Category Archives: Uncategorized
Surprise Giveaway!
Happy Mother’s Day! Before we get to the giveaway, take a minute to read what I found on Facebook. I love it.
To those who gave birth this year to their first child—we celebrate with you
To those who lost a child this year – we mourn with you
To those who are in the trenches with little ones every day and wear the badge of food stains – we appreciate you
To those who experienced loss this year through miscarriage, failed adoptions, or running away—we mourn with you
To those who walk the hard path of infertility, fraught with pokes, prods, tears, and disappointment – we walk with you. Forgive us when we say foolish things. We don’t mean to make this harder than it is.
To those who are foster moms, mentor moms, and spiritual moms – we need you
To those who have warm and close relationships with your children – we celebrate with you
To those who have disappointment, heart ache, and distance with your children – we sit with you
To those who lost their mothers this year – we grieve with you
To those who experienced abuse at the hands of your own mother – we acknowledge your experience
To those who lived through driving tests, medical tests, and the overall testing of motherhood – we are better for having you in our midst
To those who will have emptier nests in the upcoming year – we grieve and rejoice with you
And to those who are pregnant with new life, both expected and surprising –we anticipate with you
This Mother’s Day, we walk with you. Mothering is not for the faint of heart and we have real warriors in our midst. We remember you.
A very, very fun drink post will be on it’s way, but for now. A 25 hour giveaway! But first….my mom is going to try and tickle you.
I hope anyone else in the world is even kind of laughing, because I’m cracking myself up. My mom’s gonna get ya. I used a filter (obviously) on this photo, so she doesn’t really have a plastic, white-gloved right hand. Or does she?
You’ve got until Mother’s Day is over to enter the giveaway of a lifetime. You may be the lucky reader who wins $20 to spend on anything you want at Amazon.com. Call your mom, call your friends, call your boss and quit. You could be a dollarnaire by this time tomorrow. Good luck!
App’ing It Forward
My heart is leaping for joy and breaking to bits over this blog move to WordPress.org and GoDaddy from WordPress.com. I have lost so many links to Pinterest pins, old posts and other pieces in the move. The possibilities on this new site however, are proving to be worth the momentary struggle. Most of my time has been spent out of my kitchen, so I don’t have any food to share. I have great news to pass along instead!
My friend Pete’s game has finally hit the app store and is ready for purchase. There will be a special Mr. Jabbs post coming in the next couple weeks, with a special celebration recipe attached. For now, head over and drop the .99 cents on Mr. Jabbs’ Epic Waste of Time and keep checking back in to Food It Forward!
Hawaiian Dip Recipe
I’m in the middle of linking all my old posts with my new. (Sounds like a real party, eh?) I’m just posting this old recipe (with an old note underneath) to make sure it will still be found!
This dip could NOT be easier to make!
- 8 oz. cream cheese softened
- 2½ cups sweetened coconut (I prefer flaked over shredded)
- 20 oz. can pineapple (chunks or crushed)
- nuts or cherries to top dip with
- Blend all ingredients together in food processor to crush up pineapple and coconut pieces. Refrigerate at least 30 minutes before serving. I think it tastes great with Trader Joe’s Pita Crackers, but I am sure there are plenty of dipping options you can find!
Quick and easy recipe for today, be sure to save this recipe for summer (which seems so far away right now)!
Jy and I are hoping to get out to see the Oscar nominated short films this Saturday. Cross your fingers we can get out to go, it is always such a fun tradition that has gotten harder to keep up with after having kids. Are you watching the awards this Sunday night? Are you going to be happy when I quit talking about the Oscars and movie themed food? Hope not!
See you tomorrow, Happy Tuesday friends!
Oscars 2013: Les Miserables
Someday, someday I say, I will learn how to type an accent with my keyboard and it won’t look like this: Les Mise’rables. That’s an apostrophe not an accent. Am I right? Am I blind? Am I hungry? Nope, I just ate a bowl of Les wonderful soup.
This is the second to last Best Picture nominee post and it has been a tough one! There were too many options for this movie and I couldn’t narrow it down to something easy and yummy without some contemplation.
On the way home from our weekend getaway, Jy (Mr. Movie Fuel) gave me plenty of fun ideas. My favorite? Les Fisherables. Really? Les Fisherables? After discussing the possibility of injecting a baguette with wine and brie, Jy stumbled onto the fact that French Onion Soup was too, a meal of the poor. Bingo! I’m poor, so it sounded like a match made in heaven.
As we all know, plenty of chefs have had their hands on French Onion Soup and have classed up the beefy pot quite a bit. I’m doubting the French who rose up against the aristocracy were preparing their soups with organic croutons, Gruyère and sherry. I’m thinking more along the lines of rotten onions and hopefully some bone broth!
