It's About Time

OK, if anyone there still reads this blog, no I am not dead, or retired, or moved on to something else.  Believe me, Break the Fast is continually on my mind.  But....it's not my job, and my job, unpaid though it is, takes precedence, so The Blog must wait.  Hurray, that I have time today!

I have a huge backlog of items to post, but today I thought I'd keep it simple.  Not too many weeks ago, I was folding laundry and listening to the Meal Makeover Moms podcast.  Their focus on this particular episode was breakfast.  Yeah!  I love breakfast.  They reaffirmed everything I believe about breakfast and then addressed the conundrum that many of us, including me, find ourselves in: how to make a kid-friendly, tasty, nutritious breakfast in a very short time that will get your children from early morning to school lunchtime without crashing. Yes, we can fry eggs and bacon, but surely not every day?

The key word is protein.  Protein is what is going to get you through the morning.  Let's see: we can have eggs, bacon, sausage, and at this point I run out of ideas for the typical morning sources.  None of these is going to kill us, but a daily dose is not only boring but also not the best for overall well-being.  Don't get me wrong, I looooove bacon, and nothing beats an egg for a quick, satisfying start to the day, but come on, there must be something else out there.

Meal Makeover Moms to the rescue!  How about a peanut butter smoothie?  Well, yes, how about it?  I listened to their recipe, and then just went to my trusty blender and started in.  My beef with smoothies has always been that they don't have staying power.  Cool Guy, in particular, could do a smoothie every day, but I resist because it takes time, cleaning up time, and it isn't enough.  For that same amount of time, I could get something much more substantial on the table.  But, hey, a peanut butter smoothie might work, so I tried.

And yes, one glass of Elvis-inspired smoothie was not only tasty, kid-appealing, and full of good nutrition, but it also kept us happy until lunch.

I didn't really follow the recipe.  I just took the idea and used what I had, which I would encourage you to do, also.

Here it is.  If you try this, hope you're as happy as I.

Elvis Smoothie
1 banana
vanilla yogurt
milk
peanut butter
ice cubes

Place all in the blender.  I usually put in a few serving spoonfuls of yogurt, a splash of milk and a large serving spoon of peanut butter.  Sorry I can't be more specific.  I don't think you can screw this up.  Consistency is what you're working for, not too thick, not too runny.  The ice cubes help thin it out and give a frostiness, which is nice.  A nice touch, if you're feeling indulgent, is to add some chocolate syrup, but the shake is delicious with or without.

Confluence

Some call it zeitgeist, or serendipity.  I'm calling it confluence today.  It's where all of a sudden, ideas start appearing, seemingly randomly, and all are pointing at an idea.

I've been experiencing this lately.

The idea is answering a call, and yes, this does apply to breakfast.

Not to get too personal, let's just say that the call that I am answering is my job as a mother.  Sometimes, usually in the two dark months after Christmas, I tend to get the winter blues.  Part of it could be due to lack of fresh air and sunshine, part of it to the post-holiday letdown, though I would definitely say that has decreased over the years.  And part of it is the prospect of three more months of this weather until things just begin to get better.  Definitely retiring somewhere warm year-round.

Back to the call.  Why am I here?  What is my  purpose in life?  (I am getting to breakfast.  Bear with me.)  What in my life is meaningful?  Purposeful?  Why do I get up every morning?  This is something that each of us, at some stage - if we reflect at all - must face.  And the midst of the winter blues brings this kind of reflection to the fore.  I am here because I have a very big job to do: raise my sons to be healthy, whole, productive, and happy beings.  My job happens to be harder than some other mothers' and not as hard as others.  I have daily challenges.  I can crumple, or I can soldier on.  I choose to soldier on, though it is often by will alone that I do so in January and February.

Confluence: what was that all about?  Things run across my path.  I was at Mass yesterday, and the theme was answering the call.  I have been reading things, and those things point to my call.  Notably, I just finished the book version of Supersize Me, the documentary by Morgan Spurlock about his month of eating only McDonald's food and upping the portion when it is offered.  The upshot is that he gained an enormous amount of weight and did some major damage to his health.  In the book, titled Don't Eat This Book, he tackles many other facets of America's problem with bad eating and overall bad living.

My call is not just to avoid fast food, though I do, despite the whine factor, despite non-stop media bombardment.  My call is, among many other things, to provide food which will be the most beneficial to my family.  It must be nutritious and satisfying on all levels, even if it isn't featured on TV or accompanied by a toy.

My particular job is to make sure that my ADHD child gets a good whallop of protein in the morning to help him focus just a little bit better.  And it has to be appealing and tasty or he'll have none of it.  And it has to be joyous, a tiny morning celebration, or the day will never go in a positive direction.  I have talked before about making the morning breakfast an early version of the Family Dinner Table.  I can carve out time in the morning to at least sip that second cup of coffee while breakfast is going on, and to make pleasant conversation anticipating the events of the day, making a few jokes, and in general easing everyone into a state of mind to take on the world.

It's a tall order, and it occupies a great deal of my brain.  I also need variety, if only to keep my own psyche stimulated.

I was at first reluctant to talk about this, afraid that I would sound preachy or over proud, but then I reckoned that my thoughts might be the bit of information traveling across someone else's path to add to her own confluence.  If you've hung in so far, thank you.  On to the preaching (or motiviation.)  If you are the primary care-giver in your home, ask yourself where your strengths are.  We are all going to excel in some areas and need improvement in others.  Of late, I have been a pretty good home-manager.  I have gotten us fairly organized.  I keep a multitude of appointments each week, and I am on time, pay on schedule, and keep good records.  I get three meals on the table seven days a week.  My grocery bill is high, but not as high as an eating out bill would be.  My family consumes well above the national average in fruits, veggies, and whole grains.

