Back again

But I'm not going to even try to remember everything we've eaten since I last logged on here. Suffice it to say, we've had plenty, remained in a perpetually stuffed state, and nearly eaten our way into sugar comas. It's been a great Christmas! Over the past week or so, Daddy picked up some groceries for us, totaling $48.50, bringing the grocery money to $638.22.

Here's some food-related fun we've had in the last week or two:

Chocolate mints using THIS recipe.

Obviously, I decided to dip the mints instead of top them. One tip if you decide to do this recipe: Keep them in the freezer. I did most of the time, and they were delicious that way. But I also wanted to see how they held up out of the freezer. Well, they held up okay, but the chocolate got grainy...

The final result of our plum pudding adventures! Much to our surprise, it was actually pretty good! We just need to add more nuts and cook it somewhat less. Still, we were fairly pleased with the end result, especially since we've never done it before!

Four more days 'til Christmas!

Well, I remembered to check my receipts this evening! Daddy and I picked up some groceries while we were out and about Saturday - to the total of: $63.88, which brought the grocery money total to a whopping (or not so whopping) $186.72. Mama gave me this pay period's grocery money today however, which brings the total up to a much more comfortable $686.72.

While I'm here, here's today's meals:

Breakfast: Get whatcha want.

Lunch: Mama made beef hash with the left-over roast, potatoes, and carrots from last night. Oh, beef hash obviously implies cornbread as well, but I probably should include it for those who don't know (aka, Northerners). ;)

Dinner: Popcorn. Left-overs from lunch.

Getting in the Christmas Spirit

Majorly. Like, we're not doing a very good job of cooking meals...

Breakfast: Get whatcha want.

Lunch: Get whatcha want. (See?)

Dinner: Roast, potatoes, and carrots.

Just because we're not doing very well in the meal area of our lives it doesn't mean we've forsaken the kitchen this Christmas season. Nope, far from it. Claire was in there a lot yesterday fixing fudge and rice krispy treats for the folks in the band with them (and the studio folks, since they're in the studio today.). Yesterday afternoon, I fixed chocolate peppermints. Sorta similar to peppermint patties. Yes, they're good. I just need to get the rest dipped in chocolate... Perhaps, if I can remember, I'll post that recipe tomorrow.

For now, here's our fudge recipe (which is, in my opinion, the best fudge recipe ever!):

• 1 1/2 bags of chocolate chips

• 1 can of sweetened condensed milk

• Salt

• Vanilla

Melt the chocolate chips together with the sweetened condensed milk. We do it in the microwave. Mix in a little salt and vanilla if you want. Pour into a lined 9X9 casserole dish, refrigerate (or freeze, if you're like us and in a hurry to eat it!) until completely cooled and hardened. Lift the lining out of the dish, pull it off the fudge, and cut into bite-sized pieces. Enjoy! It's totally easy and incredibly rewarding!!!

We often change it up somewhat for what we're craving at the time. Sometimes we'll substitute chopped Andes mints for about half the chocolate if we're wanting minty fudge. Oh, yeah; it's good! Other times we'll do dark chocolate chips. I'm pretty sure we've even done white chocolate, milk chocolate, butterscotch, and peanut butter batches in the same way, but our favorites remain the semi-sweet, dark, or minty versions.

Catch up

So, I sorta kinda forgot about this blog yesterday... oops. I'll see if I can remember enough to get by:

Friday:

Breakfast: ... Nope, don't remember.

Lunch: Pizza crust French bread with butter. It was good. I'm thinking about doing that again today, but we'll just have to see how the day unfolds.

Dinner: I got 2 beef roasts (1 chuck, 1 rump) out of the freezer, too late to do roast, but not really knowing what I was going to do with them. So, I just started (early) cutting them up and trimming them up into bite-sized stew meat. Then I browned the meat and added some broth and about half a bottle of old wine. I browned/caramelized 2 cans of sliced mushrooms and 1 onion, and added those to the meat. Then I threw in 5 or so potatoes and 1-2 large carrots. After that I just let it simmer for 2.5-3 hours. Oh, of course there was the usual salt, pepper, and garlic powder seasoning. As I went along, my goal became to get as close to beef bourguignon as I could without it taking all day and making a huge mess. I am pleased to report that I think I came fairly close! Everyone like it! So, there's my recipe for a cheaper, easier, and faster Julia Child signature dish. I love that kind of cooking! I have a somewhat definite end result in mind, no recipe, and I actually end up hitting fairly close to my mark! YESSSS!


