American = Burger? July 3, 2009

For me, one of the things I miss the most since my diagnosis as having Celiac Disease is hamburgers.

Where I grew up in Northern California, there was this drive-in close to my Grandpa’s tire store that sold something called ‘King Olive Burger’.

My mouth waters even now thinking about it. Sometimes I physically almost cry, because I crave them so badly. But for me, unlike most other Americans, the normal comfort ‘fast foods’ aren’t.

I can’t just order pizza out, I can’t hit my local fast food joint and get a hoagie or burger.  All of the normal fast foods require me to spend hours making pizza crust, or hamburger buns, or sandwich buns. My fast foods are quesadilla’s made on corn tortilla’s. Or lettuce roll ups.

I found out yesterday that McDonalds in Sweden offers Gluten-Free burgers. Amy was actually able to walk into a McDonald’s in Stockholm and order a burger and NOT GET SICK! I’m darn near sick with jealousy though LOL!

So today, I wrote a note to McDonalds HQ. If we could get every Celiac and those with Gluten sensitivity to write a company who already DOES offer GF products, just not here in America…. Well, maybe we can make a difference. Want to contact McDonald’s?

Here’s what I had to say. (I’m surrounded by 4 chattering children, so I’m probably not that clear, but it’ll do the job)

I wanted to contact your office with a suggestion that you introduce gluten-free burgers in America as has been done in Sweden. 1 in 100 people in America have Celiac Disease or a gluten-allergy. That is a lot of people who can not eat at your establishment. I know my family and I (4 of us have Celiac disease) ate at McDonald s at least once a week while grocery shopping. But can no longer do so after our diagnosis. We’d love to start eating at McDonald’s again and miss the memories and the food. We hope that you will follow your European fellows, and other companies such as General Mills and Betty Crocker who have all realized just how big of an impact the gluten-free market can make. Thank you for your consideration.

This Post Brought to you by… June 25, 2009

the 90 degree 64% humidity and a cranky baby who won’t nap.

I’m sitting here at the computer listening to my youngest wail ‘Moooommmmyyyyyy!’ and ‘Pweeeeeeeese!’ So every few minutes I have to go in and tell her to lay down and go to sleep as she’s kicking the wall, or playing with her lego’s, or talking to and rocking her babies.

So I’m window shopping again.

My honey and I have had this ongoing ‘discussion’ (that means it’s not an arguement, but it’s definitely a disagreement) about the future of our bathroom. He liked my ex-husbands all black look LOL. But I’d like some style, some color, a sense of restfulness and peace. I’d like to be able to lay and relax in the bathtub and feel like vampires aren’t going to come join me in the goth club you know? Plus since the bathroom is an extension of our bedroom, I’d really like for the colors to go together. My bedroom is various colors of brown from chocolate to amber, and various colors of blue from periwinkle to cobalt. (I really like browns and blues LOL) So I’ve just been vaguely looking all over the place for things I’d like. Well, I really think I’ve found it! I’ll have to either find rugs that work, or do what I was thinking and make a bathroom rug, something like this fluffy one (neato huH?) but probably this one, I have some brown and blue scraps I’ve been savign for almost 16 years, and it’d be nice to have a place to use them where they are seen a lot.

Anyways, onto the pictures of my discoveries today. I’m really psyched about these, I do believe I will be slowly buying these pieces as money allows.

Chicken Verde Tamales June 24, 2009

So today I finally got the tamales done.

A few days ago, I put a whole fryer chicken in the crockpot with a cup of water and let it cook for hoooooouuuuuurs. Yes dears, probably about 12 hours LOL! I put it in the fridge before going to bed.

Day 2? I deboned the chicken, the bones were nice and soft at this point and my dog was quite please with her chicken broth and bones breakfast.

I put all the chicken meat back in the crockpot with a can of diced green chiles, and a small jar of salsa verde.

I let it cook about 3 hours, added a can of black beans, some cumin, garlic, salt, cilantro and another can of green chiles. (heh)

For the tamale/masa covering, I followed the instruction upon my package, but instead of using lard, I used bacon grease. Mmmmmm bacon. It really added SO much extra flavor and didn’t detract at all from the taste.

