Crockpot Fantasies/Failures, etc. 4

It's very late, and I shouldn't be blogging, but I am kicking off what will hopefully be a month of good eating habits tomorrow, and so I need to stuff myself with everything yummy in the house tonight! I've got food cooking in the oven while I type--eight minutes left! Yesterday I had high hopes for this recipe:

Steak with Mushrooms and Onions

2-2 1/2 lb. boneless beef bottom round steaks (or braising steaks), fat-trimmed, cut into 6 equal pieces
1/2 cup steakhouse sauce
1 T vegetable oil
4 cups sliced mushrooms
1 medium onion chopped
1/4 t salt
1/2 t ground pepper

1. In Ziploc bag, combine steak and sauce. Seal and refrigerate at least one hour, up to 8.
2. Remove stakes from marinade.
3. Heat oil over medium high heat. Add steaks and brown, turning once, 2 minutes per side.
4. Layer mushrooms, onions, and browned steaks in slowcooker. Deglaze skillet with a small amount of water and add pan juices to cooker. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.
5. Cover. Cook on low 6 to 8 hours or on high 4 to 6 hours, until meat is tender and cooked through.

Because I lured Lorena away from her cooking duties by loaning her North and South, I offered to share some of this with them, knowing we would not eat it all (only 1/6 of us really appreciates beef). They were excellent food critics, and agreed with me that the meat was not very tender, although the flavor was good. Dan really liked it just the way it was and didn't think anything was wrong with it. We didn't all eat dinner together because everyone was every which way that night, so none of the kids tried it. I would like to try it again, because I think the recipe had thicker steaks in mind--it says to divide the meat up into six pieces and mine came already cut up into 8 pieces. Any experts on bottom round beef out there? Maybe it's always that way. If anyone tries out this recipe, let me know it turns out.

Crockpot Fantasies 3

Tonight's meal was more of a success! Dan and I really liked it, and Anna said it was better than the chicken (but refused to take more than two bites). It calls for a pork shoulder roast, which required me to go to the meat counter at the store for maybe the second time in my life. What the lady got for me had the word "butt" in it, so I'm a little confused because the butt can't be anywhere near the shoulder, can it? Well, whatever body part it entailed, it tasted good. I can't scan the recipe because our other computer has quit working, but it's pretty short (and easy!):

Pepper Pork Sandwiches

3 lb. pork shoulder roast
2 cans enchilada sauce (this is so annoying to me that they don't say what size!!! I used one big one.)
1/2 pkg. taco seasoning
2 habanero chile peppers, seeded and diced (I used jalapenos)

1. Put all ingredients in slow cooker. Cook on low 8 to 9 hours.
2. Remove pork, and shred with two forks. Return to cooker. Turn heat to high and cook 20 more minutes.
3. Serve on sandwich rolls and top with shredded cheese, if desired.

Makes 6 servings.

Mr. Thornton and Ms. Hale of North and South

I also must announce that I am now the proud owner of North and South, the best Brit-Lit-Chick-Flick to date. I got it just to share the joy with others, so if anyone is interested in watching it, let me know. I promised it to Lorena first, and then it's available to whomever. If you like it, I also recommend Wives and Daughters, another miniseries based on one of Elizabeth Gaskell's novels (It's available from Netflix, and I got the one I watched from the library). It's almost as good as N&S, and has an original ending love scene that was brilliant. I also got the soundtrack to Pirates of the Caribbean (what a RUSH!!) and Living With Ghosts by Patty Griffin (six stars out of five). I know I'm spoiling myself, someone stop me!

Crockpot Fantasies 2

Just a note--if you click on the pictures, they get really, really big so you can read them better. Next time I will do it right and they won't be quite so huge, but easier to read.

This soup was just a basic chicken noodle soup--Anna progressed from saying dinner was "disgusting" to "interesting." It is one of those 3 hours recipes that makes me think, "Why do this in the crockpot?" Instead I would just buy a couple of cans of Healthy Choice soup.