Luckily, I found a recipe that is light on the wallet, good for the body and easy on the cook. I’ve added a slice of french bread into my soup, which is not done in the, as it is meant to be a “clean recipe”. The Gracious Pantry is an awesome site to read about clean eating and find almost any recipe to replace your old, dirty, fat food. Did I just make you drool there? Mmm, old, dirty fat food!
- 4 cups beef broth (I used the organic “Pacific” brand)
- 2 onions
- 1 tsp. balsamic vinegar
- 1 tbsp. olive oil
- Parmesan Cheese
- Clean and slice your onions. (Slice them thin!)
- In a soup pot, sauté your onions in the olive oil until they are soft.
- Add beef broth and vinegar to the pot and boil until the liquid has cooked down by approximately half.
- Serve sprinkled with approximately 2 tbsp. parmesan cheese sprinkled over the top.
Again, bread makes the world better, so I’ve added a slice to my soup. Yeah, I’ll suffer the gluten consequences, but who am I to talk of suffering? I never had to diet the way Anne Hathaway did for her role in Les Mis. That, my friends, is suffering. Although her millions of dollars may have soothed her hunger pains. Wait, does cash have carbs?
Oscars 2013: Silver Linings Playbook
While Silver Linings Playbook is still on my must-see list, I’ve done a bit of research. From what it sounds like, the majority of websites suggest I make crabby snacks or homemades.
Crabby snacks are a lot like the tuna melts my family loved to make, back in the day. Instead of canned tuna on a buttered english muffin, crabby snacks class it up with some canned crab. That doesn’t sound super amazing to me, but who am I to judge?
Homemades are either homemade noodles or pizza with hamburger or chicken on top, depending on what you read. No and no. Not feeling like whipping up either.
My favorite suggestion is the idea of using football watching snacks as an Oscar night dish. Bradley Cooper’s character is a Philidelphia Eagles superfan and serving buffalo wings is perfectly acceptable in my playbook.
I made these buffalo wings for the Superbowl and its sad, sad, outcome.
The recipe is from The Pioneer Woman and is totally easy to prepare, especially if you have a deep fryer.
All this recipe requires is some frying and dipping.
I’m still working my way towards Zero Dark Thirty and I have loved all your suggestions so far. I found a fun idea on a site I can’t seem to find again! Let me know if you are familiar with Puzzler or a site that sounds something like it. Listen to this idea, Gyro Dark Thirty! How funny is that? I have no idea how to make Gyros, so I think I’ll stick with some of your ideas.
You’ll be seeing FoFo posts start rolling in a little faster than they have been, so keep checking back. The Oscars are coming soon and there is nothing like celebrating millionaires with swag bags and gold statues.
Oscars 2013: Amour
Have you seen Amour? Most of us haven’t, right?
It looks like a beautiful, sad, sad, movie. I just read the plot, complete with spoilers (I won’t add any here) and yep, beautiful and sad are right! This isn’t on my must see list, as is Beast of The Southern Wild and Silver Linings Playbook. However, if you are a sucker for a movie that jumps, no…pounds on your heart-strings, get your booty out there and see this movie.
I am more than happy to drink about this movie though! Take a look at the Catatonic, a drink especially made for this year’s Oscars.
The tribute to Amour is in the name, but honey, you best believe Mama when I say this mug of love will work with ANY movie you wanna see! If you are a lazy dater (like my husband and me), you can set up a night at home with a Catatonic, a Netflix disc, some pajamas and mismatching socks. Perfect.
You are going to need some Adult Chocolate Milk, which was waiting for me on the top shelf in the spirit aisle at my grocery store. Can we get a new name for spirits, yet? That word just means way too many things. I had a lot of spirit in high school. My friend Jody knows well of my jealousy over her “Most Spirited” yearbook win. She loves to remind me that it was SHE who owned the orange Guess! jeans, not me. That was back between 1991-1995, the years of grunge and clunky shoes. Skinny, bold colored pants were not as hot then as they are now.
Oh yeah, spirits.
Spirit is also used to describe ghosts, it’s a name for Jesus’ energy left on earth, it’s the way uneducated folks spell Sprite. Can’t we just agree to call it liqueur? Better yet, let’s call it booze. I don’t have to use spell check when I call it booze. Go get some Adult Chocolate Milk where you find the rest of your booze.
There are ENDLESS options for this bottle of creamy chocolate infused with vodka! Think of the adult chocolate shakes, the frappuccinos, the puddings, the popsicles, the mochas. ACK! I’m jealous! I’ll be saving one of my weekly DAMY treat times for an Adult Chocolate Milk drink, fo’ shiz.