The kids have declared them best ever and kept hovering over the pot I had them steaming in LOL! Even the picky 2 year old ate a small one.

You want to see pictures? My oldest daughter took them, she’s a much better photog than I ever thought of being. I’m artsy in a lot of ways, but not THAT one LOL

Spreading the masa on the cornhusk

Now for the filling

Rolling the tamale up

Tieing a knot on the tamales

Tamales in the pot for their steaming

Kaia entertaining herself while mom makes dinner

My photog doing a self portrait with her little sister

I am a Happy Woman June 22, 2009

It’s just now 10:30 and we have gotten so much done this morning.

1. I have 10 loofah gourd plants planted against the fenceline, all weeds pulled along that 4-5 ft or so that they are planted, and then mulch put down to keep the weeds away for the next few months or so (and hopefully help my dirt turn into something better than the sand it is)
2. All 12 Spaghetti Squash are planted! yay!
3. A whole bunch of squashes have popped up in the compost I pulled out and it turns out they are all cucumbers LOL, thankfully because NONE of my cucumbers came up!
4. I’ve weeded SO much of the garden while watering
5. I planted the Lemon Basil with the Regular Basil and Sacred Basil.
6. All the basil plants are mulched
7. The banana trees are mulched
8. The front yard is mowed, thank you Honey!
9. The tomato plants are staked and runners picked off.
10. Leaves from the forest picked up and used as mulch on the spaghetti squash plants.
11. I found out that DD hasn’t been spinning the compost tumbler the other day and it’s full of maggots because she left the lid off *sigh*, so more leaves went in there, I washed off the ‘bottom’ so more air flow could get through. And then spun it thoroughly, so now it’s more well mixed and smells earthy again instead of rotting.
12. I remembered to put up the tools when I was done!
13. Plus, it was under 80 degrees the whole time I was working! Yay!

Window Shopping with Kaboodle June 20, 2009

Usually throughout my life, I’ve never been much for window shopping. I loathe going to stores, walking around, yearning for things I won’t be able to afford, ever, can’t afford now, or I *want,want,want* but it’s just beyond my price range.

To me, that’s torture, not good fun.

Then I discovered internet window shopping.

I don’t do it often, but when I do, oh boy does my OCD go into effect LOL!!

Today it’s dishes at Overstock.com. When my ex-husband first left, I went immediately and started buying dishes, bed linens, shower curtains etc that he would have hated. I wanted to get the all black goth look out of my house and got lots of stuff that I just thought was beautiful. I didn’t have to decorate like a military wife anymore, and I didn’t need to decorate to make my ex happy either.

Pretty freeing!

However, it’s been three years. And my dishes have been dropped, shattered, chipped, lost, etc. And the cups, heh, the cups are definitely in need of replacing. So I’m window shopping. And I’m using Kaboodle.

Kaboodle is this neat widget that you can put on your toolbar (I use firefox) and when you find something you are absolutely in love with  for yourself, a loved one’s present, or just as a ‘maybe in the future’ (solar water heater and new totally cool reel mower anyone?) you click the kaboodle button on your toolbar, and a page pops up that enables you to save that object to lists. I’ve got a ton of lists, from self sufficiency items, to kids wish lists, to decor, to kitchen, to jewelry hehehe. I love kaboodle. I’ve tried a lot of different wish lists over the years, and this one is the easiest to use, best looking, and it lets you organize things, PLUS you can move things if you accidentally put them in the wrong spot. You can friend others, invite people to see your lists, so all the gramma’s and aunties can just do one click shopping for my kidlets. Fun, useful and totally non-frustrating.

And in window shopping today, I’ve discovered some things about myself. I have pretty eclectic tastes, and they’ve changed since 3 years ago when I was just discovering myself.  Would you like to see my pretties?

If you click the pictures, they’ll take you to the original page and maybe you’d like to buy them?

