Snow Chicks and Toast

We woke up this morning and peeked out the window to see lots of snow. For those of you who've never had the joy of an Oklahoma snow, never, and I mean NEVER get into a snowball fight here. You see, Oklahoma snow isn't what the rest of the world knows as light fluffy snow, it's sleet cleverly disguised as snow. One pelt upside the head from an Oklahoma snowball could very likely send little cartoon birdies spinning around your head and leave you with a whelp the size of Utah.

Speaking of birdies, with the ground being all frosted over I tossed a loverly batch of rolls out for the birds and squirrels, just to make sure they had a little snack. One little squirrel sprinted over, snatched up a roll and raced back up the tree before the birds could hog it all. I just loved how he was using his fluffy tail as an umbrella.


After watching all the birds nibble on their bread, Miss Danielle said that she wanted to be a birdie and have snow and toast for breakfast and there was no way I could resist such a cutie patootie request. Being as our loverly old house leaks some serious cold air from under the cabinets, I wanted out of the kitchen as soon as possible so let me share with you my cheating version of cinnamon toast sticks.

First, cut the bread into strips with a pair of kitchen scissors. Please note that the quality of the pictures decreases as we go along due to my frozen toes wanting to get out quick!


Then scoot all the pieces together and give them a coat of butter flavored non stick spray and sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar. Hey, everyone else got to stay home from work for a snow day, I think I'm allowed to slack a bit in the nutrition arena. Don't be hatin'.


Toss them into a 400F preheated oven and then turn off the heat while you cook the eggs (about 10 mins).


Pair them up with bacon pieces to make a nest for the egg yolk birdies to stay warm from the egg white snowflakes.

To make the birdies and snowflakes, I separated the egg yolks and whites and cooked them up omelet style. Once they were done I simply cut them with cookie cutters.

Freaky Friday - Revenge of the Pachyderms

Great googaly moogaly what the heck is wrong with people?! I think little baby elephants are unbelievably cute, but when some freakish person puts them into baby clothes it just makes them look a little....well....freakish. Look into those eyes. Oh sure they may seem cute at first, but then you pan out a bit and realize those eyes belong to some half elephant, half baby DNA mutation that could trample you while you're sleeping. The best part is that she comes with a pacifier that "fits right into the tip of her trunk". TRUNK???? Since when do pacifiers belong up one's nose? I'm not sure what kind of whacked out version of "Animal Planet" they're watching over there at The Ashton-Drake Galleries, but someone needs to send in an intervention STAT!

Just in case one of you has a secret mutated elephant/baby fetish here's the link so you can bring "Claire" home to be part of your family:

www.collectiblestoday.com

While we're talking about freaky elephant things. Here's a nice nightmare inducing clip to share with all the little ones in your life. My therapist thanks you Disney!

Life's For Sharing

This is just cool.

Insert Chicken-ish Title Here or Here Or Over There

It seems that I had one of those brain farts at the store before Christmas and bought some phyllo dough. Seriously, I have no idea why I bought this stuff. Don't get me wrong, it's wonderfully loverly stuff that is great for getting your blood flow pumping from trying to keep it from drying out as you frantically throw your dish together. I just don't have the patients to work with this stuff on a normal bases. So I've been trying to come up with ideas as to what to do with it. I also was looking for something exciting to do with a wee bit of cheese left from the block and a few pieces of cooked bacon that needed to be used and so Chicken Rolls were born {insert owooos and ahhhhhs here}.

First tip O'the day is instead of brushing melted butter between each sheet of phyllo, put the melted butter in a spray bottle and just spritz it on. Yes, I realize this little "ah ha" moment will change your life for the better and you just heard angelic horns blowing and the sun just separated the clouds and is now shining a rainbow through your front window. Feel free to name your first born after me.

Let's see...yes, Chicken Rolls. Take 3 lbs of chicken, toss in pot with a smidgen of your favorite herbs, fill with water just to cover chicken and boil for an hour or two, until the chicken is no longer pink and the bones are easily removed.