On the minus side, I am not as patient with the delights of a child as some would be.  I get bored playing blocks or legos, or pushing cars and trucks around.  I don't do that as well as I should.  I like to escape to my books as soon as possible.

Whatever your own weakness, are you at all able to make it better?  Are there some tiny steps you can take to make your own home a little easier to live in?  More joyous?  Healthier?  Less stressful?  Are there things you could give up?  Are there things that are non-negotiable?  Baby, it's cold outside.  Take some time to think about this while cooped up indoors.  What is truly important?  If your world crashed on you tomorrow, what would you hold onto?  In ten years, what will you regret?  What will you be proud about?

Are you answering your own call?  Honestly?  Are you striving?

Back to breakfast: In my quest of the Holy Grail (or Grails) of breakfasts, I have stumbled on a few of late.  Stirring vanilla protein powder in a bowl of oatmeal makes Cool Guy happy while adding the protein he needs.  He likes the added vanilla flavor, and I like that it holds him until lunch.  Do I notice any discernible difference in his focus?  Not that I can tell, but then who knows how scattered he'd be without it?

The second uber-breakfast was recently discovered.  This is called a Bird's Nest.  You butter a slice of toast and then tear it up into pieces into a bowl.  Add a 3-minute egg on top, to be the egg in the nest, and then pour a little syrup over it.  When you break the egg, most of yolk soaks into the syrupy toast, and you have an absolutely wonderful taste treat.  It is comfort food at its finest.  The presentation is happy, the taste is sublime.  If the toast is whole wheat, and you include a glass of juice and a fruit, you have a perfect breakfast. Kid-appealing, good for you, better than fast food, and it only takes 5 minutes, start to finish.

If I have inspired you to examine your own calling, I am glad.  I would love to continue this conversation further.  If I have inspired you only to try the Bird's Nest, then that is enough.

What to do When Your Kids Won't Eat Hard-Boiled Eggs

It's maddening.  Neither Encyclopedia nor Cool Guy will even taste a hard boiled egg.  So, so easy, so nutritious, so portable, so REJECTED.

Still, every month or so, they appear on the breakfast table, always with other things, so that the boys will have something to eat.  I wish they would at least try them, but it's not really a battle I'm ready to have a stand-off over.  I continue to boil more eggs than get consumed, and then have eggs left over.

Here are some things I do.  (Also, let me confess, I always boil more eggs than needed so that I WILL have extras)
1. Have them the next day cold while I fix oatmeal for the boys.
2. Slice them, cold, and serve them open face on buttered bread for lunch the next day.
3. Make tuna or egg salad.
4. Use them, quartered, in salads.
5. One from my mom: quarter them and serve over cooked spinach.  (I'm still the only consumer, but it's an old favorite.)

I was playing around with egg salad the other day, and came up with a great version that Burt raved about.  I diced up the eggs, and then added mashed avocado, a squirt of mustard, squirt of mayo, and had the best egg salad ever.  Do try it.

My New Favorite Breakfast Sandwich

Sometimes I amaze myself.  I sauntered into the kitchen, knew it was oatmeal time for Cool Guy, just didn't feel like having that myself, and created something new from what I had around, and am I ever glad I did.

I'm sure I'm not the first person on earth to make this breakfast sandwich, but I've never seen it before (my wide-ranging experience -- not), and I am super thrilled with it.  I think I'm calling it something like Avocado Hamwich.  For now, it's just My New Favorite.

I'm even going to go out on a limb and say that it's healthy.  Yes, I know avocados are loaded with fat, but it's the good kind of fat, the kind that doesn't clog your arteries, and also makes you feel good and full all morning long.  And they taste soooo good and have lots of other good nutrients in them.  Not only that, avocados allow your body to more easily absorb other vitamins, like beta carotein.  If you're curious, or just want to justify the avocado fat to yourself, you can learn all about avocado nutrients here.  And please don't skip the little bit of butter.  (Yes, I know that it's saturated fat, but just tiny smear of butter is what we're talking about.)  It really makes it.  Really.

I would definitely cut this rich breakfast with some fruit.  I think the perfect match would be an orange, but it's not orange season, so I had some fresh pineapple with mine.

Avocado and Ham Breakfast Sandwich


Half an avocado, peeled and mashed
little bit of butter
diced ham
1 whole wheat English muffin, toasted

1. Spread a little butter on the muffin while warm.
2. Spread with avocado
3. Top with ham.

Yum.

Tweaks

I'm interrupting my 5S series for a bit about tweaks to breakfast.  I've done two lately, and they've been huge successes, so I'm sharing them to inspire you to devise tweaks of your own.

Tweak #1: Mary Poppins says a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, but around here, all it takes is a spoonful of pork, preferably in the bacon or sausage category.  Here's the story.  I had some leftover cooked  sausage in the fridge and wondered what in the heck to do with it.  Sure, I could put it in an omelet, but I don't do omelets.  Lots of other ways to use it, but I ran across an idea from A Real American Breakfast.  This is one of those fantasy cookbooks, where only in my fantasies would I be cooking like this.  After all, I have lots of other things to do, and there are still only 24 hours per day.  However, I was glancing through and saw that they stuffed cooked sausage in the center of baked apples.  Up to this point, boys have refused baked apples.  I've tried stuffing them with brown sugar, raisins, pecans, cinnamon, all of the above, and no dice.  "What the hey," I thought, "can't hurt to try."  Let me tell you, those apples disappeared in nano-seconds.  Wish I'd made more.  Brown sugar won't do it, but sausage does.

This is super easy to make; all you need is to be awake an hour before eating.

