It’s Not Christmas Without…

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Mom’s oatmeal cookies. They are the only cookies that are an absolute must in our house.

I know, I know, mom. Couldn’t leave you out of the flashback pics though.

Admittedly, this week has gotten away from us a little. We haven’t had many home cooked meals and we’ve put our cooking around the world on hold for a few days. Rather we’ve been finishing up our holiday to do list – okay, we started and have almost finished up our holiday to do list. Fortunately I’m taking a day off work today and plan to finish everything up, because for the next three days it’s all about playing with the kids.

Now the one thing we made sure to have time for this week was mom’s oatmeal cookies. These little gems grace our holiday dessert table every year. I don’t know where the recipe originally came from, I just know it’s hands-down my favorite cookie. It’s sweet with a hint of vanilla and practically melts in your mouth. I don’t think it’s Mike’s favorite cookie, but he does ask that I only make them one time a year because he just can’t control himself around them. And the kids…well, they would eat these for every meal of the day if we let them. Continue reading →

Cel-e-brate Good Times

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…come on! Why am I cursed with these terrible songs in my head?! At any rate, we’re celebrating this week and not because of Christmas. I’m still not close to ready for that…shopping, baking, menu planning, cleaning, wrapping, etc. all still left to do. I guess procrastination got the better of me this year – that and work. Two more days to go this week and I’m home free!

So what are we celebrating? A four-spoon dish? Yes, but we’ll get to that momentarily. Are we celebrating two new awards? Yes, but again, we’ll get to that.  Our celebration is in fact nothing blog or holiday related. We’re celebrating something that’s been in the making for 16 years…31 seasons…314 games and 117 penalty minutes (for Mike that is). 

The Flock, Mike’s broomball team for more than a decade, clinched the Evanston Broomball League finals. And yes, it was worth the wait. Mike and I were just dating when I experienced my first broomball game. In fact, I don’t think anyone on his team was married. But last night as they took the title, eight pairs of little feet (a pair of which are brand new!) got to join their daddies on the ice. How time flies. Congratulations guys!

So in honor of our champion and because we’re always on the look-out for a great weekend breakfast recipe, we bring you Maple Bacon Biscuits. Yes, they are as good as they sound. We’ll be making these on Christmas morning and the next time we have overnight guests. We started by chopping up some bacon into bite size pieces. Continue reading →

Always be Prepared

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While this is the motto of the Boy Scouts, it’s also something my parents instilled in me as I was growing up. For instance, my mom always had everything you could possibly need in her purse from band aids and tissues to breath mints and stain remover. No matter what the need, you could be sure an answer was in her purse.

We also had a “safety” plan for every possible emergency from fires to strangers, and as I got older we had an escape plan for parties should they get “out of hand” or make me “uncomfortable.”  Then when I went away to college mom gave me a stash of what she called, “mad money,” to be reserved for emergencies. Of course we disagreed on what constituted an emergency – I thought bar money and a train ticket to see Mike were certainly valid situations.

My dad also imparted his preparedness wisdom too – make sure to get regular oil changes, keep a safety kit in the car, remember teenage boys have hormones (My response to dad – “So do teenage girls.” I’m amazed he ever let me out of the house after that.), never walk alone at night…the list goes on. Continue reading →

Going Nuts

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Sometimes I wonder if I’m going nuts anyway. It’s been one of those weeks. Work is beyond stressful at the moment, which I’m not used to at this time of year (nor do I really like it). We’ve got holiday parties to attend, the kids’ classroom parties to get ready for, Mike’s wrapping up his semester of teaching (finals to grade!), we have birthdays to celebrate and we’re planning to host Christmas at our house. And speaking of Christmas we haven’t even started shopping yet. Yikes!

So what’s a crazed, stressed out girl to do? Make a dessert – an Uzbek dessert! Miss A and I came across a recipe called Shakarli Bodom (sugar-coated almonds) and instantly knew it was for us. It’s got nuts and it’s loaded with sugar. Continue reading →

Pillow Talk

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No. No. No. We’re not talking about that kind of pillow talk. This is a family blog after all. We’re talking about our next recipe from Uzbekistan, Kovoqli Varaki Somsa – or Pumpkin Samsa.

We came across several samsa recipes on Uzbek National Cuisine and quickly settled on the pumpkin version. Just because Thanksgiving is over, doesn’t mean we’re over the pumpkin yet. As for the samsa, well it’s similar to the manapua we made for our Hawaiian adventure and also to the old college favorite, Hot Pockets (only much, much tastier).

For today’s recipe Mr. N and I were cooking partners. Miss A was off at her friend’s birthday party – her very first party (Now if that didn’t give me scary flashes of what’s to come…). If you know anything about Miss A, you know she was excited and feeling very important, so she wasn’t sad about missing our cooking adventure today. And I have to say, it was quite fun to be in the kitchen with my favorite boy (works out having a boy and girl – they can both be my favorites!) who expertly whisked the eggs and added them to our flour to create a dough batter.  Continue reading →

Platter of Pilaf

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Now that we’ve wrapped up our Portuguese cuisine, we’re moving on to Miss A’s international pick for the next few weeks. She again got out her trusty little beach ball globe and selected the green-colored country of Uzbekistan. Both she and Mr. N have loved running around the house saying yelling “Uzbekistan!” It doesn’t have quite the same ring as “Ecuador,” but they still love saying it.

We really didn’t have any idea what to expect from Uzbek cuisine. In fact, before Miss A picked it on her globe, I wouldn’t have even known where it was. So we got out our world atlas and the kids and I did a little reading. Uzbekistan is a relatively new country having broken away from the Soviet Union in 1991, and it’s considered part of Central Asia. We also came across the website Uzbek National Cuisine from which we developed our first Uzbek recipe, Behili Palov, or Pilaf with Quinces. Continue reading →