Two for Tuesday: Potatoes

I don't even care that it's Sunday. Sue me.

 I'm posting my Two for Tuesday recipes up anyway because if I wait for Tuesday, I won't have time to write.

Anyway, potatoes and I have a love-hate relationship. I love potatoes. They hate me and refuse to cook. Really. Not even in the microwave. Our relationship is that disfunctional.

The fact that I cooked two yummy potato dishes this week is nothing short of amazing. I want to write down the recipes so I remember them. They both originally came from All Recipes, but I modified them to reduce the sodium and to match the ingredients I had, so these are the modified versions.

Leek and Potato Soup

Ingredients:

• 1 cup butter
• 2 leeks, sliced and rinsed
• 1 quart broth or stock, low or no-sodium
• 1 Tbs cornstarch
• 4 cups potatoes, peeled and cubed
• 2 cups milk
• 3 thick slices Velveeta cheese
• Mrs. Dash to taste 
• shredded cheddar cheese for garnish

Directions: 

1. In a large pot, melt butter. Cook leeks until tender. 
2. Stir cornstarch into 1 cup of broth so that there are no lumps. Add to rest of broth and again, stir out lumps. Add mixture to pot while stirring. (When I made this soup last week, I used some ham drippings I had saved from a previous dinner and added enough water to make 1 quart. This was far from a low sodium option, I know.)
3. Add the potatoes and bring to a boil. Add Mrs. Dash to taste. Pour in the milk, reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes until potatoes are cooked through. Add cheese slices and stir until melted. 
4. Serve and garnish with shredded cheddar cheese.

 (This next recipe was originally "potatoes au gratin" , but the Jedi won't eat any dish with a French name.)

 Cheesy Potatoes

Ingredients

• 6 medium potatoes, peeled and sliced
• half an onion sliced and separated into rings (or 1 whole onion)
• LOTS of Mrs. Dash
• 1/4 cup butter
• 1/4 cup flour
• 3 cups milk
• 2 1/4 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400. Butter a 2 quart casserole dish.
2. Place a layer of potatoes in the casserole dish. Season generously. Place another layer. Repeat. When you've used half the potatoes, place a layer of onion rings. Then continue with seasoned layers of potatoes.
3. In medium sized sauce pan, melt butter over medium heat. Add flour and whisk for at least one minute. 
4. Add milk and stir until thickened. Season to taste.
5. Add cheese and stir until melted.
6. Spoon sauce over potatoes.
7. Cover with aluminum foil and back for 1 and 1/2 hours. 

Last Minute Chili

The scenario:

A friend was coming over for lunch. I felt like making chili and baked potatoes. Toa of Boy is allergic to raw tomatoes and to chunks or pieces of tomatoes....so that rules out most traditional chili recipes. I slept in that morning, and then would up throwing together some pantry staples to make this chili.

The result:

Easy and tasty. Just the way I like it.

Ingredients:

1 jar LaRosa's spaghetti sauce (it's smooth and so safe for Toa and it does not give the chili too much Italian flavoring.)
1/2 jar of water
2-4 tablespoons chili powder
1/8-1/4 tsp ground cumin
dash red pepper flakes
dash black pepper
dash cinnamon
1 lb ground turkey
1 small onion, chopped
1/2  orange bell pepper, chopped
2 cans light red kidney beans, drained and rinsed

Directions:

1. Mix the spaghetti sauce, water, and spices in a large pot.  Bring to a very low simmer. (I didn't measure the spices. I just sprinkled and dumped and tasted. The chili bas was a tad too spicy so I sprinkled a bit of sugar into the mix to bring down the heat.)
2. Drain and rinse kidney beans. Add to the pot. (While I have been trying to avoid canned beans because of their high sodium content, this week I was feeling lazy. I thought if I rinsed them well, that should help.)
3. Brown ground turkey in a skillet with the onion and pepper. When meat is browned and onion is translucent, add to the pot.
4. That's pretty much it. I let the chili simmer while I scrubbed, pricked, and microwaved a few potatoes. I served it with shredded cheddar cheese and sour cream. The chili can be served over the baked potatoes or the potatoes can be a simple side dish for a bowl of chili.

