Bread Making and a New Cup

The bread I buy says "manufactured on shared equipement that manufacture products containing milk".  So, I've been baking bread.

My last batch came out *really* heavy, because I let it rise too long on the first rise. All the fault of Peanut and Little Bobble. But it showed me that I can just willy-nilly bake bread now.

I've heard of "5 minutes a day" bread, but doubted it. I've read the Alton Brown explanation of what makes bread work, and it made sense to me.  The logic of non-kneaded bread escaped me. But I've hear such good things about it, so I thought I'd give it a try. And when I saw this, she convinced me.

Well, its not exactly sandwich bread, but its close.

First, it doubled in size in 30 minutes (that's *fast* for a first rise). Might be because we only a/c to 80' -- that's still 20' to 25' cooler than outside. Or might be the relatively little flour used.

Second, I let the rise a bit too long for the second rise. And, third, I was in a hurry, and stuck it in the oven when I turned the oven on. That might be why it did rise much in the baking. Or might be the 445'F oven. That will bake the outside rather quickly. Finally, both loaves baked through in about 40 minutes, when it should of taken an hour to an hour and a half.

The bread itself isn't too bad. Its not traditional sandwich bread, for sure. There are large air-bubbles, making it quite holey and the texture is off. Its kinda like wacky cake, also called monkey cake (I think). Its cake you make when you don't have eggs, and uses vinegar and baking soda. It is nice, as it took very little hands on time and very little physical effort (especially compared with kneading a batch for 8 to 10 minutes!)

I wouldn't mind getting my hands on the book, and giving some of the recipes a try. I based my making on the ivynest.blogspot.com post.  Ya know, I think I do have copies from a magazine... I should pull those and out try that recipe.

I also figured out a new cup. I looked at Walmart, but nothing struck me as worth it. I knew I wanted a cup with a lid that used a straw. Needs to hold 16 oz. Double walled would be nice, but negotiable. I remembered seeing using mason jars on a website once, and realized that pint jars are 16 oz. So, I grabbed a pint jar, wide mouth, a lid and a screw ring. I punched a hole in the lid for a straw and --wa-la-- a new cup for me!

strawberry, banana and orange smoothie. yum.

I've got lemonade in it now. Its working nicely!

Errand Day and Nap Schedules

Today was Errand Day. Peanut and I ride with Hubby to school and drop him off. Then we do our errands (usually just grocery shopping) and head home. Later that afternoon, we will head back to pick Hubby up from school. And back home for dinner.

In theory, this sounds great. In Large Family Logistics, Brenneman lays out clear goals and objectives for this day, as well as how to prepare for it. Since its only Peanut and I running the errands, I really only need my list(s) and water for me. Thanks to Large Family Logistics, I'm usually fairly well prepared for this day.

In reality, however, it rarely works out so nicely. I'm pretty good at getting the list(s) together the night before, and having the diaper bag ready, and a snack with water for me. The hard part is fitting the running of errands in with Peanut's nap schedule. Brenneman suggests working hard to get home before the littles need a nap. I have yet to achieve this, though.

Yes, he has actually formed a schedule (yeah!). He gets up about 7 am, is up for 2 hours, and then sleeps for an hour. Up for 2 hours, sleep for {about} one hour. He's down for the final nap around 3 and is up around 4 pm. Then down for the night at 7 pm. (He still nurses 2 or 3 times over night; luckily one nursing time is before I head to bed). If I tried to fit the errands in the 2 hours between naps, that only gives me about an hour after the time given to nursing. Near impossible when the nearest store, Walmart, is about 20 minutes away.

Errand day usually runs like this: Peanut is up at 7 pm, we leave about 730 to 8 am. Drop Hubby at school, get to store #1 between 800 and 820. Spend 30 to 40 minutes in store. Nurse sitting in back seat of car. Head to store #2.... rinse and repeat. If we have only 1 store to stop at, we might be home about 9, and Peanut gets his nap relatively on time. Should I have more than 1 store to stop at, we might not get home till 1030 or 11, which means first nap is lost, Peanut is overly tired and Mommy is hungry for lunch. Alas, I've not figured out a good way to do this.

Also, some stores I want to stop at don't open till 9 or 10 am. Not figured out how to do that, yet, either.

I'm hoping that as Peanut matures, he will be awake for longer periods of time, which will mean I can get errands done and be home by 11, with only have missed part of a nap (not the whole nap). But then, Little Bobble is a year old and she makes it only about 2 hours before showing signs of sleepiness. It might be that Errand Day is just a wonky and difficult day till all children are down to single afternoon naps. Ah, well, I can handle that.