1. Have some cooked, crumbled sausage left over.  You don't need much.
2. Peel the apple, just a circle off the top of it.  This helps keep it from splitting open.
3. Take a melon baller if you have one, and use that to scoop out the core.  This makes it so easy.  Be sure to leave the bottom intact.
4. Stuff a little sausage in the middle, up to the top of the apple.
5. Now place apple or apples in a pan with just a little water in the bottom, and bake at 350 covered for 30 minutes.  Then remove the cover and bake another 15 to brown things up.

That's it.  The only real work is coring the apples, which will take you about 5 minutes.  After that, the oven does the work, while you make coffee, and work your crossword puzzle.  And it is so worth it.

Tweak #2: The Mmmelvis.  This is named after the Elvis bagel plus our common first inital.  And you say "Mmmm" after eating it.  Get it?  Here, I was just make the ol' Elvis bagel and on a whim decided to add a few chocolate chips to the mix.  What a hit!  One caveat: you may not want your bagel toasted.  When I tried that, the peanut butter, and banana, and chips all kindof slid off the thing into a puddly mess.  Cool Guy was not amused.  So Mmmelvis is better eaten non-toasted for those who prefer not to get messy hands.

Tweaking is fun, and breakfast is so forgiving, that you should really try it sometime.  And if, as when I tried adding rhubarb to the oatmeal, it turns out a disaster according to the peanut gallery, there's always cold cereal to fall back on.  And life goes on.

Toast Series: Toasted. Sweet.

I noticed that my last few posts revolved around the toaster oven and the yummies that we can make in it for breakfast: toasted cheese, toast and pb, Elvis bagel.  I'm finishing this series with one last toaster item, cinnamon toast.

How long has it been since you've made cinnamon toast?  For me, oh about 30 years.  That's not a typo.  Seriously, it's been that long.  I just forgot about it.

I love cinnamon rolls, especially those from my hometown which are dinner plate size and come warm with a big hunk of butter melting on top.  But I don't live there, and I'm not too keen on investing the time and effort to making my own here, especially since I'd only be feeding four of us and not a restaurant.  We'd all be in a super sugar coma after we were unable to stop ourselves from having more.

But I miss those things.  And after brainstorming for a solution, it hit me.  Well, duh.  Cinnamon toast.

Both boys adored them, and Cool Guy has asked for them repeatedly.  Is cinnamon toast healthy?  Not really, but it can be made acceptable, and then, augmented with other good things, can be a nice touch to a good breakfast.

Just in case someone out there doesn't know how to make it, here we go.

Cinnamon Toast

1. Take a slice of bread, preferably whole wheat to get some goodness in you, and butter one side.  As an aside, during the summer, I don't use butter, since I can't store it out of the fridge, and it's too hard to spread when it's cold, and I can never remember to set it out ahead of time.  I like Brummel and Brown yogurt spread.  It tastes OK and doesn't have any trans fats.

2. Sprinkle your buttered side with a mixture of cinnamon and sugar.  I use about 1 Tablespoon of sugar to 1/2 tsp. of cinnamon.  Try that ratio, and get a feel for the shade of brown it is, and then you can just eyeball it.  That is about enough for 4 slices.  If I have any left, I store it in an empty cinnamon can, which I have labelled as cinnamon sugar.

3. Toast your bread in the toaster oven.  Or you can run it under the broiler of a regular oven, but it won't be quite as good.

4. You can serve this with fruit, eggs, and/or a breakfast meat.

5. Get ready for repeated requests.

Life Without a Microwave

Is it possible?  A non-zapping life?  It seems hard to imagine, yet I am old enough to remember my family getting its first one when I was about 10.  And I remember the warning not to stand too close to it, and I remember our systematically destroying our melmac plates in it.  They aren't microwave safe, BTW.

So basically all my cooking life, I have had and relied on a microwave.  Not really for cooking, per se, but for all those handy things like melting butter, boiling some water, heating up leftovers.

Cool Guy especially loves loves loves the microwave.  He went through a warm milk phase about a year ago where he would heat up a small glass of milk every evening in the microwave.  In fact, he wanted everything heated up.  Perhaps not the ice cream, but basically everything else.

And that's how disaster struck.  Cool Guy, heating up yet another item, forgot that metal bowls do not go in the microwave.  Ka-pow.  Oh, and the smell.  We are unfortunate enough to have a built-in model which came with the house and would cost about $2000 to replace.  And.....we have "kitchen remodel" on our near future to-do list, and so an immediate replacement would not be wise until we know exactly what we want and where we want it.  So.  No microwave.  For about 9 months now.

And guess what?  We're doing fine. 

We did get a toaster oven to help out during this time, taking the place of the microwave and toaster, which also blinked out on us, and it is filling both jobs rather well, thank you.  In fact, today's breakfast comes courtesy of the toaster oven, which does a much better job than anything else could have done.  Today it was Toasted Cheese.  You want something pretty quick, pretty reliable, a nice vehicle for some more dairy and whole grains, you can't miss with this one.  It is one of my favorites.

Toasted Cheese
1 serving

1. For each serving, place a piece of whole wheat bread on rack in the toaster oven.

2. Place a slice of cheese on the bread.  I like cheddar; boys like Muenster.

3. Toast.  Yum.

If you don't have a toaster oven, then you must first toast bread, and then run cheese on bread under the broiler in a regular oven.  The toaster oven method is much easier and turns out a much better product.

Toast and Peanut Butter

If you have a toaster oven, put some peanut butter on bread and toast it.  It comes out perfect.  If you only have a toaster, it's a 2-step process: toast bread, and smear on pb while still warm.  It's fast, easy, nutritious, and very boy-appealing.  Throw on some sliced bananas if you're feeling Elvis-y.