Saturday:

Breakfast: I think everyone probably had yogurt, but I'm not sure.

Lunch: Daddy and I were out shopping; we had Taco Bell.

Dinner: Daddy and I were still gone. We had Starbucks scones; the family had left overs from the night before.


Sunday:

Breakfast: Cereal? Yogurt? Get whatcha want?

Lunch: Chili, apples, and a cranberry dessert with a white chocolate sauce.

Dinner/Fellowship: I don't know that we actually did what we took to do, and, since I don't know what that was, all I can put here is... I don't know!


Monday:

Breakfast: I had yogurt. Not sure about anyone else.

Lunch: Left-overs.

Dinner: We didn't really have dinner actually...

Thursday's come and gone

And the big news is that we now have relatively fast and, more importantly, unlimited internet!!!! But that doesn't really have too much to do with what we ate yesterday...

Breakfast: There was a lot of stuff out (left-overs, eggs, cereal, English muffins, etc.), so I guess it was more of a find what you want, prepare it, and enjoy it. Mama's getting a little defensive when I post that it was a "get whatcha want" breakfast...

Lunch: Egg rolls. Costco had coupons for frozen hors dourves (making them a fairly good deal) when we went the other day, so we grabbed a lot of those.

Dinner: Chicken chili burritos, using the chicken chili we froze after our Reformation celebration. Ever seen puffed tortillas? I hadn't either until last night! ;)

Greetings

I have nothing interesting to say.

Breakfast: Get whatcha want.

Lunch: Last night's left-overs.

Dinner: Roasted chicken, roasted potatoes, and green peas.

Yesterday's Eats

Breakfast: Get whatcha want.

Lunch: Spanakopita and mini quiches - left-overs from our tree-decorating dinner.

Dinner: Vegetable beef... something or other. Claire made it.

Country Dinner: December 12, 2011

Breakfast: Left-over breakfast items.

Lunch: Pasta and cheese sauce, and left-overs.

Dinner: Country ham, red-eye gravy (not the official kind, I guess. No coffee in our version.), cheese grits, and biscuits; peanut brittle for dessert.

Delicious meat simmering in water after a quick browning. The water that the ham has simmered in is what we call red-eye gravy. SO good!

Saturday and Sunday

Saturday sure seems like a long time ago...

Breakfast: If I'm remembering things correctly, Daddy fixed grits, eggs, sausage, and bacon.

Lunch: ... I have pretty much no recollection of lunch. Which means it was probably left-overs.

Dinner: We set up our Christmas tree Saturday evening, so we had our traditional finger foods. We get the frozen hors d'ourves from Costco.

Sunday:

Breakfast: French toast casserole... type thing.

Lunch: Pot roast with pickles, salad, and mint brownie bites

Dinner/fellowship: Egg rolls

Friday's menu

Breakfast: Get whatcha want.

Lunch: I wasn't home, but Mama and Luke - who were the only ones home - had the left-over chicken pizza.

Dinner: Daddy fixed bacon-wrapped filet mignon! And salad, green beans, and scalloped potatoes. Oh, yeah.

I've put if off long enough...

Well, I didn't get on here and give an update last night, so I reckon I'd better do it this morning before I get too behind again. I just don't really want to know... You see, we went grocery shopping yesterday. It was one of the biggest grocery shopping trips we've had in a really long time, and, with it being Christmas and all, we were more inclined to impulse buy. I'm sure the total will be rather high. But first, the menu:

Breakfast: Get whatcha want. We were all rushing around trying to get away as early as possible.

Lunch: Mama and I had Taco Bell, conveniently located right next to Walmart. I understand the others had ruebens. Yes, I'm jealous.

Dinner: We didn't really have dinner, now that I think of it...

