Saturday, September 13, 2008

Frostop in West Virginia

http://www.choppedonion.com/id18.html

This link brings me back to the day! This is the best hot dog in the world. They also have the best root beer. If you are ever near Huntington, WV you have to stop and get some hot dogs and root beer!

Dinner Dips

Each month, the doctors office that I work for receives Wondertime Magazine. I love this magazine because it is full of recipes and activities for kids. The website for the magazine is http://wondertime.go.com/ and it is worth searching through or subscribing to it.

In the May 2008 issue, there was an article with recipes for dinner dips. I tried the first one, enchilada dip. There is a link to make your own chips. I made the tortilla chips and they were awesome. The dip was awesome. I have included the link for the article. I am thinking about trying the guacamole dip soon. I am not sure how Jonah will do with the guacamole. On one hand he loves the color green, but on the other hand it may not look appealing to him. The guacamole recipe has tofu in it. Now I have never had tofu but I heard that it blends unnoticeable in the dip and it adds calcium and protein (I am not sure if there are different types of tofu that offer different nutrients?). That will be my next venture. But this was a hit with Jonah. He is a big chips and dip fan.

http://wondertime.go.com/life-at-home/article/dips-for-dinner.html

Buffalo Chicken Wontons

I am posting another one of my favorite recipes. The wontons are awesome for office potlucks. They are a little time consuming, but the wontons can be made ahead of time. I would usually just make the filling and put it in a microwave-safe bowl. When I got to work I would warm it up and then fill the wonton cups about 5 minutes before lunch started. You can save some time also by mixing your shredded chicken in already prepared buffalo sauce.


RUBY TUESDAY'S BUFFALO CHICKEN WONTONS

Fried wonton wrappers filled with Buffalo-sauced shredded chicken. Served with bleu cheese dressing and crunchy celery sticks for dipping.(Menu Description).

12 wonton wrappers, cut into quarters
2 tablespoons vegetable oil, to brush on wontons
6 cups water, to boil chicken
1 lb boneless skinless chicken breasts
6 tablespoons louisiana hot sauce
2 teaspoons liquid margarine
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
salt
blue cheese dressing
celery (to garnish)

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.

Place the wonton wrappers on a work surface and brush lightly with the oil. Mold the wontons, oiled-side up, into the bottoms of miniature (1-inch) muffin tins.

Bake until light brown, about 5 minutes. Remove from oven, let cool slightly and remove from the muffin tins. Cool on a wire rack. Place on a baking sheet and cover tightly with plastic wrap until ready to assemble.

Cook the chicken at a simmer until cooked through, about 12 minutes. Cool the chicken slightly, then finely chop and shred with a fork. Season with a little salt.

In a medium bowl mix together the Hot Sauce, liquid margarine, garlic powder, and cayenne pepper. Add the chicken and mix well. Refrigerate until slightly chilled.

TO ASSEMBLE:
Place 1 heaping teaspoon of the chicken mixture in each wonton cup and garnish with bleu cheese dressing and crunchy celery sticks for dipping. Serve at room temperature.

NOTE: The wonton cups can be baked up to 3 days in advance and stored in an airtight container. The chicken mixture can be made up to 1 day in advance. Let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes before serving. The wonton cups can be filled up to 1 hour in advance.

Servings: 48
Source: Cadillac Jack
MSG URL: http://www.recipelink.com/msgid/1421641

Friday, September 12, 2008

I think my dad has a pair of these glasses

Nerds funny picture
Funny Stuff / Myspace layouts


The power of the timer

Hm......
My son is a master manipulator. Seriously. He trys to get out of eating dinner. He trys to get out of going to bed. He makes excuses to not do either.

With eating dinner tonight, he started whining "feed me mommy! feed me!". AH.......he wants me to feed him like a baby. Good one. He has decided that if I don't feed him he cannot possibly eat. Well........I whipped out the timer. (cue: "The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly" western showdown whistle song")

"You have 15 minutes to eat or you will have to leave the table and go to bed."

Just imagine a drama king who is 3 1/2 years old throwing his hands up in the air like Scarlett O'Hara ("I'll never go hungry again!"). "NO! Don't set the tiii---mmmm---eeer!!!!" You would have thought that his fish flew out of the fish tank and into a Christmas tree (if anyone knows my mom you can ask her about it. The only other witnesses to the incident are me and the fish....and the fish ain't talkin'! *snicker* *snicker*). Or that all of his favorite matchbox cars had been baked or accidentally mangled up in the garbage disposal. (No, the matchbox car "accidents" did not happen in my house. But just imagine how traumatic that would be to a boy?) The world had ended at that very moment for Jonah. How could he possibly survive once the timer was set? Now his next goal....Down with the timer...bwahahahahahahaha! Hm..........



The moral of the story you say?

Huh? Oh.....right. It scares him enough to have bad dreams at night telling mommy not to set the timer (yes, for real!) but he is yet to sit and eat dinner. I guess it's time for night-night because the timer just went off!

Red Lobster Bacon Wrapped Stuffed Shrimp Recipe

I have made this several times. The only downfall was the time it took to assemble everything. I did broil these. I just stuck them in the oven and it was still awesome.