My Day at Co-op

This is not atypical.

1. Running late. About to call the other teacher for our 9am to let her know I'm running late, when the phone rings. It's the other teacher. Her youngest son has just shot himself in the eye with a plastic pop-up thing. She won't be making it to the 9am class.

2. I pull into the parking lot at co-op at 9am. Maybe 9:01...but who's counting?

3. First class, "Fun and Games". We play two rounds of four corners followed by half an hour or more of "Fruit Salad"....except we make it "Candy Bag" in honor of Valentine's Day. It's a variation of musical chairs. The boys in the class turn it into a contact sport. My take on this is....no blood, no tears--next round!

4. Kids are super-hyper by the end of "class". Fix this by handing them chocolate and sending them on to their next class. 

5. I eat a bag of sun chips during a member meeting so I have something on my stomach to take another dose of cold meds.

6. Turn in my photocopy request. Take a pair of crutches out to the van. Pay for pizza with money I borrowed from Sweetling. Make arrangements for Sweetling to attend the lazer tag outing on Wednesday.

7. Grade the Christian Life papers from my high school Life Skills class. Try not to feel too hypocritical doing so, when the spiritual maturity of some of the youth is so amazing.

8. Defeated by trying to sort five different colors of papers into 12 separate stacks. Rescued by a good friend who just took over and did it for me.

9. Pick up photocopies. Meet up with Toa of Boy. Make sure Toa gets his pizza and then drop Toa off with another great mom who offers to let Toa eat lunch with her and her boys.

10. Eat two bits of my sandwich and spend the rest of my lunch time setting up for Amazing Race.

11. This weeks challenge for Amazing Race is way too time consuming and unfun. Compensate by putting little chocolate candy bars on top of each stack of papers for the "Road Block." The students, being the awesome and terrific group that they are, take the terrible challenge on the chin and knuckle down and do their best without complaint. Eat an orange while they labor unjustly.

12. End of class is chaos. In retrospect, I know how I *should* have handled the scoring system, but hindsight is 20-20. My very patient aid in the class goes into 'damage control mode' and does ALL the clean up.

13. Head to my high school Life Skills class well after the start of the next class period. Ironically, the homework being handed in is on time management.

14. Have a nice, free-flowing discussion about what the students discovered in keeping their time logs for a day.

15. Went over the next week's assignment on Project Management. Used reorganizing my kitchen cupboards and baking supplies as an example. Made sure to put "Get help from my friend Jackie" on the list of project steps. At least I'm honest.

16. Talked about the sort of projects the students might complete for their Project Management assignment. Gave one young man permission to build something in Minecraft for his project.  Release the class early.

17. Trying to organize the mad stack of papers I have from Amazing Race. Realize that there were 11 students in class today, and I have six copies of this week's homework assignment that got left behind on the tables after class. Spend the end of co-op trying to touch base with as many Amazing Racers as I can spot. Each one assures me that they put their homework for the week in their backpack. Resign myself to emailing the homework to the parents.

18. Meet up with Toa and Sweetling. Collect all our stuff. Go and sit and shiver on the playground till three o-clock so that Toa can play with his friends a bit.

19. Leave co-op.

20. Stop at Walmart for more cold meds. Toa requests bananas. We're also out of juice. In the produce section, Sweetling finds leeks and remembers a recipe from her manga cookbook that calls for leeks. We leave Walmart with cold meds, juice, bananas, leeks, asparagus, two loaves of French bread, and a box of bakery cinnamon rolls.

21. Next stop is the library. Toa has two Captain Underpants novels on hold and ready to be picked up. I have two Downton Abbey books ready to be picked up. Sweetling checks for the third book in a manga series she is reading, but it isn't in.