$425.79 is the sum of everything we spent yesterday. That was using some coupons, and our Costco rebate check. Ouch. The grocery total is now, according to this blog $253.43, but according to what I just counted $250.60. I think this is probably from the use of much of the change on the vending machines at Costco as we were leaving. I never got a total for how much that was. So, I'm going to blame this discrepancy on that.

December 7th

Well, we did good yesterday, and, if using leftovers is good, we did good today too!

Breakfast: I had left-over pumpkin bread. The others had eggs and whatever else they wanted.

Lunch: Left-over pizza.

Dinner: Daddy fixed steak, bread, and salad!

**Edit to add: Forgot to mention that Daddy picked up a gallon of milk for us. Cost $4. Brings the grocery total to $679.22.**

3 for 3! YEAH!

<-- The finished lid organization project! I LOVE it! :)

Breakfast: Pumpkin bread... 'course it wouldn't get done, so it was more of a brunch at 9:00am...

Lunch: Tomato soup.

Dinner: White pizza (topping was: left-over alfredo sauce, pre-cooked chicken we had in the freezer, pre-cooked bacon we had in the freezer, and a bit of ranch mix, salt, and pepper. Garnished with still more left-over alfredo sauce and green onions.). That would have been just fine had I not dumped most of the topping into the oven as I was attempting to get it out... Thankfully Daddy walked in right at that moment, and we were able to save most of it. We still had it for dinner, so all's good. And it turned out much better than I was expecting!


Mama and Luke made spritz cookies today! They're Christmas must-haves around here!

Another Monday down

It's been rainy, and the temperature is, I understand, supposed to plunge. Ugh. Oh, well, we enjoyed the lovely weather this weekend!

Breakfast: Get whatcha want, as long as it doesn't involve eggs (grocery shopping trip supposed to happen on Thursday).

Lunch: Left-overs

Dinner: Claire made spaghetti and bread sticks.

When I was in town (Centerville) with Daddy this morning, I did pick up 18 eggs for $2.59. That makes the new grocery total: $683.22.

Sunday

We didn't do so great in the food area yesterday...

Breakfast: Get whatcha want. Or, don't get anything. <-- me...

Lunch: Roast with veggies, greens, apples and seriously awesome apple dip made from cream cheese and heath bits.

Dinner: Daddy, Kyle, and I went to a lessons and carols in Nashville yesterday afternoon. We got hot Krispy Kremes and hot chocolate on the way home. Yeah, that was awesome.

<-- Proof of hot Krispy Kremes! I snapped this picture because lately it seems like every time I want hot Krispy Kremes the hot sign's not on. It's a beautiful sight, is it not?

Confession

It'll come in a minute...

Breakfast: Part get whatcha want, part omelet.

Lunch: Broccoli soup. I do not like broccoli. <-- There's the confession.

Dinner: Roast, potatoes, carrots, and apples.

Today Daddy and I made 3.5 gallons of apple cider! *Joy!* Grammy and Granddaddy also brought a country ham by. They picked it up for us, and it cost $98, bringing the grocery total to $685.81. We now have pork in the freezer!!! Yeah, it's been a good day. :)

2 outa 3!

Yeah, man!

Breakfast: Get whatcha want. This was not one of the two...

Lunch: Baked sweet potatoes. (See that? NOT left-overs!)

Dinner: Homemade pizza! Made with homemade cheese, I might add.

Oh, I have dinner...!

That's kind of how I went around all day today. Remembering it briefly while I was in the middle of something else, and the quickly forgetting it again. So 'round about 12:45 this afternoon, I finally remembered it long enough to grab some meat out of the freezer and begin thinking through possibilities. The result was none too impressive... Still, we ate, and that's what matters.

Breakfast: Get whatcha want

Lunch: Left-over turkey-fajita soup

Dinner: Macaroni and cheese and grilled kielbasa

Wednesday

Breakfast: Daddy made us pancakes and sausage!

Lunch: Left-overs.

Dinner: Fajita soup with the rest of the left-over turkey and greens.

And I got paid! The new total is $783.81, but that won't last long. I have a feeling a grocery trip will be in order in the next week or so...