Best Homemade Pudding

I am a huge fan of pudding. Pistachio, vanilla, lemon, banana, butterscotch... they all fill my heart with joy. My husband is not. He thinks it's gross. I think the texture just weirds him out. However, my mom and dad won him over to pudding with their homemade cocoa pudding that we have during the holiday season. Well, really anytime, but especially around Hanukkah and Christmas. I finally started making it for him (well, us) a few years ago. It is SO easy and SO good! We like it best when hot, especially if you top it with homemade whipped cream. Oh my. It is also quite good cold. In fact, that is what I used as Moon Mud for our space day. I'm going to be a doll and share our super easy recipe :o)

Cocoa Pudding

1/2 cup sugar (brown or white! I have used both and can barely tell a difference)

1/4 cup cornstarch (I love Trader Joe's brand as it is non GMO)

3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder

1/8 tsp salt

2 1/3 cups milk

dash of vanilla

Combine the dry ingredients in the pot, then add the milk. Heat on medium and whisk pudding until it is thick. DON'T let it burn! It will get weird and lumpy. When it is the desired consistency (about 4 minutes usually for me),  add the vanilla and enjoy!

Today's Smoothie...

Why? Because I am always thirsty. I have always loved smoothies, but with both pregnancies I have craved them almost constantly. I almost never do the same one twice and am always on the lookout for different ingredients.

Today's smoothie was really refreshing and would be great in the summer especially.

Here's what I blended together:

A handful of spinach

A few ice cubes

About 1.5 cups of Almond/Coconut Milk I just discovered at a health food store. I often buy them separately but this blend is delicious! Coconut Cream would be great, too.

About 1/2 cup pineapple (frozen, fresh, canned, whatever :o)

About 1/2 cup pineapple juice

1 ripe banana broken into pieces.

It is green, but tastes similar to a pina colada.

Delicious!

Meatless Mexican Pizza

I really don't like fast food. I dont eat fast hamburgers or struggle with french fry cravings, and even though I am a mom, I am not a huge fan of Chick-fil-A, but I do have one fast food weakness. Okay, I have two weaknesses, I love Sonic slushies, but I am not thinking about beverages at the moment, just food. Warm, crispy, cheesy food: the mexican pizza from Taco Bell to be exact. I get it without meat and add extra hot sauce and I love it. It is the one thing I could eat even when in the midst of horrible nausea and vomitting with both of my pregnancies. I would crave them. At times even to the point of having my loving husband drive me to Taco Bell so I could buy two. I ate one, had him pull into a parking lot for me to throw up, then I ate the second before we ever got to our destination. I know that is so gross, but pregnancy is weird and that is how much I love them.

I rarely give into the magnetic pull that I feel when driving by the place, but I think about it often. Today I was really feeling it, but knew I shouldn't. So, instead, I made it for dinner. I know I have done it in the past, but I have no idea when or how long ago. It was so easy and really, really good.

So here goes it, my version of a...

Meatless Mexican Pizza:

What I Used:

-corn tortillas

-refried beans (i love the trader joes fat free kind)

-chopped onion

-chopped green chiles

-1 diced tomato

-chopped cilantro

-bit of cumin

-non GMO canned corn

-sliced black olives

-shredded cheese

-sour cream

Preheat oven to 350degrees

Heat a bit of oil (I used non GMO canola oil, but I know grape seed is much better for you for high heats) in a skillet

Place a corn tortilla in the oil and let is sizzle for about 15 seconds, then flip it over and do the same on the other side. Take it out and let it drain the excess oil onto a paper towel on a plate. Do this until all the tortillas you are wanting to use are crispy and not dripping wet. I used 9 as I was making 4 2-layer pizzas for my husband and myself and a single layer one for our son.

Place bottom layer tortillas on a cookie sheet and top with a layer of beans, onions, and cumin.

Put second layer tortilla on top and add corn, olives, more onion, green chiles, tomatoes, cilantro, and cheese.

Stick it in the preheated oven for about 20 minutes or until melty and smelling amazing.

I added some more fresh tomato and cilantro and some sour cream. And Enjoy!

If I had thought about it I also would have smashed up an avocado and added some lime juice to the mix, but it was still REALLY good and totally hit the spot. Plus, this way it was real food I was eating and not nearly as questionable. As with most recipes, the options are endless for toppings and ways to do it.

What do you like to put on a Mexican Pizza?

Veggie Pot Pie

Someday I plan to have this blog be about something in my life other than just food. However, today is not that day. Every day for the past week I have been planning on making this warm comfort food and just never did it. A friend from back home flew all the way from California to take my maternity photos (!) and I really wanted to make this for her. She is a vegetarian and for some reason I have always had a hard time finding chicken-less pot pies so I thought it would be nice. But ya, it never happened. I finally got around to making it tonight and it was perfect. Especially with the cold windy evening that it is and the predictions of snow.

I am not opposed to chicken pot pies, in fact, I rather like them. However, we rarely buy meat as we are picky and only get the fancy grass fed organic kind, which doesnt fit into our student budget very often. And not being crazy about meat anyways, it works out easily for us.

This pot pie can easily be made with chicken broth instead of the vegetable broth, but then it wouldn't be suitable for most vegetarians (obviously).

Veggie Pot Pie

2 carrots

2 sticks of celery

2 russet potatoes

1/3 cup butter

garlic

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon black pepper

sage

1 3/4 cups vegetable broth

2/3 cup milk

• 2 (9 inch) unbaked pie crusts

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F

Take your beautiful veggies, wash them, and chop them up! (i have extra ones in the pic...)

