[Sshhh Veggie-Turkey Chili] & WHERE HAVE I BEEN?!

Good Evening Friends!  You may have been wondering where I've been.... honestly- I HAVE TOO... We moved, as I mentioned before.  And the cleaning, organizing, unpacking and doing that OVER, and OVER again has consumed my life.  I can't seem to get back into a normal routine of create, clean, cook, craft, work, ship, soap, photograph, blog, exercise, play with Madi.  Hopefully that will come soon.  For the mean time, I apologize if you've missed us- I sure have!

The only sense of "normalcy" I can seem to find and document has been cooking and BAKING... I know, weird right?  BAKING, ME?!  Well, the zucchini's here at Grandpa's house are GOING NUTS- I can't wait to show them to you, and the fun recipes I've been trying out and modifying!

But for now, check out how many veggies I HID in our dinner tonight-

• Zucchini
• Red Pepper
• Hatch Chili
• Onion

ALL OF WHICH MY HUSBAND DOES NOT LIKE and will pick out of he sees them, ridiculous- right?!

I'd love to share my recipe with you!

Ingredients:

• 1 shredded zucchini (I use my food processor, or a cheese grader)
• 1 chopped Red Pepper
• 1 shredded Onion
• 1 chopped Hatch Chili
• 1 package ground Turkey Breast
• 2 cans Beans of your choice (I typically use dried beans, but they have to be soaked over night, and I didn't plan ahead this time) {I used Pinto and Kidney- but I love to use Black as well}
• 1 can Diced Tomatoes
• Chili Spice Mix

Now for the process:
Use a large pot and turn your pan onto Medium.  Dump in the ground turkey and start grading and chopping your veggies.  Layer the veggies on top of the turkey as it begins to brown.  Once you've put them all in, give it a stir.  After a few minutes cooking it will look like this.

Let it continue to cook for about 20 minutes, giving it a stir frequently.

Then, add in some spice!  I LOVE, this Chili Spice Mix by my baking addiction.  You know I don't like to measure, and I didn't have any mixed ahead tonight, so I just pulled up the list and added a few teaspoons of this, and a few teaspoons of that... Although, I left out the Cayenne this time, since I had some fresh Hatch Chili's from my Bountiful Basket.

I also add in a little bit of Better than Bullion- have not heard of it?!  

Familiarize yourself!  It's wonderful when you don't have any homemade stock in the freezer!  I think I added in about 2 table spoons along with my 2 cans of beans and 1 can of tomatoes.  Make sure you use the whole can of beans, don't drain them.

Now, you could just bring it to a boil and serve it up, but I like to let my Chili simmer, for a while.  Tonight it sat on the stove on low for more than an hour until Kyle got home and the corn bread was done baking.

Eventually the veggies (sshhhh) reduce to almost nothing, and that makes for a happy wife, cause the husband doesn't notice they are there!

I had a few ears of corn left from my basket, so I shucked them, cut the kernels off the cob, and added them in, right before serving (that way they didn't get smooshy)

It was so good, Madi ate two bowls, and Kyle didn't mention a single Veggie, AND I didn't get a presentation photo of it in a bowl, I was too hungry and then it was gone.

I'd love to hear of any other recipes you use to hide veggies!  Please share.

I am hoping this is the first of my re-regular posts to come!  See you soon!

Totally Unoriginal [BACK TO SCHOOL} Teacher Gifts and a personal update

Hello my friends.  Wow- its been WAY too long since I've written.  If you didn't see it before, my little family moved.  We have had an awesome opportunity to help a family member out- while being helped ourselves and now we live in a beautiful house in Issaquah, WA.  We'll be working on all sorts of fun home-improvements projects to get Kyle's childhood home ready to sell over the next year- I am excited to share them with you all!

Among-st the mess of moving, [BACK TO SCHOOL] has been on my mind, even though I only have a few close to me participating in this exciting time.  I was going to take some time to round up some of my favorite [BACK TO SCHOOL] teacher gifts, but there are SO many good round-ups already out there, I figured... why reinvent the wheel!?  Right??

So, sharing from one of my favorite blogs- Lil' Luna- 15+ Back to School Gifts! (Click the image to head over to her round-up)

Think of how special your child's' new teacher will feel when receiving such a thoughtful handcrafted gift... it will get you started off on the RIGHT foot!

Enjoy-

My First Curated Collection

I am a Looksi Square Curator.  That means, once a quarter I get to put together a collection of what I consider to be the finest of ANYTHING.  I've been loving the idea of chillin' in the evenings this autumn in the back yard, by the fire, with yummy food, drink and a beautiful atmosphere so I decided to use that as a theme for my first Curated Collection:

The look, feel, and taste of this setting is what I will be creating with this collection of other blogger's DIY posts, stay tuned until Friday!

p.s.  Our little family is in the process of a BIG move- my apologies for being more absent than I'd like for the last little bit and through the end of this month.  Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers that we can get everything done!

