The Week's Menu: Small Group Edition

This round of foodies is brought to you by: our church small group.  Read below to find out why.

Seven Layer Dip

The seven layer dip. Great for parties, the Super Bowl, and any night you're hoping to gain a few extra pounds.  We were the bringers of this delicious bowl for our small group a few weeks ago.  Easy, and gluten-free - all you need to do is layer guacamole, refried beans, sour cream, salsa, some tomatoes, olives, and cheese.  Don't forget the chips.

Chicken Lettuce Wraps

This dinner menu was inspired by [you guessed it] small group.  A turkey version was served for snack one week, and I like them enough I decided that I needed to give them another try.  After a weekend of family visiting [resulting in a full fridge!] I had just about everything to make my own lettuce wraps. I found the recipe linked above, which is supposed to be just like the wraps from P.F. Changs.  I don't know if its true, being that I've never had their wraps, but this stuff tastes pretty authentic restaurant. Josh claims its the secret ingredient in the sauce - ketchup. To make sure this recipe is gluten-free, use Tamari instead of soy sauce.  I also found that stir-frying the chicken/veggie mix in the special sauce worked better than spooning it over at the end.

To each their own, I suppose.

Enjoy!

The Week's Menu

The last couple of weeks have been so full of leftovers that cooking was pretty minimal and haphazard.  I did, however, have a few recipes from the last couple weeks to share with you.

Easy Enchies

I made this recipe a couple times over the last couple weeks, each time for different groups of people we had over.  No complaints yet.

Honey Baked Lentils
This is another recipe I relied heavily on during the deployment days.  And I promise, it tastes a million times better than it looks. My husband also swears that it tastes better the longer it sits in the fridge - I won't argue with that.  I was introduced to this recipe by my hubby, who specifically requested it from his mom so that we could make it.  And we do make it on a regular basis, adding breakfast sausage for a little extra flavor.  We typically eat it with rice, although it works just as well as a filler for burritos.  To make sure this recipe is gluten-free, use Tamari sauce instead of soy.

Beef Stir Fry

Josh's brother has this amazing habit of bringing over fun foods to cook for us on a regular basis. During his last visit, he brought over some prepackaged Korean boneless short ribs marinated in a ginger sauce.  Being that we ate it along with the honey baked lentils, there was a lot left over.  I ended up cutting up the leftover beef and stir frying it with some frozen veggies and gluten-free teriyaki sauce. There is nothing quite like eating Chinese takeout cooked on your own stove.

Hope you have a great Father's Day weekend!

Easy Enchies

This recipe is officially my first ever recipe I came up with on my very own.  I developed it while Josh was deployed [therefore I had a lot of time to get it right], and I think it's time to finally share it!  I originally designed it using flour tortillas, and over the last year or so I've worked out ways to adapt it using corn tortillas.  In theory, it should be an easy transition, right?

If you've ever had corn tortillas, you know how easily they rip apart. Getting them to roll up and stay rolled can be a royal pain.

Usually I end up just making more of a enchilada casserole, but last night, the tortillas actually stayed rolled - so I figured it deserved taking a picture of.

Okay, enough! Recipe time!

Easy Enchies
[a recipe by lil' old me]

Time: 30 minutes or less
Makes: 5 corn enchiladas

Ingredients

• 10 corn tortillas [if you do happen to want to make this with flour tortillas, you only need 5]
• 1 [8 oz] bag shredded mexican cheese 
• 1 [15 oz] can enchilada sauce
• 2 cups cooked, shredded chicken

Instructions

[1] Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease an 8x8 casserole dish.

[2] Layer 2 corn tortillas together, off-set, to make them the length of the casserole dish.

[3] In your two-becomes-one corn tortilla, put in a small handful of chicken and cheese, and 3 spoonfuls of enchilada sauce.

[4] Roll tortillas, place in your casserole dish, and repeat steps 2-4 for the rest of your tortillas.

