"Set It and Forget It"

I hope everyone made it through Monday relatively unscathed.  Just think now that Monday's over we're that much closer to the weekend. 

I don't know about you but I'm always exhausted on Monday.  You'd think after the weekend I'd be all rested up and ready to take on the world, but it doesn't work that way for me.  I can tell you it's not because I've been out partying all weekend, unless of course your idea of partying is a couple glasses of vino and a good book.  That's how I roll now that I'm... ahem...almost 43 (B-day next week)...ugh when did that happen????

Here's a little know fact about me, I'm a sucker for an infomercial and The Shopping Channel, well, let's just say we're well acquainted.  I've bought fitness equipment, dvd's, electronics and kitchen equipment to name a few.  Saturday  I dug out one of those purchases, blew off the dust and put it to use.  

Ronco Showtime Rotisserie

I know what you're thinking.... SUCKER!!!  Yup that's me. I actually didn't buy this from the infomercial I got it off Ebay after watching it 5431 times.  One of the drawbacks of not sleeping is you see a lot of infomercials. 

I actually really like this but I don't use it much because I keep it stored away. It takes up precious counter space and trust me I have enough appliances out on my counter as it is. 

It takes about an hour to cook a 4lb chicken and they are 100 times better than what you get at the grocery store.  You can do kabobs, roasts and there are even baskets if you want to do shrimpies, or fish. 

Since chickens were on sale this week I picked up a couple put a rub on one, then "Set it and Forgot it".  

For the rub I used -  lemon zest, paprika, granulated garlic, fresh ground pepper, sea salt, pinch of cayenne, oregano, and some chili powder. No measurements just what I thought looked good.  Give the chicken a little massage and don't forget to loosen the skin and rub some of the spices under it and on the breast meat itself. An hour later a perfectly roasted and juicy chicken.

Served with some freshly made pasta!!

All in all a good day in the kitchen.

Looks like it's about time to get myself ready for another day tomorrow and then catch some zzzzzzz's (hopefully).

~Jackie

Catching Up & A Pasta Party

Hope you all had a fantabulous weekend.  It's been sunny and gorgeous in my neck of the woods.  Two weekends in a row.  Hopefully this doesn't turn out to be our summer.


In case you haven't noticed it's been a few weeks, I mean months since I posted more than once.  I thought I would do a quick recap of what's been going on with my life.


Last I checked in I was attempting to sell my house.  Well it FINALLY sold in November.  Let me just say that was possibly the worst experience ever.  My divorce was easier than that.  Mostly because it was a rental so it sat empty for seven months.  Thant meant extra mortgage payments, power etc. I was not in my happy place during that process. I really was sad to see it go.  I loved my house, but didn't want to risk having horrible tenants.


There's been a whole lot of learning going on over here too.  I finally made a commitment to something I have wanted to do for a long time and enrolled in the RHN (Registered Holistic Nutritionist) program at the Canadian School of Natural Nutrition.  It's challenging to say the least and my poor old brain is getting a workout.  It's been 20 years since I've been in school so you can only imagine what a change it is.  On top of the course I've been taking quite a few nutrition related workshops too. Information overload.

Something else new and exciting is, I've been introduced to the wonderful world of Aromatherapy.  I've been taking some courses at Casaroma Wellness in Dartmouth and am amazed by all there is too learn about it. There's so much more to it than just pretty smells.  The endless number of things you can accomplish with aromatherapy instead of putting a million chemicals in and on your body it's amazing. 


Once you start learning about all the nasty stuff that's in the products we use every day on our skin, on our kids skin and not to mention what we put into our bodies...well it's scary!!  The hidden things in food and what they say is ok for us to eat or put on our skin, in you cleaning products etc. It's just not a good thing.  


I'd like to say I've been a workout machine and am in the best shape of my life since the last time I was here but I can't. I've been plagued with chronic tendinitis in my shoulders and knees, and I've been fighting what seems to be a losing battle over the last year with my thyroid.  Although I'm hoping it will improve soon.  Plus I've come up with a new mysterious issue that my lymph system doesn't seem to be working as it should.  So I've been stuck with constantly swollen legs, ankles and feet. All that combined with a lack of motivation has resulted in a 20 - 25lb weight gain.  This of course doesn't make me happy and I'm annoyed that the majority of the clothes in the closet don't fit anymore but I'm confident it will change.  My main goal is health and once that falls into place I know I'll be at my happy or at least my happier weight once again.


There was another first over here yesterday.  I made my own pasta for the first time.  I got this KA attachment for Christmas but have been afraid to try it out.  I don't know why but the thought of making pasta scared me.

I thought I'd start off simple and made a basic egg pasta.  It turned out really good. If I could make it fresh each time I wanted pasta I would. So much better than anything you can buy.  Hubby even liked it.. woo hoo!!  I made some fusili and rigatoni.  I preferred the fusili but I think I had the speed to high on the rigatoni and it turned out a little thicker than it should be.  