Squash, Chickens, and a B-day Party June 19, 2009

I’ve been having a really hard time getting my squash in. I’ve got about 20 pumpkin plants in, maybe more, but it’s hard to tell (my daughter left her pumpkin on the porch after halloween and it slimed down to the flower bed LOL and I dug them up)

Now remember, I’m in Southern Georgia, some of my friends are already harvesting cucumber, zuccini and summer squash.

However, the cantalope, cucumbers, watermelon, yellow squash, spaghetti squash, loofah gourds and various exotics aren’t in the ground yet. I’ve got one watermelon in, 4 zucchini, 6 spaghetti squash.

I’ve probably got about 24 more plants to plant and it’s HARD going. Our dirt is pure sand honestly. So I have to modify the dirt as I go along. Our compost is extremely nitrogen rich. I didn’t know that my honey had added our whole stash of goat poo to the compost tumbler, so I need to cut each handful of compost with sand otherwise it burns the plants (much to my dismay upon first finding this out) Plus the sand is extrememly compacted, there are some leftover weeds, and it is HOT HOT HOT outside. I’m dripping sweat and soaked to the skin after barely an hour (and all before 10am)

So everyday I try to get 4-6 in depending upon what my energy level is like. It’s slow going and makes me very frustrated that I’m not getting enough done.

I try to be easy on myself, but some days it’s hard when I look at where I am in reality, and where my brain says I should be.

Also disappointing today was the girls handling of their responsibilities. Normally the boys take care of feeding and watering the chickens, but the girls will be doing it for the summer. Today is the 3rd time that I’ve gone out there and found at least one of the chicken tractors without water. My honey is maintaining it was an accident. But I’m adding stuff up in my head and it all adds up to an accident with uncaring neglect. Not just careless – but uncaring.  They are my step-daughters, and I love them dearly, but they aren’t being raised full-time by us, and their mother, well, their mother doesn’t have the same sort of values we do. And it’s hard.

Also on today’s list is my one of my best friends son’s b-day party. He’s turning 12, and is currently ensconced on my floor watching CSI with the girls. His mom wants him out of the house while they decorate, wrap and other b-day type stuff…

I’ve got a whole chicken in the crockpot. I’ve got one of those cool ones that has a pressure seal. So the bones get really soft and I can feed them to my cat and dog. The rest of the chicken is hopefully going to be made into chicken verde tamales. I have to run to the store to pick up some corn husks and hopefully tomorrow we will be having some yummy chicken verde tamales. I’ll post the recipe if they turn out well! Because you KNOW I can’t just follow a recipe, I HAVE to make it mine. (recipe’s huh!)

Food Review – Amy’s Tamale Verde June 18, 2009

Since the last time I was online, there have been some changes in my life, some good, some bad, and some are just temporary.

One of those changes for the better is receiving foodstamps. I’m not very happy with needing them. And I’m not happy to get them, but at the same time, I’m deliriously happy that because of our income and the amount of people we having living in our home, we get about 300-400 more a month that what I was paying for in cash. This means many many more fresh fruits and veggies, and it means a lot more healthy gluten-free foods for me.

So I’ve been trying some of the Gluten-Free foods available at my local Publix and Wal-Mart.

Todays Gluten Free Food Review is brought to you by Amy’s Tamale Verde

I should start off by telling you that I grew up all over California, and some of my best friends mother’s barely spoke English and fed me home made frijoles and tortilla’s. My grandmother exhanged her ginger cookie recipe for my bf’s mom’s tamale recipe. So I’m pretty aware of what a real tamale should taste like and what is Americanized and what is Tex-Mex.

This one is between Authentic and Tex-Mex and it’s awesome. The whole thing was moist, delicious, and FILLING, the serving size was actually just a little too large for me. A nice change from those frozen meals that are more like snacks, or are SO huge they don’t help me in the constant battle to maintain a healthy weight. It was attractively packaged, and the actual items inside looked good before I even stuck them in the microwave. Again, unlike a lot of home-fast foods on the market today.