[5] Pour the rest of the sauce over the rolled tortillas, then spread the leftover cheese on top of that.

[6] Cook enchiladas for about 15 minutes, or until the cheese is melted and the sauce is bubbling.

Serve with sour cream and/or guacamole.

*Note: reheatability is high.  I would make a batch of eight for myself during the deployment days and just keep heating up one or two for dinners over the next few days.

*Another note: we made these using leftover crockpot chicken from this recipe I raved about once upon a time.  I'm still raving here - it was a great alteration that I may consider making into the standard.

The Week's Menu

I bet you've been waiting for this moment.

Just kidding.

Here's another week's menu of pretty yummy, gluten-free meals!

Crockpot Pork Roast

We made this pot roast based off of the link above - but we overdid it on the spices.  The original recipe is designed for the oven, so to adapt it to the crockpot, we added 1 cup of veggie oil.  Again, we overdid it.  Our faults aside, I like this recipe for it's simplicity of ingredients and steps.  We just added sweet potatoes to the crockpot and served it with apples and rice. I'm pretty sure this recipe is actually really good, because all three of us happily ate through our slightly-too salty meat and potatoes. I recommend following the measurements better than we did.  And half the vegetable oil.

Sweet Chili Lime Tofu

What's to hate about tofu? If it's not the [lack of] flavor, its the squishy consistency. That being said, you must try this recipe.  Or come over and let me make it for you.  This blog has cooking tofu figured out so its not so squishy - she spells out the details of dry frying in the recipe.  And the chili lime sauce is, well, again, you have to try it.  You won't be disappointed.  To make sure the recipe is gluten-free, use Tamari sauce instead of soy.

Note for mamas: this is an intensive recipe.  I recommend making this on a night when the hubby is home to manage children.

Note for everyone: don't go off my picture to decide if it's any good. Click on the link to see appropriately delicious pictures of this appropriately delicious meal.

Beef Stew

Another great Pinterest find that is super adaptable to what you have in your fridge.  I used some already cooked roast beef I had and added bratwursts.  The original recipe has a part where you add flour to thicken the soup.  I just omitted that part and added all the broth in at the beginning.

Dessert? Homemade Chocolate Freezy Goop

Chocolate Magis Shell sauce is hands down my favorite of all time ice cream topping.  It's also a bit pricey, especially when you go through the bottles as quickly as I do.  I found this recipe for the homemade version and knew I had to try it out.  Whether this recipe actually saves money, I'm not sure - coconut oil and chocolate bars aren't exactly cheap either.  But if you're a fan of knowing what's going into your stomach, this is a great alternative.  My personal recommendation - vanilla ice cream with fresh strawberries, topped with this baby.  The best.

The Week's Menu

A fellow blogger has started doing a weekly menu sharing over the last month, and I thought the idea to be pretty brilliant!  I'm not going to do the exact same thing as her [cause that's cheating], but I am going to follow in her footsteps of sharing a couple of meals from the last week that we as a family have really enjoyed.

You probably guessed that all these meals will be gluten-free, and when it's needed I will share my adaptations from an original recipe to make it so.

Without further ado, The Week's Menu!

Crockpot Chicken Tacos

I was introduced to this super easy recipe from he same blogger I mentioned above [thanks Angie!].  Delicious chicken tacos made of chicken breasts, taco seasoning, and salsa. Seriously, how can one not turn down a three-ingredient, two-step meal that everyone raves about?  The rumors are true: this recipe really is as good as it claims.

I know that only hearing raves about something can be obnoxious and feel really fake.  Pinky promise, this isn't fake obnoxious. It really is one of the easiest home made recipes I have ever run across.  The chicken really does just shred when you stir it. The chicken really does taste good. My husband ate it; my kid ate it; my mother-in-law ate it. It works well as leftovers.  Five stars from this blogger.