Strain chicken, while saving cooking water. Remove bones, toss back into cooking water and place back on stove to simmer for another hour. Strain bones from water (which is now broth) and freeze in 1 cup portions. Cut up cooked chicken and separate into 3 Ziploc baggies. Place 2 in the freezer and keep one for making the chicken rolls.

You can also cheat and buy 2 cups worth of caned/pouched cooked chicken and forget I ever said anything about putting chicken in a pot. I promise not to judge(or tell).

Now throw the cooked chicken in a big bowl. Add cooked bacon, chopped fresh spinach, shredded cheese and ranch dressing. Stir it all together while you pray that you're able to get the phyllo dough to roll up.

Place 1 sheet of phyllo dough on rolling surface, spritz with butter, top with another sheet of phyllo dough, spritz, repeat with one more sheet of dough. Now you have your rolling dough made from 3 sheets of phyllo. Was anyone else taken back to elementary school worded math problems?

Put a couple of large spoonfuls of the chicken mixture on the short end of the phyllo dough, fold long sides over mixture and then roll up like an egg roll. Put on greased cookie sheet. Bake at 350F for about 25 mins.

CHICKEN ROLLS

• 2 cups chopped cooked chicken
• 1/2 cup finely chopped fresh spinach
• 1/4 cup crumbled bacon
• 1/3 cup ranch dressing
• 1 cup shredded cheese
• pkg phyllo dough

1. Mix all ingredients, except phyllo dough together in large bowl.
2. Stack phyllo dough in sets of 3 spritzing melted butter between each layer.
3. Place a couple of large spoonfuls of chicken mix on short end of phyllo dough.
4. Fold ends over and roll up like an egg roll.
5. Bake for abou5 25 minutes at 350 degrees F.

Thank God For The FBI

A friend of mine forwarded this to me the other day asking me if I'd check for her to see if it was real. This person sends stuff like this to me frequently and is truly sincere in her interest as to it's validity. First, I'll let you scan over it. We'll talk more in a moment.

--- On Mon, 1/12/09, FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION wrote:
From: FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION Subject: F.B.I INVESTIGATION.To: Date: Monday, January 12, 2009, 10:42 AM
ANTI-TERRORIST AND MONETARY CRIMES DIVISION
FBI HEADQUARTERS IN WASHINGTON, D.C.
FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION
J. EDGAR HOOVER BUILDING
935 PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE, NW WASHINGTON, D.C. 20535-0001
Website: www.fbi.gov

ATTN: BENEFICIARY.

This is to Officially inform you that it has come to our notice and we have thoroughly completed an Investigated with the help of our Intelligence Monitoring Network System that you are having an illegal transaction with Impostors claiming to be Prof. Charles C. Soludo of the Central Bank Of Nigeria, Mr. Patrick Aziza, none officials of Oceanic Bank, none officials of Zenith Bank and some impostors claiming to be the Federal Bureau Of Investigation agents and EFCC and ICPC. During our Investigation, it came to our notice that the reason why you have not received your payment is because you have not fulfilled your Financial Obligation given to you in respect of your Contract/Inheritance Payment.

So therefore, we have contacted the Federal Ministry Of Finance on your behalf and they have brought a solution to your problem by coordinating your payment in the total amount of $800,000.00 USD which will be deposited into an ATM CARD which you will use to withdraw funds anywhe Since the Federal Bureau of Investigation has been involved in this transaction, you are now to be rest assured that this transaction is legitimate and completely risk-free as it is our duty to Protect and Serve citizens of the United States Of America.

We also notice that some imposter has been claiming to be one of our offices; I want you to stop anything you have with any of them and proceed with Mr. Paul Smith, is the only person in change of this matter.

All you have to do is immediately contact the ATM CARD CENTER via E-mail for instructions on how to procure your Approval Slip which contains details on how to receive and activate your ATM CARD for immediate use to withdraw funds being paid to you. We have confirmed that the amount required to procure the Approval Slip will cost you a total of $496 USD which will be paid directly to the ATM CARD CENTER agent via Western Union Money Transfer / MoneyGram Money Transfer. Below, you shall find contact details of the Agent whom will process your transaction from Federal Minister of Finance: We have agreement with the federal government of Nigeria that you must pay for the approval slip for them to confirm that you are the real possessor of this card.