First of all, I think they used a completely different bread for the picture. Mine turned out looking like a giant muffin. I did enjoy the novelty of putting a bowl in the crockpot. And I did use my food storage wheat and freshly ground it. As far as taste, I would say save the recipe to use with your stored wheat for when the terrorists launch chemical warfare and you have all your windows and doors duct-taped and there's not much else to eat.

I did the bread early enough that I had a free crockpot to do dessert. This was pretty good for being low-fat, low-calorie fare. The chocolate makes a pudding like sauce over the cake. I think it's worth a try if you have the ingredients on hand; however, I believe if you're going to have dessert you should just have the real thing--hmmmm, maybe that's why I'm overweight?????

Fantasies of a Desperate Housewife

No, this has nothing to do with Ralph Fiennes, Gregory Peck, or Dr. Archung. In actuality, I have often fantasized about selecting a cookbook and making every single recipe in it. So tonight I have begun to make my dreams come true--with Prevention Guide Slow Cooker Recipes, one of the recipe books you buy at the check stand. There are sixty main dishes, five sides dishes and six desserts and y'all are going to hear about all of them! This particular book helps me in two ways: Crockpot meals can be prepared earlier in the day, before the pain in my legs and laziness kicks in; and the recipes are supposed to be healthy. Because they are healthy, I'm not expecting to be wowed, just to be nourished without gagging. Which brings me to tonight's dinner:

Quickest Chicken
4 boneless, skinless chicken breast halves
1 package dry Italian dressing mix
1 cup warm water or chicken broth (I used chicken broth)

1. Place chicken in slow cooker. Sprinkle with dressing mix. Pour water over chicken.
2. Cover. Cook on low 8 to 10 hours.

This wasn't spectacular, but it was better than other crock pot chicken experiences I have had. The dressing packet gives it a good flavor, and the broth is really good. Five out of six of us ate it, but not all were happy about it. Jeremy put mustard all over his and had seconds--whatever works! Anna fought gagging throughout dinner (which is not surprising for her), and it didn't help that Dan was trying to "get her sugar" while her mouth was full.
I have two crockpots, so I also made a side dish:

Wild Rice Pilaf
1 1/2 cups uncooked wild rice
1/2 cup finely chopped scallions
14 oz. low sodium chicken broth
1/2 t dried thyme leaves

1. Coat slow cooker with nonstick cooking spray. Rinse rice and drain well (Oops, I didn't do this! I hope we'll live.) In slow cooker, combine scallions, chicken broth, and 2 cups water and mix well.
2. Cover. Cook on high 3-4 hours. Add thyme and stir gently, adding salt and pepper to taste.
3. Cook on low 30 to 60 more minutes, or until rice is tender.

This had a good flavor but was pretty mushy. Anna called it "Crazy Rice." I cooked it for 4 hours and if I made it again, I would try just 3 hours. The problem with that is that's just too late in the day--I'd rather get it done in the morning.

Would I make this again? Probably. Mostly because the chicken was WAY EASY. But I would pick another side dish.

Family Picture

I was cleaning out some drawers and came across this picture of my mom's graduation from nursing school. This is one of my favorites--it's one of the few pictures of all of my family together. From the left there's my dad and me, Shawnna peeking in from the back, my mom (obviously, being in the nurse's uniform) who already at that point was thinner than me, and my Grandma and Grandpa Rairigh.

Shelley's Classic Film Festival

This week I've had my own private classic film festival--only Ben and Jerry were invited. I'm pretty green to the whole movie classics scene. I've seen a lot of Hitchcock movies and a handful of others, but that's about it. Anna walked in during one movie and said, "This movie is ugly! It's all black and grey and old looking!" What do you say to that? Here's what Me and B and J have to say about the old flicks:

Gentleman's Agreement(1947) Starring Gregory Peck, Dorothy McGuire, and John Garfield. Winner Best Picture.

