Yard Sale Mania!

Just a quick post to let those of you in Northern Utah know that I am participating in a HUGE multi-family yard sale tomorrow. The sale is at 1625 So. Melanie Lane in Syracuse from 8 AM to 1 PM. Come on by for some screamin’ deals and cute stuff. You can get more info from the link below.

Find garage sales
in Syracuse, UT.

Going Green: Stop Using Paper Towels

I’m starting a new series on living green. I’m certainly not an expert on the subject, but my nature-loving heart can’t take the guilt of pillaging Mother Earth any more than I have to. That being said, I should also note that I’m in no way ready to stop using my air conditioning or switch to cloth diapers. What I am trying to do is make small changes that will amount to reducing the Halvorsen family carbon footprint without creating work levels akin to those on a turn-of-the-century farmstead.

My first experiment has been reducing our use of paper towels. I originally tried cutting out paper towels all together, but that was a little too much for us. After a few month of scientific analysis in the trenches, I’ve managed to cut our paper towel use by about 90%. Here are things that I have found useful in my efforts to reduce paper towel use.

• Keep paper towel alternatives handy: I started by trying to make rags out of old clothes (reuse and all that), but they really didn’t work out. None of my rags were absorbent enough, and many of them had synthetic fibers that actually repelled liquids. A much better alternative is to buy bulk washcloths and bar mops. I bought about 20 and keep them in a drawer in my kitchen. I go through at least one a day (usually 2 or 3), so I keep a bucket under the sink for the dirty ones. Every couple of days I take my bucket down to the laundry room and throw my rags in the wash. I’ve even gone so far as to develop a color code: Pastel clothes are for wiping my toddler’s hands and face, white is for kitchen counter tops, and brights are for bathrooms.

• Look for specialty products: I bought special cloths designed for dusting and cleaning glass respectively. They work like a dream and have cut down on not only paper towel use, but cleaning fluids as well. I don’t use furniture polish anymore, and the glass-cleaning cloths still work when wet, so I don’t need to use as much window cleaner. These specialty products weren’t expensive–I got mine at the dollar store.

• Make it easy on yourself: The best way to ensure that you are successful in your quest for paper towel liberation is to make it as easy on yourself as possible. If you don’t have rags handy, you’re going to reach for that roll of earth-trashing convenience. I found that, especially in the first month or two, it was best to put the paper towels out of sight and keep stashes of rags throughout the house. I have a huge stockpile in the kitchen, some in each bathroom, and a few in the kids’ rooms. Once I got in the habit of reaching for rags first, I put the paper towels back on the counter.

Ultimately, there are really only 3 reasons I reach for a paper towel these days.

1. To clean up animal poop and/or vomit.
2. To blow my nose (you think I would get tissues, but no. Apparently that is beyond me.)
3. To wipe up spills when I’ve been lazy and haven’t restocked my rag drawer.

The first item isn’t gonna change. I love the planet, but I just can’t stomach wiping up animal waste with a rag. Maybe I’ll have some kind of zen epiphany and come to peace with that little bit of the circle of life. Until then, I’ll work on using a hanky and folding my laundry.

Easter Leftover Quiche with Asparagus, Leeks, Ham and Gruyere

If you’re like me, Easter brings almost as many leftovers as Thanksgiving. With two big family dinners to attend as well as our own celebrations, we had food coming out our ears (sliced ham, anyone?). The other day I found myself staring at a fridge brimming with eggs (14 to be exact) and other odds and ends. Since I happened to have some Gruyere cheese, it was clear that a quiche was in order.

Now let me make one thing clear. I’m not really a baker. I mean, I’ll throw together some cupcakes or cookies now and then, but bread and pastry is pretty much beyond me. All that measuring and weighing and delicately combining things just right . . . It’s enough to put me off cooking all together. I’m infamous for just throwing any old thing into a recipe without measuring or even paying attention. It drives my husband bonkers because he’ll really love something and then I can’t recreate it. I think of recipes as guidelines more than anything else. So please forgive me for using store-bought pie crust. I know it’s a mortal sin in the eyes of some, but I’m just too darn lazy to do it the right way.