I wanted to taste the pasta when I gave mine a try so I kept it simple  - butter, fresh grated Parmesan and fresh ground black pepper... Delish!!

I guess it wasn't really a quick catch up, but I think that's everything I had for you.

Have a great week everyone, don't work too hard!!

~~ Jackie 

Healthier Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

Well, hello bloggies, it's been awhile. I don't know how many times over the past few months I've thought about blogging, tried a new recipe and thought I should post about it, or taken pics with the intention of posting them.  Obviously those thoughts were just that.

It's been so long I wasn't sure what to start with so I thought I would do a recipe post.

My goal today was to attempt to make over  "healthify" my tried and true favorite Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe.  Now when I say healthify I don't mean no fat, no sugar, no taste diet cookie.  I wanted to keep the basic integrity of the recipe and just make some better choices with my ingredients.

The original recipe calls for 1 cup of Golden Crisco shortening, 1 cup packed brown sugar, 1 cup white sugar and 2 cups AP flour. So I switched out the shortening , bye bye killer trans fat, with Organic Virgin Coconut Oil.  Replaced the brown sugar and white sugar with Coconut Sugar and ground Turbinado sugar. I wasn't sure  what to do with the flour. I was thinking Quinoa flour and Spelt flour but thought that might be too much of an odd texture and change the taste a little too much.  I use Spelt flour quite often and have had great success substituting 1:1 with AP flour.  I knew I wanted to use my Quinoa flour so I just subbed half the flour with that and left the rest as unbleached AP flour.

Here's the finished recipe

Healthier Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 Cup Coconut Oil

1 Cup Cocount sugar

2/3 Cup Turbinado sugar (ground)

2 large eggs

2 tsp  pure Vanilla

1 Cup Quinoa flour

1 Cup AP flour

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

Chocolate chips - I never measure these

Preheat oven to 350

1.  Cream coconut oil, sugars, vanilla and eggs together

2.  Add in dry ingredients and mix well

3.  Fold in chocolate chips

Using small scoop place on cookie sheet and bake for 8-10 minutes or to desired doneness.

** I haven't tried to make them gluten free but to do so sub in the gluten free flour mix  or try a commercially prepared mix for the AP flour.**

I was pleased with how they turned out.  Not quite the same texture as the original cookie but it actually tasted like a chocolate chip cookie and that's what I was hoping for.

Here's hoping my posts aren't as sporadic and infrequent as they have been.  My intentions are always good, but time isn't always on my side to get a post done.

~~ Jackie

Recipe Catch Up

Well hello out there… Hopefully someone’s still out there despite my sporadic posts.  The last long weekend of the summer is over, and all the kiddies are heading back to school.  I have to say though that fall is my favorite time of the year.  The cooler weather, (not that we’ve had a very hot summer), the turning leaves, the annual trek to the Valley to see the Pumpkin People it’s all good.  Well almost all, the one thing I don’t enjoy is the shorter days, but I guess you can’t have everything.
Even though I haven’t been posting I have been taking pictures.  The only problem with that is I can’t remember what recipes go along with what pictures. I thought I would just do a recap of some of the pics that I know.
This first one is for my parents.  They’ve been helping me out a lot looking after my house while it’s for sale. Mowing the lawn, trimming the hedges, turning off the lights when the realtors forget and so on.  They live next door to the house so it saves me tons of time and gas driving in from Porters Lake.  I’ve been doing some cooking and baking for them in return.
I thought this recipe came from Oh She Glows but I can’t seem to find it there at the moment. My next best guess is I found it via Pinterest.  It was a simple no bake dessert, that I knew my dad would LOVE, because it contained peanut butter and my dad is addicted to peanut butter.  The other ingredients were rice syrup, vanilla, Kamut puffs, butter (or earth balance) and melted chocolate to drizzle over the top.

Of course I sampled them before delivering them to the parents…. they almost didn’t make it there.

As soon as I saw Angela’s post over at Oh She glows for the Chocolate Chunk Toffee Bars I knew I had to make them.  It seems I missed taking a picture of these.  Not sure what happened there.  These too were super good, but everything I’ve made from OSG has been, so that wasn’t a shock. 
I also whipped up a batch of these Wheat Free Chocolate Digestive Cookies.  I modified the recipe slightly.  I used Xylitol instead of Stevia, and added a little maple syrup, and a couple tbsp of melted butter.

 

Really I haven’t just been making sweet treats.  I found a recipe I knew hubby would LOVE!!!  I mean how could I go wrong it incorporated all of his favorites, pasta, cheese and beer.  Yup, you heard right beer.  Usually I’m drooling over How Sweet Eats dessert creations but this is equally as good.  I think Easy Beer Mac and Cheese is possibly the best mac and cheese I’ve tasted.  

 

I guess that’s all for now.  I’m going to tuck myself into bed and get my beauty sleep before heading back to work tomorrow.

Cheers

~~Jackie