'Tis The Season

When you live in the tundra, you spend a lot of time thinking about wonderful fresh fruits and vegetables.  Well, at least I spend a good part of winter thinking about them and when summer rolls around we eat as many from the farm to the table vegetables as possible.  My pizza was fantastic and just my luck I had some italian sausage and kale left over.  The tomatoes were picked in the morning and bought from the Farmer's Market (my tomatoes are just now turning red) and the kale and herbs were picked an hour before I put it on the table and the result was an amazing meal.

What you need

• 6 beefsteak tomatoes
• Italian sausage mix
• 4 more kale leaves - I can't get enough!
• Parmesan
• Mozzarella
• 1/2 cup Cottage cheese — drained
• Panko crumbs
• Olive oil
• Tomato sauce
• Red wine 
• Garlic
• Fresh herbs - thyme, rosemary, and basil.

Cut the tops off the tomatoes and scoop out the insides using a melon baller.  Reserve any juice and tomato pulp for sauce.  Rub the tomatoes with olive oil.

Mix the Italian sausage mix and kale (you can cook the added kale in a heavy pan by heating up the Italian sausage mix), parmesan, mozzarella, and cottage cheese together and stuff your tomatoes.  Top with panko crumbs that have been mixed with olive oil and parmesan.  Bake at 375 for about 25 minutes or just before the tomatoes split.

While the tomatoes are cooking take the tomato reserve and make a sauce using the tomato sauce, garlic, wine (a splash and to taste), and herbs.  Let it simmer while the tomatoes are in the oven.

Pair with spaghetti (I used multi grain) and serve.  

This Couldn't Wait

I don't normally blog at this time of night, but I had to tell you all about the most amazing pizza ever.  This blows away the bacon candy pizza, which I thought was amazing, in every way.

Crust
The Happy Housewife has a wonderful whole wheat crust and it makes two large pizza.

Pizza

• 1/2 lbs Italian sausage 
• 4 cups Kale - My neighbor grew some for us again, so I picked, chopped, and cooked within 5 minutes.  
• Grape or cherry tomatoes
• 1/4 cup of mozzarella cheese
• Sprinkle of parmesan
• Fresh herbs - I had rosemary and thyme ready in my garden

Saute the italian sausage in a heavy pan.  Use about 1 tablespoon red wine to deglaze the pan.  Saute the onions and when they are soft add the kale.  Cook the kale until wilted.

Spread tomato sauce on the bottom of the crust and the fresh herbs.  Add the Italian sausage, kale, and onions to the pizza top with tomatoes and cheese.

Bake until golden!  We started with a salad and still ate the entire thing.

Buen provecho!

Preaparing the Molcajete

I have had my molcajete and tejolote sitting as a display piece for a really long time.  For some reason it intimidated me although I am a pretty good cook.  I made a resolve to use it, so I enlisted the kiddos to help me prepare and use the molcajete for the first time.

First, I set out the molcajete and we inspected it.  I had Mister and Ladybug guess what it was and from what material it was made.  Also, we watched how a molcajete was made.

Then it was time to prepare and make our guacamole.

Ladybug grinding up salt.

The Wee One seasoning the molcajete with garlic gloves and cumin.

Mister grinding up avocados for the guacamole.

Our finished guacamole.  I didn't get a single drop of the guacamole because they enjoyed it that much.    

My molcajete was relatively smooth and didn't need much work, so we sped up the preparing process.  We also made baked tortilla chips and had frijoles.

Our Easy and Kid Friendly Guacamole

2 avocados
1/2 Onion
Tomato
Cilantro
Lime

Peanut Butter Cups

All three of my children love peanut butter.  We buy the just peanuts smooth and you would think it's as good as a slice of cake.  I get tired of making your standard pb sandwich and occasionally I have been mixing it up. Our latest pb lunch was pb cups with a banana slice and cinnamon.

Bake the wonton wrappers in the oven at 350 until crisp (about 8 minutes).  Fill with peanut butter add a banana slice and top with cinnamon.

Mini-Food

Each week I ask Mister and Ladybug what they would like for dinner and lately they want mini-food.  During dinner we had a brainstorming session for mini-meals we could add and they came up with some good ideas, but mini tacos has been their favorite.  I combined the mini tacos with muffin tin lunches and you would have thought Disney World moved into our house.

Left-to-Right, top-to-bottom: tomatoes, lettuce, green onions, sour cream, bell peppers sauted in olive oil and lime, homemade Spanish rice, beans, cheese, wonton wrappers baked for 5 minutes.

I have never seen Ladybug eat so much. 

Cloudy Days

We had a week of sunshine outside and clouds in our room.
Literacy

Raindrop to Rainbow word family

Letter writing practice in the clouds

-og family - writing in the clouds

Sensorial

Cloud Dough - The Little Hands Art Book by Judy Press

1/2 c water

1/2 c cooking oil

2 c flour

2 c salt

food coloring - omitted

peppermint oil - omitted

This made the biggest mess, but they loved it. 

Shaving cream clouds - the preschoolers and the toddler loved this.

Science

Cloud in a bottle - no matches needed.  Warm water and an ice cube. 



Mister and Ladybug were very interested in how the clouds were formed especially the part about the sun evaporating the water, so we did our own evaporation.  They were curious to see if we could make a cloud.

We made a few observations and added to our predictions. 

We poured water on the deck and made predictions about what would happen.

Using the pictures of cirrus, stratus, and cumulus clouds they made their own cloud books and put on the correct lable for the cloud type.

Cloud matching

Three part cards



Art

Cloud crayon resist watercolor

Texxture painting a cloud

Dot painting from Make Learning Fun

Food

 

A Summer Treat

Early this summer we stood in front of the popsicle freezer section looking for popsicles.  Ladybug and Mister were pointing and telling me which ones they wanted and I would read the ingredients.  All but one had high fructose corn syrup and a whole host of ingredients I wouldn't want in my body.  I finally settled on a brand without high fructose corn syrup and we went home.  Two months later the box of 12 popsicles has 10. 

After the popsicle failure we have been experimenting with making our own popsicles.  We did red popsicles for the Wee One and they turned out great.   

• fresh pineapple - a little overripe
• frozen strawberries
• a squeeze of lime

Blend them up and freeze.  Real ingredients, no added sugar, and a wonderful treat.

Fun with Food

I am always trying to mix it up with lunches.  We do muffin tin lunches once a week and I have become obsessed with bento.  I am not much of an artist and I usually come up with these lunch ideas about 5 minutes before I start making lunch.  Last minute ideas are the story of my life.

Here are some fun we had with food last week.

Monsters

We used my mom's cookbook from when she was a child to make mice.  They are really bunnies, but as a child I always insisted we were making mice.

King Kabobs

For our letter K we made king crowns and had a special kabob lunch.  They loved the lunch and have asked a million times to do it again.  I loved it because it was quick and very little clean up.