homemade bread

yes, i joined the rest of the country in the new year's resolution thing. we have been longing to move toward healthier habits, and the new year (ok, post-holidays being the main factor ;) seemed like a good time! we still haven't completely made a "plan"... but we're choosing healthier, more natural foods. i decided to try my hand at baking some wheat bread (i don't think i've ever made a yeast bread before, besides that awesome pizza crust i told you about before!)... i had some whole wheat flour, and after not finding any recipes online that didn't require bread flour (i wanted to use what i had on hand, not go shopping on new year's day!), i checked the bag of flour, and it had a recipe! it turned out pretty good...not the best bread i've ever had, but it's healthy and fresh and natural... and tastes that way! 

so far, we've tried it with butter (yummy, but not a part of our new eating habits ;) and with an egg... i assume other people call this egg-in-a-hole, too? that's what we always called it in my family! just cut a hole in the middle of the bread (i used a champagne flute), spray a pan with cooking spray, put the bread in, and crack an egg in the middle! flip at some point, until egg is cooked as desired - super-simple, and fun for kids and adults alike ;)
and tastes great with a glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice from our tree (which we just realized today bears seedless oranges - is that normal?)... if anyone needs some oranges, let us know!

just as we were about to sit down to eat our egg-in-a-holes, my sister pointed out that joey's antics were making him a joey-in-a-hole! we both scrambled for our cameras, but this was the best i got (he really wasn't sad - he was having lots of hyper-fun! just caught it at the wrong moment ;)

also, i've been journaling and making art all two days so far this year - you can follow my daily creativity here at my other blog... also, i'm about to floss for the second night in a row (not that i haven't always done it completely consistently... ;)

20/20: (non)day 19

i didn't get dressed today.
(note: i wrote this yesterday)

i wore pajamas ALL DAY. 

and a hat. 

i decided it was okay to skip one day, because i actually only wore 19 out of my 20 pieces this whole time. 

i had originally included those maroon pleated stretchy pants in my twenty pieces (see this post for reference), but never found a way to successfully style them with the rest of my pieces. so you're actually getting 19 pieces in 19 days instead of 20 ;) tomorrow is the final day (and then it's christmas eve!) and then i get to pull out my boxes of clothes that have been hiding these last three weeks, play, and decide about "twenty pieces" before the new year!

i didn't get dressed, but i DID cook :) i made pizza! all homemade (crust, sauce, etc) - and i'm gonna share my recipe with YOU! it's really a compilation of three recipes: Crust (my childhood best friend's family recipe), Pesto (Joy of Cooking), and the rest of the toppings (Cooking Light)

i included this picture so i could talk about how much i HATE these pop cans! for no reason other than they startle me and it stresses me out ;) also, sometimes to make things easier/faster, i do just pop one of these open... but you'll see, my homemade crust is WAY better ;)

Newell family pizza dough recipe:
microwave 2 cups of water for 2 minutes. pour into large bowl and sprinkle 3 Tablespoons yeast on surface. add 1 egg, 1/4 cup oil (to make it healthier, Kim's mom used safflower oil in her recipe - i usually don't have any on hand, so use canola or whatever vegetable oil you have), 1 1/2 teaspoons salt, and 6 Tablespoons honey. whisk to combine. then add 6 1/2-7 cups flour (i have used both white and whole wheat flours in the past - both taste great!). you know it's the right consistency when it's tacky, but doesn't actually stick to your fingers. transfer to two oiled pizza pans and stretch to fit.