Black Beans and Sausage

I found this recipe in a desperate search trying to figure out "what on earth I was going to do with all this sausage in the freezer [I don't even like spicy sausage! who bought this anyway?!]." Points go to this recipe for being pretty cheap, especially if you find expired sausage on sale somewhere.

Turns out, I actually like this recipe quite a bit.  Enough to actually go out and buy the ingredients again to remake it for next week. The beans do a good job of toning down the spicy sausage, and while it is a recipe that requires your attention, its only for about 20 minutes. Also a great leftover meal, and kiddo was a fan [but she's a weird child and happily eats spicier things than I can handle]. I would recommend putting it over rice instead of with yogurt.  The meal stretched farther that way; plus the yogurt thing just wasn't to my liking.

Dessert?

Well, we eat ice cream.  Lots of it, in fact.  To the point that I probably shouldn't admit to just how often it gets consummed.  Let's just say its our go-to when we have to watch awful movies for Josh's classes.  Which happens...a lot.

Tried it? Liked it?  Let me know in the comments below!

The Fallout [What to do with a truckload of citrus]

I have been watching my stats over the weekend after getting my painting featured on Craftgawker.

Wow.

I am so overwhelmed and excited to see that over 3000 people have ventured over to my blog for that post. To any and all newcomers to The Little Mother, welcome!  I hope you like what you find here and stick around for a while!

The unfortunate fallout of having such a hugely popular post is that now I have no clue what to do with myself.  I mean, how do you top something like that?

I was talking with the hubsters about it over lunch today, and he reminded me of a quote he read in one of his film books. I don't remember the exact words of it, but here's the gist: Director John Ford commented once that he purposefully would make a couple low-budget, okay movies after finishing up a blockbuster.  Why? To keep himself humble, and to keep himself from constantly feeling like he needed to one-up his own films.  I've decided I need to adopt a similar approach here.  I'm not saying that I'm going to write a bunch of crap for a couple weeks.  [Wouldn't that be hilarious?]  No, instead I'm just going to keep plodding along, and not fret over trying to create another blockbuster.

Speaking of fallout, if you missed my picture on instagram of the fresh fruit delivery from last week, here it is:

dellie picks out her breakfast.

[I think that may go down as the worst segway ever written.]

[and if you're interested in following, I'm @lelittlemama]

We inherited a laundry basket of grapfruit, plus two more boxes of oranges and tangerines.  Like any good college student's wife, I figured this out to about 3 weeks worth of meals and enough vitamin C to keep us all healthy until 2015. [Actually, I think I had a mild panic attack wondering how much of it was going to wind up in the trash.]

My parents also came out to visit over the weekend, and were kind enough to get wrangled into making sure none of the fruit went to waste.  Three days later, we succesfully juiced, jammed, and baked all but a handful.

You might be thinking, "What on earth can you make with that much grapefruit?"

Make a surprising amount of juice.  Plus some jam. and even some homemade donuts.

I used this grapefruit donut recipe over at A Beautiful Mess. I give it a 4 out of 5.  It was definitely yummy, but hardly used up two grapefruit.  I was hoping that 3/4 cup of juice would equal out to more kills. [Gluten-free? No, sorry.]

I also made a ton of jam.  Which is probably more like jelly. Except it has been taking its time firming up.  So until then, we've been using it as syrup.

I'm new at this whole jamming and canning thing. Can you tell?

I ended up making my own jam recipes up, which basically consists of equal parts juice [tangerine or grapefruit, both work] and sugar, along with pectin, some honey, and lots of crossing of fingers. Hence the super-yummy-syrup-which-eventually-jells-into-jam-or-is-it-actually-jelly? creations in our pantry.

Here's the recipe:

Either Tangerine or Grapefruit Jam/Jelly/Jammy/Syrup

• 32 oz fresh squeezed tangerine or grapfruit juice [pulpy if you prefer, just leave the seeds out]
• 4 cups of sugar
• 2 cups honey
• 1 bag (3 oz) liquid pectin

*this make enough jammy for 6 half-pint jars.