Now for my recommendation:

I did a lot of research before deciding on a toaster oven.  The Breville got very high reviews, and I was extremely impressed with the blender by that company, so I went with it.  It is large, and I seem to do most of my oven stuff in it now.  It has lots of settings, and it has memory.  So, for instance, I find that making a certain frozen pizza does best in 18 minutes rather than the preset 20, the oven will remember that the next time I put it on pizza setting.  It has a frozen setting and a convection setting, which I have found means that I can make things 25% more quickly than in a regular oven.

In addition, I can toast up to 6 slices of toast at a time.  Plus, I can broil, and roast, and there is the pizza setting and the cookie setting.  Both turn out better product than the oven or microwave.

Now for the less than perfect parts:
1. We hear, though we have not experienced, that customer service at Breville stinks.  I'm willing to live with that.  How many times do I ever need customer service for any appliance?  It's a risk I'm willing to take, but I wanted to put it out there.  In fact, our first toaster oven was extremely noisy, as in something must be wrong noisy.  But we got the oven through Amazon, so we just exchanged it, no hassle, and that was the end of that problem.

2. The exterior gets hot.  You would think that with a top line product like this that it would be cool touch on the outside, but it's not.  So I needed to warn the boys about it, and must be careful around it when it's on.  I can live with it, but I'd rather it be otherwise.

We have changed our food storage ways to using glass and foil rather than plastic and saran.  There was an adjustment period involved.  I was OK with it, knowing that if there is any truth to the BPA issues, at least we were getting away from that.  But still an adjustment is needed.  Leftovers warm up in 15 minutes rather than 1.  It takes brain power to remember that.  But after over half a year, I honestly do not miss the microwave at all.

Would I recommend that one have both microwave AND toaster oven?  I think it would depend on how much kitchen space you have.  I don't have much.  They each have their merits and faults, but I must say that if quality rather than speed is your thing, the toaster oven wins out.

Granola Girl

Does this make me a crunchy mom?  The fact that I make granola?  Do any of you dear readers make granola?  Do you know how easy it is?  And how good?  And how good for you?

What I like best about granola, besides how good it is, is that it makes a ton at once, and then for several weeks, I have at my fingertips the making for a very healthy, very quick, breakfast.

Let's face it: the boys and I don't share the same tastes.  Cool Guy could happily eat oatmeal every morning of the year, and he does ask for it for breakfast every night before he goes to bed.  Wish he could remember to brush his teeth as faithfully as he remembers to ask for oatmeal.  But after awhile, oatmeal pales for me.  I sometimes try to jazz it up a little, like last week, when I added rhubarb to the oatmeal pot, and thought Cool Guy was going to have to miss school because he was so incensed with my tinkering.

I guess granola is my way of tinkering with oatmeal so that it's not just oatmeal that I've ruined, but is something else entirely.

I've tried several different "recipes" of granola, and by far, my favorite is King Arthur flour's Maple Granola.  All granolas I've made have been good, if I do say so myself, but this one is superior.  It is perfect in its ratio of nuts, fruits, and grain, and is sweetened perfectly.

I never, ever have the exact ingredients called for in the recipe, so I make substitutions like mad, and each batch comes out differently, and always good.  This time, I used pumpkin seeds instead of sunflower seeds, and pecans rather than walnuts.  I cut out the coconut entirely because I do not like coconut at all, ever.  And I don't add the powdered milk - don't like that either.  For fruit, I used apricots, dried cherries, and dried cranberries.  A little heavier on the cranberries than the other fruits.  And I got to use some maple syrup from the local farmer's market.  It's available right now and very reasonably priced.  Sometimes, I use dry roasted peanuts, and that makes a good addition.  And I always throw in a handful of ground flaxseed to bump up the Omega-3's.

Another twist in preparation, is that I throw the whole mess into one 13 x 9 baking dish rather than portion it out between two jelly roll pans.  I do this because my rotten, lousy oven is too small to accommodate a jelly roll pan.  I have never had a problem with baking it all in my one pan, and it makes the process that much easier.

Yes, making granola is an investment in time, though most of the time is baking time, where I just plop down and watch a movie (wish) while it bakes.  But you've got to be around for it, to stir it around, and then you've got a big bowl to wash, and some containers to find to hold it all, but it is so worth it!.

This morning, another oatmeal day, before I put the water on to boil, I measured out 1/4 cup of granola into my bowl and 1/4 of lowfat vanilla yogurt.  I mixed that together, sliced a banana and mixed that in.  The granola gets a chance to soften a little, which I like, while the boys' oatmeal is cooking.  When their oatmeal is ready, so is my granola, and we sit down and eat together.  They're happy, I'm happy.

Do my boys like granola?  In a word, no.  When it comes out of the oven, they snick little tastes, but once I've put it in containers and offer it for breakfast, they want nothing to do with it.  Go figure.  I just tell them that their tastes aren't mature enough yet.  Burt loves it, and I love it, so I say, More for us.

Print out this recipe from King Arthur.  Get some ingredients together.  Give yourself a evening to make it, and then you can spend the next few weeks congratulating yourself on how frugal and healthy your breakfast is.

Scrambled Redux

I posted not too long ago about a veggie scramble, but I'm going to risk being boring and repetitive by posting about another for several reasons.

1. This one is different.
2. I love to talk about eggs, especially when fresh.
3. I love winning prizes, and this one has a prize involved.
4. It's my blog, and I'll repeat if I want to, repeat if I want to....

First, this one is different because I used potatoes and tomatoes, both leftovers from other meals.  The potatoes were the innards from baked potato skins that I had made and just couldn't bear tossing.

Second, I went to the farmers' market last weekend, and could not believe the plethora of eggs available.  It made me so happy, and I bought a ton, or rather 3 dozen.

