Nursery sneak-peak and French Onion Soup revisited

Hello!

One of my fitness and foodie blogger crushes was talking about doing some nesting/house repairs for the baby they're expecting over at Carrots N Cake. Tina and her husband, Mal, have big plans. Oh, and don't forget to check out their cute pug, Murphy!

Since there's lots of baby love going on with Baby Lincoln at Iowa Girl Eats and the baby that Jenna and her husband are expecting over at Eat, Live, Run , I thought I would share a nursery sneak peak with you all!

Here's a roundup of a few of the projects that I've done and totally filled up the walls:

Steve found this great map, which is flanked by art from Naptime Diaries and original art from my sister.

This is a Jen original that is going on the book shelf.

Remember when I figured out how to install a floating shelf?
I made the art on the right and just framed a greeting card on the left. The tea cup was my grandma's.

This is a total Pinterest copy-cat project. The lighting is funky here, but it works in the room.

Last, but not least, we assembled the crib! It's adorable. I'll give you a full tour after the baby shower in two weeks.

An early shower gift from my parents!

So, French Onion Soup. It only has about 8 grams of carbs per serving (so I could have a really big serving) and I'm allowed to eat a whole 45 grams for dinner to fit in my gestational diabetes diet! 15 g will be taken up by a wholesome glass of milk, but I'm thinking grilled cheese croutons for the other 15 grams...

Yes, I know that in this French Onion Soup version that I made last time, I was all about the gratinee process of melting cheese all over the place. Yes, I'm still pro-cheese. Have no fear, there will be cheese, but when you see these cute bites from Ina Garten, how could you resist? Also, I'll be omitting the wine. Obviously. No booze for me even if it's in the soup!

I'll let you know how it all turns out!

Thanksgiving prep - Pommes de terre

Paula Deen

Ree Drummond (The Pioneer Woman)

Gina Neely

I love all of these ladies dearly, but there is no question that the real Queen of Comfort Food is Julia Child. She was the original celebrity chef who encouraged everyone to use butter and plenty of it. Yes, some of her food is ridiculously hard to make, but most of the time it's just delicious food that seems difficult to cook because it has a fancy French name. For instance, my husband's favorite side dish is Puree De Pommes De Terre A L'Ail, also known as garlic mashed potatoes. See? Not so scary after all. (Really not scary if you watch the clip at the end of the link I posted where they set some Julia Child to Guns N' Roses - HA!)

Thanksgiving is the food Superbowl of comfort food. There is turkey, which has the sleep-inducing tryptophan (although the wine and overeating are also culprits). There is starch everywhere from stuffing (or dressing) to rolls to potatoes. The creamy goodness of green bean casserole and mashed yams just make you think of napping. Oh, and that dollop of whipped topping (mock me, I'm a Cool Whip fan) sitting on top of a slice of pie doesn't hurt either. Everything about this day suggests comfort.

I try really hard to eat healthy meals with a variety of color and texture. My kitchen crush mom always said that you need at least three colors on your plate. I was assigned to bring potatoes to dinner at my in-law's house. Now, they didn't specify what kind of potatoes to bring. I thought I could try out a new recipe or put a twist on the Ina Garten roasted potatoes from this blog post by adding other root veggies like parsnips and beets for vibrant colors. Wouldn't that be fabulous?

When I suggested this to my husband, he was horrified. HORRIFIED. He couldn't believe that I wouldn't make cheesy potatoes. It's a staple in his holiday diet. So, I made the roasted veggies for my office's Thanksgiving potluck lunch and bought all the ingredients for cheesy potatoes.

Here is the recipe I'll be using:
Cheesy Potatoes
Ingredients:

2 lbs shredded potatoes (you can cheat and buy the frozen hash browns and thaw them)
1/4 cup butter
1 (10 1/2 ounce) can cream of mushroom soup (if you can, find the low-sodium kind)
1 cup sour cream
1-2 cups shredded cheddar cheese (save some for topping)
1/2 cup onion, diced (more or less to taste)

2 cloves garlic, crushed

1 cup corn flakes
salt and pepper, to taste 

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Mix all of the ingredients together in a big bowl except the corn flakes and a handful of the cheese. Pour the mix in a greased 13 x 9 inch baking dish and cover with foil. Remember, if the veggie grows underground, cover it up! Bake for 50 minutes. When the timer goes off, take the dish out of the oven and remove the foil without burning yourself. Steam is hot, people. Sprinkle the top of the whole dish with corn flakes and the cheese you saved. Put it back in the oven without the foil for 10 more minutes so it gets nice and crispy and melty. I don't know how it gets both crispy and melty, but it does. I don't question miracles. 