22. Home near 5pm. Many trips are needed to unload everything from the van. I start water boiling and toss pieces of chicken in the microwave to thaw. The menu for tonight will be chicken alfredo, grilled asparagus spears, and cheesy garlic toast.  My sister calls and I burn the garlic toast to a crisp in the boiler. The asparagus spears get cold while I'm draining the spaghetti and dealing with the alfredo sauce, and I set off three smoke alarms in the house. No lie.

23. Sweetling miraculously makes it out the door in time for her 6:30 black belt class. I give Toa a blueberry brownie and sit down to watch last nights episode of Downton Abbey.

24. It turns out the episode was a two hour episode. Time to get Toa a snack. He shows me his castle he is working on for his Lego Designer class at co-op.

25. Get the week's school lessons for Toa typed and printed with a cup of hot chocolate and half a cinnamon roll to sustain me while I work.

26. Tuck Toa in. Type half of this. Tuck Sweetling in. Type the other half of this. Tuck Mommy in.

Good night!

Sweetling's First Dance

I will have everyone know that I have permission to post a few photos of Sweetling at her first formal dance. When one lives with a black belt, obtaining permission before posting pictures is always wise.

After my fail attempt at putting Sweetling's hair up the week before the dance, we phoned a friend for help. Look how awesome it turned out...

She had a cute little bun on the other side too.

She and friends gathered to get ready together, though I have to confess that we caused a good friend to be late to the gathering :(

Still, they all got ready in time and looked wonderful.

And, as a Mommy, it's my job to post a couple more pictures of my girl's dress.

There were lots and lots of pictures that two of the mom's very, very kindly burned onto two CDs for each parent. But I'll restrain myself to posting two of my favorite group shots.

And my favorite candid shot of Sweetling...

Time Management

I t just occurred to me, I could do this just in an email to Christoper Robin. I'm looking for some time management help. Not only am I not getting to the extra stuff I need to get done, I can't get through the _normal_ stuff that's on my plate.

Where does the time go? I don't know. That's why I'm keeping a log for the next couple of days.

6:00-wake up. Dress. Put away groceries to the downstairs pantry. Put last nights pots and pans in to soak. I'm already starting out the day in the hole.
6:30- work on Amazing Race. Not finished.
7:30-Give up. Hungry. Make and eat breakfast. Read chapter for Sunday school. Praying for an attitude adjustment for myself.
8:10-Corralling children for school. Telling Toa that yes, school really is supposed to start at 8.
8:50-Tossed a load of towels in the wash. Made phone calls to try to find dried gourds, to no avail. Brushed teeth.
9:20-Logic and vocab with Sweetling. Also transferred laundry, help Toa with math, watered the plants. Sliced up an apple for snack. Sent an email for Amazing Race. That's how I multi task.
10:35 School with Toa. Did Science and History.
11:30 More school with Toa. Math.
11:55 Lunch break! Unloaded and reloaded dishwasher.Pizza rolls for Susan. Tostitos for Toa.Spinach salad and chips and salsa for me. Doctor Who for everyone!
1:05- lunch extended with hot fudge sundaes. don't judge me. it was heggy's and i was weak.To make up for my weakness, I cleaned the pots and pans I put in the sink this morning.
1:43-Spelling with Toa. Transferred laundry. Cleaned some old icing containers. Did the second part of history with Toa. Quick music lesson and 15 minutes of a read aloud with Toa.
3:20-Laundry. Decluttered downstairs some. Have a stack of art work that I don't know what to do with.
3;55-Food again. Check Facebook. Everyone else is one their own for dinner. Straighten my hair.
4:45 -Leave for tutoring.
7:05 -Home from tutoring. Grab a light snack. Change for Tae Kwon Do.
9:00--Back from TKD. the plans for the next hour and half include: Making a cup of hot chocolate. Transferring laundry. Tucking in Toa and putting pictures on my blog. getting a shower. Tucking in Sweetling.

 Actually, today went pretty well. I still have work to do for co-op, a pile  of papers on my desk, and a kitchen counter and a sewing machine both suffering from the 'flat surface' syndrome. but I got school done and hired Toa to clean the bathroom.