Third, the prize.  I won a giveaway from Meal Makeover Moms and was thrilled to receive at the end of Feb. a gorgeous wooden crate of  Muir Glen fancy tomato products.  You should visit the company's website to see what all they offer.  I wanted to use those tomatoes in a special way, so for awhile was afraid I'd waste them in some dish where they wouldn't shine.  Finally, I just dove in, and used half a can on some open-faced sandwiches and had half a can leftover.  Into the eggs, they go!  And they were delicious.  And shone.

Fourth, just kidding.

The way I made the dish:

1. Melt two TBS. butter in a nonstick skillet.
2. Throw in the potato innards, and toss around until getting a little crispy.
3. Turn the heat down to low.
4. Mix the eggs (I used four) and a little milk.
5. Add to the skillet, which should be cooled down a bit by now.
6. Scramble it up, and right before it is done, throw in the well-drained tomatoes.

The point of this whole dish is twofold:

1. Get some veggies into breakfast.
2. Use up leftovers.

Any veggie that would appeal to you in the morning would work, I imagine, and it always seems to all go together well with eggs.  And it's great not to be wasteful of food, with the bonus that most everything is already cooked for you, and all you have to do is warm it and mix it all together.

We had this with some hot, buttered toast.  Total time invested was about 10 minutes.  Did the boys enjoy it?  Both said they preferred their eggs plain, but they ate about half a helping each.  It takes time, developing flexible eaters, and I'm not going to push it.  Sometimes, we have plain scrambles, and sometimes veggie scrambles, sometimes weirdly colored scrambles.

If you try adding some leftover veggies to your scrambled eggs, why don't you let me know what you tried and how you liked it?  I'd love to hear from you!

Making a Hash of Breakfast

You won't mind that this morning's breakfast has no photo?  Good.  My photos stink, and this was not an appealing picture anyway.  Is there any way to make has look appetizing?

The real reason is that I snafued on the alarm situation again.  God, I hate changing time.  By the time I zipped through breakfast, it was too late to take a picture.

Hash is the topic of the day.  This is another gem I got from the Betty Crocker book back when I was first married.  We had a delicious (if I do say so myself) pot roast on Sunday, along with some leftover carrots and onions.  I was out of potatoes, so we made do.

After waking up way too late, I wasn't sure that I could pull off breakfast in time, but I found out that hash can be made in about 10 minutes.  Did you know that?  Here is how I did it.

Roast Beef Hash

leftover roast beef
leftover carrots
leftover potatoes
leftover onions
leftover pan drippings or gravy

1. dice the beef and anything else you have into small pieces.

2. Put some kind of grease in a cast iron skillet.  Today, I used olive oil, but I could have used Crisco or bacon grease.

3. Add all the chopped up bits, plus gravy or drippings,  and then go get dressed, pour juice, set the table.  The point is that you want the stuff to just sit in place in the skillet for a bit to get browned.

4. Turn it and check it every now and then.  Add more liquid if needed.  When it is good and crusty on one side and warm through, serve.  Total time, no kidding, 10 minutes.

So now, the secret is out.  Your kids will think you are a wonder mom, and really all you did was open the fridge, chop, chop, and fry.  Enjoy.

A SNAFU and Blue Eggs

I don't do Daylight Savings Time well.  The older I get, the harder it is for me to recover from that lost hour.  Part of the problem, I know, is my forgetfulness, and I forgot to set some crucial clocks forward.  So not only did I have trouble sleeping because the heater hadn't kicked off, but then my alarm which I NEEDED today due to tossing and turning, chimed in right before the new 7:00 am.  Disaster!  I had a fantastic breakfast planned, and now I only had time to scurry around and pour Rice Crispies.  And exhort the boys to hurry, hurry, hurry.  Yeck.  What a lousy way to start a week.

I do, however, have some breafasts from happier mornings on my backlog, so I'm going to step into the blogger's time machine, pull up a draft, and tell you about the blue eggs we had last Friday when that lost hour hadn't lost itself yet.

My friend Marilyn told me not so long ago, that when her kids were growing up, her husband always made scrambled eggs on Saturdays.  That was a given.  The unknown was what COLOR they would be.  I've got to try that, I said to myself.  The boys will love it!

Well, yes and no.  I did try it today (note: last Friday), and it WAS fun.  Just basic scrambled eggs with a little blue liquid food coloring dropped in while I was whisking the eggs.  They were a greenish blue, probably due to mixing with the yellow egg yolks.  And it was certainly a surprise for the boys.  Cool Guy got a big, slow smile on his face as soon as he saw them.  Encyclopedia absolutely refused to eat them.  To be honest, it was hard for me to take that first bite, but the eggs tasted just the same.  It is funny how big a role vision plays in eating our food.

"Close your eyes," I said.
"I'll still know they're blue.  I'm not eating them."

So he didn't, and Scamp had a nice morning treat.  Are dogs colorblind?  I always wondered that and wondered if they are, how do we know?  Dogs can't tell us.

Back to the eggs:  Am I going to color our scrambled eggs again?  Yes I am, sometimes.  There is nothing to be gained in this world by being always serious, always exactly so, always so dead certain straightforward.  Sometimes, and especially toward the end of a grey, wet winter, we should laugh more, do silly things, the unexpected.  Why NOT have blue eggs?

Love It or Hate It

That's how it goes at the Breakfast Table in this house when I make Malt-O-Meal.  Cool Guy and I love it, and Burt and Encyclopedia hate it.  Well, Encyclopedia tolerates it if there's enough brown sugar on top, but he would never in a million years request this for breakfast.

This may be one of those things you had to grow up eating in order to like it.  Like chicken livers.  Or smoked oysters.  Or canned spinach with hard boiled egg quarters on top.

I don't imagine that Malt-O-Meal will be signing me up for their advertising campaign team any time soon.

