Fun Friday Finds

 Here are some fun finds for your on this fine Friday! Enjoy!

Check out this great product that turns canning jars into a sippy cup! (via Design Mom)

Here's a cute pair of salad tongs...Saladbunny! (via LikeCool)

Whether you like them made from paper, yarn, or even edible, "How About Orange" has rounded up some cute cactus tutorials!

If you're looking for a sweet gardening project to finish out your summer, why not turn your back yard into a giant Candyland board? (via Ohdeedoh)

ID Mommy Recipe(s) & Kitchen Gadget of the Week: Baby Food + OXO Ice Trays

Okay, I know, so I probably shouldn't call these posts "Recipes and Kitchen Gadget of the Week" anymore since I haven't been doing them EVERY week.  Pay no attention to the technicalities and read on if you've never tried making your own baby food. It really is easier than you think and very much worth it (at least in my mind)! 

At the ripe young age of 5 month, my little guy already sprouted a tooth and is scarfing down "solid" foods.  So, since I am now in the process of stocking up on baby food, I thought I'd share what I do.  I'm going to start with the easiest foods, because these photos also include another one of my favorite kitchen gadgets...oxo ice trays.

I'll tell you why I love them as I go.

You don't need any fancy, expensive baby food making machines.  Just your good ol' blender or food processor and a steam basket will do everything. I like to do a couple foods in one night, so I only have to clean the food processor once, and once you do it the food lasts a long time.  I have 4 or 5 of these ice cube trays which enables me to do a couple foods at a time.  It's also a huge plus to be able to give your baby fresh food.  I tried getting the jarred baby food and the "no refrigeration required" Gerber Graduates meals for Sammy for their convenience on our trip to Paris.  Keep in mind that this kid eats ANYTHING, and loves all kinds of weird exotic foods that most kids won't touch, and he wouldn't eat them.  I don't blame him...they looked and smelled pretty gross!

First, Obtain Food...
One word of caution...you may want to look into purchasing organic foods for your babies, or at least the organic versions of certain types of foods, even if you're not one to buy organic for yourself.  Recent studies have enlightened us to the fact that certain foods, especially those with soft skins, absorb more pesticides than others.  Here is a very eye opening article that will help you decipher which foods are most worth your baby's while to buy organic, if you don't do ALL organic:


"The Dirty Dozen" and "The Clean 15"


Now on to the preparation...

Let's start with A for Avocado!

Avocado
This was one of both boys' first foods because, along with pears, it was among the least allergenic. Directions: Cut open, scoop out the green flesh, discard the pit and smash with a fork.  I made Toby's avocado the same night I was making guacamole so I just smashed everything together and took some out for we folk who are blessed with teeth to enjoy with our chips and bbq.

Once smashed, I just literally slop it on the top of the ice cube trays:

 Then I smooth it all out with a rubber scraper, filling all the "cubes" and scraping excess back into the bowl.

The OXO ice cube trays have nice covers that slide on top.  This is great for two reasons...
1) The cubes don't fall into the sink when you're turning it upside down under water to loosen them from the tray.
2) You can stack them in the freezer without them sticking together or spilling out.

Stick 'em in the freezer.  Once they are frozen, pop them out of the tray.  Another reason I like these trays...the shape of the "cubes" (I put in quotations because they are not cube shaped) makes them pop out very easily by putting pressure on one side, because they are curved on the bottom.  Many people pick a cube or two out of their tray at a time, and this makes that easy!

Now label a freezer bag or other container so you know what the mysterious green stuff is, and store it in the freezer.  Whenever you want to feed baby some avocado, just zap a cube or two in the microwave and you're set.

I know it's not the most "green" practice to use plastic bags, but I re-use mine until my kids have a full set of choppers and move on to crunchy stuff, so I don't waste many.  When I run out, I'll refill the bag.  I like the bags because I'm not wasting space storing empty air as I use them up, like a rigid container would do.  This may be a great application for reuseable fabric food storage bags!

So, you'll repeat this freezing and storing process with each food to stock up...

Bananas
See "Avocado"...substitute ripe bananas.  Just mash 'em with a fork and freeze them.