1. Get someone else to juice the tangerines.  If you're going to can your jammy for storage, start the sanitizing process with your jars.

2. Mix together the juice, sugar, and honey together in a 4 qt pot.  Bring to a boil, so that the sugar dissolves.

3. Follow the instructions to the liquid pectin you are using.  [The stuff I used has you bring your juice mixture to a rolling boil that can't be stirred down, dump the whole 3 oz. bag in at once, and stir constantly at a rolling boil for 1 minute. This is just an example.]

4. Let your jam simmer for 30 minutes.

5. Can 'em for use in six months when you've finally run out of scholarship money.

I used this recipe to help figure out the numbers, but from there, I just kind of made things up and read a lot of directions.  I found this tutorial on canning really helpful.

Once again, welcome newcomers! I'm so excited you've joined me!

Chicken-less Chicken Chowder

It's a bit of an ironic title to give this soup recipe.  While there truly is no chicken cooked into this soup, it is made with a chicken stock base.  And the origin of this recipe was a chicken chowder - it actually had chicken in it.

But  in this house, we roll with what we don't have.  And the night I made this, we had no chicken.  So we made up soup with what we have.  This recipe has turned out to be my most beloved of all, so far.  Its the kind of soup you would find at a Panera, or Spoons [for you local Fort Collins friends].  A little different, but hearty and delish. I also am pretty proud of it because none of the ingredients are expensive or difficult to find, but you wouldn't know it when you eat it.

A couple quick notes:

-This soup will take up most of your focus while making it.  I would recommend to all the moms reading to plan on making this over a nap time or on a night when another responsible adult can pay attention to your children for about an hour or so.

the responsible adult

-You can definitely add cooked chicken in this recipe and make it Chicken-full Chicken Chowder.  You also can easily use vegetable-based broth and make this vegetarian.

Chicken-less Chicken Chowder

[Based on Fine Cooking's Chicken and Rice Chowder from their 2010 Soups and Stews Magazine]

Time: 40 minutes to an hour of dedicated time
Servings: 6-8

Ingredients

• 2 jalapenos, cored, seeded, and diced
• 1 onion, diced
• 3 cloves garlic, diced
• 1 red potato, peeled and diced
• 2 sweet potatoes, peeled and diced
• 4 cups chicken broth [or veggie, if you want it vegetarian]
• 2 tbs butter
• 2 stalks celery, diced
• 1 red pepper
• 1/2 c milk
• 1/2 cooked wild rice/brown rice mix, if you prefer
• 1 tsp pepper
• splash Worchestershire sauce

Directions

*If you haven't already cooked your rice, I would start cooking it now.  That way you don't have to wait forever for it to finish while the family is starving*

Part One - In a 4 qt pot, put in jalapenos, onion, garlic, red potato, 1 of the 2 sweet potatoes, and chicken broth. Bring to a boil, then let simmer, covered, for 30 minutes - long enough that all of your ingredients are really mushy.

Next, blend your broth mixture until creamy. Then pour the mixture back into the pot.

Part Two - [Do this while the broth mix is simmering] In a large skillet, melt butter, then add celery, red pepper and other sweet potato.  Saute veggies for about 10 minutes on medium heat - until they are soft and browned a little bit.

Part Three - Add to the blended broth mix the sauteed veggies, milk, rice, pepper, and Worchestershire sauce.  Heat soup to a simmer [but not to a boil], and let sit for at least a few minutes before serving.

While this soup is a little spicy from the jalapenos, its not enough to deter me [the spicy wimp], or a one year old from really enjoying it. Because the jalapenos are fresh, the soup takes on more of a sweet-spicy tone to its flavor.

Have any stories of making due with what you don't have and succeeding? Do YOU have President's Day off?

Birthday Pot Roast

You remember ages ago when I said I would be posting regularly about food and diapers?  Yeah... that obviously isn't happening.  And I'm super-duper overdue for a post about gluten-free foodies.