I left the Creme De Menthe that is called for out of this drink. Mostly because Safeway didn’t have any, but also because I don’t love it and new I could make some mint-infused simple syrup instead. Six minutes were stolen from my day to make homemade whipped cream, which is so easy. Grab a little carton of whipping cream, dump as much sugar as you’d like and turn your mixer on high for a few minutes. Homemade whipped cream tastes a million times better than the canned stuff and doesn’t have corn syrup or other crazy ingredients.
I took a few sips from my mug and Jy guzzled his whole 8 oz. down. This drink is creamy, dreamylicious. The Starbucks hot chocolate packets we used really pushed our Catatonics over the top.
- 2 T Adult Chocolate Milk™
- 2 T creme de menthe
- 6 oz. hot chocolate
- 1 oz. whipped cream
- Pour the Adult Chocolate Milk™ and creme de menthe into a large coffee mug and stir. Add hot chocolate, topped with whipped cream. Sprinkle with chocolate shavings and top with a cherry if desired!
A big thank you to Deutsch Family Wine & Spirits for this recipe, it’s a keeper!
*Do you guys think they will change their name to Deutsch Family Wine & Booze? Yeah, probably not. Let’s keep it classy, kids.
Oscars 2013: Django Unchained
The next Oscar nominated movie of the series is Django Unchained, a Southern style Spaghetti Western from Quentin Tarantino. And it’s a tasty one!
I am seriously hurting for ideas on how to incorporate Zero Dark Thirty into SOME kind of food. If you have any crafty thoughts you’d like to share, please do! If I use your idea, I will send you a $10 Starbucks card. Free coffee for your brainpower, it’s easy.
Are you ready for it? Straight out of Candie Land and topped with Django’s signature…
If you haven’t seen the movie, Leonardo DiCaprio plays a sadistic plantation owner, who offers Django and his travelling partner some white cake at a crucial moment in the film. This next statement shouldn’t surprise you. Quentin Tarantino often incorporates guns and blood into his films. Alas, Django Unchained is too, a bloody flick.
The strawberry sauce (do I have to tell you it’s supposed to be blood?), which drips over and puddles under the Django White Cake, is simply sugared up strawberries with a bit of cocoa powder for depth. You can easily change the flavor with any berry you choose and same goes for the cake. To keep your cake white-ish, be sure to use clear extract. This recipe calls for whole eggs, leaving you with an almost white cake. The almond flavor lends itself well, but vanilla would work perfectly too.
It’s hard to tell from the photo, but there is a white layer of cream cheese frosting between the layers and on the top of the cake, it helps mask the tint of the cake, holds it together and gives it an extra layer of flavor.
How does it taste? It tastes “You better hide this cake from me, because I WILL find it in the middle of the night and eat 3 pieces” good. It tastes, “I am going to hide in the bathroom with the shower running and eat another piece” good.
- 1 cup sugar
- ½ cup butter
- 2 eggs
- 2 teaspoons almond extract (make sure it’s clear!)
- 2 cup cake flour
- 1¾ tsp. baking powder
- 1 cup milk
- Frosting
- 2 cups strawberries
- ¼ cup water
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- ⅛ cup cocoa powder
- 1 brick cream cheese
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- ⅛ – ¼ cup milk
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees, prepare chosen cake or cupcake pans with spray or butter and a sprinkling of flour.
- In medium bowl, cream sugar and butter. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Stir in almond extract.
- In separate bowl, mix flour and baking powder.
- Gently mix dry ingredients in with the wet.
- Stir in milk until batter is smooth and pour into pans.
- Bake 30 minutes or 25 for cupcakes.
- Let cake cook before frosting.
- Frosting
- In a medium saucepot, bring berries, water and sugar to the point of boiling.
- Lower heat and stir sauce until it thickens a bit and sugar is melted.
- Mix in cocoa powder and set aside to cool.
- (You can also use a Vitamix or Blendtec to make the sauce if you have one!)
- Blend together cream cheese and powdered sugar. Add milk slowly and only if mixture is too dry. That’s it!
Now, gotta go pay the bills. I know you may not believe this, but I don’t actually get paid for being wife and mother of the year. No one has actually ever accused me of being wife or mother of the year, but I totally know lots of people are just thinking it, so it must be true.
2012, Don’t Let the Door Hit You On the Way Out!
Happy New Year’s Eve FoFo readers! I was so sad to take down our big light display today. We always light up our backyard as you see from the photo above.
For those of you who have visited the Oakland Zoo and perhaps have seen that exact same display there, please don’t ruin it for the rest of the internet by tattling about me lying. Does anyone else have a home that looks super bare without all the holiday decorations? I need some color back in my life!
I’ll be cruising through all of 2012′s top 10′s and looking-back posts around the web, after my kids are in bed. We plan to celebrate NYE New York time, which is 9 pm for those who are even worse at math than I am. My little party planner has tonight all mapped out.