Plums, Peaches, Nectarines, etc
These soft, fleshy fruits are great for getting things moving, if you know what I mean.  They come after bananas and avocados on the "easy scale" just because they require a little more than a fork...a blender or food processor.  I just wash them, cut out the pits, and puree. (then slop into ice trays and freeze of course).  If your baby likes rice cereal, that's a good way to thicken these up when you serve them.  They are such juicy fruits, they tend to be pretty liquid-y.  I also like to mix them with some applesauce too.

Peas
I just buy frozen peas.  Cook them in the microwave or pot as directed, then toss them in the food processor or blender and puree! Frozen veggies go on sale for $1 per bag all the time at my local grocery store, and they stretch WAY WAY farther than a jar of Gerber peas.  (and look, smell, and taste a whole lot more appetizing.) 

Bam.  Peas. Not much more work than making a package of frozen peas for dinner.  Easy peasy.  I usually end up adding a little water when I serve these because they can get pretty thick and pasty otherwise, and hard for baby to swallow.

Pears
You can do the same with apples.  Wash and chop them up...

Drop them in a steaming basket in a pot with some water and cook until they get soft.

Then puree, pack, and freeze! Pears!

 
Broccoli,  Cauliflower
For the easiest way to do broccoli, cauliflower, etc, see "peas."  You can pick up endless frozen veggies and do the same thing.  Otherwise, I also have done fresh broccoli...just steam it and puree.

Carrots
Like above, for the quickest route, do some frozen carrots.  I tend to buy the big bags of carrots in the produce section and steam them.  But, it's not really a whole lot more work to just steam fresh carrots.  No, you don't have to peel them...just wash well, steam and puree!

Sweet Potato
Same as carrots...scrub clean, chop, steam and puree!

Apples
Okay, maybe this should go above Avocados because the easiest is to just buy a gigantic jar of applesauce and open it.  I tried making it myself once and found I'd rather just buy a big jar of applesauce.  I just make sure it doesn't have any sugar added, and it's cheaper per ounce than the tiny jars of Gerber.  If you want to make it yourself, it'll be the same as pears above.  You just don't find big jars of "pear sauce." 

See...it may seem hard, but it really is easy...especially if you've already got some of these foods and/or tools out to make your own food already.  Here are a couple more tips...

Mix it up!
Once you go through the whole one-food-at-a-time thing to make sure your kid isn't allergic to anything, you can have some fun mixing flavors too. I like to mix other things with applesauce, such as peaches or plums, because on it's own applesauce tends to stop babies up. (see next tip...)

Keep Things Moving!
Some foods tend to contribute to constipation more than others, including:
- rice cereal (Sammy threw this up every time so we don't even use it)
- unripe bananas
- applesauce
- carrots
- potato
- dairy (cheese, yogurt)

What helps me keep things regular for my boys is to make sure to have at least one food item offered at each meal (along with 1 of the culprits above) which helps keep the digestive system moving.  To make it easier to remember, I keep foods that do this which start with "P" (for "poop" of course) on hand: Pears, Peaches, Plums and Peas. 


So give it a try...your baby will thank you for it!  Okay, maybe by flinging the peas back in your face, but deep down inside, he or she will thank you!

Here's another nice site full of homemade baby food recipes, along with charts to help you decipher which foods you can food at what ages:
Wholesome Baby Food

Recipe & Gadget of the Week: Cheesy Pork Chops with Spicy Apples + Apple Peeler/corer/slicer

Recipe of the Week: Cheesy Pork Chops with Spicy Apples

This week's recipe comes to you from my favorite recipe site, Allrecipes. I found this one last week when looking for something to do with limited ingredients that I had in the frig/freezer. The combination of flavors sounds really strange, but it's surprisingly delicious, AND easy! The recipe says to grill the pork chops, however, I'm not so savvy with the grill (I leave that to my grilling and smoking expert husband), so I used a grill pan, which still worked great. Also, that way I didn't have to worry about any onions or apples falling through the grill. Give it a try...it's worth it!

