The Toby Show

The Crud

Here's the deal... Circumstances have conspired to keep me away from the blog for a while.  It couldn't be helped and I've missed it.  I know you understand but my apologies.

I beleive I've already mentioned that my laptop is toast. Soggy, soggy toast. Thank you, Jemima.  But besides that, all 4 of us here have been sick over the last 2 weeks. In fact, I still feel pretty crummy. It's not the Swine Flu just the plain old Crud.  Stuffy head, sore throat, cough, dog tired.  But I'm on the mend so expect more action around here.

ANd for anyone else suffering these days, here's my recipe for a great throat and cough tea.  Tea is kind if a misnomer as there's no tea in it, it's more of an infusion.  I drink this all the time when I'm sick, especially at night.  It's my own concoction and I do not claim that it has any real medicinal benefits.  All I can tell you is it's mild, harmless and it makes me feel better.

 

JL's Sick Tea

3-4 slices of fresh ginger root

1-2 tsp honey

juice from 1 slice of fresh lemon

Toss the ginger in a mug, squeeze the lemon slice and drop it in, poor in boiling water from the kettle and stir in the honey.  Steep for about 5 minutes and drink between moans.

When I'm sick I keep ginger root in a small snack bag (unsliced) and put it in a glass container along with lemon wedges (sliced).  It's all in the fridge when I need a hit and the honey is already next to the kettle.

Hope everyone is scrubbing those hands and staying healthy.

Homemade Zwieback Toasts

Jemima is teething (nothing poking through yet just torrents of slobber and the low grade fever on and off) and increasingly interested in self-feeding.  The other night I did something I would probably never have done with Huck at 7 months... 

...I gave her a crust of toasted bread.  <scary music>

Of course she went mad for it.  Got me thinking.  I don't need expensive organic barley teething biscuits and specially made zwieback toast sticks and imported rusk (okay, I never bought imported rusks, but I did check them out and covet them).  No, I don't need any of those things.  Because I have this...

Stephen is fond of eating the first bread heel of the loaf, but the heel at the end is usually a little tough after a few days in the bread box so I've been saving them with the intention that when I have a full bag I'll make croutons or breadcrumbs or use them for stuffing or something.

Or, as I'm sure you've surmised by now, I'll make homemade Zwieback Toast for my little teether! 

Turns out it is so easy you're all gonna do a V-8 and wonder why you never did this before.

HOMEMADE ZWIEBACK TOASTS

Use slices or heels of any good, dense, whole grain bread--homemade or store bought.

Cut bread slices into 3/4 to 1 inch by 2-4 inch long "sticks."

Place on baking sheet. 

Put in a cold oven.

Turn oven to 250F degrees and bake for 40 minutes.

They should come out browned, but not burnt, and crisp.

For those of you in the South, I bet you could do it in a toaster oven too so you don't have to have the oven on for that long in the middle of summer. 

REMINDER:  Don't forget that babies under 1 should not be given anything with raw honey in it, even if it's cooked.  I don't mind Jemma getting a little egg in a recipe before she's 1 since my bread only contains a single egg and we have no egg allergies, but if lots of allergies run in your family you should be mindful of that, too. 

And as with ANY solid food given to a baby this young, full supervision is a must. 

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Homemade Pickles

Welcome Crafty Crow readers! 

"Once you're a pickle, you can never be a cucumber again."

Today's post is another installment of "Half-assed Homesteading."  Sort of Homemade Pickles. 

It was super easy and Stephen says they are really yummy and fresh tasting--I don't like pickles.  They would make a really simple gift to take to a summer barbeque or picnic.

Homemade Pickles

Slice 3 or 4 cukes--approximately 1/8" thickness.  Lay papertowels over a rimmed baking sheet and sprinkle it with sea salt.  Now lay out the cuke slices, sprinkle again and put another layer of papertowels down.  Let them sit like this for about    45 minutes.