Gregory Peck plays a journalist assigned to write a series on Anti-Semitism, and decides to pretend he is a Jewish man to find out what it's like to be a victim of religious intolerance. I know I should write something deep and meaningful about such an important topic, but all I can say is that Gregory Peck was a total hottie! (Does anyone know the origin of this word "hottie?" Is that even how it's spelled? I was going to call him a total babe, but is that only used to describe women? I'm so behind on all of this terminology, but to say he was "a very handsome man" just doesn't have the oomph it deserved. )

Guess Who's Coming To Dinner(1967) Starring Spencer Tracy, Sidney Poitier, and Katherine Hepburn. Winner Best Screenplay and Best Actress-Katherine Hepburn.
The daughter of liberal upper-class parents comes home with her fiance, a black doctor. Although the parents have always supported black rights, the father has trouble accepting the interracial union. It was a touching story with excellent dialog. Forty years later it's hard to imagine how this movie was received by audiences. I read that interracial marriage was illegal in 17 states up until June of the year the movie was made, so it must have been a hot topic. Being from a different generation, I have no problem with interracial marriages--I think culture is more of an issue that skin color, which doesn't make it wrong, just challenging. Spencer Tracy was dying when he made the film, but did it because he felt it was so important. He died 17 days after the shooting ended. Katherine Hepburn never watched the completed film because she felt it would be too painful. I would definitely recommend this movie, and it made me want to see "Guess Who?" with Ashton Kutcher again!

The Maltese Falcon(1941) Starring Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor. Winner Best Picture.
To know the plot of this movie, just refer to the terribly exciting blog on the audio book. I thought the movie looked cool, but I still wasn't wowed by the story. The back of the case says, "Many say it's the best detective drama ever. Each time you see it, you'll find it hard to disagree." Well, I'm not finding it hard. Maybe it's Post-Da Vinci Code Syndrome.



By the way, two thumbs up to Ben and Jerry's Magic Brownie flavor!

New Song

Things have been a little busy the last few days (although not as busy as most of you, I'm sure), but a good new song is worth a little time for a blog, I thought. The only place I can find it on the web is on the group's website. The song is called Seven Days of Lonely by I Nine. If you have time, check it out!

Manchester United Vs. The Coyotes - Game 3

I missed Game 2 of the season, when Jeremy's team played against The Galaxy and won 5-2. Jeremy played goalie and according to Dan he did awesome. We attribute his goalie skills to his obsession with Nation Ball.
This week Jeremy played goalie again during the second half, but didn't get too many opportunities to defend the goal . His team won 5-0. Here is footage of his only chance to show us his cool moves:

Listening Library: The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett (1930)

I finished listening to this audio book yesterday thanks to laundry. It is quite unlike anything I've ever read, but it caught my eye at the library. The main character is detective Sam Spade, a tough, "yellow-grey-eyed" detective. (I had a hard time picturing what someone with yellow-grey eyes would look like.) Quoting from Amazon:

"Spade's partner is murdered on a stakeout; the cops blame him for the killing; a beautiful redhead with a heartbreaking story appears and disappears; grotesque villains demand a payoff he can't provide; and everyone wants a fabulously valuable gold statuette of a falcon, created as tribute for the Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV. Who has it? And what will it take to get it back? Spade's solution is as complicated as the motives of the seekers assembled in his hotel room, but the truth can be a cold comfort indeed."

The whole time I was listening, I just kept picturing black and white movie scenes in a dark detective's office, with cigarette smoke drifting through the air, and dramatic camera angles, like some scenes from Who Framed Roger Rabbit? After doing some research on Wikipedia (of course), I found out this kind of movie has a name: film noir, "black film" in French. Maybe everybody else is familiar with this term, but it is new to me. Film noir usually includes a story about crime, a detective and a femme fatale, and uses shadows dramatically.