That being said, here's one!

What happens when it's my birthday, I'm getting over a cold, and the hubby has found a chuck roast on manager's special at the grocery store? We make pot roast.

This pot roast recipe is a combination of two recipes and some adaptation courtesy of a lack of spices.  Here's how it went down: hubby found this recipe, and declared it must be amazing because over 1000 people have rated it very highly.  However, dry onion soup mix has a little note on the side of the box stating that "this product has been processed in a plant that also processes x, y, z, and wheat." Go figure.  So, I went and found this recipe to substitute. Then, on birthday morning while we were scrambling to get everything in the crockpot in time to eat it before midnight, I realized we had no onion flakes.  So, here's what we came up with!

Birthday Pot Roast [with all credit given to Marie and Chef Dee]

Ingredients

• 1 4 lb. chuck roast on manager's special
• 1/3 of  a small bag of baby carrots
• 2 celery stalks, chopped
• 1 onion, chopped
• 3 red potatoes, cubed
• 1 cup water
• 3 teaspoons onion powder
• 2 cubes of beef bouillion
• 1/2 teaspoon parsley flakes
• 1/4 teaspoon celery seed
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika

Directions

1. Brown the chuck roast on a skillet, about 4 minutes on each side.


2. Dump all the ingredients in a crock pot.


3. Cook for 10-12 hours on high.


4. Invite some friends over for dinner, and enjoy!

Sorry for the lack of pictures.  That whole being sick thing, you know.  Makes one forget to do important things, like take pictures of their quarter-century birthday for posterity's sake.

Roasted Sweet Marmalade Potato Casserole

So I'm totally posting a Thanksgiving recipe a whole week late.  Yeah, I'm that girl.

But guess what?  I made my very recipe up, again!  I offered to make sweet potato something for the Thanksgiving party I went to this year.  I have never, ever, been a fan of sweet potatoes [just like I'm not a fan of stuffing either], so I decided to take on the challenge to see if I could create a sweet potato dish that I actually liked.

Fate would have it that I would discover the wonder of the roasted vegetable.  It all started with me roasting apples and sweet potatoes for Kiddo, so I could then dice them up as finger food.  Being the good parent that I am, I try everything that I put in her mouth.  Turns out, roasted sweet potatoes are kind of addicting.  Something happens when you cover a sweet potato in canola oil and roast it - it turns into candy.  Don't believe me?   Then try this recipe out.

Roasted  Marmalade Sweet Potato Casserole

Whew, what a name!  I decided to add orange marmalade to the recipe for two reasons - one, everybody else's recipes put citrus in their sweet potato casserole, so I figured I should join in.  Two, we had a whole jar of the stuff left over from a previous dinner. Score.

Time: 1 hour [to be on the safe side]
Bakes: 425 degrees fahrenheit
Makes: a 9x13 pan

Ingredients

• 8 sweet potatoes
• Oil, for drizzle
• 3/4 cup half & half
• 1/2 cup orange marmalade
• 1 stick [8 tbs] butter
• 4 tsp cinnamon
• Marshmallows or walnuts [or both!] for topping

Directions

1. Slice your sweet potatoes into 1/2 slices.
2. Next, put them in a large bowl and pour a little bit of oil in.  Toss potatoes until coated.
3. Arrange onto a baking sheet in a single layer, and roast at 425 degrees for 15 minutes [or until soft, but not burnt].
4. Put your roasted potatoes back into your bowl and blend until mashed thoroughly.
5. Add the half & half, marmalade, butter, and cinnamon into the bowl.  Blend again until all the ingredients are mixed together.  [At this point, you can take a break and wait until you're about ready to serve. The next part will only take a few minutes]
6. Place sweet potato mixture into a 9x13 pan. Cover with either marshmallow or walnut toppings.
7.  Broil until marshmallows are browned/walnuts are toasted. 