CONTACT INFORMATION FEDERAL MINISTER OF FINANCE.
ATM CARD CENTRE
NAME: MR. PAUL SMITH
CELL PHONE: +234-70 8515 0758
EMAIL: info@atmcard-centre.com
CONTACT CODE 555

Immediately contact Mr. Paul Smith of the ATM Card Centre with the following information:

Full Name: Address:
City:
State:
Zip Code:
Direct Phone Number:
Current Occupation:

Contact code 555, use this code and contact Mr. Paul Smith because of the impostors in Nigeria. Once you have sent the required information to Mr. Paul Smith he will contact you with instructions on how to make the payment of $496 USD for the Approval Slip after which he will proceed towards delivery of the ATM CARD without any further delay.

You have hereby been authorized/guaranteed by the Federal Bureau Of Investigation to commence towards completing this transaction, as there shall be NO delay once payment for the Approval Slip has been made to the authorized agent.

Once you have completed payment of $496 to the agent in charge of this transaction, immediately contact us back for more investigation for conformation of your ATM card. The both offices are working 24hours to get this project complete.

Federal Bureau Investigation
Robert S. Mueller III
Director, FBI
------

Now there are some slight give aways that tell us this is a fake. Just in case you, like my dear friend, need some help spotting them, let me point out a few.

1. The FBI knows how to use proper English.
2. The FBI has enough money to afford a spell checking program.
3. The FBI knows your name doesn't need to call you "Beneficiary" .
4. The Director of the FBI has other things to worry about than your $496.
5. Lastly, have you ACTUALLY talked to anyone claiming to be Prof. Charles C. Soludo of the Central Bank Of Nigeria?

Glad we could have this little talk and I hope it gave you a giggle. The sad part is that there's still people out there falling for this mess. Now stay out of Nigerian banks!

Good Morning Muffins

I'm out of laundry soap (recipe here) and need to make some more, but I have been putting it off for a bit because as I have to hand grate the soap (UGH I miss my food processor). Being as we're down to the underwear with holes and the "I'm with Stupid" t-shirts, I think I better get me bum in gear and get to grating. But first I have to tell you about the fantastic muffins I made yesterday before church.

As I've said before I'm always looking to sneak in healthy good stuff wherever I can, and these little beauties are full of whole grain, fruity, fiber-tastic deliciousness. They are moist, tasty and even my hubby was sneaking them off the plate. He asked me today if I wrote down how I made them so we could have them again. I must confess a little tear of joy welled up in eye.


Good Morning Muffins

1 egg
2 tablespoons coconut oil
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup lowfat cottage cheese
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup oatmeal
1/2 cup wheat germ
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 cups diced apple
1/2 cup shredded carrot
1/2 cup raisins
1/2 cup coconut flakes

Mix wet ingredients together. Add dry ingredients and stir just until moistened. Toss in fruits/veggies and mix together.

Batter doesn't rise much so fill muffin cups as full as you want your muffin to be.

Bake at 375F for 16 min if making full size muffins, 10 mins if making minis.

makes 12 regular or 36 minis.

******
Oh and if anyone has ideas on how to use up a pound of jalapenos, a cup of peach juice, and a dozen eggs please fill me in.

My fridge and I both thank you!

Saturday's Soapbox

You know it's such a loverly day today I thought we'd just take a walk in the sun. OUCH! Oh my, I just stubbed my toe on something. What's this? A soapbox? Well, gee willikers who am I to waste a perfectly good soapbox? Let me just climb up here a second. Goodness so many topics from which to chose.

Let's just start with environmental snobs. Let me preface by saying that I used to work for a grassroots environmental lobbyist organization. I worked long hours on things like bringing curbside recycling to Oklahoma, requiring better ground water protection from garbage dumps and battling corporate hog farms (who btw are nasty nasty nasty polluters of both our environment and our bodies). I've lived totally off the grid, complete with bicycle powered generator, and was a vegetarian for years. In my heart, I will always be a hairy legged, tree hugging, bandanna wearing hippie. That being said, I'm sick of these, "I'm better than you" trendy greenies who treat people like poo just because they don't have their own compost pile. Poo, compost pile, that's kinda funny. Anyhoo, if you really believe in a cause, you'll take any help you can get, be it big or small. Even Ed Begley, Jr. had to start somewhere.

