o)

As the years go by, I’m sure thankful for family traditions — I think everyone ought to have special traditions they look forward to and fondly remember from days gone by. I love hearing my children’s “we always ______ “ (but those comments are sometimes followed by an older child saying: “O, yes, we always did that. One time.” 😉

Well, for us, Aebelskivers are a many-many time thing. And, when we go to Spokane we always have at least one breakfast at The Olde European restaurant and always have at least one order of ‘skivers.

Link Potpourri

Men Pleasers
I’ve often wondered how, or by what means, the church will be carried away — what will it look like when the elect are deceived (Mark 13.22) and who’ll deceive and be deceived (2Timothy 3.13). When “An influential evangelical leader is coming under fire for saying in a NPR interview he believes in homosexual civil unions and that Christians who oppose same-sex marriage and abortion may still find reasons to support Obama.” the church ought to take notice!

Perfect Turkey Every Time. No Kidding.
Was your Ts’giving turkey heavy-duty dry? Well, if you’ll follow Mrs. King’s advice, you’ll never have to serve dry-as-shoe-leather turkey again. She explains it quite well — you’ll have to bookmark this one when you want to prepare your next turkey.

Browsing the News
Did you think OJ would ever be brought to justice? Me neither. The judge called him “arrogant and ignorant.” I always wondered how this would play out.

Kaz humidifier & Vicks
I’ve been sick this week… coughing, coughing, coughing. O, I’ve been taking it easy — I have this tremendous fear of a bout of pneumonia — so I take it easy when I have chest congestion like this. So I have a Kaz cold-air humidifier going and for the last couple of nights my husband has been rubbing my feet with Vicks. We’ve been told that doing so quiets coughs – and though I know it sounds like a hoax, I have slept better the last couple of nights and my feet feel terrific when I wake up!! ;o) So, after my bath, he rubbed the Vicks on the bottom of my feet and then covered them with cotton socks. Nice. Try it… if you’ve been coughing, maybe the Vicks will help you, too!

(I must say, though, with the humidifier going in our room, I was dreaming that I was on an jetliner and the steward was telling the passengers that the cabin would soon be pressurized and… yeah… different jetliner dreams all night. )