Tomatoes & Taboule

The chickens are the only ones who help me eat the tomatoes this summer but they are so good this year that I’m not complaining about having to eat so many! In case some of you also have a big supply right now I thought I’d share my favorite use for them currently: TABOULE! Its nothing new for me but its something I only make in the summer with fresh tomatoes and I am eating it every day lately. I use the box mix and its the easiest thing to make. I have fresh mint but its good without that addition and I add a lot of tomatoes. I also have been eating grilled cheese with tomato. This was my first year growing beefsteak tomatoes and I’m going to stick with them from now on. Hopefully next summer one of the kids will decide to like them!

YUMMY Chocolate Zucchini Muffins!

I grew some nice big zucchini this summer but I’m not a huge fan of it cooked so I have eaten it raw with ranch, stir fried in my favorite recipe (must blog about that one soon) and then I threw out some I cooked on its own because it tasted gross. I am now going to use the rest of my stash to make only these muffins, they are so good and here is a confession:

I baked 2 batches the other day, thats 48 muffins and after them being in the house for only 2 days there are 11 left. We all love them but Ben is without a doubt the main culprit. I had frozen 12 the day I made them to save for school snacks (and thought I’d freeze another 12 but then they started disappearing) but yesterday morning I had to defrost one for Ben (he got it out of the freezer and was going to eat it frozen so I microwaved it 15 seconds).

**Additional confession: I made batches 3 & 4 yesterday afternoon! So in total 96 muffins this week, I did freeze a bunch from the last 2 batches though!

Anyway I got the recipe from All Recipes.com, here is the link: Chocolate Zuccinin Muffins

Instead of listing my changes I think I changed the recipe enough that I should just write my version of it below! Each time I made them a bit different, here is what I did for the 4th batch and that was the best one.

Ingredients:

3 eggs or 3/4 cup Egg Beaters like product

1 3/4 cups white sugar (wow that is a lot but the original has 2)

1/2 cup canola oil (original has 1 cup veg oil and no applesauce)

1/2 cup applesauce (I tried 1 cup and no oil but it wasn’t as good and really stuck to wrapper)

1/3 cup unsweetened DARK cocoa powder (original isn’t dark and they don’t come out nice and dark)

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract (I just pour some in)

2 1/2 cups grated zucchini (up from the original 2)

1 1/2 cups flour

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (original has 3 regular)

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

1 heaping tsp cinnamon (original called for 1/4 tsp each of cinn, nutmeg, cloves and cardamom)

3/4 cup mini chocolate chips

*top muffins prior to baking with 1/4 mini chocolate chips and a little brown sugar)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease or line two 12 cup muffin tins with paper liners.
2. In a large bowl beat the eggs. Beat in the sugar and oil. Add the cocoa, vanilla, zucchini and stir well.
3. Stir in the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and chocolate chips. Mix until just moist.
4. Pour batter into prepared muffin tins filling exactly 24 muffins. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20 to 25 minutes. Remove from pan and let cool on a wire rack.

*The batter doesn’t rise a lot so fill them cups high, each time the batter seemed like more than 24 muffins worth but turned out to be the perfect amount. Jamie got a bit messy while she sat on the counter to help me!

Blue Sky & Cloud Jello!

I found this GREAT and easy Jello idea and I HAD to try it and pass it on so that every Jello loving family I know can enjoy it too! Click over to the Huber Hof Academy blog for full directions but basically you make Jello normally except (after you mix your boiling water in) you add ice instead of the cold water and after 5 minutes of stirring it will set just enough to spoon into the glasses with the whipped cream layered carefully for clouds. I followed the instructions except I found that you need to definitely double the recipe and use 4 boxes of Jello (thats how many it took to make the 6 glasses above) AND I was lazy and bought Cool Whip to use instead of home made whipped cream (my substitution worked fine but don’t try with Ready Whip because it wouldn’t be firm enough to support the Jello). You can even make these a day or two ahead of time because our leftovers still look great in the fridge. I don’t know if mine look quite as perfect as the Huber Hof mom’s but I did them fast and they impressed the kids so I’m definitely going to keep making them.