Pesto:
put in food processor and grind to a rough, slightly chunky paste:
2 cups fresh basil leaves
1/3 cup pine nuts
2 cloves garlic
1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese 
(i actually used Romano this time because i forgot to buy parmesan - still good :)
then slowly pour in through feed tube with machine running:
1/2 cup olive oil
salt and pepper (i ALWAYS forget these)


spread evenly over dough, leaving a half to an inch around the edge.
this recipe makes enough for both pizzas (or make one and freeze the rest for next time! or use it tomorrow in some pasta - mmm i love pesto...) the first time i had pesto pizza was in Vernazza, Cinque Terre, Italy - and i made my own version a bunch of time after getting home. but once i found this Red Grape Chicken Pesto pizza recipe in Cooking light, i converted :)

Toppings:
add 1 1/2 cups seedless red grapes, halved, scattered across pesto.
top with 8 ounces shredded rotisserie chicken breast 
(i've measured this at about 1 1/2 breasts, if you don't have a scale).

top with 3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
4 ounces fresh mozzarella, thinly sliced

sprinkle 3 Tablespoons grated Romano cheese
and a little black pepper

bake in 475-degree oven for 12-15 minutes, or until crust is golden!

sprinkle with 1/4 cup sliced green onions (i also always forget this step, but i had to include a shot of it in my post because of the lovely ombre color effect - heck yeah - fashion and food crossover - that's right! ;)

for the record, if i WOULD have gotten dressed today, i would have probably tried combining number 10 (teal lacy anthro top) with number 18 (striped off-white/blue skirt) somehow, and added some leggings and boots ;)

spotlight five: yellow pendant and found hardware necklace

close... closer... closest! 

i love the closeup of this necklace - you can really see the detail of the found hardware pieces and all their different textures...!

and i made a meal this week that joey ate! 

cook 8oz penne pasta according to package directions, drain.  cook 8oz sausage and 1 cup sliced onion in 2 tsp. olive oil for 4 minutes (until browned). add 2 tsp minced garlic (you guys, for the first time in my life i bought the packaged minced garlic...! such a timesaver! though i guess you give up a bit of freshness? we didn't notice ;) and cook for 2 minutes. add 1 1/4lb chopped tomatoes (this equaled 7 Romas for me), cook for 2 minutes.  take off stove and add the cooked pasta, 2 Tbsp grated Romano cheese, 1/4 tsp salt, 1/8 tsp pepper. sprinkle with 4 Tbsp

grated Romano, and 1/4 cup fresh basil leaves, torn. - serve! jason, joey, and i all loved it, and it only has 389 cal per serving (this recipe makes 4 servings)! :) we had broccoli with it, cause i knew joey'd eat that even if he wouldn't eat the pasta - but he did! yay! success! need more recipes like this one (but different ;) 

three months in... and spotlight three: found wood necklace

 attention: 

those of you who only read this blog for pictures of the cutest kid in the world, please scroll to the bottom immediately.

now, for anyone who stuck around for the outfit and jewelry... the outfit: top, thrifted; shorts, thrifted (seen here and here and here in the past "month shots with the shed"); boots, gift from jason; necklace, handmade from cord and a found piece of wood; earrings, bought at the Light of Christmas boutique last year, made by the lovely Becca Nevius (both of us will be selling jewelry there this year!)

isn't this little piece of wood amazing?? it's like a miniature tree! love it :)

                                                                closeup of the earrings by becca

now for the "three months in" update... there is no update. i weigh exactly the same as last month (190 lbs), and have continued to struggle with eating healthy.
this month i blame:
a) jason for buying me ten pounds of bulk chai latte powder (the best in the world.) to celebrate the arrival of fall (and i have yet to celebrate or really even acknowledge its subsequent departure, with the temperatures still in the 80s this week). you have to try it to understand, but this chai sweetness is truly irresistible. and something about allowing myself to have it every day seems to undermine my healthy aspirations... 
and/or 
b) joey. this is probably an even bigger one. i got all inspired to cook and make healthy meals, and the ones i was trying were delicious! but my almost-2-year-old refuses to eat pretty much every single one. so it makes me less motivated to cook this way when i'm going to either have to cook a separate meal for him, or send him to bed hungry. i've tried to find healthy, toddler-friendly meals, but almost everything seems to be either/or. of course he'll eat macaroni and cheese, burgers, fried chicken, and sweets. but not anything I cook, oh no. he does eat vegetables pretty well... he'll ask for broccoli, peas, and edamame until their supply is exhausted! but nothing that really fills him up, and i try to fill him up in the hopes that maybe THIS will be the week he sleeps through the night...

but i haven't given up! my sister gave me this book about toddlers and it had some fun snacky ideas in there (also a constant drama in our house - he'll eat something up every day one week, and then have nothing to do with it the following one, so i'm constantly problem-solving. guess that's the life of a mother ;) 

he has not been eating bananas for me this week, so i thought i'd try a different version...

i changed the recipe a little bit on this, since i had a package of Jell-O graham cracker crust in my cupboard, and called them a different name (she called them no-bake banana cookies)

"special bananas"

1. slice up banana

2. shake in ziploc bag of graham cracker crust

3. serve.

