Your Home

This post will not be about cooking. I have no recipes in this post and no cooking tips and no pictures of food. Hopefully it is still interesting.

I read a book this week called Inspired Design. Written by Roxanne Hughes Packham and Hannah Packham. I bought the book because I was a little interested in reading it but mostly because I wanted to support the ministry that the funds from the book would go to. I brought the book home thinking that it would look nice on my coffee table and I would open it and look at the pretty pictures when I had the time. Little did I know that once I cracked the book open I was hooked and I would finish the book in less than two days, going away from it inspired to use my home in a whole new way. My husband and I live in a small apartment. We are saving up for a down payment, so in the meantime we live in a conservative 583 square foot apartment that is just big enough for the two of us and we totally love it. I worked hard to decorate my little home to make it look like ours and to add my own touches to it when we first moved in. I am learning what a cozy and neat home can mean to people and to their lives. The book Inspired Design was written by an interior designer who uses her home and hospitable spirit to minister to and love other people. I could not imagine a more wonderful purpose for a home. It sounds a little like what God intended for women to do in their homes.

I remember hating cleaning my room when I was a child. I remember telling my mother that real friends would not care if the house was clean or dirty. My childish logic is funny to me now as I have come to realize that the reason you clean and decorate your home is to make people feel welcome and loved. To make them feel like they are important enough for you to clean and decorate and welcome them into your life and into a tidy home that is comfortable, beautiful, and peaceful.

My husband and I wrote our own vows at our wedding. One line that I wrote for him and promised to him was that I would "make our home a place of comfort, peace, and rest". I now add to that that I want our home to be warm and welcoming to others who come in. That my decorations will tell a story about the things we love and what we are passionate about. Wether that is a guestbook, a picture, a quote, or a color, I hope and pray that our souls and love for God, each other, and other people will be clearly conveyed through the little 583 square foot apartment.

Homemade Pretzels

 

For this next dish, I really have no claim to the recipe. I am a follower of one blogger who is most intriguing. My husband and I were home on a sunday afternoon, looking for something to do. We ended up in the kitchen doing my favorite hobby. Making food. He is such a sweetheart. We decided that pretzels would be fun to make. You can find the recipe at
http://smittenkitchen.com/2007/02/knotted-and-stacked-disappearing-acts/
Seriously. You are going to love these things. We took them over to my brother and sister in-laws house and ate them with warmed marinara sauce and a cheese dip. My cheese dip was super easy. All you need is:
3/4 cup of milk
1 Tbsp of melted butter
4 Tbsp of flour
                                                      1/2 cup of shredded cheese of your choice (I used pepper jack for this)
                                                       Salt and pepper to taste

In a small sauce pot, heat the milk and butter until warm. Do not boil. slowly stir in the flour until a smooth rue forms.  Once the flour is dissolved slowly stir in the cheese allowing it to melt into the sauce as you go. Once all of the cheese is melted and incorporated, add salt and pepper to taste.

Breakfast Potato's with Eggs Benedict Redone

Saturday morning is the time for fun breakfast. I remember that when I was a kid. Saturday morning was the time that my Dad took over the kitchen and made a scrumptious breakfast. Usually it consisted of eggs, bacon, toast, potato's etc. It was always one of my favorite meals of the week. Now that I have my own home I have tried to start to incorporate meal traditions into our family. One of them will be scrumptious, cholesterol filled, and delicious Saturday morning breakfast. This week I tried to make one of my personal favorite breakfasts: Eggs Benedict. I have had many eggs benedict meals at many different restaurants and everyone does it a little different. One of the main components of Eggs Benedict is the Hollandaise Sauce. Be warned. This was my first time making Hollandaise Sauce so I am by no means an expert. I found a recipe and through it sounded good so I tried it. If you know how to make it better or have tips for me that I could improve on what I have done then please let me know.

Ok enough chatter. Let's get to it.

Eggs Benedict:
2 large eggs
1 tomato, sliced
4 slices of bacon
2 english muffins or other kind of toast-able bread
butter for spreading on the toast
2 T of vinegar (any kind)

Hollandaise Sauce:
3 egg yolks
1 tablespoon of freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/3 cup of melted butter
pinch of cilli powder
pinch of salt

For the Hollandaise Sauce:
1. put the egg yolks and the lemon juice into a bowl and whisk together until the yolks become thick and   doubled in volume. About 5 min or so.
2. Get a small sauce pan and put about an inch of water in the bottom and turn  on low. Take the whisked eggs and lemon juice and put them over the saucepan in a metal bowl. The bottom of the bowl should not touch the water. Whisk the mixture and add the butter. Whisking until it thickens further and doubles in size. Be careful not to let it get too hot or else the eggs will scramble.
3. Remove from the heat and add the chili powder and the salt. Mix in. Store in a warm place until you are ready to use it.

Eggs and Bacon:
1. Get a small pot to poach you eggs in.  Fill with water and heat until it boils and then reduce to a simmer. Add the vinegar and a pinch of salt to the water.
2. On the side take a bowl and put ice and water in it. This will be used to blanch the eggs after they are done poaching.

