Cooking Self-Reliantly

On Sunday night I made Rachael Ray's delicious "Stromboli Bread":

Rachael Ray's Official Website :: Pat's Stromboli Bread

I have made this before and usually end up with 2 problems: problem one is the insides of the bread.  What do I do with it once I scoop it out of the loaf?  I eat it, of course!  But that is kind of wasteful (although very tasty).  So this time I took a note from Martha Stewart's book and made some delicious croutons.  Simply toss cubed bread in a little EVOO, pop them in the oven while the Stromboli Bread is baking and voila!

Okay, problem two: I always have extra stuffing.  Maybe Rachael's bread is bigger or maybe she tastes more stuffing along the way, but I always have way too much and it usually goes to waste.  My solution here was actually another RR recipe: I mixed the leftovers together with some kidney beans, added a can of chicken broth and BAM! soup for lunches!  Guess what goes great on top of that?  Homemade croutons, that's what.

So as you can see, I'm fairly proud of myself and my cooking adventures this week.  Tonight I am home alone so I made a grilled cheese-- not exactly gourmet but better than take-out!

2010- The Year of Self Reliance!

Welcome 2010!  I must admit, 2009 will be very hard to beat but I am looking forward to a fun-filled year.  Patrick and I have made a joint resolution to be more self-reliant.  This is a more exciting way to say "cheap".  With our around-the-world trip a mere 2 years away (that's only 24 months!!) we really need to focus on building our savings and paying down our debts.  So we've got the large-scale financial part all planned out but it's the day-to-day expenses that we need to work on.

Last night we were both craving some delicious Chinese takeout from our favorite place (go Chef Won!) but decided to stick ot our plan and had veggie chili over baked potatos instead.  Pat lamented our lack of sour cream so I whipped up some cheese sauce:

CHEESE SAUCE
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp flour
1 cup milk
1 cup shredded cheese
1/4 tsp paprika
salt and pepper to taste

Melt the butter in a small saucepan.  Whisk in the flour until it is smooth.  Pour in the milk and whisk continuously; bring to a simmer until thickened.  Add the cheese and spices. Serve over potatos or veggies.

I used some fantastic garlic chedder cheese from Trader Joes.  Yummy yum!

I know it will be hard to break some of my spending habits-- I love stopping for a fancy coffee, eating dinner out and hitting up air conditioned bars in the summer-- but when I keep our long-term goals in mind it doesn't seem too bad.

Here's to the year ahead: may it be filled with laughter, creativity, love and (of course) self-reliance!

GUACAMOLE de PATRICK

This is a fairly accurate portrayal of myself and how I eat guacamole.  I LOVE IT SO MUCH.  And every time I eat it I think of how many years were wasted NOT eating it because I thought it looked gross.  Now I completely disagree with myself, not only does it taste delicious, it LOOKS delicious too!

We went to the grocery store tonight.  Whenever we get a lot of groceries it means we can have "whatever we want" for dinner and we always want taco salad.  Hence the exquisito guacamole made by my hubby!

Here is his "recipe":

• 
  
  1 avocado, mashed
• 
  
  1/2 sweet onion, chopped fine
• 
  
  2 (or 3!) cloves garlic chopped up in the food processor
• 
  
  1 tomato from the vine chopped up
• 
  
  the juice from 1/2-1 whole lime (go with the whole, it is awesome)
• 
  
  2 tablespoons sour cream
• 
  
  several twists from the sea salt grinder thing

Mix together and say "mmmmmmmmmmmm."

Working weekend

I had to work today (even though it is my usually day off) because that is how life is sometimes. But it's okay, I was able to do some work in the studio yesterday. Including the first page of the scrapbook I'm making for our honeymoon.

Ta-da! Not much, huh? I like the style though-- especially the cut-out cursive letters. I am hoping to get better at paper cutting so I can make cool paper cuts like the ones found on this etsy shop: elisita This woman is an inspiration to me and my goal of having some sort of crafty business.

I also did Pilate's tonight for the first time in probably 5 weeks. I really need to get back to my fitness! Now that the weather is cooling down I have absolutely no excuse. I am looking forward to getting back into running shape and maybe even running a distance run this fall. Go!!

Patrick has me hooked on his latest coffee concoction. It is a quad espresso (4 shots) over ice with a pump of simple syrup topped with a bit of skim milk. This certainly gives me my get-up-and-go each morning. What is your favorite "wake-up" beverage?

Coraline

Tonight Patrick and I watched the movie Coraline. It was pretty good, not at all what I was expecting. Though I'm not really sure what I thought it would be. Watching it felt like watching art in motion-- it is done in stop animation so I guess that would explain it. But I liked the style. It was like not-so-twisted Tim Burton combined with animated Wes Anderson.

I love, love, love going to Anthropologie. They always have the most creative (and often incredibly cute) displays. Whoever has the decorating job at that store definitely has the best job ever.

The Wedding Lens .com

Cool, so this is a widget available from the photo-storing/sharing website I mentioned in my previous post. I am really excited to see our guests post their photos here!

My wedding invites

Patrick and I are enthusiastically counting down the days until our wedding (23!!!!). Although we haven't driven ourselves crazy with some of the more *ambitious* craft projects, Pat and I have really enjoyed putting a little bit of our artistic personalities into this special day. These are the invites:

We bought an invite kit from Target and then dressed it up a little bit. I printed all of them off on my DeskJet printer (still going strong after 7 years!). Patrick designed and cut the wraps for the invites using pretty paper from the art store and some ribbon.

He also drew the illustration for the reception card and I created the map on the back.



Then we had a little assemly line!






We are not having a professional photographer for the wedding because many of our friends take great pictures. Instead we put these little notes in the invites asking guests to upload to our online photo album hosted by http://www.theweddinglens.com Great site and a great way to save $$$$!

I'd love to share some more of our projects with you in future posts. What are some of your favorite wedding craft ideas?