;)

joey, do you like them? 

"yeah! spetta bananas!" ;)

beef pot pie

last week we had some delicious chicken pot pies from a little cookbook/magazine jason bought me: Cooking Light's Readers' Top-rated Recipes. we've tried a couple of recipes from it, and they have been wonderful! delicious, using pretty much normal ingredients (martha stewart's recipes, on the other hand,  are GORGEOUS, but they end up being kind of expensive to make, with all the unusual ingredients you have to buy just for that recipe, and sometimes i can't even find them at the grocery store). so, since we're trying to be more budget-conscious, i thought about what i could make with ingredients i already had instead of heading to the store to spend more money. i never make the same thing two weeks in a row (i guess i feel like it's too repetitive... for my family. i don't mind... so maybe i should find out if they do! i'd waste less fresh ingredients that way), and i had run out of chicken, so i thought "how about BEEF pot pie? used the same basic recipe, altered slightly to account for the beef-ness, and to our taste (the first time was a little bitter, and i thought it might have been the parsnips in the original recipe, so i replaced those with a sweeter alternative: carrots. beef pot pies

preheat oven to 400 degrees. 

boil 3 cups reduced-fat beef broth in large dutch oven. 

add vegetables - 1 cup each of 1/2 inch cubes of: potato, sweet potato, celery, carrots, and onion.

cover & simmer for 6 minutes, then add one pound of steak, cut into bite-size pieces. 

cook 5 minutes, then remove meat & vegetables with a slotted spoon. 

mix 2/3 cup flour with 1 1/2 cup milk in a bowl with a whisk. add to broth.

cook 5 minutes, stirring frequently. stir in meat & vegetables.

add 1 1/2 cups frozen green peas, thawed <--a step i forgot both times i made this; 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley, 2 Tablespoons chopped fresh thyme, 1 1/2 teaspoons salt, 1 teaspoon pepper.

spoon into ramekins coated with cooking spray. recipe called for 8, but i actually only did 2 in individual ramekins - one each for me & my love - and the rest in a larger (identical) "ramekin"? 

top each with puff pastry dough, and bake for 16 minutes, or until pastry begins to brown.

and it seemed too boring to drink water, so i created a sparkling beverage out of: 

2/3 juice (pineapple orange banana - what joey calls "monana juice") and 1/3 sparkling water. 

garnish with an extra sprig of thyme, and enjoy!

ps. yes, these are the ramekins that i got the whole set of 6 + the large one for $4.50 at an estate sale - aren't they so fun!? makes me want to bake pots de creme, and other individual-sized recipes just so i can use them!

a night in Los Angeles... at work.

for those of you who don't know, i've been a nurse at children's hospital of los angeles for 8 years now (!)

 i only work occasionally now (like one 12-hour shift a month ;) so i can mostly stay home with joey full-time and play with art and stuff sometimes (much less than i feel like i should be able to, being so lucky to stay home and all... but what they say about motherhood being full-time is SO TRUE! i always have this little person tagging along, wanting to be with me, needing me almost every minute! and i love it. ;) 

these lovely instagrammers were taken in the breakroom during my lunch - ha ha.

you'll get better photos next time i hope ;)

so usually when i'm running out the door to work is the time i'm least concerned with healthy habits, but today, i had made these chicken strips (got randomly inspired to cook during joey's nap!), and they turned out so yummy! and we had these cherries that it turns out were super-sweet (but still firm - can't eat me no squishy cherries ;)

so there you have it - chicken and cherries! i wonder if those could be combined into a dish somehow... it'd have to have some cool name that also started with ch...