In the kitchen

We have taken a hit financially now that I'm not working, but one of my super powers has always been cooking from a limited pantry. I used to refer to it as my "Iron Chef" super power, but having spent more time in the hulu catalog of free Food Channel shows, I now realize it's more along the lines of Chopped.

Anyway. this week I tried shopping at Aldi for the first time. It went great so I have another meal plan and grocery list made up for next week based on their weekly ad (more on that in another post).

We had two Cornish game hens in the freezer so I pulled them out to defrost and then had the best time dressing the little guys. They were so fun to handle. I stuffed them with celery greens and the last of an old onion that I dressed with lemon juice, salt, pepper, and poultry seasoning and then shoved pieces of butter up in there. The same rub/butter on top and then into the oven until the hubs got home from work, basting frequently which was another first for me. SO FUN!

I served it with mashed potatoes (from the cupboard), stuffing (.89$ at Aldi) and corn for the man (in the freezer) since he loves it. We ate our fill, but there was quite a bit left over. If I were to do it again, one hen would be plenty for both of us.

The next day I got to work tearing it apart and got two more meals' worth of meat out of the carcasses. I made creamy chicken casserole that has stuffing on top- which was perfect for the amount we had left over- and a chicken soup base that I'll add a little extra broth and rice to on Sunday when we're ready to eat it. I felt so happy and proud of myself as I did it and both of the additional meals have turned out great.

Another fun kitchen victory for me has been coming up with alternative desserts. Eric has wisely chosen to cut back on his sugar intake (the man has a serious sweet tooth inherited from his mother who will literally eat only a chocolate bar for lunch) and I'm trying to not only encourage, but enable him by providing something sweet at the end of the meal that isn't full of refined sugar. We've had orange slices, canned fruit, and pictured on the left, baked pears. We got the weird dark skinned Asian pears and I wasn't really sure how to know when they are ripe so I thought it would be safest to cook them. I sprinkled them with cinnamon, a few drizzles of honey, and handful of crushed walnuts and used coconut butter for the fat to cook them in. They turned out awesome! While I was coming up with ingredients I really wanted to use the nuts but we only had large pieces and I don't have a suitable crushing apparatus...or so I thought. Instead of adding a mortal and pestle to my birthday wish list, I grabbed a small pyrex storage dish and a small jar from the cupboard that I had already re-purposed as a travel size peanut butter container and there you have it- the outcome was beyond satisfactory and the good news is, I have a whole collection of these jars because they came from a box of sample jams that Nana gave us for Christmas from the Amish Market.