I should also note that while this recipe is my own, I use America’s Test Kitchen’s method for making quiche which calls for blind baking the crust before putting in the filling.

Easter Quiche with Asparagus, Leeks, and Ham

Serves 6

Ingredients

1 ready-made, refrigerated pie crust

2 Tbsp. unsalted butter

1 leek, white and light green parts cut into 1/2 inch slices and rinsed thouroughlly

1/2 lb. asparagus, tough ends trimmed and cut into 1/2 inch chunks

5 large eggs

2 cups whole milk (don’t use low-fat milk)

1/4 tsp. salt

1 tsp. fresh ground pepper

1/2 tsp. dried thyme

4 oz. (about 1 cup) Gruyere cheese, shredded

3-4 slices baked ham, cubed

Proceedure

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Place crust in a pie plate and bake for 10 minutes. Remove pie plate from oven and set aside.
2. Melt butter in a skillet over medium heat. Cook leeks and asparagus until just tender, 4 to six minutes.
3. In another bowl, whisk together milk, eggs, salt, pepper, and thyme.
4. Sprinkle cheese over bottom of warm pie crust. Top with ham and vegetable mixture, distributing all evenly over bottom of crust. Pour egg mixture over all until it comes just below the edge of the pie crust. Cover edges of crust with foil strips to prevent over cooking them.
5. Return quiche to oven and cook until center is set but still a little jiggly, like custard, 40-50 minutes. A knife inserted near the center of the quiche should come out clean. Remove quiche to cooling rack and serve slightly warm or at room temperature.

Easter Dress for Petra

I was browsing Mad Mim, one of my very favorite sewing blogs and say that she had some posts about Easter clothes for her kids. I realized that I had nothing for my own little ones and decided to get my butt in gear and make a dress for my Petra. I bought the fabric in the fall (and it shows), but I’m happy none the less. She loves the dress and refused to take it off until bedtime. What more could a sewing mommy want?

Katsudon

Oh how I love good katsudon. This is Japanese comfort food at its best, and often a favorite of Western eaters. Katsudon is a breaded, fried pork cutlet served with egg, scallion, onion, and rice. It has a sweet and salty sauce that is so tasty. This certainly isn’t healthy, but its a fun meal to try once in a while. Serve it with warm, salted edamame and some hot miso soup for an authentic Japanese dinner that even kids will be happy to gobble up. Panko are Japanese breadcrumbs that are much lighter and crispier than the Western kind. They are a must for this recipe, so look for them in the Asian aisle of the market or at Asian specialty stores. Mirin is a sweet rice cooking wine, also widely available at Asian markets.

Serves 4

Ingredients

4 thin pork cutlets

1/2 cup flour

3 eggs. divided

2 cups panko bread crumbs

Vegetable Oil for frying

1/2 cup soy sauce

2 Tbsp. mirin (sweet rice wine)

2 tsp. sugar

1 tsp. fish sauce

1 small sweet onion, thinly sliced

1-2 cups white rice. cooked

4 scallions, white and green parts sliced

Proceedure

1. Pat pork dry with paper towels and season with salt and pepper. Put flour, one beaten egg, and panko each in a separate shallow dish. Dredge a pork cutlet in flour, shaking off excess, then in egg, and last in panko. Press pork into the panko to ensure it gets a nice, thick coating of the bread crumbs. Repeat with remaining pork pieces.
2. Heat 4 to 6 inches of oil to 340 degrees (medium to medium high) in a heavy pot. You’ll know the oil is ready when some bread crumbs dropped into the pot sizzle. Place a piece of pork in the pot and fry until deep golden brown, moving the pork gently to ensure even cooking. Turn pork over to fry the other side until golden brown. Repeat with remaining pork. Only fry one piece of pork at a time!
3. Place pork on a wire rack over paper towels to drain. Meanwhile, make the katsu sauce by combining the soy sauce, mirin, sugar, fish sauce, and sliced onion in a medium sized pot. Bring to a boil and cover. Reduce heat to low and cook for about five minutes, until onion is soft and dark brown. Add a little water if needed.
4. Chop the pork into one inch strips. Nestle pork pieces on top of the katsu sauce. Beat remaining eggs and quickly pour over pork. Turn heat to high and cover pot. Cook 30 seconds to 1 minute until egg is set and cooked to desired firmness.
5. Serve pork cutlets over white rice. Drizzle with katsu sauce and top with green onions.