Back to the cereal.  When I speak of Malt-O-Meal, I'm referring only to the original hot cereal, not the chocolate hot cereal or any of the cold cereals that the company makes.  We had this on occasion, probably more in the winter, when I was growing up.  Definitely we had Malt-O-Meal more than oatmeal, and again, going back to the growing-up/taste thing, that may be why I prefer Malt-O-Meal to oatmeal.

After marrying Burt and moving out of Oklahoma, I couldn't find Malt-O-Meal.  Not on the East Coast, not on the West.  I can remember actually asking my mom to buy some and mail it to me.  I think shipping rates were way cheaper back then.  It eased the homesickness.

So here's the good and bad:

• It's a mixture of wheat and barley, with a taste all its own - good
• It has a very fine texture, like that of Cream of Wheat - good if your kids have texture issues
• Still on texture: if you're not careful, there will be lumps - bad.  See Bill Cosby.
• It can be made in about 3 minutes - good
• It cannot be made ahead and held.  You end up with cement. - bad. 
• If you don't rinse your pot and your bowls and spoons right away, same cement will be encrusted on those items - very bad
• It has iron, calcium, vitamins - good
• It most definitely fills you up - good
• It is not whole grain - too bad.

I made Malt-O-Meal the day I left for my quilt retreat.  It was so good, I made it again today.  If you are lucky enough to find it in a store near you (and I am now lucky enough and don't have to have care packages shipped), you should give it a try.  Definitely give it a try if you like Cream of Wheat since, IMHO, Malt-O-Meal has lots more character, perhaps sweeter and/or nuttier tasting, due to the barley.

Here are a few tips learned the hard way.

• Pretend that you don't have a microwave.  Using it is the biggest waste of time when making Malt-O-Meal.  Not only will you spend more time making the stuff, it will be incredibly time intensive as you stop to stir every 30 seconds.  And the stuff will boil over and you'll then have a cement-encrusted microwave.
• To avoid lumps, use a whisk to stir the Malt-O-Meal into your saucepan.
• Make it just before eating.  It won't keep.

We like our served with brown sugar, butter, and a little milk.  I'm sure any stir-ins that work with oatmeal, would work just as well, but we're set in our ways here.

Egg in a Hole

I wish I could say that I had this dish growing up, but even if I had been given it, I probably wouldn't have eaten it.  Somehow, this one completely missed my radar until about two years ago.  I was at my hairdresser's shop, as I am every 6th Saturday morning, and her husband, Bob, brought her breakfast.

He had fixed her a tray of an amazing breakfast that he made from home, and this was one of the items.  I thought that was one of the nicest, most loving things I had ever witnessed.  Seriously.  It made quite an impression.

I don't remember what all was on that tray, but I do remember seeing the egg-in-a-hole, and marvelling at his ingenuity.  He is clever and considerate!  Later, I found out that all the rest of the world knew about this dish and calls it by a million different names. 

The first time I made it for the boys, it was love at first sight for them.  In fact, I'd say that this was what brought Encyclopedia into the world of eggs.  He asks for this one often.  I think it's the fried bread part that he hankers for, but the egg is also consumed.

We especially have this for breakfast on mornings that I have leftover homemade bread.  (Really, that's bread machine made, but still better than boughten.)  Our bread this morning was whole wheat sandwich-type bread that I cut fairly thick because we looooove that crispy, browned-buttery exterior and squishy interior of thick-cut fried bread.  Served with some bacon and oranges, this breakfast is just what we need on a cold, humpday morning.

Please don't think you need homemade bread to make this.  We often have it with regular boughten bread, and it's good, just not as good.  One egg-in-the-hole takes as long to make as just frying an egg.  Flipping can be tricky, but really, this is one dish that is hard to ruin.  Hope you try it!

Egg-in-a-Hole

For each serving:

• 1 slice whole grain bread
• 1 egg
• 1 or 2 Tablespoons butter

1. Use a biscuit cutter, glass, or something like that to cut a hole in the center of the bread.

2. Melt the butter in a skillet.

3. Fry one side of the bread and the hole in the skillet.

4. As the bread is frying, crack the egg into the hole.  Cook it some, as you would any fried egg.

5. Flip it all over carefully.

6. Cook to how you like it.  Over easy takes advantage of the yolk/bread thing, but some kids (Encyclopedia) will only eat eggs hard.

Flying Solo

Some things you just can't convert the heathens to.

Today boys are having oatmeal again, and I am having what I had planned for all of us and what quickly got deep 6-ed by the boys: cottage cheese and canned pears.  I don't know......is this something like creamed chipped beef on toast?  Something that you have to have grown up during a certain era to even conceive eating?

When I was growing up, this used to be a frequent dish at dinner.  Sometimes my mom would have a small bowl next to the dinner plate with a leaf of lettuce lining it, a mound of cottage cheese, and half a pear perched on top.  That was our salad for the night.  I loved it.  It was a nice change from the usual tiny bowl of iceberg lettuce that we usually had, and I like pears.  And cottage cheese.  Something about the combination, the sweet pears with the slightly salty cottage cheese just hits the right note.

How is it, then, that the boys have not been won over to this great combo?  I keep putting it on the table, and they keep refusing to eat it.  Is it me?  Or them?

No matter.  I like it, and they like oatmeal day after day, so we're all happy.

No recipe needed for this one.  Combine cottage cheese and canned pear halves, and dig in.  You've got most of your nutrition bases covered.

Roughy

The name for my new fruit salad: Roughy.  It's like a Smoothie, but it's not smooth - get it? 

The point is that sometimes it takes clever marketing to make things appealing to the Younger Generation.  "Fruit Salad" just doesn't stir excitement in my boys' souls.  I guess I could have called it "Wookie yum-yums," or some such, but I've got a little dignity left.  After making this salad, I realized that what I put into the bowl was exactly what I would have put into the blender if we were having smoothies.