While they're sitting, mix the following in a saucepan and bring it to a boil, stirring:
3 cups white vinegar
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 tsp sea salt
1/2 tsp mustard seed
1/2 tsp celery seed
1/4 tsp tumeric

Once our cukes are prepped, stuff them in your jar(s).  Stuff dill fronds in there, too.  Pack the jars pretty full or the pickles will rise to the top and float off the bottom...like mine did.  Now pour the hot brine in to completely cover the pickles.  Seal and refrigerate for a few hours before serving.

The only bummer of this half-assed version is that they will really only keep in the fridge for a couple of weeks. 

I also want to add that Classico Tomato Sauce rocks.  I'd love to make big bulk batches of homemade suace but I've just never gotten around to trying it.  I also live in an area where the growing season is really too short to grow big tomatoes unless you have a greenhouse.  So, we keep a jar of Classico for those nights when dinner just doesn't get made and we fall back on spaghetti.  Not only was Classico voted the top jarred tomato sauce by readers of the Fort Worth Star Telegram (according to my Mom), but they use really nice Atlas Mason Jars.  I collect these and use them for putting up other things.  They are perfect for this.

It's a great recipe to try if you have a bumper crop of cucumbers from your garden.  And Cassi from The Crafty Crow is right, it's a great recipe to make with kids.  Laying out the cukes, salting them, measuring the spices, stuffing the in a jars with cukes and dill.  Big, big fun for the little people.

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Clean Out Your Fridge with Quinoa, The Mother Grain

I'm not a big salad eater.  Lettuce?  Blech.  Frisee?  Looks like something I pulled out of my yard.  It's one of those "what's the point?" foods for me.  Like chicken wings.  Not worth the trouble to get it on the fork.  But I do like most vegetables and I love whole grains.  So in an effort to get more veggies into my diet I have been trying out grain salads.

I've fallen in love with this recipe for Quinoa with Zucchini and Corn.  It's very yummy.  I didn't change a thing.

It's fresh and flavorful and easy to make.  It's good warm or cold and makes a nice lunch, light dinner or just a side dish.  I'd take this to a potluck, too.  This was my first time cooking with Quinoa.  It's got a nice, almost nutty flavor and is packed with protein and vitamins.  Just about the healthiest grain you can eat. 

And now that I know a good way to cook this stuff it's going to be a great way to clean out the fridge.  This recipe is really worth trying as is even if you have to make a special trip to get the ingredients but you can substitute almost any veggies and fresh herbs you have into this recipe quite easily. 

I generally have things like carrots, parsley, apples, broccoil, spinach, etc, around.  I'm betting you do, too.  Sometimes they lose a bit of their...vigor before I get around to using them.  And I often have a night where there's plenty of food in the house but nothing (so I think) to create a whole meal out of. 

Quinoa is my new solution to this problem--I need to remember that brown rice works great this way, too. 

Got 2 carrots that won't make it another day, 1 apple and a little bit of parsley?  Go for it.  Find a 1/4 bag of walnuts in the pantry?  Toss 'em in. 

Have a half a pint of cherry tomatoes that look...alright...and little red onion and a handful of basil?  Do it!  Uh ho, that avocado is about to go bad, too?  Stick it in there.

Just buy the grains in bulk and keep on hand and when those nights roll around, make up a pot of quinoa, clean out the crisper for the saute, then toss in whatever herbs, fruit, nuts or cheese you like at the end.   We're not vegetarians so I did use chicken stock in the recipe instead of water but you can certainly substitute veggie stock for some added flavor.

Here are a few other Quinoa recipes I plan to try in the coming weeks:

Quinoa Chard Pilaf

Coconut Curry Lentil Stew over Quinoa

Quinoa Pilaf and Quinoa Super Salad

This is gooooood stuff and just the right kind of energy booster for mid-day.  Try it.

Let's Talk About Pasta

Because I bet your kid is as obsessed with it as mine is.  Strangely though, he will devour some shapes and turn his nose up at others.  So we had a little chat and a visual demonstration...

"Pasta is pasta," I said. "It comes in many fun and exciting shapes and sizes, but it all tastes the same.  You can put butter, or pesto or tomato sauce on ANY of it."