The scoop on marshmallows - yes, they are gluten-free. From what I understand, certain brands make their 'mallows in dedicated gluten-free facilities, but regardless, they all should not have any wheat ingredients in them.  If you're concerned about any traces, check with the particular brand to be on the safe side.

picture time!

roasted sweet potatoes...yum.

blend them up, or let your hubby do it [you didn't thinkI wore giant watches, did you?]

slather into a pan

toppings!

Remember when I said that roasted sweet potatoes are like candy?  This casserole is like candy mixed with marmalade [candy] then topped with marshmallows [more candy].

Now I understand why I like it.

What's your favorite Thanksgiving menu item?  Honestly, its not Thanksgiving without fresh baked rolls for me.  I have childhood memories of hoarding 5 or 6 of them during mealtime...

Corn Bread Stuffing

Are you excited for Thanksgiving too?  Tons of yummy, free food, a few days off from work slash school, and, if you're close to family, you have an excuse to hang out with them all day :)

However, Thanksgiving meals when you have a food intolerance can be...a bummer, especially when half of the menu is off limits. I will be honest from the beginning, I'm not a huge fan of stuffing.  But I totally realize that there are a lot of people who really, really like it.  Maybe you do? If so, here's a gluten-free stuffing recipe to use this Thursday!  I did a trial run on this stuff a couple weeks ago for church. I got a few compliments on it (good thing, I believe), and I even tried it out myself.  Again, I'm not a big fan of stuffing, but it wasn't bad.

This recipe is based off last Thursday's corn bread recipe I shared with you.  It will be your base, with some typical but still-yummy veggies and seasonings to make it all stuffing-like.

Corn Bread Stuffing (From Taste of Home Cookbook)

Time: 25 min prep, 40 min bake
Bake: 325 degrees
Makes: 9 cups

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 cups chopped celery
• 1 1/4 cups chopped onions
• 2 and 8 tablespoons butter
• 1 9x9 pan of gluten-free corn bread
• 4 teaspoons rubbed sage
• 4 teaspoons poultry seasoning
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 1/3 cups chicken broth

Directions

1. In a large skillet, saute celery and onion in 2 tablespoons of butter until tender. Then transfer to a large bowl.

2. Break corn bread apart into small pieces.  Crumbling is okay, but the goal is to have more chunks than crumbles when you're done.

3. In bowl, add corn bread, sage and poultry seasoning.

4. Combine eggs, 8 tablespoons of melted butter, and chicken broth together. Then add it to corn bread mixture, stirring gently so as not to break apart the corn bread too much.

5. Grease a 9x13 baking dish, and transfer your stuffing into the dish.

6. Cover and bake at 325 degrees for 30 minutes.

7. Uncover, then bake for 10 more minutes [or until thermometer reads 165 degrees] and stuffing is lightly browned.

you can already tell, this is so not going to be healthy.

cutting corn bread

cutting more corn bread

the stuffing pre-bake

foil is so shiny...

mmmm, stuffing.

I hope you all have a great Thanksgiving break planned this week!

Tennessee Corn Bread

The mornings are chilly, the holidays are coming; I think there's no better comfort food than corn bread.

I originally found this recipe while on the quest for a gluten-free stuffing last Thanksgiving.  What happened was after hours of scouring everything for a stuffing that didn't use bread, I ran across a recipe that used corn bread instead.  Corn isn't wheat, right?  Perfect. Now I just need a corn bread recipe.

Turns out, a lot of corn bread recipes use flour anyway.  Except this one!

Now for the disclaimer: while cornmeal in and of itself has no gluten in it, oftentimes it is processed in a plant that process wheat.  Know your gluten-intolerance limits.  If you can't handle wheat contamination of any kind, then you will want to get cornmeal that is labelled gluten-free and states on the box or bag that it was processed in a wheat-free facility.

Okay, now on to the good stuff!

