Ingredient Challenge

Hearts of Palm

Cornmeal

Cornmeal Coated Chicken Wings. 

When I served tables I never remembered to bring out the finger bowl, but now I'm a pro.  Finger bowl and all.  These wings were goooooood and tasted as crispy deep fried as you can get without deep frying.  Here's how it's done:

Whisk together:

1c Milk

1T vinegar

1 egg

1t salt 

1t hot sauce

Pour mix over wings to soak in a sealed container for 4hrs or overnight.  Before cooking, mix the following into a large Ziploc bag.  Dump in wings a couple at a time and transfer to baking sheet.

1/2c cornmeal

1/2c flour

1.5 chili powder

1.5 cumin

Roast wings at 400F, turning once, for 45min or till juice runs clear.  Serve with blue cheese dip (or ranch if you don't have any). 

Yum. 

If at first you succeed only marginally...

Try try again. (if a DIY is a total bust I just throw up the white flag.) My Do It Youself projects generally require a number of attempts and tweaks and are always inspired by:

1. Things I can't find
2. Things I can't afford (or can make for way less)

And so enters the story of my d.i.y MANGO FROZEN YOGURT, and no it can't just be found at the grocery store. Grocery store varities taste so artifical I don't even think mango is in the ingredients. But once, once when I was pregnant I found two containers of Hagen Daas Mango Frozen yogurt and I've been searching for it ever since.

What's a girl that pines for discontinued hagen daas mango frozen yogurt to do? Make her own.

The recipe implied that all you needed was a freezer. Maybe I heard wrong, but they even seemed to discourage ice cream makers in favor of this more simple method. I'm prone to fighting with contraptions so I was all for simple. Here's how it went:

3c Mango cubed (about 2)
1/3c berry sugar (instantly dissolves so it grainy)
1tbsp lemon juice
1c balkan (or plain) yogurt (Balkan is just a bit creamier)

Blend or process it all together and pour into plastic-wrap lined baking pan

Freeze it for 1.5 hours. Break it into chunks and re blend.



Freeze till firm in an air tight container.

I nailed the flavor. BANG! But it came out of the freezer hard as a rock. I spent the next week chiseling this snack into my mouth. Apparently freezers don't just automatically turn mango yogurt mush into a smooth dessert.

Now I know.

So I posted a query to my facebook friends if anyone had an ice cream maker I could borrow. I figured I'd test the waters to see if this made any difference before I even considered buying one of my own.

I wasn't hopeful as I fought with the contraption I'd borrowed. It looked nothing like the sleek model I'd scoped out at Superstore. I couldn't get the lid on. I couldn't get the spinner to turn. Test 2 wasn't looking hopeful. But despite the 30 year old machine with broken parts ... check out the frozen yogurt that came out of it 20 minutes later!

Yum! Someone tell superstore I'm coming for their ice cream maker!

 Better then Hagen Daas heaven.

Okay let's be honest

I probably just have a hard time saying no (to anything) and have come up with a fancy excuse to justify it.  Lucky KID!

Permissive?

We're about to hit the terrible twos. In fact, they may have arrived in a screaming fit this weekend. Will my discipline strategy hold up?

Every once and awhile hubby calls me permissive in that "I'm 80% kidding" way. I maintain that she does not get whatever she wants. Today she had a mini meltdown because I wouldn't take my pants off. Now, if I'd spent the day in my underwear I'd accept the permissive label. What I am is deliberate. I call it gentle guidance. If it's likely not a big deal - I don't make it one. But I'm not afraid to pull out the "Don't You Dare" face when I need too, it looks like this (it even scares me a little bit):


I deliberately use the word 'no' sparingly, but that doesn't mean I forgo behaviour training all together. It's alot more work to enforce boundaries while not saying no. It's the "how about we do this" instead manner of correction. Instead of "no" or "don't" I try to remain positive:

• How about dig in this dirt rather then in my herb garden, Mommy's herbs need to stay in their ground.


• Here, take one one square of toilet paper (rather then the whole roll.)


• When holding an object she shouldn't have I quickly offer her another rather then grabbing it from her while saying no.


• Grabbing anything from her makes her furious. So even if I have nothing else to offer I bend down and tell her that she needs to give it to me. If she doesn't, then I take it -- the fall out is always less intense when I've given her the choice first.


• Will she fall or break my couch if she jumps on it? Not likely, jump away. (and yes, I think she can figure out the difference between our couch and someone else's).


• If she's doing something she doesn't know she shouldn't be doing, I intervene gently. I may even explain why she can't do that. She might not understand the reason, but she certainly understands the, your-not-in-trouble-but, tone I'm using.

With a little effort there's a way to promote boundaries by creatively redirecting, saving 'no' for more serious discipline issues. Redirecting requires a conscious effort and it doesn't guarantee a happy child anyway, so why bother? Because I want her to feel empowered by choice, not restricted by rules.

The other day she reached into my junk drawer, pulled out 2 packs of cards then proceeded to scatter them around the kitchen. I didn't love that. I stopped and considered my response; I calculated the time it would take to gather, separate and count 2 decks of cards and the chances of them coming back complete. Plus, I didn't want her to feel like she has an all access pass to that drawer, where she'd also find scissors and gift certificates. But disseminating my $1.50 playing cards? Not really that big a deal. So I let her do it, knowing that permitting it may bite me later when I have to set a boundary around that drawer. But I decide "to let tomorrow worry about itself" - and that day, I told her to go nuts, throw my cards around the kitchen to your hearts content.

She never did it again anyways. Unless safety is a consideration I don't react strongly (or at all) to a first offense. I learned as a manager that if somethings is really a problem, there will be lot's of opportunities to address it. Half the time, it's not a problem at all.

When I do have to correct a behavior in a more serious "oh no you don't!" manner, I pick one or two at a time. Currently it's: don't you dare hit and, don't you dare draw on anything but paper. Her "I sorry" sobs are heart breaking and defiant all at once but she's never surprised by my response.

I'm willing to accept the tears to avoid anymore of this:

on my kitchen cabinets.

She was born cautious, so I hope this encourages her to think "I'll try it" more often then "I'd better not."

Ingredient Challenge

I can see it getting a bit tricky, this business of picking a new ingredient every week. I'll have to start keeping my eye peeled for inspiration while visiting our lovely local markets, like Save on foods and Superstore. Here is this weeks:


Cornmeal, and not the boxed "cornmeal muffin mix" -- the real thing (which is likely not that different. I said I'd keep my eyes peeled for ideas, okay?)

Circles

About a year ago a regular customer came into the store while I was working. I asked her about her daughter, who was 2 at the time. She told me they'd just discovered she was an exceptional draw'er and proudly pulled out her camera to show me a picture of her art. As she was doing so she informed me that they were already looking into fine art schools to register her in.

Two. 2 years old. The picture looked like scribbles to me, but I oo'd and ah'd. Inside I was laughing at the proud mom. Silly moms. Carrying around pictures of their kids scribbles.

Then Magdelyn drew a circle, and announced it as one. CIRCLE! More Circles! And I seriously considered signing her up for art class as I took a picture of it. I knew what was happening but I couldn't stop it. MY KID CAN DRAW CIRCLES!


Silly Mom.