Tried and true

You might recall that my New Year's Resolutions were to try new recipes, make more crafts and be more frugal.

Have I become more frugal? I think so.

Have I done more crafting? Ummm...no. But I am relatively caught up on laundry, so I think it evens out.

Have I tried new recipes?  Yes!  While I've made a point to blog about the new Martha Stewart and Everyday Food recipes I've tried, I've had great experiences with meals and desserts from other bloggers and websites.  Also,  Pinterest has become a great source of new recipes for me.  I have boards for general recipes, desserts and vegetable dishes, and I am trying something new as often as possible.

Here's what I've tried, along with the links and my reviews.

Creamy Garlic Pasta by the Cheese Pusher:  OMG this stuff is amazing. I love this recipe. I've made it as a side dish and seeing how it was inhaled by my family, I made it again. The second time around, I added diced cooked chicken to make it the main course. Yum!

Cheesy Vegetable Chowder by Lulu the Baker: this is another great recipe. I foresee creating a crockpot version of this for cool fall nights.

Baked Potato Soup by Mama Loves Food: this was okay. I think I experimented a bit with the amounts of ingredients and technique here (and we all know how that usually turns out for me!) so it wasn't as tasty as I had hoped. I'll try this again in the fall, and next time I'll be sure to follow the instructions.

Crock Pot Chicken Taco Chili by Reds:  this is pretty good (and a good break from regular chili), and as far as cooking/prep go, it's a breeze!  I like to combine any leftovers with rice to make my Tex Mex Chicken Casserole.

Chickpeas in Spicy Tomato Sauce by Food.com: this was okay. I didn't make the recipe as spicy as it could have been, but this was a hearty (and different!) dish. Serve with rice!

Blueberry Breakfast Cake from Alexandra's Kitchen:  this is so, so, so delicious!  It's so cake-like that I feel guilty for eating it as breakfast instead of dessert. Word to the wise, however...Alexandra mentions in the instructions that the cake might need 10 minutes or so longer in the oven...my experience is that it most definitely needs longer time in the over. Just so you know.

Baked Sweet Potato Chips (shown above) from Martha Stewart:  these are amazing. I could eat them all day long!  Keep in mind that I had a sheet of these burn, so at the halfway mark you'll want to keep a close eye on these and probably decrease the baking time.

No Bake Cookies from Lick the Bowl Good: these cookies were a favorite when I was a kid, and I still love them just as much.  I increase the amount of oats by one cup when I use this recipe.

Terribly Terrific Toffee from A Southern Grace: NOM NOM NOM  I've made this recipe three times in less than a week now, and I might do another batch or two this weekend. This toffee, based with plain old saltine crackers, is easy to make and even easier to eat. Give it a try!

In fact, give all these recipes a try! And if you have a recipe I might like, or that you'd like to see featured on The Martha Initiative, be sure to let me know. Happy cooking!

Martha Monday--Corn on the cob cupcakes

Months ago, I came across these charming corn-on-the-cob cupcakes on Martha Stewart and immediately pinned them to my Barnyard Party board where I was gathering inspiration and ideas for Little Miss' second birthday.

Since then, it has become one of my most repinned and 'liked' items on Pinterest.  Who knew that cupcakes candied up to look like corn on the cob would be so popular?! Because they were a hit on Pinterest I knew they'd be a hit at Little Miss' party, and I just had to make them.

These may look complicated, but honestly the hardest part was finding a store nearby that sells jelly beans in bulk by color (at Woodman's, for those in the Fox Valley who need to know!).   The corn kernels are various shades/flavors of Jelly Belly's; I believe I used lemon, pineapple, cream soda and pina colada.  The pat of butter is a yellow/lemon Starburst candy, and the pepper is black sanding sugar.

Isn't that fun?  The cupcakes were a real hit.  All this week I'll feature details from our "Down on the Farm" themed birthday party for Little Miss.  Happy Monday!

OMG Organizing!

OMG you guys!!!  Guess what arrived via FedEx today?

Here's a hint:

Here's another hint:

It's a hot-off-the-press copy of The Best of Martha Stewart Living Organizing!

Be still, my heart! While this has the shape and cover of a magazine, the organization and weight are more suited to a book. It has organizing ideas for every room in the house, accompanied by great photo spreads.   

A few of the rooms featured are Martha's! I just love getting peaks into her home and life.  Through her blog and other media, of course. It's not like I'm stalking Martha, okay?

This special Organizing issue is on newsstands until April 30. For anyone wanting to get organized this year, and for those who are mostly organized but need some fresh ideas, this magazine is for you.

Happy organizing!

Resolute

So far, I'm sticking to my New Year's Resolution of trying new recipes...

...well, sort of.  We had lasagna on Wednesday. I've made lasagna before, but since it's not in my regular rotation (I make it once or twice a year, if even that) I'm counting it as a new recipe. It was delicious, easier to make than I remembered, and a nice change of pace for dinner.