And under the guise of Roughy, this salad got eaten.  Not that is wasn't delicious on its own, but it looked suspicious, being an amalgamation of things all mixed up together.

I served this fruit salad with oatmeal (again) for the boys and with a leftover scone for me.  Here's how I made it.

Roughy

1. Take whatever fresh fruit you have on hand (I had oranges, apples, and bananas) and cut them into bite-sized chunks.  I didn't peel the apple, and no one protested.

2. Throw in some dried fruit.  I used a handful of dried cherries and a handful of dried cranberries.

3. Stir in enough vanilla yogurt to cover all the fruit well.

That's it!  And it got eaten and requested again.

If I had had some canned pineapple, I would have used it.  I only used one of each fruit, but this could be infinitely expanded.  Total time was minimal.  I started the salad while the oatmeal was cooking, and while the boys were putting on their oatmeal toppings, I finished up the salad.  It could also be made ahead, thus allowing the dried fruit to soften a little.

A Bagel Story

We had bagels this morning, but not just any bagels.  No, these bagels come with a story, which I hope you will be patient with as I indulge in a little nostalgia.

In the mid-1980's, I was a pledge at a social sorority at Oklahoma State University.  Every Monday evening, while the members of the sorority had their chapter meeting, the pledges of all the houses participated in an institution known as "Coke Date."  All the pledges  in my house - and we were dressed in church clothes - lined up shortest to tallest, meaning that I was first in line.  Then the pledges from a fraternity (it rotated week by week) would be lined up the same way, shortest to tallest, at our front door.  We paired off, me with the first (shortest) boy in line, and so on.  I have no idea what happened if there were more girls than boys or vice versa.  That problem fell to the tall ones.  Then we would walk, two by two, on a Coke Date, to keep ourselves occupied while our elders took care of the important business of the house.

Many, many times, our Coke Date was a trip to a bagel place on the main drag in Stillwater.  At that time, bagels were not common fare in Oklahoma.  I cannot remember ever having one until the Coke Dates.  Monday at this bagel place was 2 for 1 night, a promotion ploy I imagine that was concocted with the Coke Dates in mind.  Anyway, we would line up, and proceed conveyer-line style through the place, getting a foil-wrapped bagel shoved at us, and then on to the Dr. Pepper station.  (Yes, it's called Coke Date, but Dr. Pepper reigned.)

Monday night, therefore, would find us, in a strict, formulaic ritual, partnered with a total stranger of the opposite sex, who paired well according to height,  munching our bagels, sipping our DP's, and being with Everyone at this bagel joint, having a memorable time of it.  It was fun, and I met some very nice, short, young men during that time, but it also seems so quaint, even foreign to me now.  Really, what a bizarre thing it was!

The bagels, though, were fantastic.  Remember, I had never had one before.  These were just your basic white (who at that time had even heard of an Everything Bagel?), with cream cheese and very thin slices of ham sandwiched in the middle.  They were wrapped in foil and kept warm, and the combination of the chewy bread, the melty, messy cheese, and the salty ham was just unforgettable.  And I've never forgotten, though I don't think I can remember one boy who provided me with these beauties.

When I make bagels for breakfast, I like to replicate my college treat and remember that very exciting, world-expanding, eye-opening period of my life.

Stillwater Bagels

1. For each bagel, spread both halves with cream cheese.  I like to use Neufchatel, as it's lower in fat.  And nowadays, I use whole wheat bagels.

2. Place 3 or so slices of thin, deli ham on one half and top with the other half.

3. Wrap in foil, and put in a 300 degree oven for about 10 minutes.

4. Have lots of napkins handy, unwrap, and enjoy!

You could get the bagels assembled the night before, wrap them and refrigerate, although assembly is very quick the morning of.  But if you're pressed for time, it works fine.  Then it's only a 10-minute breakfast.

Hopple Popple

I read about hopple popple on Roadfood.com and realized that I sort of have been making it all along.  And I'm not even German!  After a little more investigating on the web, it seems that there are many variations of this dish.  The constants are eggs, potatoes, onion, some kind of meat, and some cheese.  What makes hopple popple different from just a basic meat-and-potato scramble is that the eggs are in the background.  Yes, they're there in every forkful, but you'd be hard-pressed to decide whether it's a meat dish, a potato dish, or an egg dish.  They all play equally starring roles.

Meat can be anything: bacon, sausage, ham, and even pepperoni or salami.  Eggs can be prepared scrambled, or made like a puffy omelette.  I go for simplicity: scrambled.

Last night we had potatoes with our ham loaf, finally finishing the last of our ham.  I made sure to cook a couple of extra potatoes for this morning, and I had some smoked turkey sausage in the fridge.  I prefer pork, but when the sausage is mixed with a bunch of other stuff, turkey does fine.  Turkey or pork, the smoked links are absolutely fabulous in this dish.

Being MLK day, there is no school, so the boys slept in late.  While waiting for them to begin their Day of Sloth, I went ahead and got as much ready for hopple popple as possible, so that it would only be minutes of cooking time, and we'd actually have our breakfast in the a.m.

I find it helpful, when I have time and think of it, to get as much chopped, sliced, and diced ahead of time and waiting in little bowls next to the stove.  Then all I have to do is dump and cook.  Also, it allows the cold food, like the potatoes and sausage to warm up a little and not need quite so much time.

Now, my boys like everything in this dish, except the onions, which I chop up very fine so they won't see them, but there is something about mixing it all up together that seems to go against their collective grains.  But this morning, after the NTY bite, they both had nice helpings.  I thought it was one of the BEST BREAKFASTS EVER!  Not just scrambled eggs, not just fried potatoes, not just sausage, but more than even the sum total.