 

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1 onion, sliced
• 1 pinch red pepper flakes
• 1 apple, cored and sliced
• 2 teaspoons white sugar
• 2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
• 4 pork chops
• salt and pepper to taste
• 4 slices extra sharp Cheddar cheese

Directions

1. Prepare a grill for high heat.
2. While the grill heats, melt the butter in a skillet over medium heat. Add the onion, and cook until soft. Season with red pepper flakes then add the sliced apple. Stir in the sugar and balsamic vinegar, and simmer for 5 minutes, or until apples are soft and golden.
3. Season the pork chops with salt and pepper. Grill for 3 to 5 minutes per side, depending on thickness. Spoon the onions and apples on top of the chops, and top with a slice of Cheddar cheese. Cover the grill, and cook for about 3 minutes until cheese is melted and bubbling.

Kitchen Gadget of the Week: Apple Peeler/Corer/Slicer

This gadget will make the coring and slicing of your apple for the above recipe take mere seconds. There are many different brands, as you can see above, but they all basically do the same thing.  Stab your apple with the prongs on the end of the corkscrew-like post, then crank the handle.  As your apple spins, it will be spiral cut, peeled, and cored all at the same time.  This thing is awesome if you like to make apple pies, apple crisp, muffins, etc. and don't want to spend your whole weekend hunched over the garbage can peeling apples.  It also works for potatoes, although it works best with a more uniformly shaped piece of produce like an apple.  It's not exactly an appliance you'd like sitting on your counter top on display, as it's form is entirely dictated by it's function.  But, when it comes to saving time, you won't care how ugly the thing is!

Recipe & Gadget of the Week: Jambalaya + Collapsible Colanders

Recipe of the Week: Gretchen's Hack-Job Jambalaya
I call this my "hack-job" jambalaya because I'm guessing it would disgust any true New Orleand-er. I took an actual jambalaya recipe off the web and pretty much butchered it to fit within my hubby's extremely picky tastebuds, and make it to use up whatever strange things I have in my freezer. However, this still turns out tasting good to everyone in the house!

The reason I'm sharing this recipe is it's my favorite way to use up a bunch of random meat from the freezer, or your husband's latest "lets-see-how-gigantic-of-a-cut-of-meat-we-can-grill-at-once-and-how-many-left-overs-we-can-generate" experiment. You can seriously mix together creatures from the land, sea, and air in one dish and it works. (I realize that I am making friends with no vegetarians right now.) I made this last week with my strangest selection yet: diced up breakfast sausage, left-over Christmas turkey, and a package of pepperoni from the freezer. It was delicious. No kidding. I've even used up frozen hot dogs in this.  ANYTHING goes...

Ingredients:
1 Tbsp butter
1 large onion, minced
1 1/2 C rice
2-3 lbs meat...pork, sliced smoked sausage, ham, pork, veal, chicken...
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tsp parsley (or 1 sprig fresh)
1/2 tsp ground thyme (or 1 sprig fresh)
2 bay leaves, crushed
1/2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes, or to taste (or real red and green peppers; my hubby doesn't like these either so I use red pepper flakes for flavor)
small can tomato paste (or 1 diced tomato; my hubby doesn't like tomato chunks so I use paste)
salt and pepper to taste

Instructions:
Fry onion lightly in butter. Add meat. Add remaining ingredients, except for rice and seafood (if any). Cook and stir about 5 minutes; careful not to scorch. Add 1 quart hot water. Boil for 10 minutes. Add the rice and cook about 1/2 hour longer, gradually adding up to 2 more quarts water as needed/desired, until the rice is tender and it's at your desired consistency. At this point you can add cooked shrimp or other seafood too if you have any!  You can also toss in those half-full bags of frozen veggies you have in your freezer, or other left-over cooked veggies from previous meals.

Above is my photo of last week's sausage, turkey and pepperoni variation. Every time I make it it's a little different! Sometimes I'll toss in some frozen veggies too...just experiment and have fun using up your weird left-over meats and making more room in your freezer again!

Kitchen Gadget of the Week: Collapsible Silicone Colanders
I recently purchased this 6-quart collapsible strainer from Progressive through Amazon:

PRO's: The thing I like about this particular one is that, besides being collapsible and taking up less storage space, as opposed to my old Tupperware one, it has a nice stable base.  So, it's not rocking around in the sink, spilling my pasta down the drain as I try to pour it in just right.  It's also square, so it utilizes more of the room in the sink and is more forgiving when aiming a pot of whatever you may pour into it.  Last but not least, the pull-out handles stretch to the edges of the sink so it can balance up above the drain.