{Quinoa Chicken Salad}

the bunch had the opportunity to apply to blog for Bountiful Baskets... and we are SO excited!  I love to cook, but busy life often means creativity in the kitchen is slacking.  If we are selected to blog for them, it will FORCE me to start getting creative again and THAT MAKES ME EXCITED!!

Applying for the position alone has already stirred some creativity- today when I got home with my basket, I had already come up with the idea of using the uncooked single chicken breast [that has been sitting in the fridge for most of the week, with out a purpose] and the quinoa that hasn't gotten eaten up yet along with my basket contents to pull together a Chicken Salad!

Here's my list of ingredients:

• 6 oz of Chicken Breast
• 1/2 cup cooked Quinoa
• 2 Celery Stocks 
• 1/2 small Red Onion
• Butter Lettuce Leaves
• 1/2 cup Cottage Cheese
• 1/4 cup Non-Fat Greek Yogurt
• Salt and Pepper
• 1/4 tsp. Mrs. Dash

Here's how I made it:

First I trimmed up my Chicken Breast and cut it in half.  Laid it in a hot pan and added Salt and Pepper.  Then I added about 1/4 cup water in the bottom of the pan and covered with a lid.  I wanted the chicken to stay really moist and didn't want to add any oil to the pan, so this is a great way to achieve that!

While my chicken was cooking, I prepared my celery by washing, then tearing back the top so it breaks off and rip it backwards down the stock to peel off most of the chewy strings.

Then I cut them into long skinny strips and chopped it up fine.

I chopped up the red onion as well, but did it a little smaller (I'm not a huge fan of chomping into a LARGE piece of raw onion in any type of food).  

When the chicken was done cooking, I chopped it up into small chunks.  Then, in a bowl I combined all of the ingredients.  If your mixed salad is looking a little dry still, add another spoonful or so of Greek Yogurt.

I plucked off 4 leaves of of butter lettuce and washed and dried them.  Laid 2 leaves on top of each other and spooned about 1/2 cup of the salad mixture into the lettuce leaves.  

AND ENJOYED!

I hope you love this recipe as much as I did.   It made enough for me to have for 3 lunches- and the flavors developed even more each day- it got Yummier and Yummier!

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How to Make your Strawberries Last Longer

I LOVE FRUIT- and I LOVE TO LEARN WAYS TO MAKE MY FRUIT LAST LONGER ON THE SHELF {or in the fridge}. I have heard all sorts of different ideas on washing before storing, not washing till you eat, soaking for an extended amount of time (as outlined in my Two For One Strawberry Recipe post) and more for how to make berries last in the fridge.  AND I've had a few friends tell me now that they have made the plunge and experimented with rinsing their Strawberries in Vinegar Water to help preserve their freshness.  The concept made sense to me, so I thought I would give it a try this last time I purchased a flat of Strawberries from Bountiful Baskets.

I started out by pouring Regular White Vinegar about 1/10th of my LARGE bowl full.  [As ALMOST ALWAYS, I didn't measure- measuring isn't fun].  I then dumped about half of my Strawberries into the bowl and filled to the top with water.

I let the berries soak for about 5 minutes and then I gently pushed the berries floating at the top down into the water a few times to make sure all the berries were getting equal soaking time.

After another 5 minutes  [10 minutes total], I laid paper towels out on my counter and let my Strawberries dry.  I left them out for about an hour, and then I patted them dry with another paper towel.

I made sure to also rinse the plastic containers I was using to store my berries in with the vinegar water before returning them to the container for storage.  If I skipped this step I would be risking re-transferring the bacteria, or whatever it is that causes the berries to start to mold back onto the berries.  I simply dipped the plastic containers in the vinegar water a few times and patted dry with a paper towel.

I had a neighbor to thank for keeping an eye on our home while we went to the cabin, so I decided to make them a Strawberry Pie and one for my little family to enjoy for dessert for a few days, so I cut up a lot of the Strawberries then to put in my pies.
What remained was 3 clam shells of preserved Strawberries that I put in the fridge.

The berries I purchased on July 13th, were still fresh and juicy on July 27th!!! I would definitely say that rinsing them in Vinegar helped them last longer- and they tasted AWESOME!

In case you are wondering how I make my Strawberry Pie, I make it just like my Momma taught me.

• Wash and cut Berries
• Mix 1 container of Marie's Strawberry Glaze with the cut berries
• Bake an empty pie shell and let it cool
• Gently spoon the Glazed Strawberries into the Baked Pie Shell
• Refrigerate and serve chilled

{Photo borrowed from Google Images- My pie crust didn't bake pretty and I was embarrassed}

The neighbors loved their strawberry pie, and we enjoyed ours for 3 nights after dinner.

I highly recommend soaking your Strawberries in Vinegar Water- it does make them last longer!

Do you have any other berry preserving tips?  I'd love it if you share!