Unplugged Project: FOOD!

I had intentions of doing the last 2 unplugged projects but the kids don’t always like my suggestions and even passed up “want to find rocks and paint them?”. This week is FOOD so there was no way for them to turn down that!

The first thing that came to mind was fruit (we’re having a fruity week as I’ve already posted about). I got out grapes and cut up a variety of fruit: mango, cantaloupe, bananas, apple, and kiwi for us to make fruit shish kabobs. The boys are big enough to use the sharp wooden skewers but Jamie isn’t so I gave the boys this snack during her nap time. Its just important to remind the kids that the sharp end is for stabbing the fruit and that they need to hold that end when they’re ready to eat it so they don’t stab themselves!

I figured this was a good time to experiment with the GREEN smoothies I have been thinking about. I made them for the kids without telling them that the green was from spinach (I’ll fill them in on that once they’re hooked on them and won’t care). I put some OJ in the blender and then filled it loosely with spinach. I blended that up a bit and then added 2 bananas and some cantaloupe and mango I had already cut up. I added some brown sugar because I was nervous it wouldn’t be sweet enough and then I added about 3 cups of chopped ice. I was pleasantly surprised at how much I liked it! I poured the boys some in their dino cups and said it was a green dino smoothie. Ben loved it and drank all of his but Ethan didn’t like it (although he tried it twice to be nice). Jamie also loved it. John didn’t think it was bad but didn’t want any. I’ll have to try out different combos but for my first attempt I think it was great that 3 of us gave it a thumbs up.

*Update: today I made a purple green smoothie and all 3 kids liked it! I used a lot of spinach, OJ and frozen blueberries with 1 banana, 1 mango and some frozen strawberries. It was a dark purple since I added so many blueberries, otherwise I’m sure it would have been a gross brown.

Some other food ideas I thought about doing:

1. vegetable/fruit prints: I used to cut up interesting ingredients and give my art students paint to make prints. They would make things like scenes or just colorful abstracts. I did this with my own kids a few times but not in a while. We have old celery and some rubbery broccoli in the fridge and thats a great use for it so if the kids want to we can do it this week.
2. jello mold with fruit crossed my mind but I was too lazy this week
3. decorate your own cupcakes was another idea but my kids would have just eaten the frosting
4. make your own pizzas

Multicolored Easter Bunny Cupcakes

I decided VERY last minute to make the Easter Bunny cupcakes this morning to bring to our playgroup Easter egg hunt. So they were rushed and not as cute as they usually are but the brown chocolate bunnies were CHOCOLATE so it was worth it to me! In real life they looked cuter than when I look at them in the pictures now but I really threw the features together fast so remember to look at my other bunnies so you can see how they are supposed to look!

Easter Bunny Cupcakes

I love these bunny cupcakes I made previous Easters, they are how I got the idea for my pig cupcake and so I wanted to share my idea for this years bunny cupcakes (even though I won’t make them until Sat night). I bought chocolate, strawberry and plain white marshmallows so this year I can have 3 different colored bunnies. I will use food coloring to tint my coconut pink and brown and make chocolate frosted cupcakes for the brown bunnies (the white frosting isn’t my favorite but I’ll need it for the white bunnies and the pink ones will get a little food coloring added). The coconut is really essential for holding the nose and cheeks in place so I wouldn’t skip it. The mini marshmallow cheeks will be white for all 3 colors of bunnies and this year I got a bag of yummy pink lemonade jelly bellies for the noses. I also have black licorice strings for whiskers but I am on the fence on those and opted to not use it for past bunnies. If you need directions to make the ears click on my pig cupcakes (ears can be made in advance to save time).

*Click here to see how they came out.

Mickey Mouse Ears Cookies

I really like baking cookies and Ben likes things that are “double” so I often put the dough close together on the sheet so he can have “double cookies”. I made a triple cookie by accident one day and it gave me the idea to make cookies shaped like Mickey Mouse’s head/ears. I made chocolate chocolate chip cookie dough and used a medium sized pampered chef scoop for the head and then I used the small scoop to make the ears. I made these for Jamie’s mommy & me class today and the kids seemed to like them! I think they would be perfect for someone planning a Mickey Mouse Birthday Party.