I’m acutally looking for a recipe online to see if I can try to replicate this at least a bit so I can share it with my family. I will most definitely be buying this brand and this particular item again. I was very pleased!

Cons were that the sauce tended to migrate to the beans, but as I’m a food mixer, not such a big con for me. The spanish rice was a little bland, as was the tamale. Also, not a big deal, since this is fast food, not MY food. Also, the tamale is much flatter and less fat/round as appearing on the box. So if you are expecting seriously authentic Mexican Food with lots of flavor. This isn’t it. But if you are ok with semi-authentic and good flavour, texture and filling, then go for it.

Potter Puppet Pals Cake May 17, 2009

I’ll just go ahead and upload all the pictures from Morgan’s cake. Sadly, one picture turned out from Ian’s mandrake fondant sculptures. They turned out pretty neat looking, but more like pissed old men than whining babies LOL. However, they sunk into the ice cream, rather than hanging around on top. So the visual wasn’t quite the same, but the kids really loved them heh

I’ll go ahead and point you at Niel Cicierega if you are wondering WHY in the heck we did a cake like this. We are big fans at this house *grins*

Then on to Morgan’s cake:

Morgan's drawing used for the pattern

Morgan wanted a white cake with rainbow sprinkles

After dying the fondant with decent dye, I put them in bags, or on wax paper to roll out

After rolling them out. I put the pattern pieces on them and cut them out with a very sharp, small knife

Then I started putting them all together

Morgan, dressed as Harry Potter looks on in glee (that’s my daughter’s expression for glee) She’d probably kill me if she knew I included that picture

After putting most of it together, I cut the edge off the purple

Then added the ‘wrist’ for the puppet master

The whole thing together

Then my VERY FIRST time ever writing on a cake. So please don’t make fun of me LOL, it says ‘Voldemorts Nipple’

Then, they destroyed all my hard work!

Nightgown Day 2 May 17, 2009

So, our previous day’s nightgown brought to you by material I’ve had since my now 15 year old was 2. That’s right, this scrap of material was left over from a dress I made for her in 1996! Wow I’m a stash-rat.

Today instead of ribbon, I used some bias tape I’d made for something else that was never finished. I like these big fat ties better. Much more sturdy for the under 2 set. I’m just lazy and really really trying to avoid the iron, because I’ll get really OCD and it’ll take a couple of hours to do this, instead of under 1. Hmmmm.

We’ll have to see what today brings us.

Anyways, last nights success story!

Kaia Posing for the Camera

“Cup Cakes” May 17, 2009

A few months ago, on the Silly Yaks list I’m on, on yahoogroups. Someone posted about a cake in a cup they’d made.

Earlier today I was whining to myself (well ok, my honey too in passing) how I wanted brownies, or cake, or chocolate chip cookies or SOMETHING sweet, rich and chocolaty!
So I’m putting up the coffee cups after the younger kids have gone to bed, and I have this recipe  kind of tap dance through my head.
Of Course I have to try it. And of Course I had to mess with the recipe LOL! I’m that kind of girl.

Just so you know, the older kids who were washing dishes have pronounced this ‘chocolately coffee goodness in a cup’ and ‘we’re definitely keeping this recipe!’
So kid tested and approved (and it’s with gluten free flours hahahaha)

Spiral Owls Cake-in-a-Cup

4 TB flour (my mix worked very well)
4 TB sugar
2 TB unsweetened cocoa
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp xanthum gum (if this is GF)
1 tsp instant coffee granules

mix together well, then add

2 eggs

Mix well again, then add

1 TB oil
1/2 tsp vanilla
3 TB milk, cream or milk substitute

mix well, then microwave on high for 3 min. Watch it, it’s an awesome display of science in your microwave, the kids and I were fascinated!

It’s really good! Very rich, chocolately, it has filled my craving to completion. It’s a very moist cake, almost custardy (which is a plus in my book from dry, crumbly cakes you mostly get with GF flours)

Cake Rising in the Microwave

Chocolaty Goodness Wafting Up