I was at the store a while back and this woman in line behind me made quite a stink about the sign the store had hanging about switching to green bulbs.

Freak woman, "I can't believe you have that sign hanging when you use plastic grocery bags".

Me, "Well, at least they're doing something."

Freak woman,"But they're made of petroleum for God's sake!".

This is coming from a woman purchasing a plastic single serve 20 oz bottle of Coke who just moments before, I watched smearing on her Maybelline makeup. Really?? Maybe you ought to rethink your accessories before you make an environmental assault.

I've seen this kind of attitude so many times it's makes me steam. For goodness sake, let people do what they can. Think about the grand scheme of things, if everyone who never recycled would recycle just one can a year it would make a huge difference in our landfills. It's SOMETHING.

Thanks for letting me get that off my chest. Now go hug a tree (and a hippie)!

The History of Aprons

A friend of mine sent this to me in an email yesterday and it really made me smile. My grandma lived in the country on a little farm and I have wonderful memories of her and her all purpose apron. Maybe it's the memories that make me love my apron so much. I hope you enjoy it too.

The History of Aprons

The principal use of Grandma's apron was to protect the dress underneath, because she only had a few, it was easier to wash aprons than dresses and they used less material, but along with that, it served as a potholder for removing hot pans from the oven.

It was wonderful for drying children's tears, and on occasion was even used for cleaning out dirty ears.

From the chicken coop, the apron was used for carrying eggs, fussy chicks, and sometimes half-hatched eggs to be finished in the warming oven.

When company came, those aprons were ideal hiding places for shy kids.

And when the weather was cold, grandma wrapped it around her arms.

Those big old aprons wiped many a perspiring brow, bent over the hot wood stove.

Chips and kindling wood were brought into the kitchen in that apron.

From the garden, it carried all sorts of vegetables. After the peas had been shelled, it carried out the hulls.

In the fall, the apron was used to bring in apples that had fallen from the trees.

When unexpected company drove up the road, it was surprising how much furniture that old apron could dust in a matter of seconds.

When dinner was ready, Grandma walked out onto the porch, waved her apron, and the men knew it was time to come in from the fields to dinner.

It will be a long time before someone invents something that will replace that 'old-time apron' that served so many purposes.

Pucker Up!

You know those days when life sucks big honkin' smelly eggs, so much so that your face is stuck in permanent pucker mode? Well, just call me Sour-puss Sally. Luckily, my grandmother, in her infinite wisdom, taught me that when life hands you lemons, make Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins. That way if you can't say something nice, you can just pop them in your mouth and not say anything at all (although you will make noises of taste bud ecstasy).


Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup butter, melted (I used coconut oil, becuase I'm trying to be good)
1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons grated lemon peel (out of lemons, so I used lemon extract, don't tell Grandma)
2 cups flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 Tablespoons poppy seeds

Mix all the wet ingredients together, then dump in the dry ingredients and mix just until moist. Spoon into muffin cups and cook at 400F for 15 mins, 10 if you're making mini-muffins (makes 12 reg muffins or 36 minis).

Lemon Glaze
1/4 cup powdered sugar
2 Tablespoons lemon juice

Stir together until smooth. Add more juice if too thick or more powdered sugar if too thin. Glaze tops of muffins and then lick the bowl clean (it's good for the soul).

Who You Calling Chicken?

The other night, while eating dinner, my wondermous hubby made the comment, "Better enjoy it, because she'll never remember how to make it again", and as much as I wanted to backhand him for being Mr. Smarty Pants, he was completely right. I'm famous for cooking on the fly and just throwing this and that in the pot.

This is one of the best reasons for posting recipes on this here blog. It forces me to keep record of what I'm doing! I still toss things in here and there, but now, I keep paper and pen next to me so I can write it down. Which brings us to today's post.

