: Life is hard. God is good. We need each other.
Cooking rice is messy. No matter how large of a pot I use, it boils over and leaves a starchy, sticky mess on my stovetop. I even tried a rice cooker. It sputtered the same sticky splatters and had parts that got coated in the muck that I had to wash each time. Gah!
Then I started reading about baked rice. Baking rice in the oven eliminates all the mess. It sounds too good to be true, I know.
But it’s not!
Coming up with side dishes can be the worst. You want something new and different, but not difficult. Whenever I serve roasted vegetables there are ooos and ahhs. Like I took out the good china, or something. Is it because of the impressive presentation…huge baking sheets filled with colorful veggies?
They are pretty. The fact that it’s so special tells me that I need to do it more often. After all… it’s so easy!
Seriously, I made trays of roasted vegetables last night and my husband had some leftovers for lunch today. He just walked in and said, “Those were so good…like some of the best food you make. Ever. You can make those whenever you want.” He said that about vegetables. Vegetables! (This is from the guy who told me that my vegetable lasagna tasted “too vegetable-y”).
Are you a Lord of the Rings fan? I’ll admit, I haven’t read the books. But I love the movie trilogy. They are so rich and full of wisdom and heart. I know, I know, I need to read the books. Right now I’m working my way through the Harry Potter series, and not very quickly, at that.
We love a party with a theme around here, so when my niece finished the book series, we had to get one on the calendar. What better way to spend a Saturday, than going on an epic adventure with tasty treats to fill your belly!
The snow is melting, the temperature is rising. Spring is most definitely right around the corner. I can almost remember that summer once existed. It was nice, if I’m remembering correctly.
And then, while tidying up my computer’s desktop, I came across some pictures of this bursting-with-freshness summer vegetable lasagna. Suddenly, summer felt real to me. I could remember not feeling cold, the smell of grilling meats, and bright green grass.
Winter is soup weather. If you’re a soup fan, you’re going to want to check this one out. It is unique to every other wild rice soup I’ve ever had. Most wild rice soups are thick and hearty. I love ’em. My creamy chicken and rice soup is thick like this. Yum! But this soup is not like that.
For some reason, decades ago, when my mom got the recipe for this wild rice soup, she didn’t thicken it as much as called for. What that leaves you with is a silky, creamy broth. It’s totally unique. And wonderful!
The thing about fresh produce is that it grows when it grows and then it grows no more. What that means is that when you get an abundance of apples or tomatoes or carrots, you need to figure out what to do with your stash, or it will spoil. Carrots last a pretty long time, but even so, they get soft and bendy after awhile.
I made a delicious creamy chicken and rice soup this weekend. It was my first time cooking with the carrots I had dehydrated this summer. We belong to a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) and get boxes of freshly picked vegetables each week. When the farm has an abundance, so do we. And this summer, we got piles of carrots!