Tennessee Corn Bread (From Taste of Home
Cookbook)

Time: 30 minutes
Oven: 425 degrees
Makes: a 9x9 pan or 9 in spring form pan

Ingredients:

• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup mayonnaise [the cookbook notes that reduced-fat or fat-free mayo is not
• recommended]
• 1/2 cup buttermilk
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 2 cups yellow cornmeal [again, know what your intolerance can handle, and choose
• your cornmeal brand accordingly]
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 3 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt

Directions

1. In large mixing bowl, beat together eggs, mayo, buttermilk, and oil until smooth.
2. Add cornmeal, sugar, baking powder, and salt into bowl, and stir together until just combined.
3. Grease you 9x9 pan or 9 in spring form, and add batter.
4. Bake at 425 degrees for 18-20 minutes, or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean.

I'm starting to fall in love with my spring form pan.  It can bake anything into a beautiful circle - now my corn bread can be both yummy and visually appealing.

pour some honey on it...

eat it with some soup.

We had it with some Vegetable Lime Chickpea Chili that I found over at Two Peas and Their Pod. It's a pretty delicious vegetarian chili to combat the winter chills or some stuffy noses.

Curious about how our weekend went?  Ha ha, I'm going to tell you anyway.  Well, Dellie slept...okay.  She had trouble going to sleep and woke up a few times during both nights, but at least she wasn't alone.  Our friends' kiddos had a pretty rough go at it too.  But no one died, and we came back feeling like we learned a lot from the conference.  So success?  I suppose so when you've got a 10 month old.

See you Monday!  I'll be posting my corn bread stuffing recipe, just in time for Thanksgiving!

Tuscan Stew

Over the last week, a very exciting new development has occurred in our household - Dellie is mobile!  She can both crawl and cruise around tables and chairs like a pro.  Its been really exciting to see her jump in physical ability literally overnight.  The only problem is that night thing - my child now refuses to sleep.  I don't know if she is just so thrilled to be able to move around or what, but it has made afternoons and evenings a little bit more stressful [when I say that, I actually mean a lot more stressful].  I'm honestly just pinning my hopes that her sudden disinterest in sleep is just a side effect of her new skills, and she will go back to her normal sleep routine within a few days or so.

Okay, actually, I'm really hoping it will go away by tomorrow night.  We're going on a church retreat this weekend. Turns out we will be sharing a room with another family who has two kids of their own.  While a not-sleeping child is stressful no matter what, it will be exponentially stressful if we're trying to get her to sleep in the room with two other poor children who actually know how to take naps.  Sigh... if you get the chance, send some prayers our way.

On a more happy note, I am going to share with you a recipe that I think I can safely say I actually made up on my own!  I originally did start with a recipe, but realized that I had bought all the wrong ingredients for it.  How I did that, I don't know.  So I just made up my own thing with what I did have. The result is my very own Tuscan Stew.

Tuscan Stew

Time: 30 minutes
Makes 6 servings

Ingredients

• 1 small onion, diced
• 2 cups diced carrots
• 2 sticks of celery, diced
• 1 tablespoon of olive oil
• 2 cans [28 oz in total] chicken broth
• 1 cup water
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 1 can [15 oz] pinto, white kidney, or great northern beans
• 1 can [15 oz] garbanzo beans
• 8 oz box of gluten free pasta [I used Ancient Harvest Quinoa pasta], any shape you'd like

Instructions

1. In 4 qt. saucepan, saute onion, carrots, and celery together in olive oil, until onion is tender.

2. Add broth, water, salt and pepper, bring to a boil.

3. Stir in beans and pasta, return to a boil.

4. Reduce heat and let simmer for 15 minutes or until pasta and veggies are tender, stirring every so often.

Things I really like about this recipe is that is is easy to make, and doesn't take too much time.  And even though there isn't any meat directly in it, the beans still keep it really filling.  Lastly, it reheats well for leftovers.

Happy Friday!

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I linked this up on Whatever Wherever Wednesday!