Now with pictures!

Hana mentioned I should add pictures to my diaper reviews... so I did!

http://youngernews.blogspot.com/2011/08/what-i-like-about-various-cloth-diapers.html

Hair, hair, hair....

Within the past 2 years, I donated hair for wigs. I know I blogged about it, but I can't find the post... ah, well. I know it was while we were here in Central Texas.


Today, I cut off a 10 inch ponytail to donate for wig making. I've never needed a wig, but my Mom and my step-mom have both used a wig while on chemo. (And both had beautiful silver-grey hair regrow after the chemo stopped. I'd love to have silver-grey hair. :::sigh:::)

I should have done this a month ago, before I was losing gobs of hair (postpartum thing, I'm guessing).



I have been blessed with fast growing and thick hair. This was not always so. As a child, I had fine, thin and straight hair. As an adult, it has thickened and curled.

One of these days, I'll figure out how to use the mirror for a picture and not get flash glare.

I suspect the next pony-tail that is long enough to donate will take longer, unless I get pregnant again. 

Dairy free recipe: Prok chops with onion compote

We like onions, and just about anything with onions on or in it. In this case, slow-ish cooked onions with a white wine sauce on porkchops? Oh, yes. And its dairy & egg free (see note below).

This is a recipe from Martha Stewart Living (the magazine), but its altered slightly... because I only  have 1 skillet.

Preheat oven to 375'. Put a cookie sheet or such in the oven to heat as the oven heats. I put down foil on the cookie sheet to make it easy to clean. Heat about 2 TBSP oil in the skillet over medium-high heat. Salt and pepper the porkchops, and brown in the hot oil, about 3 minutes each side. I can only brown one porkchop at a time. Put the browned porkchops on the hot cookie sheet in the oven and let them bake to desire doneness.  I let them bake for about 5 to 10 more minute, then turn the oven off but leave the porkchops in the oven.

porkchops in the oven

In the skillet that you browned the porkchops in, add a bit of oil and let it heat up. Turn the burner down to medium heat. Slice 2 onions. Put them in the hot oil and let them brown slowly. Give them a good 20 to 30 minutes to brown, stirring occasionally.

When they are a nice golden brown, add 1/4 to 1/2 cup of white cooking wine, or white wine vinegar (I use white wine vinegar). Let it simmer until almost all the liquid is gone; this will take 5 or so minutes.

Serve with rice and a green salad.

Note on the egg-free: I've noticed a pattern and I'm not certain its dairy bothering Peanut. The pattern indicates it might be egg, so I'm now going sans-eggs. The plan: two weeks with no symptoms and I'll do a "challenge" -- first milk, then egg. Hopefully, I won't have to drop anything else from my diet.

Mourning my loss... of a cup

Since I'm avoiding dairy products and foods that have dairy in them, or are exposed to dairy, I've gotten creative with breakfast. There's peanut butter on graham crackers, peanut butter on homemade, dairy-free bread, or peanut butter on ritz... yes, I eat a lot of peanut butter. Luckily, I really like peanut butter. In fact, I like it so much I usually by it by the 40 oz jar 2-pack at Sams.

Peanut butter and chocolate is the best, but since chocolate has dairy... I will mix Hershey's chocolate syrup into peanut butter. Not quite as good at mixing in actual chocolate by way of chocolate chips, but close enough.

To break out of the peanut butter monotony, I expanded into fruit.  I made peach-strawberry sorbet with a borrowed ice cream maker...

all the fruit to make into sorbet.  Yummy, yummy

Sorbet takes a lot of sugar... 8 oz!

Its fruit, its gotta work for breakfast, right?

And I've made fruit smoothies for breakfast. Strawberry-orange-banana, or peach-strawberry-banana-orange, or peach-orange. I have orange juice, thus the proliferation of "orange" in the smoothies.

This has worked nicely until today. Smoothies are utterly transportable via a wonderfully double-walled insulated, even has a straw, cup. I love this cup. When I was hug-o prego, I kept this cup full of ice water. I made ice coffee to go in this cup. Have I mentioned that I really like this cup?  But today I was forgetful and ended up feeling like quite a dork. I left the cup on top of the car.... and it fell off as we were driving and broke.

Sad, broken cup :(

I haven't decided if I'm going to replace the cup or not. It won't be a Jamba Juice cup if I do replace it, and not even a new Jamba Juice cup would truly replace this cup.

Ah, well, it is *only* a cup. But, I will say good bye and wash it out one last time before putting the cup to rest.

On the bright side, no smoothie was found on the car after retrieving the cup. And no smoothie was lost out the seal where the top screws on. That's a good seal.