*These cookies are SUPER EASY, just add cocoa powder to your regular chocolate chip cookie recipe (I used about 3 tablespoons) and let them cool a few minutes before you take them off the cookie sheet so that the ears don’t fall off!

*I’m adding a picture before I put the cookies sheet in the oven so you can see how I spaced the dough. I should have taken a picture of one a plate since my old cookie sheets weren’t the best backdrop!

Chocolate & Peanut Butter Playdough

I was searching online for a good chocolate playdough and I wasn’t very happy with any of the recipes (it seems like a lot of sites just copy the same play dough recipes from other sites). So I decided to make my own recipe up yesterday and for my first attempt I am very pleased. This recipe tastes great and is a good texture to play with BUT it really does look gross (like poop to be honest but the boys didn’t notice). I gave it to my boys on a plate and after a few minutes of playing with it I gave them mini M&Ms for decorating (eyes and spots). I have to confess that their favorite part was eating it so I didn’t take any pictures of their creations (but Janne below did in a post on her blog).

Here is the recipe, let me know how it works if you try it! I may tweak it next time I make it but here is exactly what I did and it came out yummy:

• 1 cup creamy peanut butter
• about 1 cup powdered sugar (I added 1/2 cup first and then added more to get the right consistency)
• 3 tablespoons dutch cocoa powder
• 3 tablespoons powdered milk (probably could have left it out or used more of it if you want less sugar but I find too much gives a grainy texture)

*I would only give it to the kids on plates because after they squished it and pounded it, it did stick to the plates a bit and I wouldn’t want it on my table. It didn’t stick to their hands though so you don’t have to worry about it being super sticky!

Here are my previous play dough posts:
Coffee playdough (my favorite I think)
Peanut butter playdough

Homemade Yogurt, your kids will eat???

I mentioned this briefly in a previous post but I’ve decided to write some more about my new yogurt maker because I am still excited about it! I bought one for myself and one as a gift and I’m glad I did. Its easier than I thought to make and I get to control what goes into it. I also really like that there are no longer tons of little plastic containers coming into the house and I’m reminded of that every time I eat out of one of the cute glass jars (they have nice white lids that you put on after the 12-15 hours in the maker).

Here is what I put in my most recent batch : a mix of organic 1% and skim, 5 tablespoons of powdered milk, red food color, sugar, strawberry jam, vanilla extract and 1 jar of plain yogurt from the previous batch (you can make each jar different if you want, I have been making one jar totally plain to use as a starter for the next and after I fill that jar I add the sugar, jam, vanilla and color to the rest). I didn’t buy a starter but just used some plain yogurt the first time. I read that you will need to buy a small container of plain yogurt to use as a starter again (or get some actual starter) after a few batches but I haven’t gotten to the point where I have needed to yet. I have tried to make it appeal to my boys who are used to the sugary kids yogurt but in the future I plan to cut back on the sugar and if maybe the food coloring. Oh and YES the boys are eating it and the food coloring is the key I believe to getting them to give it a chance. I’ll be honest though, while having some yesterday Ethan said “yes I like it but I like the alligator kind with the sprinkles better”. If worse comes to worse we’ll just throw on a few sprinkles next time!

Pesto Pizza!

I LOVE my homemade pizza! I cheat and use store bought dough (either white or whole wheat depending on my mood). I shove it into my rectangular Pampered Chef stoneware pan and then top it with pesto sauce, blobs of low fat ricotta cheese (you could spread it but I like to leave it so it looks kind of polka dotty) and a layer of mozzarella. I bake it at 375 for 20 minutes. So easy and super good.

*If you are using store bought pesto only use 1/2 of a small container per pizza.

*Okay I remeber thinking how my grandmother (my father’s mom) was weird to wash out ziplock bags and leave them on the counter to dry so she could reuse them. I try not to be too wasteful so I thought of her when I took the empty rice krispie bag and put my leftover pizza in it. I didn’t save the bag intentionaly but I just happened to have made rice krispie treats and pizza the same night.

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