We were lucky enough to be able to take some time off and have a nice little visit to East Troy for Christmas. Nana and Papa hosted Christmas Eve this year and it was a blast! Mateo put on quite the show for everyone and was quite enamored with his cousin Mya.
Christmas day was pretty quite and relaxing and Mateo made quite the haul between Auntie A and Uncle L, Nana/Papa and Santa. However, Auntie A and Uncle L will be paid back at some point for the drum they gave to Mateo - not sure how or when but they will be paid back.
Joe finally caved this year and agreed to family pictures. A friend recommended the photographer who came to our house!! It was so nice! Below are some of my favorites.
We couldn't celebrate the BIG 1 without a party at Nana and Papa's!! It was a wonderful time and many thanks to everyone that showed up and celebrated with us.
Here are some pictures and video of the day and the cake smashing!
And here is the video of the cake smashing...they only turn 1 once right?
I cannot believe how time flies. It seems like just yesterday that we brought home a little 6lb 9oz bundle of joy and we were trying to figure out how this parenting thing should work.
Well that 6lb 9oz bundle of joy is now about 20lbs of pure sassy energy (many think he gets that from me) and we've entered the world of tantrums and timeouts, for which I blame his ped. We had his one year appointment and she said to not be surprised if he starts to throw himself on the floor or hold his breath or bang his head...um excuse me? About two days later, the throwing himself on the floor and banging his head had started.
Thankfully, his "bad" days are some kids "good" days so we really can't complain too much. He is such a little boy now...and it's a bit surreal.
We celebrated his birthday with brunch at Todd and Anna's on their deck and some wonderful cake:
About a month or so ago my sister and mom introduced me to Pintrest. It's a neat site and is growing pretty fast so their platform is a bit slow (and annoying at times) but its great to find recipes or other decorating ideas.
Anyway, I've become horribly addicted and have found some great recipes. Here is the original recipe but I've changed it a bit. The main thing, instead of baking in a 9x13 and using two cans of biscuits, I'd use one can and bake in an 8x8 or something similar because the middle didn't get done and was still a bit doughy, yet the outside was completely done.
If you want to make a double batch, I would bake in two 8x8 dishes, rather than one 9x13 pan to ensure the middle cooks and the edges don't burn.
Ingredients (for an 8x8 dish)
1 can refrigerated biscuits
1 jar pizza sauce (15 oz) - I used 2 jars as Joe likes sauce
Mozzarella or pizza blend cheese
1/2 ground beef/italian sausage
diced pepperoni
sliced mushrooms
Directions
Preheat oven to 375
Cook meat until no longer pink.
Slice "toppings" (mushrooms, peppers, onions - whatever you choose)
Cut uncooked biscuits into quarters (or smaller)
Combine biscuits and pizza sauce in bowl. Add meat, half of cheese and rest of toppings.
Transfer to 8x8 greased pan
Top with remaining cheese
Bake at 375 for 25-30 minutes or until biscuits are done
I really, really liked this recipe. I started thinking and you could totally do a taco version which I'm going to try next time.
PS - If you want an invite to pintrest, let me know and I'll send you an invite.
I love pasta, always have and pretty sure I always will. I also have grown to love goat cheese so when I came across this recipe, I had to try it and of course had to muck with it.
Ingredients
1 box pasta
1 bunch thin asparagus
1/4 cup olive oil
1 lemon for grating
2 tsp fresh chopped tarragon
4 oz log of goat cheese
1 package chicken sausage (found where the hotdogs are. we used apple champagne!!)
Salt and pepper to taste
Lemon juice (optional - I didn't need it)
Directions
Chop asparagus into 1 inch pieces
Grate 1 lemon
Cut up chicken sausage and saute in pan until heated through and browned
Cook pasta according to directions. With 3 minutes left to cook, add the aspargus to the pasta.
Cook 3 more minutes
Drain pasta/asparagus and reserve 1 cup pasta water
In a large bowl, combine olive oil, lemon peel, tarragon and crumble in the goat cheese
Stir together and add pasta/asparagus and chicken sausage with some splashes of the pasta water
Stir until goat cheese is melted. Add salt/pepper to taster. If needed, add more water/lemon juice (I didn't add more lemon juice).
As we were eating this, I started thinking what else I could have added - roasted red peppers and mushrooms were the first to come to mind. Joe would have used two packages of the chicken sausage. Experiment - let me know how it turns out.
Every morning as I drink my coffee at work I'm wishing for a muffin or something but am too cheap to stop and buy something. I came across this recipe and thought - what the heck, I'll give it a try. Since I've never made scones before, I stuck super close to the recipe except for the rolling out on the counter part. My dough was so incredibly sticky that I just scooped the dough out of the bowl and patted out on the baking sheet. I was a little nervous on how they'd turn out but they were delicious.