"But Jen, how do you shred all those potatoes?" Well, crushers, I usually cheat and buy the bags of frozen potatoes. However, this year I own a food processor with one of those fancy, schmancy slicer attachments, so I'm going to try that. If that doesn't work, I'll end up slicing them and making potatoes au gratin. I'll post that recipe next week.

I know I haven't been around much and I'll be MIA for the next few days, but that's because my sister is getting married this weekend, so I don't have to do much cooking! I'll be eating Thanksgiving potluck dinner, then leftovers and rehearsal dinner and then wedding food and then more leftovers all weekend! WHOO HOO!

Thank you to all the crushers who read this blog, make comments, share what you've learned or made you laugh and special thanks to those who take it one step further and either donates to get food to those who need it or just shares meals with others.

 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Dinner with Friends revisited

So I have been teasing you with this menu for when we had some friends over on Tuesday night, right? Well, it was delicious. Too bad I forgot to take a picture of our beautifully set table and the delicious food! Instead, I had my husband take a picture of the leftovers. They were still delicious...


Here is why there is no awesome photo:
1. I got out of work later than expected thanks to some cranky people on the phones.
2. My husband's truck died and that was the night we could pick it up. However, since he was still coaching and I somehow beat him home, I had to throw the ribs in the oven so they would cook long enough and then throw on running clothes so that I could run there (it's about a mile and a half away) and make it over to the mechanic shop before they closed and then they wanted to explain what happened. While I normally LOVE that mechanics take the time to explain things to me even if I'm a woman (thank you Mechanic Scott!), I really didn't need them to reenact ripping the dome light out of the car.
3. Our guests showed up early. However, they showed up with rocky road cheesecake, so who cares?!

Coach S and Mrs. Coach S are adorable! We had a lovely dinner, great conversation, and made plans for another get-together. Hopefully, it's to watch a Packer game or play with their new puppy! I could totally see why Coach S and my husband are friends. While they may talk slowly, you can tell that their minds are moving 100 times faster. Unlike me, a motor-mouth, my husband carefully considers the words that come out of his mouth 98% of the time. If only I would learn to not plow people over with words! I'm sure that's exhausting.

OK, back to the food. Ribs and potatoes are going to be the focus here because, that's all I have a picture of to share with you.

Ribs:
My husband does the grocery shopping for us based on a careful and detailed list. He does a great job! He found wonderful baby back ribs on sale!

Here is the recipe (I made this one up based on a lot of recipes and mostly what my mom told me to do):
Ingredients:
3 pounds of baby back ribs, thawed (approximate weight)
2-3 tablespoons of Galena Street rub from Penzey's Spices (alternatives are the Northwoods spice or Emeril's original)
Splash of vinegar
Optional:
1 18 oz bottle of Sweet Baby Ray's Original BBQ sauce - This is my husband's favorite. I also like the hickory or honey flavored variety. However, this went really well with the rub.

How to:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Put the ribs bone-side down in a baking dish. I used a 13 x 9 inch pan, but had to cut the ribs to fit. (I REALLY wish I had a picture of this for you). I drizzled a bit of vinegar over the tops of the ribs - just enough to get them wet. Sprinkle the rub spices over the ribs. You don't have to get carried away here, but make sure the spices are even. Then bake in the oven for 2 hours. With 30 minutes left to bake, you can either choose to baste them a bit with the pan juices or you can cover the ribs with sauce. I go for the sauce, but that's just me. If you don't want them so messy, you can leave the sauce off or just on the side. Bake for 30 more minutes.

The garlic oven roasted potatoes were modified from Kitchen Crush Ina Garten's recipe. This is a super easy recipe and it is always a hit! Here is the real recipe.

Here is what I did:
Ingredients:
3 lbs of red potatoes, washed and cut in inch-sized chunks
1/4 cup of regular grapeseed oil (I'm a fan of the Wildtree products)
6 cloves of garlic, crushed
1/2 tablespoon Penzey's Pasta Sprinkle (Italian seasoning)

Since you've got the oven hot, you don't need to preheat the oven, but you'll just bake them longer. However, if you're just making these alone, preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Wash the potatoes and chop them into quarters or inch-sized chunks. In a large bowl, mix the potatoes with the oil and garlic. Warning, if you crush your own garlic like I did, your hands will smell like garlic for a while. Then spread the potatoes on a baking sheet (I cover mine with aluminum foil for easy cleaning) and then sprinkle them with the Italian seasoning. Bake for about 1.5 hours if they're at 350 with the ribs or for about 45 minutes to an hour at 400. Turn them once or twice during the baking time so they get browned evenly.

Here is what everything looks like when it's done:

OH MY GOSH! Ok, so I'll have to give you the photo later if I can figure out how to get it off of my phone since he texted it to me instead of e-mailing it to me. Hmm... We will get this fixed. I hope! In the meantime, use your imagination!