My boy is sharp but I gotta tell you, this came as a sort of revelation to him.  Like it opened the doors wide on a whole new world of pasta devotion.  It just goes to show that sometimes 5 minutes of deliberate explanation of something we find obvious can be worth a lot of headache later.

Then we dumped out our visual aid, did some pasta shape sorting and spelled a few words with our alphabet pasta.  I'll be sure to let you know how well he synthesizes this new information at dinnertime.

I also recently discovered something quite interesting about my son's favorite food.  I always thought cooking pasta "al dente" was just a matter of taste.  Some people like it firmer than others.  Big whoop.  While this is still true, there's another reason to cook pasta al dente--it's much healthier. 

Pasta actually has a LOWER glycemic index when cooked al dente. 

Did you know this?  My mother and my husband neither one did so I'm going out on a limb and assuming this isn't general knowledge. 

Glycemic index measures how rapidly a carbohydrate triggers a rise in blood sugar--the higher the index, the faster the blood sugar response.  Fast is bad.  You want your body to use glucose slowly and steadily.  You want low glycemic index foods for steady energy, mood and appetite.  By cooking pasta al dente and keeping the glycemic index lower, you are actually making it a healthier.  Crazy, huh?  For more about glycemic index check out this page from he American Diabetes Association. 

While no one here has diabetes, I still found it interesting and also very strange that it's not common knowledge.  Just thought I'd share.

Frozen Treats, Part 1

Here in the mountains the seasons seem to hit right on the Solstice and Equinox--well, except for Spring which can be slow to emerge out of the blanket of snow.  So no surprise that 2 days after the Summer Solstice, it was summer!  Yippee!!

We made up a bunch of fun frozen treats to celebrate.  Look at at these goodies!

The "cooking" involved in making these is perfect for kids--toddlers to teens in my opinion.  And if you've got craft sticks coming out the wazoo like me, this is a great project.  I only have a 2 popsicle molds so we used Dixie Cups for most of them.  You can also make mini pops using ice cube trays.

I saw the chocolate banana pops and grape skewers from this One Crafty Place round-up.   The Banana Pop recipe looks great but I must admit we cut corners on that one and just used Santa Cruz Organic Chocolate Syrup instead.  Still very good (note that there is only one left).  The Watermelon & Orange Juice Pops are just made up but no less yummy.

Watermelon Pops

6-8 cups of watermelon chunks
2 tbsp sugar

I actually used all of one of those personal seedless watermelons.  You could do this without any added sugar at all if you get a really sweet melon but a little added in does bring out the natural sweetness.  Mix in a blender, pour in molds, put a stick in it, freeze.

OJ Pops

Enough Orange Juice to fill your pop molds

We used Simply Orange.  Pour and put a stick in it.  Couldn't be any simpler. 

To keep the sticks upright when you're trying to freeze something thin, like OJ arrange all your cups on a baking sheet then wrap a layer of plastic wrap or tin foil over the entire thing.   Then you can just poke holes in the wrap with the sticks before you freeze. 

We're making a bunch more for the 4th. Stay cool!

Kids Meals :: Fast Healthy Lunch

This is my 3-year-old's current favorite lunch.  Just thought I'd share because I know so many kids this age are going through a picky phase and it's sometimes tough to come up with ideas for new things to try with them.

A creamy hummus sandwich with chopped baby spinach "sprinkles" on half a whole wheat or multigrain English muffin.  I put cream cheese on the other half of the English muffin and cut it into triangles with a blueberry or a dried cranberry on each little "pie."  Then a few dates on the side.  Despite being kinda cutsy, it's fast and easy and requires no cooking.  I usually toast the English muffin but you don't have to.

Huck just gobbles this up.  He also likes to do the sprinkles and garnish the pie slices himself.

Maybe you're kid will like it, maybe not, but there it is.

Now, a little quid pro quo, if you please.   Share your kids current favorite lunch.  I'm sure we could all use a few new ideas.