Ingredients
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup (1/4 lb) butter, cut into pieces
1 grated zest of a lemon
3/4 cup buttermilk
1 large egg
1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries (if using frozen, don't thaw them)
Directions
Preheat the oven to 400F.
In a large bowl, blend flour, sugar, baking powder and salt.
Add the butter and lemon zest and blend until the mixture is crumbly
In a small bowl, whisk together the buttermilk and egg.
Add to the flour mixture and stir a few strokes; add the blueberries and stir just until combined.
At this point it says to pat out the dough but I have no idea how they did that since mine was so incredibly sticky. Instead, I greased the largest baking sheet I had and used a spoon to scoop out the dough which I patted into a circle.
I baked about til the tops were golden - I forgot to set a timer so I seriously have no idea how long. Maybe 20 or 30 minutes?
Anyway, they were actually really, really good and I'm looking forward to eating one with my morning coffee.
Growing up we used to make homemade pizza all the time using the pizza crusts that came in a tube. I loved them and still love pizza but have always thought making any sort of dough was too hard. Kneading? How do you do that properly? How do you know when the dough is done rising?
A friend told me she uses this recipe from the Smitten Kitchen. I actually found a similar recipe from Penzy's with the only switch being beer instead of white wine. I've made quite a few pizzas now and it is so good - this will definitely be a staple during the fall/winter months when I don't mind the oven heating up my house.
The measurements below will give you one large pizza or two mediums depending on how thick/thin you roll it out. You can freeze half the dough and use at another time.
Ingredients for dough
3/4 cup warm water
1/4 cup white wine (I used white cooking wine)
1 packet active dry yeast
1 tsp honey
2 tsp salt
2 tbsp olive oil
3 cups flour
Directions for dough
Whisk wine, water and yeast in a bowl until yeast has dissolved.
Add honey, salt and olive oil and stir.
Add flour and work it with your fingers until it comes together. I've had to add one or two more tablespoons of water to the dough so it isn't dry
Sprinkle some flour on the counter and knead the dough for a minute or two.
Quickly wipe out the bowl you mixed the flour in. Coat the inside with olive oil. Put the dough back in and cover with plastic wrap
Let rise for up to two hours or until it's doubled. To tell if dough is risen: Stick two floured fingers in the dough. If the indents stayed, it's done.
Once the dough has risen, gently deflate dough on a floured counter
Roll it into a ball and sprinkle the top with flour and cover with plastic wrap again.
After 15 minutes, dough is ready to roll out or to refridgerate/freeze.
If you're going to roll out and cook, preheat the oven to the highest temp (I'm a whimp and am afraid to go past 475) and if using a baking stone, make sure that is heating in the oven.
Roll out the dough to your desired size/thickness. Sprinkle down flour/cornmeal before you roll out. Transfer to heated baking stone. Top with sauce and toppings. Bake at 475 (in my case) until crust is done and cheese is melted.
As for toppings, I've used roasted red peppers, artichokes, mushrooms, goat cheese, mozzarella cheese, pizza sauce, italian sausage, etc.
Every year I so look forward to the Minnesota State Fair! I love, love, love it! This year we begged Nana, Papa, Amy and Luke to come up for the weekend so we could all go together. You know, six adults to one baby would surely be way easier than two adults to one baby.
Joe and I learned just how truely blessed we are and what a mild-mannered, laid back kiddo we have. We walked through the gates of the fair at 7:30 a.m. and walked back out around 1:30 p.m. Mateo was an absolute angel. We saw the animals, the bizzare, ate and even ran into someone we knew. The weather was great and it wasn't super crowded.
The trash sculpture. Every year an artist creates a
sculpture from the trash found in the Mississippi
A huge thanks to Nana, Papa, Amy and Luke for fighting with each other over who would push Mateo in the stroller.
Actually, Joe had such a good time at the fair that he actually took Mateo back last Saturday by himself. Yes - a boy's outing. Every year Joe's friends and their sons spend a Saturday at the fair and Joe decided he was going to take Taye and go along. Joe and Mateo left at 6:50 a.m. and didn't get home until about 2:30 p.m.
Again, Mateo was an angel and had a great time hanging out with the boys. He even had his first glass of milk thanks to Uncle Travis not paying attention. Travis set his cup down on Mateo's tray and all of a sudden noticed that Mateo had the cup and was drinking from it, as well as milk all down his face/shirt. Evidently the "uncles" are out of practice not realizing just what a 10 month old can get their hands on.
And one more thing. Joe and Travis have a thing for hot food. Their motto - the hotter the better. Well, here's a nice little video of Joe and Travis conquering the Ghost Wing challenge. Evidently ghost peppers are supposed to be one of the hottest peppers in the world.