Red Lobster Bacon Wrapped Stuffed Shrimp
37 min | 30 min prep
SERVES 2
Seasoning
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika
• 1 dash fresh ground pepper
• 1 dash cayenne pepper
• 1 dash allspice
Dipping Sauce
• 1/3 cup ranch dressing
• 1/4 teaspoon dried cilantro
• 5 pieces of thin sliced bacon
• 5 large shrimp
• 3 slices fresh jalapenos
• 1 ounce monterey jack pepper cheese
1. Preheat oven to broil.
2. Make the seasoning blend by combining the ingredients in a small bowl. Set this aside.
3. Make the dipping sauce by combining the ranch dressing with cilantro in a medium bowl.
4. Cook the bacon in a frying pan over medium/high heat, but don't cook it all the way to crispy or brown. About 3 minutes per side.
5. When bacon is done drain on paper towels.
6. Shell the shrimp, leaving the last segment of the shell and the tail.
7. Remove the dark vein from the back of the shrimp, and then cut down into the back of the shrimp, without cutting all the way through, so that the shrimp is nearly butterflied open. (This will make a pocket for the pepper and cheese).
8. Pour 1 cup of water into a small bowl.
9. Add the shrimp and jalapeño peppers and microwave for 60 to 90 seconds.
10. Shrimp should be starting to firm up and change color.
11. Immediately pour the water out of the bowl, remove the jalapeño slices and pour cold water over the shrimp.
12. Place the shrimp and jalapeño pepper slices onto paper towels to drain off excess water.
13. Build the appetizer by cutting the jalapeño slices in half and removing the seeds.
14. You should now have 6 jalapeño slices. You'll need 5 of these.
15. Place one slice into the slit on the back of a shrimp.
16. Cut an inch-long chunk of cheese (about 1/4 inch thick), and place it on the jalapeño slice.
17. Wrap a piece of bacon around the shrimp, starting where the cheese is.
18. Start wrapping the thinnest end of the bacon.
19. Go 1 1/2 times around the shrimp and then cut off the excess bacon and slide a skewer through the shrimp, starting with the end where the cheese is and piercing the cut end of the bacon on the other side.
20. Repeat with the remaining shrimp and slide them onto the skewer with the tails facing the same direction.
21. Put the skewer onto a baking sheet or broiler pan and sprinkle a very light coating of the seasoning blend over the shrimp, then broil for 3 to 4 minutes or until the bacon begins to brown and the cheese begins to ooze.
22. Serve over a bed of rice if desired.

Spaghetti

I just picked little man up from preschool and it is already time to start dinner. I have such a hard time getting Jonah to eat sometimes so I have to be inventive on how to get something good in him. I don't always cook....sometimes I just don't have the time. I can say that there have been days I have broke out tv dinners. Anyway, here is what I did for my sauce. I browned italian sausage with minced garlic, sea salt, pepper, and dehydrated onions (I cannot use real onions after PRK surgery...it burns). Then I cooked until onions were soft. I added green bell pepper, parsley and a mixture of shredded zucchini and yellow squash and let those soften up. Then I added the sauce (I used a spaghetti sauce that did not have veggies or meat - or you could use a mushroom only sauce). The squash and zucchini hide really well in the sauce. I usually use ground beef, but I wanted to see how much of a difference it made. The only difference is what you like better....beef or sausage. Of course the sausage has a strong flavor to it.

There are less than 70 days until Twilight the movie comes out! I will post all the recipes I am going to make that night. I included the link of Bella's Kitchen from Twilightmoms in an earlier post. I found some recipes I posted on the website specifically for Team Jacob! They are anti-vamp recipes. I am sure I will not try them all for that night, but there is always DVD release day! You can use any excuse to throw a party. I cannot wait to see Stephenie Meyer on Ellen next week.

Sunday, September 7, 2008

John Bytheway

If your LDS and you have not heard a John Bytheway talk...you are missing a lot!

I watched his "Righteous Warriors: Lessons From the War Chapters in the Book of Mormon". If you have not seen it, I think you can listen to it or watch it from the following link:
http://www.byub.org/findatalk/details.asp?ID=5564

I loved the talk. I know it was geared for teens but adults would enjoy this also. He went into so much detail...which was awesome...that he was unable to complete all of the chapters that he was planning on discussing. I was sadden by that. So I emailed him and he informed me of the book that he wrote. It is also called Righteous Warriors: Lessons From the War Chapters in the Book of Mormon. It is so worth buying. I know you can get it from Deseret.com or from Amazon.com.

It goes into a history of the war chapters and the many wonderful lessons that we can learn from these chapters. They happen the be my favorite chapters of the Book of Mormon. I especially love the chapters with Captain Moroni and the sons of Helaman. It is definitally well over a 5 star book.

I took my son out last night to see Wall E. This was his first time at a movie theater (he is 3 1/2 now). I was surprised at how well he sat during the movie. I thought that he would run around aimlessly in the dark while I searched through the mass of crying and screaming children in the theater. He sat on my lap the whole time and did not move! I had to check to make sure he was not sleeping. He loved the movie! I thought there were some slow parts and was very surprised he stuck through it. I would have to say it was pretty good. Some say it has politics in it. I guess it is liberal in a way because of the whole global warming issue. I am not liberal but I guess I can see some of the issues in the movie. To me it was about littering, being wasteful, ungrateful, and lazy.....and more importantly the love between Eve and Wall E. In any issue, it was pretty good and I can't wait until we can own it. It will be another movie (like Disney Cars) that I will have to play over and over and over and over and over.......

"Little man, why don't we watch another movie? Brother Bear looks good and you have not watched it yet!"

"No....I want to watch Cars!"

"But you just watched it yesterday...and the day before...."


I know there are others out there with the same problem and you feel my pain.