Kids Meals :: Fishy Cakes

I got off to spectacular start with variety in the foods Huck would eat, but I've really seen his taste narrow over the last year.  If he could eat pasta with pesto every night of the week, he would.  I don't know if it's just his age or the fact that I've gotten a little lazy and am falling back on sure things more.  Whatever the cause, I've been trying to expand his palette a little and get out of the pasta rut.

I've got a winner here in the brain food category.   I modified this recipe from one found in The Toddler Cookbook by Annabel Karmel.

Fishy Cakes

1 can pink or red salmon
3 tbsp fresh chives or spinach, chopped
2 tsp lemon juice
1 tbsp ketchup
1 tbsp mayonnaise
1 cup breadcrumbs
2 tbsp flour
1 egg
1 cup panko breadcrumbs
Canola or sunflower oil
a few frozen peas

The original recipe calls for chives which would be wonderful, only Huck doesn't really like the consistency of chives.  However, he's not at all averse to flecks of green stuff in his food so I opted for chopped spinach instead.  Any green would do.  It also called for fresh breadcrumbs in the cakes and dried for the coating but I just used packaged dry crumbs in the cakes and prefer panko crumbs for the coating.  Extra crispy!

Drain the salmon and dump it in a small mixing bowl.  Chop it up with fork.  Add the spinach or chives, lemon juice, ketchup, & mayo and stir it all together.  Now start adding in the breadcrumbs until you have a somewhat sticky consistency that will hold a shape.  Not too dry or it might fall apart. 

Scoop up a dollop and form it into a ball.  My balls were about 1 1/2 to 2 inches in diameter.  You can either flatten it into a traditional crab cake shape, do an oval like a typical salmon croquette (which is what these really are) or hand mold them into little fishy shapes, which I knew my guy would flip for.

Put flour, egg (beaten) and panko in plates or shallow bowls.  Coat the cakes in flour first, the dredge in the gg, then coat with panko. Once you have all your cakes made (I got 6 fish and 3 round cakes out of this recipe), stick your finger in there and make a little eye socket for the frozen pea. 

Up to this point this is a great recipe for kids to help out with.  Huck especially likes mashing the salmon and making the hole for the eye.

Now heat some oil up in a frying pan or sauce pan.  Using a sauce pan means you can cook fewer at once but you have less splattered mess (and wrist burns) to deal with later.  Use enough oil to come almost halfway up the side of each cake.  About 1/4 inch depending on how thick yours are.  Let it get really hot then cook the cakes for about 2 minutes (or until golden) on each side.  Take them out with tongs and lay on a paper towel to drain.  

Don't forget to give each fishy a little green eyeball.  This is yummy with a side of sweet potato fries and some ketchup, mayo, or remoulade.

And if you find that your kid, like mine, loves these, then pop over to Itty Bitty Bristro and try the Dijon Salmon Casserole or the Pasta with Salmon & Peas.

Jazz's Tortilla Soup

This is my Mom's recipe and IT IS WONDERFUL.  It's hearty, has awesome flavor (authentic Tex-Mex so it's pretty spicy) and it will spoil you to any tortilla soup you ever try to eat in a restaurant.  My snooty, foodie husband says it's got depth.

Now, you know how my mother is about her chili powder.  While she insists that Frito Pie can only be made with Mexene Chili Powder, this Tortilla Soup MUST be made with Gebhardt's Chili Powder.  Don't question this people.  Just to do as she says.  It's easier that way. 

This, and the fact that my mother-in-law also insisted on a certain chili powder for her Texas Red Chili (McCormick's Hot Mexican Style) is why, at any given time, I have at least 3 brands of chili powder in my pantry. 

It must be a Texas thing.  Sometimes when I'm out of the one I need for a specific recipe, I'll substitute (the horror!) a different chili powder.  But I always feel guilty about it.

Don't be thrown off by the long list of ingredients.  Besides being great, this soup is also quick and easy.  I love it when those two things go together.

Chicken Tortilla Soup
This makes a pretty big pot of soup.  Probably 6-8 servings.

