It’s cold here. (Like, really cold.)
It’s so cold that it’s possible some mornings I turn the oven on before I even turn the coffee maker on.
Just kidding. (Let’s not get ridiculous.)
But it’s true that it’s cold, and it’s also true that cooking in the morning is a great way to warm up my chilly kitchen.
Chilly kitchen. Chilly morning. (Can see where I’m going with this?)
A lunch time quickie today!
When I was a vegetarian, I truly didn’t miss meat. Truly.
But now that I’ve been eating some meat again, I must admit. It’s good.
Especially bacon.
When I get good quality bacon from the local markets – or in this case, from Zak’s mom and step dad who raised their own pigs last year – I dig it.
I’ve been cooking 10 – 12 strips at once to make homemade bacon bits for salads. Fry it up, trim most (but not all) of the fat, move to a few paper towels to soak up the grease, chop and store in the fridge to use on salads over the course of a few days.
Some of us (who shall go unnamed) have been feeling a lot like this for the past week or so.
(He’s pretending he’s a pregnant woman.)
This means that meals around here have been a bit lackluster lately. I’ve been letting Barbie’s Sharpie outfits steal the show.
I just realized that I post quite a few pictures of my kids in their pajamas. I do dress them when I finally drag myself up from the prone position, I swear.
Avocado!
That’s right. We’re putting avocado in the blender this morning ’cause we’re making a chocolate avocado smoothie for breakfast.
Aren’t you excited?! I’m excited too.
See, I’ve never used avocado in a smoothie before because avocados usually don’t make it past salads, bean burritos or stay-at-home burrito bowls around here.
But today, half an avocado is going into the blender with one banana, a good pour of almond milk and a couple teaspoons of cocoa powder. Maybe some spinach too if you feel like it.
Let’s say you laid down on the couch this afternoon, kids busy and frolicking to and fro, and you decide to close your eyes for “just a minute”.
Then let’s say you woke up some unknown amount of time later, living room dark, kids off entertaining themselves some place else, and suddenly you realize you’ve got about a half hour before your hungry husband would be home from work and ready for dinner.
In other words, let’s say you needed to throw something together for dinner fast.
It was a dark and stormy night.
Actually, it was just a cold and gloomy Friday morning. And I was in the mood to cook.
I was also in the mood to shake things up! I went googling my way around the world wide web in search of something outlandish to do with a bag of red lentils.
Like… string them together to use as garland on our Christmas tree? Get started on a lentil mosaic of A Starry Night? Toss lentils at wine glasses filled with varying levels of water and teach myself to play I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing In?
Enchiladas for dinner tonight!
And they. were. awesome.
But guess what’s inside of them? Just guess!
Never mind, you won’t be able to guess. In fact, you won’t even believe me when I tell you.
OK fine, I’ll tell you.
In a minute.
First, let’s start with these little buggers. They played a big part of what made tonight’s meal so good.
While I’ve made my own enchilada sauce before, I did it a bit differently this time.
Homemade Enchilada Sauce
Today, I had a plan.
That plan was to make dinner early, so that when we got home from an outing with friends late this afternoon, dinner would be mostly ready. All that would be left to do would be to make some guac to top it all off.
And that plan worked. For the most part.
I did indeed make Sweet Potato and Black Bean Chili with quinoa this morning before setting off on the day’s adventure.
I don’t know what the weather is like where you are,
but it’s A Cold, Wet and Dreary kind of day here.
Or maybe A Soup, Sandwich and Writing on Your Bread with Mustard kind of day?
Yeah, I like that kind of day much better.
So I guess that means we better make some soup. Soup that’s gonna start with cabbage and leeks.
Leeks that need their scary, hairy parts sliced off. Scary, hairy parts that need to find something fun to do.
I just read a study published by the New England Journal of Medicine from June of this year concerning the changes in diet and lifestyle and long-term weight gain in women and men.
More than 120,000 healthy men and women were observed over the course of 20 years. Their change in weight was evaluated at 4 year intervals.
The results of the study showed that within each 4-year period, study participants gained an average of just over 3 pounds. (Ever notice how easily your weight can creep up over the years?) With a 3 pounds gain being the average – a 4 lb weight loss at one end of the spectrum and 12 lb weight gain at the other end.
More Mama’s Weeds
