3/11 - Red Wine Excuse Casserole

11 MEALS PROJECT - 3/11

RED WINE EXCUSE CASSEROLE

My excuse to open a bottle of red at cooking time. One glass for me, one glass for the casserole...
I use 1kg packs of meat and it does a couple of meals.

Oven. 180C
Into whatever size pieces you fancy, chop	500g - 1kg braising/blade casserole steak
Cover with flour by tossing in shopping bag with	1/2 cup of flour
In a heavy based casserole pot, brown small batches of the meat at a time and set aside.
Chop and fry	1 Onion 1-2 cloves crushed garlic
Return meat into the pan along with the onions and deglaze pan with	1 glass of red wine
Add	3-4 cups beef stock (cover the meat) 1 tin chopped tomatoes 1 bay leaf
Chop and add	3-4 potatoes 1-2 carrots (kumera, pumpkin, whatever vege you have) S&P
Cover and put in oven for 1 1/2 hours. Serve with green vege.

2/11 Pumpkin Soup and Scout Bread

11 MEAL PROJECT - 2/11

RORY’S SCOUT BREAD

Oven. 200C
In a big bowl mix	3 cup flour 3 tsp baking powder 1 tsp salt
Pour in one of Dads favourite	330ml can/stubbie of beer
Rinse out the bottle with water and add to mix. (Brings it to about 400mls total liquid).
Mix well. Tip into greased loaf tin.
Grate and sprinkle over	1/2 cup cheese (Optional)
Bake for 50-60 mins. Yummy hot. Toasts well. Doesn’t work with stout or low alcohol beer (what use is low alcohol beer to a scout? Gotta be prepared!)

(Under 6 YRS) PUMPKIN SOUP

If I go to the trouble of chopping up any pumpkin I do the whole thing, then roast the pieces with skin on. We eat what we need that night, and the rest I leave in the oven.The next day (theoretically) when I open the oven and discover it again, I easily peel the skin off and throw together this soup. Butternuts are easiest as they only need to be halved and the garlic/oil floated in the middle. Life is too short and fingers too precious to peel pumpkin raw.

Halve, de-seed, and roast	1 Butternut Pumpkin 1 clove crushed Garlic Glug Olive Oil
Chop and fry	1 onion 1-2 cloves of crushed garlic (Optional !) 3 rashers of Bacon
Peel and add	Cooked pumpkin 5 cups chicken stock/water mixed with pkt soup S&P Dash of Sweet chlli Sauce (Optional)
Boil and mash pumpkin. To serve, add	1/2 cup cheese (Anything, but Gruyere for No.1 flavour)

(Over 6YRS) THAI PUMPKIN SOUP

As with recipe above but instead of stock add	2 cups water 1 400ml tin Coconut milk 1-2 fresh/dried chillis, or Sweet Chilli Sauce 1tbsp Lemongrass, minced 1tbsp Fish Sauce S&P
Serve with	Fresh Coriander

1/11 Claire CHicken Lentil One Pot

11 MEAL PROJECT - 1/11

CLAIRE’S CHICKEN AND PUY LENTIL ONE POT WONDERFULNESS

Oven. 180C
Chop and gently fry	1 Onion 1 or 2 Cloves of Garlic 1 Fennel Bulb (Optional)
In large casserole pot add	1/4 cup Currants 1/2 cup Lentils
Wash, pat dry and trim excess fat off	1 whole chicken (Optional - stuffed with 1 lemon)
Place chicken on top of Lentil Mixture, pour in	1/2 cup chicken stock or water
Cook uncovered for 1 1/4 hours.
For extra deliciousness, stir in chopped	Fennel Top 2 tbsp Cream S&P
Carve chicken and serve on bed of Lentils.