3. Crack the eggs, one at a time into a small bowl and then slowly and gently place the egg into the pot of water. Let it poach for about 4 min. Depending on how you like your eggs you can cook longer or shorter. Very carefully remove from the pot with a spoon and place in a bowl of ice water.
4. Let it sit here for about a min and then remove with a spoon and place on a plate with paper towels to let it dry off.
5. Repeat with the other egg.
6. Toast the Bread
7. Cook the bacon on the stove top and save the bacon grease.

The Benedict:
1. Preheat the oven to Broil
2. Assemble the sandwich by buttering the bread, then place the sliced tomato, the poached egg, bacon and finally the Hollandaise Sauce on top.
3. Place on a baking sheet covered with aluminum foil or parchment paper (so you don't have to wash the baking sheet) and put in the oven for about 3 min.  You just want to heat the sandwich a little to melt the hollandaise over the sandwich and heat the tomatoes.

Breakfast Potatoes:

1 large yukon potato or 2 small potatoes of your choice
Rock salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
Chili Powder
2 Tbsp of olive oil
Leftover bacon grease

1. Cut the potato into small, square, equal size pieces.
2. While on the cutting board, add salt, pepper, chili powder and olive oil. Move it around the potatoes with your hands to spread out the oil and seasoning.
3. Fry in the bacon grease over medium heat. About 8-10 min until potatoes are cooked and crispy.

Hope you love it!

Meat Free Night

Lately, I have been trying to find ways that my husband and I can eat very healthy but still enjoy good food and even indulge a little from time to time. One of the ways that I have decided to do that is to make sure that I have at LEAST one night a week where we are meat free. For some of you this may be a novelty. For others, you may eat meat free multiple times a week or you may even be vegetarian. Wherever you are coming from, I am going to try to post my meat free meals from time to time just to share with you my ideas. They may not be the most inventive recipes in the world, or, who knows, they may be the most inventive. I got the idea for this recipe from a magazine and added my own twist to it. I thought that the result was tasty, pretty, and, most important, very healthy.

I made a pasta dish with pesto and grape tomatoes. I used my own home made pesto for this which is super easy and fun because you can virtually change any of the ingredients and still make an awesome pesto. I also used whole grain rotini pasta. Whole grain pasta was used because it adds texture and heaviness to the dish along with a little extra protein and fiber. This is good because we are not using meat so the extra protein is nice and will make you feel more full. Rotini is good because the pesto will stick easily to all the swirls. You can use this or any other small pasta noodle. Grape tomatoes are fantastic. Tomatoes are one of my favorite foods by the way, but we will cover that in another post. Grope tomatoes are awesome because they have a condensed flavor and are sweet and add juiciness to the bite. Hmmm, my mouth waters just thinking about it.
Also, I have an easy and yummy salad that I hope you will love.

Here we go

Ingredients:
1 pound of whole grain rotini or other small pasta
1 cup of grape tomatos, cut in half,
1/2 cup of parsley
1 cups of fresh spinach
1/2 cup of basil
1/2 cup of olive oil
1/3 cup of grated parmesan cheese
salt and pepper
1 clove of garlic
1/2 cup of pine nuts
1/2 cup of cashews
1/2 tsp of red pepper flakes

Get a large pot for your pasta and boil the water, once water is boiling, add the pasta and a small hand full of salt. Keep the lid off and let cook for 8-10 minutes or until done. Strain.
In the meantime take 1 cup of the spinach, the parsley, the basil, garlic, cashews, 1/2 tsp of salt, parmesan cheese, and olive oil. If you have a food processor put these ingredients in a food processor and turn on and slowly stream in the olive oil. If you do not have a food processor take all of these ingredients plus the olive oil and put in a large bowl and blend together with an emersion blender. You can adjust the consistency of the sauce by adding more olive oil if you like. Once the pesto is done, combine with the pasta and mix together in a large bowl. Add the cut grape tomatoes. Take the pine nuts and put them in a small frying pan and toast over high heat for about 3-4 min and then put pine nuts over the pasta.
                                                                 Combine. Salt and Pepper

Salad
3 cups of fresh spinach
1 orange
1/4 of a red onion
1/2 cup of white wine vinegar
1/4 cup of lemon juice
1/2 cup of olive oil
salt and pepper to taste.

Put the spinach in your salad bowl. Take the orange and cut the top and the bottom off. Then cut down on all sides of the orange to remove the skin. Cut down the middle and then into bite size pieces. Like such

Take the red onion and slice it into thin bite size pieces. take it and put it into a small bowl and pour 1/4 of a cup of white wine vinegar over it and let it sit for 10-15 min. The vinegar will begin to break down the onion and make it flavorful and not as strong when you eat it raw in the salad. Once it has set, add it to the salad. In a separate bowl, put the remaining vinegar, lemon juice and add some salt and pepper. Whisk in the olive oil. Pour the dressing over the salad. 

  Enjoy!