Strawberry Spinach Salad with Goat Cheese and Chicken

This is so simple it almost isn’t a recipe, but it’s one of my favorite light dinners so I thought I would include it here. This is especially good with fresh, local berries and cheese that I buy at the farmer’s market. I’m a big goat cheese fan, and the local dairy goat farmer has the absolute best I’ve tasted. Even if you can’t get everything local, this is still a delicious and easy lunch or supper. This would also work well at a baby or bridal shower.

Serves 2

Ingredients

1/2 lb. baby spinach, washed and dried

1/2 lb. strawberries, hulled and sliced

4 oz. goat cheese with herbs, crumbled

4 oz. Planters Flavor Grove chipotle cashews

2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, grilled, baked, or poached

Briana’s Home Style blush wine vinaigrette

Procedure

1. Do I really need to say this? Put the spinach on a plate. Put the other stuff on top of it. Eat it. Be ever so happy. The end!

Late Summer Grilling: Red Curry Pork Chops with Grilled Peaches

This was one of those “what in the heck is for dinner?” recipes where I just had to use what was on hand. It turned out so mouth-wateringly delicious that we’ve had it three times since my first attempt. Although fresh peaches work well here, even store-bought fruit will come out well thanks to the heavy caramelization that occurs on the grill. Thai Red Curry Paste can be found in the Asian aisle of most supermarkets or in Asian grocery stores.

Serves 4

Ingredients

4 3/4″ thick pork chops or steaks

2 Tbsp. Thai red curry paste

1 Tbsp. vegetable oil

3 tsp. minced garlic, divided

3 large, ripe peaches

1 medium zucchini

1 red onion

8 oz. mushrooms, stems removed

1/2 cup soy sauce

1/4 cup brown sugar

Procedure

1. Pat pork dry with paper towels and season both sides with salt and pepper. In a small bowl, whisk together curry paste, oil, and one tsp. garlic. Spread resulting paste evenly over all sides of pork chops and allow to marinade at least one hour and up to over night.
2. Soak eight bamboo skewers in water for 30 minutes. Remove from water and set aside. Cut each peach into eight pieces. Cut zucchini and onion into 1″ chunks; separate layers of onion.
3. Alternate veggies and peaches on skewers as follows: mushroom, onion, peach, onion, zucchini, onion, mushroom . . . and so forth until all skewers are filled.
4. Combine soy sauce, brown sugar, and remaining garlic in a small bowl.
5. Preheat grill on high heat for 10 minutes and oil the grates. Lower temperature on one side of the grill to medium. Place veggie skewers on the lower heat side of the grill and brush liberally with the soy sauce mixture. Cook covered for five minutes.
6. Turn veggies and brush with soy sauce mixture again. Place pork on the hot side of the grill. Cook covered for another five minutes. Turn meat and veggies. Add more soy sauce to veggies and cook covered another five minutes.
7. Remove pork from grill to a platter. Tent with aluminum foil and allow to rest for 10 minutes. The pork will finish cooking under the foil and resting the meat will allow the juices to return to the center. Turn veggies again and brush one last time with soy sauce. By this point, the veggies and especially the peaches should be showing a lot of dark brown caramelization.
8. Serve pork and veggies together. I offered oven roasted potatoes with this dish, but they aren’t really necessary.