One of my old classmates is currently going through chemo so I'm cooking a few meals for her and her family. Due to the flip flops that treatment does to your body, she's not exactly up for the normal "casserole of care" type items like baked ziti or chicken enchiladas. We opted for nice, calm, soothing, chicken soup and homemade wheat rolls.

I was lucky enough to find chicken quarters on sale for $2.90 for 10 lbs! So the day before I made the soup, I skinned and deboned the chicken and cooked it in the crock pot with a bit of white wine and lemon pepper. I also took the skin and bones, tossed it in a bean pot filled with water, thyme, rosemary, celery seed, onion ends, carrots, garlic and a touch of salt and let it simmer all day. Ran it through a strainer and let the broth cool in the fridge so I could remove the fat layer. I ended up with 7 lbs cooked chicken and 8 cups broth. Booooyah!

I've never made regular chicken soup before, but I will definately make it again!

Chicken Veggie Soup

• 4 cups chicken broth
• 2 cups chopped onions and celery
• 3 cups frozen mixed veggies
• 4 cups chopped cooked chicken
• 2 tsp McCormicks Grill Mates Roasted Garlic and Herb
• 1 tsp salt
• pinch celery seed

Let simmer in crock pot on low for 6 hours. 30 mins before you're ready to serve, stir in a cup of white sauce (you can also use a can of undiluted cream soup)

Make a white sauce with:

• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1 cup milk

In a small saucepan over medium heat, melt butter. Add flour and stir until the butter and flour are well combined. Pour in milk, stirring constantly as it thickens.

Confession

Goodness it's so nice to be back. I'm sorry for the delay in posts, but I've been stuck in quick sand and if I were to move even one finger to type, I'd surely have been swallowed whole by the angry earthly muck. Fortunately, Brendan Fraser was out and about filming "George of the Jungle, part 5-The Monkey Blog", and saw me wee little head sticking from the ground, ripped his jungle toga into strips, tied them together to form a make shift lasso and rescued me from certain death.

Or maybe, I just dropped the ball and let my bloggity responsibilities fall to the wayside without warning.

Hi, my name is Michelle and I'm a really crummy blog keeper upper with a vivid imagination and poor blog scheduling skills. You may now begin pelting me with wet noodles, although I ask that you wait until I am standing near a duck pond so that we don't waste perfectly good food and make my greenie friends angry.

Thanks, I'm sure Mother Earth thanks you too.

Speaking of Mother Earth and ticking off my greenie friends, I found really cool trash bags!!!! Yes, I suck. I'm weak and I love plastic trash bags. Actually, they are Glad ForceFlex bags with the Quick Tie feature instead of the drawstring. Seriously, I'm in love with the trash bags. I'm thinking I could make a loverly teddy trash bear so that I could curl up with the bags at night.

What makes them so amazing is that they actually stay ATTACHED to the rim of the trash can without falling inside the can. SHOCK!!! If that weren't enough, they are able to withstand that weird "bet I can stuff one more thing in this trash can without taking it out" syndrome that attacks every member of my family.

And now you know the weirdness that lurks through my mind at absurd times of the night.

I really got on here to catch everyone up on the going ons in our little corner of the Universe, but my hubby cheated and had Saturday Night Live playing on the TV while I was trying to think, and everyone who knows me will tell you that my mind goes about 10,000 miles per second in 6 million different ways and if you add just one more intsy wintsy item, it can completely derail my thought process for days (or at least until the commercial comes on). Um, did anyone else see that seriously LONG sentence that just flew by?

Now it is very, very late and I need to get to bed. Therefore, I shall have to meet with you again tomorrow. However, to help pass the time until then, I'd like to share with you a couple pics that my hubby took of Nathan and his FIANCE, Michelle, from our little Christmas get together (yes, she stole my name and the sad thing is I keep trying to call her by my sister's name).

Nate aka "Natemous Maximus"

Michelle aka "Stephanie, I mean Michelle"

Um, can you tell that Nate and Michelle are very tall people and that Dan and I are very short?

Oh and here's a shot of the Bling!