CON's: It's definitely not as compact as it could be.  The hard plastic pieces are still quite bulky.  Also, the holes for the water to strain through are really only on the bottom surface and slightly up the edges.  It would do a much better job straining if the holes were all the way up the sides.

For these reasons, now I'm kindof wishing I had paid a little more for one of the OXO strainers instead:
 
While they aren't square, the silicone is thinner, easier to collapse, and has holes up the sides.  The wire frame also gives it a MUCH thinner profile compared to the thick plastic frame of the Progressive one.  So, if mine wears out, I'll definitely replace it with an OXO one...but overall I love the idea of a collapsible strainer in general as it sure does save me some cabinet space!

Recipe & Gadget of the Week: Meat Loaf Miniatures + Flat Whisk

Recipe of the Week: Meat Loaf Miniatures
I found this recipe from some old cookbook on my shelf while desperately in search of something to make with the limited groceries we had on hand at the time. It immediately became one of my husband's favorites. It freezes really well too!

Ingredients:
1 C ketchup
3-4 Tbsp Packed Brown Sugar
1 tsp Ground Mustard
2 Eggs, Beaten
4 Tsp Worcestershire Sauce
3 C Crispix Cereal, crushed
3 tsp Onion Powder
1/2 to 1 tsp Seasoned Salt
1/2 tsp Garlic Powder
1/2 tsp Pepper
2-3 lbs lean ground beef or ground turkey

Instructions:
In large bowl, combine ketchup, brown sugar, and mustard. Remove 1/2 C for topping; set aside. Add eggs, worcestershire sauce, cereal, and seasonings to remaining ketchup mixture; mix well. Let stand for 5 minutes. Crumble beef over cereal mixture and mix well.

Press meat mixture into 18 muffin cups (about 1/3 cup each). bake at 375 for 18-20 minutes. Drizzle with reserved ketchup mixture; bake 10 minutes longer or until meat is no longer pink and meat thermometer reads 160 degrees.

Cool remaining loaves; freeze. Transfer to freezer bags; freeze for up to 3 months. To use frozen meat loaves; Completely thaw in refrigerator. Place in a greased baking dish. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes or until heated through, or cover and microwave on high for 1 minute or until heated through.


Kitchen Gadget of the Week: the "Kitchzen Flat Whisk" by Chef'n
Okay, purely by chance we have another gadget by Chef'n this week, and no, I don't get royalties from them. However, if anyone from Chef'n is reading this and would like to mail me an envelope full of cash, I will not object. Heck, I'll probably just use it to buy more Chef'n stuff anyway.

I love this whisk. I actually found it at a thrift store, brand new, still in the package. I know our local Target store often donates brand new product to the thrift stores, so I believe it likely came from there. I find a lot of great new items that way! Here are a couple reasons why I love this whisk...

1) Store-ability
If you own a whisk, chances are it's been the cause of your drawer jamming more than once. That, or it gets tangled up with the other tools in your drawer. Being almost flat, this one fits perfectly in my shallow drawer, and does not get snarled up with my other tools.
2) Scrape-ability
The end of this whisk is not round like most standard whisks. Instead, it has rounded corners. This works fantastic when I need to whisk in a pot on the stove, which do not have rounded bowl bottoms. So, I can scrape around the corners and get everything mixed well.
3) Non-Scratching
Having the end dipped in silicone saves my pans from scratches, and holds up to the heat.
4) Non-burning
If I let the whisk sit in a hot pot, grabbing the handle doesn't burn a metal spring pattern in the palm of my hand. It has a nice rubbery handle.
5) Clean-ability
Last but CERTAINLY not least, one of my favorite things about this whisk is how easy it is to clean. I don't have to try to get inside the cage like a round whisk between wires to clean it. Being almost flat (each wire is about 1/8" separated vertically when laid down on the counter), a wipe of the soapy sponge on the front and back of the wires will clean all sides of the wires. That's hard to describe without seeing it, but trust me, it's a piece of cake to clean!

Happy whisking! :-)