Tooth Fairy Busy Week

Little Miss Pink is awash in dribble. It pours out over her chin and gushes down anything she's wearing. Without a bib she is soaked to the belly button in about the time it takes to go and get a bib from the drawer. Combined with her mushy food and finger food, of which she is very keen and generous to her surroundings, she now has a lovely hardened green/yellow food/dribble stain on every top and singlet she owns. Life is glorious.
She blows bubbles of dribble and rubs the spots of dribble into the carpet.
She's the bishop blessing every toy with her holy water.
She's the taste tester thats puts everything to the mouth for assessment, then spits it out.
She's the lady at the party who's drunk too much champagne and sprays you while talking loudly with glazed eyes.
She has two bottom teeth which are invaluable help for masticating marmite toast, but she is definitely working on more. Two white mounds are rising in her upper gum, like the earth rising before the mole erupts from his digging spree. And the river of dribble flows by.
She's ever so cute in her Amber beads, which based purely on no scientific evidence what-so-ever seem to have reduced the frantic finger and furniture leg chewing behaviour.
So its a busy week for the tooth fairy in our house, what with the four wisdom teeth I had out yesterday, and the imminent arrival our her royal dribbly-ness' new pearly whites. Luckily my darling mum is here to help with practical things like food and school runs, while our girl chews the house down and I swan in bed blogging and sucking food through a straw.

Has anyone seen a sock?

Our school boy had a great first half a week of formal education. He hasnt been brimming with details, he tends to get home and hurl himself firmly back into his world of pure imagined brother and brother adventure. He wasn't so keen on listening or following instructions at the weekend though - he'd obviously had enough of that for one week.
Uniform misplaced so far tally by day three stood at - Shorts, Shirt, Fleece and socks x2. This morning we managed to find a fleece on his bag hook, a shirt in the bathroom, and a solitary sock in the lost property bin.
I'm missing him and would so very much love to know what he's doing all day. I'm just on stand by for any random pieces of information he may impart. He sat down after school today at his lovely desk in the lounge, and set to work on his homework book. I suggested actually doing what his teacher had set, but, he wasnt really into that. When he'd finished he said 'Im going to put these on my wall to look at every day'. One is a picture of a box with a line of letters in it. He says it reads "Thankyou very much for letting me go to school".

First School Day

Big Brother has officially had his first day at school.We are getting into the territory where he may be actually laying down some permanent life long memories. A scary thought on a number of levels, but I think I can remember my first day. Or at least I can recall the photo taken to mark the occasion, and the blue school satchel.
:ast night we celebrated the occasion with The Last Meal of the Condemned - not that I sold it to him that way, I told him it was his choice for dinner and pudding cause it was a special day. He chose Carbonara followed by Banana Choc Chip Custard.
Last night he said "I'm going to go to school forever, until I'm 14!"
And this morning he leapt into his uniform (it fitted, luckily, as he'd been singularly not interested in trying on before today) and after the obligatory photo shoot, off we went to school with great excitement (Mr 5) and heavy heart (mum). I forced myself to walk out after a quick goodbye, then I had to force myself to drive away. And stay away for 6 hours!
I phoned at lunch time - "He's fine, he's playing on the computer" was the report.
At 3pm he was thrilled to see me, and I got a big hug. He only lost one pair of socks. He read his homework reading book in the car on the way home. Over the course of the evening a few details of the day emerged - he had learned 'Ballet dancing' (Its actually Belly Dancing practise for the upcoming Aladin School Production) and he gave us a demo. Definitely not your classical ballet.
Tomorrow will be even more interesting, - lets hope the present enthusiasm lasts if not forever, then at least until he's 14.

Happy Birthday Big Brother

Well, my baby turned 5 today.
As I gave the 5 year old a birthday hug this morning I promised that I could tell him the story of his birth, but perhaps not today - maybe save that one for his 21st! It is probably a mothers role to relive the birth every year, and I can't believe this is my 5th anniversary of that life changing day.
Big Brother has been SO excited about this great birthday, and he has had lots of opportunity to celebrate it - a play centre leaving party, a movie night at his house complete with his own popcorn shop, an icecream cake dinner with his bestest ski buddy Grace, and that was all even before the day dawned.
Last night at dinner he was telling us how excited he is about turning 5, and then announced ' we need to set up a platform to put all the presents on'! I'm not sure how many he was expecting.
He's had a great day though - he took one of his new dragon books with him to church with his grandparents while his parents popped up the hill to celebrate 5 years of parenthood by spending the morning snowboarding - then we all went to movies and he spent only a short time hiding in the aisle behind the chairs. Sausages for dinner and early to bed.
And tomorrow - another round of presents and birthday cake with both sets of grandparents - just to keep stretching out that birthday.