I didn't think the story was that exciting or suspenseful, and I was annoyed by Sam Spade and his lack of emotion and morals. From what I've read, this is pretty characteristic of crime novels of the time (Depression Era), and they refer to it as "hard-boiled" crime fiction, because the characters are tough like a hard-boiled egg. (Just for the record, my hard-boiled eggs are not tough.) It was almost the antithesis of a romance, maybe what a man's dream world would be like: solving crime, carrying a gun, and three women throwing themselves at you without expecting a relationship. There was also a lot of cigarette rolling and booze drinking. I did like getting a taste of this genre, and learning new words like "film noir" and "hard-boiled." It may help me when I watch Jeopardy!

I really want to watch the movie, starring Humphrey Bogart, but someone has checked it out of the library. Instead I checked out a couple of other classic movies since I was in that frame of mind, and if I have time to watch them, I will of course blog endlessly about them!

Bookworm Banter: The Bronze Bow

After a couple of long months, I have actually finished a book! Oh, there have been others I guess, but one was a parenting book (very good by the way, but I can't write about it since my children read my blog and I don't want them to know all of my secrets), and one housekeeping book. I attempted to listen to Bee Season, which became too explicit in its realism, and Water For Elephants, which made me feel as though I had walked into a (misnomeric) "gentleman's club." These past couple of months of limited reading have reinforced my belief that the escapism of reading fiction is essential to my psychological well-being. So please don't judge me if I seem to always have my head stuck in a book; it's my form of Prozac. And just like Prozac, reading has its negative side effects--but that could be a long blog topic in itself that I'm sure no one would be interested in.

And sooo . . . the book I have finished is The Bronze Bow by Elizabeth George Speare, which is a children's book--a pretty safe bet after my X-rated choices. It was the Newberry Award winner in 1962, and is written by the author of The Witch of Blackbird Pond, which also won the Newberry. I have learned that I'm not very good at summarizing a book--I envy those who write for the book jacket--so I have just copied Amazon's description:

"In this Newberry Medal-winning novel, Daniel bar Jamin is fired by only one passion: to avenge his father's death by crucifixion by driving the Roman legions from his land of Israel. He joins an outlaw band and leads a dangerous life of spying, plotting, and impatiently waiting to seek revenge. Headstrong Daniel is devoid of tenderness and forgiveness, heading down a destructive path toward disaster until he hears the lessons taught by Jesus of Nazareth. "

Reading about Daniel's experiences helped me see what life was like at that time for the Jews under the dominion of the Romans, and it is interesting to see how he tries to understand Jesus' message of forgiveness as he feels so much anger for his enemies. I wouldn't describe it as a page-turner, but not all good books are. I would guess that had this book been written recently it would have no chance of winning an award, with all of its Christian themes. As far as children reading it, I'm not sure if the Harry Potter generation could stay focused. Maybe a good family read-aloud book? I give it 3 out of 5 stars.

Over the last several years I have been trying to read the Newberry Award books. I have read 31 out of about 85, so I still have a long way to go! Some of my favorites are: The View From Saturday (Konigsburg), Walk Two Moons (Creech), The Giver (Lowry), From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler (Konigsburg), A Wrinkle in Time (L'Engle), The Witch of Blackbird Pond (Speare), and Call It Courage (Sperry). I think these are all books that can be enjoyed regardless of age. But maybe I'm not a good judge, since I can be a bit childlike/ish.

Joyriding at Disneyland!

Healthy Snack

I thought it was so clever of Susan to review a food item in her blog, so now I'm following suit. I love these Nabisco Garden Harvest Toasted Chips! I tried the Vegetable Medley flavor. They kind of remind me of Doritos, but a little grainier and with a veggie taste (duh!) . Each serving (16 chips) is 120 calories and has 3 grams of fiber. They are made with whole grain wheat flour and are "naturally flavored." I'm one of those people who needs a lot of crunch to my food--I've read that this means I'm stressed and anxious (who me?). I'm actually eating them right now, just so I can be accurate in my reviewing. Now it's on to my Diet Cherry Pepsi to wash it down . . . Well, I went to get the Pepsi that I put in the freezer to cool off faster, and now it's half frozen! I usually set the timer, but forgot to this time. I'll just have to keep blogging till it thaws out . . . Apparently I'm not sufficiently aware of the physics of frozen soda. It has managed to come out of the top of the can and spill all over the tablecloth. Is this some sort of punishment for drinking a caffeinated beverage, or just part of my really bad day?

