Didn't IY

The week of my daughter's graduation turned out not to be the best time to make serious lifestyle improvements. Who knew?

Yes, it's okay to laugh at me. I do it all the time.

Things have settled down a bit now, so hopefully I can get back on the horse. I had plain yogurt doctored with blackberries, honey, and granola cereal for breakfast. Getting ready to drink some water. Might go for a walk, might take a nap. We'll see. I also have a sink full of dirty dishes and some chicken waiting to be turned into nuggets.

Speaking of walking, this is probably a good place to share a cheap, effective sports drink substitute you can make at home easily. This is a modified version of a recipe that has saved many lives in third world countries where diarrhea is a major killer, especially of children.

Like the recipe, I use about a half liter of water and a handful of sugar, but instead of regular table salt, I use "Lite Salt" because it contains potassium. I also squirt in some lemon juice to reduce the nastiness factor -- this isn't the best tasting stuff you will ever drink. But it is tolerable, effective, and cheap.

Update: One of the problems with combining exercise with Vitamin D acquisition is that it's better not to bathe soon after sun exposure and I just spent 28 minutes walking at a nice clip in humid,  sunny 90 degree weather. Ick!

DIY on me

I've suffered from low energy levels for as long as I can remember. It sucks because it makes it hard to do everything I want to do. I usually end up doing just the bare minimum -- cooking, dishes, laundry. I rarely get to actually cleaning stuff. Now it's becoming increasingly clear that whatever issue I am dealing with, both of my daughters have the same problem, too. I don't want this for them. So once again I am trying to find something that helps.

Everything I've read says basically the same thing -- get enough sleep, eat a balanced diet, get moderate exercise -- then it adds a plug for whatever supplement, etc it's trying to sell. The thing that limits how much sense this makes to me is that I know a lot of people that don't eat right or exercise that seem quite perky.

So anyway, what I'm trying at the moment is to drink more water, get a half hour of exercise in the sun (vitamin D), eat more veggies and fruits, and go to bed earlier. One thing I read said two liters of water a day is a good goal, so I rinsed out an empty soda bottle, filled it with water, and put it in the fridge. If I make sure it is full before I go to bed at night, it will be cold and I should have a pretty good gauge of how much I'm drinking throughout the day.

We'll see how it goes.

Food

This is the fruit (okay meat) of my labors. Will add more to post soon. Just looked at the clock and noticed the time. Church starts in about 3 minutes and I am not sure anyone is even wearing shoes yet. I am dressed but my hair and teeth are currently unbrushed. Yikes!

Update 6/1/11:

We were a little late to church, but our church is not terribly uptight about that, thankfully, so all was fine.

Okay, so recipes. I really like allrecipes.com. They have user ratings and reviews so it makes it easier to find the best recipes. And you can also save the recipes you like, which is going to make it easier for me to find and post them here. Yay!

Schnitzel: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Wiener-Schnitzel/Detail.aspx I substitute pork for veal, boneless loin or chops -- whatever's on sale. Around here, you can usually find something for $3 or $4/lb.

Chicken strips: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Breaded-Chicken-Fingers/Detail.aspx My family pretty much goes crazy for these things.

Chicken and dumplings: http://www.food.com/recipe/cracker-barrel-chicken-dumplings-83701

I don't really use a specific recipe for meatloaf and shepherd's pie anymore, but I'll describe the basics:

For meatloaf, my standard thing is to use one cup of ketchup, one cup of oatmeal, and one egg for each pound and a half of ground beef. I almost always add chopped onion and sometimes I substitute other stuff for the ketchup, like spaghetti sauce or salsa, especially when I don't have enough ketchup. I also sometimes add a little brown sugar and/or mustard. 

For shepherd's pie, I saute onions and/or green peppers in a couple of table spoons of butter, then make a white sauce with chicken broth. I mix this sauce with cooked chicken and a package of frozen vegetables (we like peas and carrots) in a casserole dish. Then I spread mashed potatoes on top of the chicken mixture and bake for around thirty minutes. This last time, I used some chicken and broth from the chicken and broth for the dumplings. Considering it's usually not too hard to get a whole chicken for around $1/lb, it's two pretty cheap dishes.

I didn't end up making the peanut butter oatmeal bars until last night, but did finally get them done. I wanted to make a couple of batches, but didn't have enough eggs, so maybe next time. This recipe does have a lot of sugar, but it also has stuff that is pretty healthy, like whole wheat flour, oatmeal, eggs, and peanut butter. http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Peanut-Butter-Oatmeal-Cookies/Detail.aspx I press all the dough into a large cookie sheet, then once it has baked and cooled, cut it into bars with my plastic-bladed pizza cutter. We have them for breakfasts and snacks, etc.

Weekly Cookathon and requisit whining

Resting my feet for a few while the food cools. Today I made one chicken shepherd pie, one normal sized meatloaf and several individual sized meat loaves, breaded tenders from three humongous chicken breasts, chicken and dumplings, and a butt load of schnitzel. I've been cooking for hours and I hurt for real. Tomorrow I need to make more peanut butter oatmeal bars and, perhaps, a butt load of  mashed potatoes. If I can still move. I think I over did it a bit, but this is all stuff we will eat and it is so good. Wish I was hungry.

If I didn't already post recipes, I will try to do that soon. Maybe some pics, too. I should send a kid to look for the camera . . .

Kitchen Splurge

I am not one of those people that just loves to cook. Over the years I've learned to cook pretty well, but I try to get out of it as much as I can. This has led to a reliance on prepared foods and restaurants, neither of which are good for the budget. Lately, I've been making an effort to cook more from scratch. Since I don't really enjoy it, I want to get it all done at once, so I've been making and freezing food for several meals at once.

Over the last few weeks of doing this, I've noticed some deficiencies in my kitchen equipment, so I picked up several things to make my work less frustrating:

• small bamboo cutting board (so I can stop using dinner plates for cutting onions)
• plastic cutting mats (for rolling cookie and dumpling dough)
• bottle brush thingy (got it so I could clean the kids' plastic drink bottles, but it is too big)
• large glass jar for sun tea
• potato peelers (planning on recruiting the kids for this chore)
• rubber spatula (the old one is disintegrating)
• ceramic casserole dish (the old one is dead)
• extra long rubber gloves
• pretty, light-weight apron (to keep grease and bleach from ruining any more of my shirts)

 And probably some other stuff I can't remember. Anyway, I'm kind of looking forward to having an easier time of my next cooking marathon.