Once they're all chopped, put them in a med sized pot and cover with water. Boil for about 15 minutes. Drain and set them aside. Here is where I like to add about a cup of frozen peas. I don't like to overcook them and adding them now will thaw them within minutes amidst the hot vegetables.

Meanwhile, melt 1/3 cup butter in a pan and add garlic. Chopped, minced, whatever you like. Normally I would throw in half an onion and soften it in this buttery garlic glory, but I didn't have one. So I added more garlic.

Once you are satisfied with your butter meltiness, add the salt, pepper, flour, and milk. I also usually do celery seed here, but since I am out of that, too I threw in some sage. I have no idea how much. Then mix in the vegetable broth (not pictured).

Mix it all really well over medium heat until it turns into a smooth gravy. You can leave it like this or be like me and add, you guessed it, more garlic. And maybe some seasoned salt. And more sage. And seriously, I could eat this by the spoonful. This makes me think I am in the right place living in the south...

In a deep pie dish lay down your pie crust. Layer half the veggie mixture, half of the gravy, other half of veggies, then gravy. Should I be calling it sauce? Lastly, top it off with the second pie crust and cut little slits to let the heat escape while it bakes.

30 minutes later it should be browned and look something like this.

Dig in! I assure you, it does not lack in flavor with the vegetable broth! Especially with the garlic and sage or whatever other seasonings you like to add. My husband, 4 year old, and myself ate half of it for dinner and it makes great leftovers.

Toasted Marshmallow Milkshake

Yesterday afternoon I was having a mad craving for a milkshake. A really good milkshake. We didn't have any ice cream in the house and I had already downed a giant smoothie so I did what I always do when I am craving something i can't have: searched it on Pinterest. Cos I love to torture myself with beautiful images of things I can't have. And apparently I am not the only one who does this, cos let's face it, there would be no Pinterest if there weren't hundreds or thousands of us. Anyways, I searched "milkshake"and so many beautiful photos came into view, but one really stuckout: The Toasted Marshmallow Milkshake. So i immidiately repinned it and then went to the original post in order to gawk at a larger image.It took me here. I stared and I nearly drooled. Today we went grocery shopping and made sure we got vanilla ice cream. And it was so worth it. You can go to the original blog to see her creation with much better pictures and more detailed measurements. I tend to ingnore details in recipes and I don't have the patience to figure out how to edit bad photos to make them amazing, but this is what I did.

Put a bunch of marshmallows on a cookiesheet. I used foil to prevent having to clean a sticky sheet. Then i ran out of big ones so I added a bunch of minis.

Broil those babies for a minute or so.

Put 2 parts vanilla bean ice cream and 1 part milk in the blender.

Add the toasted/charred marshmallows and blend.

This is the finished product, which I wish looked better but the lighting was bad and blah blah blah, here it is.

And it was divine. Seriously, I could have easily drank the whole thing by myself. And probably a second one as well.

Go ahead, make one...you know you want to...

In the beginning...

I have been planning on starting a blog for the past... year? More for my own benefit than anything else. I like to keep track of things I do for "school time", which is my version of barely structured pre school for my 4 year old son, as well as food I make and things that inspire me. I had planned on starting it with my last birthday, hence the name, so I opened the blog and then never posted. Then I thought I would start when we moved to a new town. Nothing. Maybe we should announce our second pregnancy on here? Nah. So, here I am closer to age 27 than to age 26, 7 months pregnant, and starting with a post about food!

I have been all about using our Thanksgiving leftovers more creatively this year and of all the lunches and dinners we have gotten out of them (we had a lot since we had two Thanksgiving dinners with LOTS of leftovers) my very favorite is what I made for dinner tonight.

Lentil Shepherd's Pie. Honestly, I generally prefer it to have ground beef, but I have been wanting to attempt to recreate the vegetarian pie at The Family Wash in East Nashville. If you live in the area and haven't been there, you should! It is charming and quirky and I have never been disappointed in what I ordered. Even Gwyneth Paltrow mentioned this local treasure and their vegetarian shepherds pie in her blog.

I didn't see any recipes that looked appealing/called for my random leftover ingredients so I took ideas from different recipes and this is what I got... Enjoy!

Lentil Shepherd's Pie

Ingredients I used:

1.5 cups chicken broth (could easily use water or vegetable broth to make it safe for vegetarians)

about 1 cup dried lentils, rinsed and sorted

1 carrot, chopped

1/2 white onion, chopped

1/4 green bell pepper, chopped

about a teaspoon of minced garlic

butter or oil or more broth for the veggies

3 or 4 cups leftover mashed potatoes

about 4 or 5 ounces cheddar cheese, shredded

salt and pepper to taste

Do it:

preheat oven to 350degrees

Simmer broth and lentils in sauce pan for about 25 or 30 minutes or until nearly tender

while lentils are simmering, gently cook the chopped vegetables and garlic over medium heat. I used a little butter then added about 1/4 cup broth into the mix after a few minutes just because i had enough left over. When the colors are still bright and they are not too soft, remove from heat and add salt and pepper if you like. mix lentils and veggie blend together and put them in the bottom of a baking dish ( I used a 2qt dish I think). Cover the mix with mashed potatoes and top with shredded cheese.

Bake covered for 20 minutes then uncover and broil for 10 minutes. Voila!

It wasn't exactly like the version at The Family Wash, but it was really satisfying and used up random ingredients i had hanging out in my fridge and pantry. And for the best part? My recently picky 4 year old ate it all! His only complaint was that the "crust" gave him "spice" in his mouth... whatever that means. I am no photographer, but am posting these more to give you an idea of what it looks like. Also because I never even read a recipe if I don't get to see a picture of the finished product.

If any one has ideas or suggestions for variations of shepherd's pie, either vegetarian or not, I would love to see them!