But, I do need to branch out to truly new recipes, and I've been pouring over my cookbooks.  This is the stack on the family room end table that I peruse whenever I have a spare moment.  The tabs sticking out are marking the recipes I want to try:

And here's another shelf of cookbooks in the office:

This shelf is baking cookbooks only:

Of course, I have more cooking/baking books that don't fit on those shelves just laying around the house.  I want to go through all of them, try the recipes that sound good, and get rid of any that don't have something I can use. 

In addition to the usual cookbooks, I have years of back issues of magazines with valuable recipes.  Below are my office shelves dedicated to Martha Stewart publications (plus the Complete Chicken Cookbook which won't fit on the other cookbook shelf).  Some of the Martha Stewart books deal with crafts, organization and business, but I own a few cookbooks from her and I've kept every issue of Martha Stewart Living from 2005 on.  I've also kept every issue I've ever received of Everyday Food, which now amounts to a sizable collection of those. I need to go through each of these again and find recipes and meals that will work for my family. 

As if this weren't enough cookbooks and magazines, I also have 10+ years worth of Taste of Home back issues, as well as 10+ special Taste of Home publications (hardback books, recipe collections, etc.).  There's also two years of back issues of Better Homes and Gardens, and several binders worth of recipes, tips and ideas I've clipped from magazines over the last 14+ years. 

With all material for new dinner and meal ideas, I might need to change my resolution from trying two new dinner recipes a month to trying a new recipe twice a day.  And working out more. That, or investing in several new pairs of sweat pants. 

I'm leaning towards new sweat pants.

NYE cocktails

I'm thinking ahead to New Year's Eve, cocktails, and the possibility of staying up until midnight.  Which I doubt will happen, especially if I indulge in these cocktails, but I'm totally fine with that.

Martha has some amazing winter cocktails and champagne and sparkling wine cocktails.  These in particular have caught my eye (and my mouth):

Pomegranate-Champagne Punch

The Blizzard Cocktail

Coquito

Semifreddo Bellini

Frizzante Mojito



Prosecco Sangria

Don't those look amazing?! I don't want to pick just one, so I might make all of them, get crazy drunk and fall asleep by 9:30.  Which would mostly be a repeat of last year's New Year's Eve for me.

Have a wonderful New Year's Eve celebration!  If I can recover from all these cocktails, I'll be back bright and early on Monday morning with my New Year's Resolutions.  Happy New Year!

My Martha street cred

My Martha street cred has gone through the roof.  Seriously. 

Let me explain: my goal is to be like Martha Stewart as much as possible, and when I can't do something just like her, I'll put my own spin on things.  This applies to anything Martha does: homekeeping, crafting, entertaining, gardening, decorating and more.  Now, though, I've truly done it. 

I made homemade pumpkin pie, using puree made from PUMPKINS I GREW IN MY OWN GARDEN. 

Just. like. Martha. Stewart.

I have achieved Martha-ness.  I grew something, harvested it, AND TURNED IT INTO A PIE.  Let me tell you, it feels amazing!  This must be what it feels like to rule the world!

Ahem.  Sorry, I got carried away there.

The great news in all this is that not only have I achieved (if only for a few hours) Martha-ocity, but you can too!  Making pumpkin puree is actually quite easy, and you don't even have to grow your own pumpkins to do it.

I simply followed the directions on Martha's website.  Start with a small sugar or baking pumpkin.  Pierce the pumpkin all the way through with a sharp knife, and bake it for 60-90 minutes at 400F.   Martha's directions state to put the pumpkin in a baking dish along with an inch of water, but my pumpkins were too big for that. I placed them on a foil-lined cookie sheet with a bit of water, and just added more water as necessary.

The pumpkins get nice and soft, and the rind starts to separate itself from the pulp.  Very easy!

When the pumpkins were cool enough to handle, I cut them apart.  Seeds and stringy stuff when into the compost bin, and pulp went into a big bowl.  When I had enough in the bowl, I ran it through the food processor.  Of course, I should have put the pulp right into the food processor and not dirtied up a dish, but I didn't think about that until the process was over.  See what I mean about putting my own spin on things?  That's just how I roll sometimes!

Puree went into quart size freezer bags.  Four pumpkins gave me approximately eights quart bags of pumpkin puree.  The puree from the fully mature pumpkins will need to be squeezed out before I use it, but that can be done easily using a cheesecloth.  Or, I might turn that batch into pumpkin soup.  The rest of the puree will be used for pies, Martha's delicious Pumpkin Donut Muffins, Pumpkin Cookies with Brown Butter Icing and more.  Yum!

Here's where that amazing "Oh-my-God-I-am-just-like-Martha-Stewart-gaze-upon-my-creation-in-awe!" feeling began to wear off and turn into a "gee-whiz-that-is-a-ridiculous-amount-of-pumpkin-puree-and-I'm-really-tired-I-could-use-a-break" feeling:

Achieving Martha-ness is awesome, but it sure does make a mess.  Next step: acquire Martha Stewart's staff of 40 to start cleaning up after me.  And then the student will truly become the master. 

A girl can dream, right?