Here, then, is my Scots-Irish, French, Cherokee (see, no German!) version of hopple popple.

Hopple Popple
to feed 4 with leftovers

• 1 half of a long link of smoked turkey sausage, like Hillshire Farms, cut in half lengthways and then thinly sliced
• 2 small potatoes, cooked (boiled or baked) and peeled
• half of a small onion, diced very small
• 4 eggs, beaten with a little milk
• shredded cheese

1. Cook the sausage or other meat in a skillet until it is a little crispy.

2. Add some bacon grease (or butter or oil) if you need a little more grease.
3. Add the potatoes and onions and cook until the potatoes are getting some brown.

4. Add the eggs and be sure that the heat is on low.

5. Scramble it all together until the eggs are how you like them.
6. Top with cheese and mix that in.

My Smoothie Ambivilance

I like smoothies, really, but I don't see them as the be-all and end-all of healthy breakfasts.  Today was another snow day, so a perfect day for smoothies ----not?  Yes, and no.

One the one hand, it was cold outside, so most people would want something warm.  Not a good day for smoothies.  On the other hand, they lack a rib-sticking quality to get the boys and me through until lunchtime.  A better day for smoothies than most, since boys would be here to have something else if needed.  Mainly I chose to make smoothies today because the boys asked for them.

So my two gripes about smoothies are that they don't sustain us throughout the morning and that I hate my blender.  To combat the first problem, I could serve something else along with the smoothie, such as a breakfast meat, or even some cereal.  Cool Guy handled the problem by having a bowl of cereal at 10:30 this morning.  To combat the second problem, I am waiting to receive another blender in the mail.  I'll give this new one a try, and if it is the success that I hope it to be, I'll post about it.

The good part about smoothies is

• they are easy
• they are healthy
• boys like them
• they are quick
• they are customizable

Today's smoothie got in 100% of our Vitamin C, a lot of our Vitamin A, a good chunk of potassium, some calcium, protein, and even some Omega-3.  That's quite a whallop for such a small investment of time and energy.  And did I mention that the boys like them?

In the final analysis, I think smoothies are a good thing, but not something that I would want every day as my main source of morning sustenance.  Enjoy it for what it is: a yummy, healthy drink.

My basic recipe for smoothies is vague.  It takes a little tinkering with yourself to make it yours.

Smoothie
For two or three people

1 banana
Several serving spoonfuls vanilla yogurt (probably 3/4 cup total)
Fresh or frozen other fruit of your choice, about 1 cup (we used frozen mango today)
2-3 ice cubes if not using frozen fruit
Orange juice if needed
Optional ground flax seed or wheat germ for extra nutrition

1. Place the fruits, ground flax seed,  and yogurt in the blender and turn it on.  Hopefully your blender works better than mine.

2. If it seems too thick, add orange juice until it is of a consistency you like.

3. Pour into glasses, add straws, and FILL YOUR BLENDER WITH WATER.

4. Train your family members to fill their glasses with water after they are done with their smoothies.  Smoothie residue is the devil to clean after it dries on the blender and glasses.

Dig the Pig

I always said I'd make a great vegetarian if it weren't for pork.  Barbeque pulled pork, pork tenderloin, ham, bacon, sausage - I'd miss it too much.

I try, as much as is realistic, to buy my pork at the farmer's market, where they raise "happy pigs," my term, but it doesn't always happen.  Last weekend, recovering from the Eternal Cold, which has now developed into a full-blown sinus infection, I just didn't have the strength to muster the trip.  Cool Guy and I went to the local grocery store, and he asked for Stick Sausage.  That's our term for sausage in links instead of patties.  Well, you don't have to ask me twice!

Today, a snow day, but nevertheless one with very little sleep on my part (thank you, racking cough), I thought it would be the perfect time to just slide those babies in the skillet and basically let breakfast take care of itself.

Yes, they're fatty.  Yes, they're salty.  Yes, they're processed food, and I don't know what some of the ingredients are, but they are tasty, and they are just what fills the bill on a day like today - a "Mom's not at her best" kind of day.

We had ours with oranges and toast.  Easy Peasy.

You Say Tomato, I Say To-mah-to

No, I didn't serve tomatoes this morning.  Or potato po-tah-tos.  We had hard boiled eggs, one of my favorite breakfasts.

What I want to talk about is how different things are done in different families, and hard boiled eggs are a case in point.

The way I grew up, we peeled them, sat at the table with salt and pepper shakers, sprinkled those on, and munched away, using more salt and pepper as needed.  De-lightful.

Burt's family proceeds entirely differently: They put the eggs on a plate, roughly chop them, and then put pats of butter, plus some salt and pepper, and eat them with a fork.  De-licious.

I think one of the most interesting things in life is finding different ways of doing every-day, ordinary things.  De-lovely.

Are there other ways to eat hard boiled eggs? 

Both methods are equally good, but my way has the advantage of allowing a little flexibility for cooking and serving.  Burt's way requires the eggs to be quite hot, as in right off the stove, to have enough heat for the butter to melt.  I eat my plain hard boiled eggs hot, room temp, or cold.  It's all good to me.  And since I have a rotten, miserable cold right now and plan on crawling back into bed the moment I start feeling bad again, I think I'll go with the flexibility of the plain eggs today.

(Just a note: neither boy has yet taken to hard boiled eggs, but both like eggs in general now.  I'm suspecting that they just haven't had enough during all those cold cereal years, so I continue to make them once a month or so, serve the no-thank-you bite, plan on using the rejected eggs for tuna salad, and get on with things.  Mom-sick days are fine ones for the boys to pour their own cereal.)

This morning's eggs were served with whole wheat English muffins with honey, and a mandarin orange.