Canola Oil
Corn tortillas (yellow or white)
1 onion, chopped
6 cloves garlic, minced
1 bunch cilantro, chopped
1 jalapeno, sliced
2 quarts chicken broth
2 cans petite diced tomatoes
1 Tbsp chili powder (Gebhardt's if you can get it)
1 1/2 Tbsp cumin
1/2 tsp cayenne
3 bay leaves
1 bag frozen corn
1 large lime
4 chicken breasts
salt, to taste
pepper jack cheese, shredded
avocado

Take about a dozen corn tortillas and cut them into very thin strips.  Put about an inch of canola oil in a dutch oven or soup pot and heat it up.  Drop one little piece of torilla in there and when it rises, the oil is hot enough.  Now batch fry your tortilla strips until they are crisp.  Pull them out with tongs and lay them on a plate of paper towels to drain.  You can even do this the day before if you want.  Once you've finished making all the strips, get rid of the oil leaving about a tablespoon in the pot.

Return the pot to the stove and saute your onion in the oil, when they're almost browned add in the jalepeno & garlic for a bit.  Add the cilantro then tear up 3 corn tortillas into small pieces and toss them in too.  Stir.  Add the spices and stir everything together. 

Now add the broth, tomatoes and frozen corn.  Stir and bring to nice simmer for a bit.  Add the 4 chicken breasts and continue to simmer the soup for another 20-30 minutes, until chicken is cooked through.  Pull out the cooked chicken breasts and shred them with forks on a cutting board then return the shredded chicken to the soup. 

Squeeze the juice of one lime into the soup and salt.

Top with the tortilla strips, pepper jack cheese and diced avocado. 

This is one of those dishes that's even better on the second or third day.  My mom only makes half of this recipe for her and my dad, but I like to make it this way so we have lots left over.

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Frito Pie...a Texas Tradition

Welcome to another edition of...

When Organic Moms Go Bad!

<imagine huge booming voice and lots of reverb>

Anyone from Texas--probably Oklahoma, maybe Louisiana, too--knows this is really old school.  And really yummy. 

Back in the 40s, my husband's grandparents were invited to a party about an exciting investment opportunity.  Over drinks in a nice Dallas neighborhood, they were offered a new snack food--strange little curved corn chips.  They tasted, deemed them "too salty," and PASSED on getting in on the ground floor of the Frito Lay Empire.  DOH!  Jemma could have been a Frito heiress!  Instead, she's the daughter of unemployed writers and she's wearing her brother's hand-me-downs.  C'est la vie.

Frito Pie

2 lbs ground beef
1 yellow onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
4 Tbsp chili powder
2 Tbsp flour
2 tsp salt
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp sugar
2 cans tomato sauce (8 oz)
2 cups water
1 bag Frito's Corn Chips (Original, not Scoops)

Brown meat, onion and garlic together.  Drain off excess fat.  Stir in remaining ingredients.  Mix well.  Cover and simmer 30 minutes. 

 

Now my mother insists that the only way to make this is using Mexene Chili Powder.  I'm not sure, but it could be because our secret family recipe for Frito Pie turns out to be the chili recipe on the back of the Mexene jar.   If you can't get Mexene in your neck of the woods just do the best you can but know that, according to my mother, what you are eating will pail in comparison to the real thing. 

Once your chili is done, dump a handful of Fritos in a bowl and ladle chili over the top.

It's also my mother's contention that only weirdos and Yankees use Scoops.  Please get Frito's Original Corn Chips or, again, you'll just be eatin' chili over corn chips, not real Frito Pie.  

Garnish with copious amounts of cheddar cheese.  Red onion and/or sliced jalapenos are good, too.  Finish up with a tooth brush. 

Makes 8 servings of about 2/3 cup each.

For a truly traditional and kitschy touch, get individual Frito bags--if they even still make them.  Slice open the front of the bag (with a box-cutter for an extremely authentic bought-it-at-a-high-school-football-game vibe), lay the bag in a bowl (or paper hot dog boat) and pour the chili in the bag.  That's how they came at Pennington Field. 

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For more great recipes like this visit my Comfort Food page.

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