Questions

I find myself constantly nagged by questions of all sorts, which is why I love Wikipedia so much. Tonight I went to Walmart, got a cart, and wondered, "When did people start using shopping carts? Were they always so big? What do shopping carts say about our society?" So I looked it up. Here's what I learned:

• The first shopping cart was invented by Sylvan Goldman, owner of the Piggly-Wiggly in Oklahoma City in 1937.
• They advertised the invention as part of a new “No Basket Carrying Plan.”
• The invention did not catch on immediately. Men found them effeminate; women found them suggestive of a baby carriage. "I've pushed my last baby buggy," offended women informed him. After hiring several male and female models to push his new invention around his store and demonstrate their utility, as well as greeters to explain their use, shopping carts became extremely popular and Goldman became a multimillionaire.
• The basket size of the shopping cart increased as stores have realized that their customers purchased more as its size increased.
• Shopping carts have been ranked third on the list for worst public items to touch. This is probably due to the fact that most shopping carts are used by many different people and that the seat where babies sit on with one customer may be used for fruit and raw meat by another. (I think next time I shop I may have to do a Niles Crane or Adrian Monk move and disinfect the entire cart!)

Check out the entire article on shopping carts--in case you have any burning questions of your own.
Also, there's an intriguing website about a classification system for stray shopping carts called The Stray Shopping Cart Project. You'll never look at a stray shopping cart the same way again.

Bookworm Banter

I haven't been much of a bookworm lately, but thanks to Jeremy's 2.5 hour soccer practice, I was able to read Housekeeping Secrets My Mother Never Taught Me. You see, I would much rather read about housework than actually do it. But I get books like this from the library occasionally in hopes of motivating myself to get my house clean. It is actually pretty clean right now, so it must have worked! The book was almost a "Housework for Dummies" kind of a book, but here are a few hints that I liked and thought could be useful:

• To remove burned-on starch from an iron, iron salt on a sheet of wax paper. Put newspaper under the wax paper.
• To prevent runs in your pantyhose, dampen and freeze them when you first buy them. Thaw them in a sink or tub, and then let them dry. (Think it will work?)
• The right way to tuck in a shirt: there should be two pinch pleats in front, one above each hip bone and two in back, below the shoulder blades. Everywhere else should be smooth and unwrinkled. (Who knew?)
• To dust knick-knacks, use a blow dryer set on low. Aim the dryer down.
• The toilet paper should unroll from the top so the pattern shows and you can fold the end into a point that rests on the roll. (I've seen this at Tiffani's, the queen of homemaking)
• Use hairspray to immobilize a fly so that you can swat it. (This was my favorite--I hate flies that never land!)
• Use a mouse pad under a cutting board or bowl to keep it from slipping.

Happy Homemaking!

We did it again!

Another 12 miles to the Doppler and back with Sara and Sherri on Saturday. This time I had better shoes, although it was VERY HOT! Here is a photo of the lovely view of the smog:

Here's a photo of the Doppler as we got nearer to the end, when the exhaustion sets in:

I did have Sherri take a picture of me at the top, but I just can't bring myself to post it--I look pretty bad. So you'll just have to take my word for it that I made it!

myTunes

This is the best thing to happen to me since I discovered In 'n' Out! Now I can add a list of a lot of my favorite songs to my blog. It's like an early Christmas! I also got a new lawn mower today. Things are really going my way. Everybody get listening! It would only take you about 2.5 hours to listen to them all!
Adding the play list did weird things to my blog. I'll have to try to fix it . . . tomorrow.