It reads:
- TV
- Cookies
- Barbies
- Slurpees
- Dinner
- Freeze Dance
- Chess
- Countdown
Who says we don’t know how to party? Everyone? Oh, yeah, everyone says that.
My friend Jody gave me a great recipe, which has inspired my second new favorite salad. (My first is a few posts down and it’s buffalo chicken-licious).
Paso Uno (That’s step one, Gringos): Buy a fat pomegranate at the end of the farmers’ market for $1.00
Step Two: Read the photos below. You’ll be slicing off the top, scoring the corners, peeling back the pom and pulling out all the seeds.
Next: Toast some nuts. Any nuts! Pour raw nuts into a dry pan and turn the heat to high. Once the pan is hot, keep the nuts moving for 1-2 minutes and you’ve got yourself some flavor!
Step Twelve: Use a dressing which is light in flavor. I don’t think you can go wrong with a Poppy Seed or Balsamic.
Step C: Mix seeds, nuts and dressing into a giant bowl of lettuce.
Step Last: Crumble blue cheese, feta, cojita or whatever crumbly stuff you’ve got over the top.
Step Eat: Eat it.
Before I go party with my family in my pajamas, I’d love to wish you all a Happy New Year! 2013 has great things in store for us all. Yes, it will have some poop as well, but it’s all in how we look at it and deal with it, right?
Thank you all for making 2012 a bigger, better year for Food It Forward. As of yesterday, FoFo has had a little more than 82,000 views this year. I plan to triple that number in ’13. Lucky number 13, right! Be safe tonight!
As my Grandfather would love to say on NYE,
“I’m not brushing my teeth until next year,”
Kim
Winter Wake Up Smoothie
I have heard it said that it takes us Californian’s roughly ten days to be sick and tired of winter. I’m a day ahead of the crowd! For those of you in colder climates, I understand how annoying us sunshine state folk are, I really do.
Here is something we can all agree on though, a trip to Hawaii!
I can’t afford to send us all to Hawaii, but I think I can scrape enough money together to maybe ship a shoebox? Not overnight of course, but none the less, it’s going!
While it is a sunny, 40 degree day outside here, I’d love it if some of you would join me for a quick tropical getaway, via smoothie.
To make this tropical smoothie, you’ll need:
- -frozen pineapple
- -ice
- -kiwis (the fruit, not the people)
- -an apple (optional)
- -coconut cream (optional)
- -coconut or almond milk
Check out these hunka-hunkas I found at today’s farmers’ market!
That is one kiwi, one! I know it might be tough to find sweet kiwi this time of year, but it’s worth it. The father-son duo at the market told me how you can use kiwi to marinate chicken. The enzymes of this fruit break poultry down nicely. Who knew? If you have tried kiwi as a marinade, will you drop me a line? I’d love some tips.
This smoothie was made possible by my Vitamix. Ahh. I topped my cup with some shredded coconut and took a virtual trip to the tropics (without my kids). There is a bit of a peppery flavor to this drink and I’m guessing the kiwi is to blame. Jy and Dallas still loved it and I feel pretty jazzy after sipping mine down too.
Now it’s time for me to go clean. Not sweep and put away laundry clean. This is the big stuff. I’ve been useless the past few days with a killer cold and the three males of the house took that as a sign to fling ape poo, leave toy bombs and let our home go south. Not like beautiful, historic mansion south. Like, Honey Boo-Boo’s poor cousin who hopes to get some of HBB’s TLC money south. Bad, real bad.
We Survived the Mayan Apocalypse
Happy last week of 2012, FoFo friends! I vowed all December to not have the attitude of “I’m so glad it is over!” I didn’t vow hard enough I guess, because I am glad we are quickly rolling towards January. It isn’t necessarily all the shopping and wrapping that knocks me out, it’s the ridiculous amount of time I spend running quick errands or buying groceries. It’s all the extra cleaning and baking, balanced with keeping a cheerful demeanor and ensuring I squeeze in every tradition my five year old can remember. He can remember a lot of them! The class party, field trip, church parties, brunches, lunches, dinners, parties and decorating, it’s all so much fun, but exhausting too!
I haven’t really kept it a secret that I have been battling the weight I put on after working so hard this spring to take it off. Between a pulled neck and a head cold, I haven’t been able to really give it the big start I have wanted to. Luckily, I am now set up for success and ready to say goodbye to the pounds that don’t belong to me.
Starting with, protein shakes! I wish I took a photo of the shake I am drinking right now, it’s great! Dates are the best way to sweeten a tart smoothie and I’ll have to remember to post more about that. For now, check this out:
It’s the 6300, baby!
The mother of all Christmas gifts! The Vitamix 6300. It’s beyond amazing and it’s proof that my parents can buy my love. Just kidding, I loved them first and actually now feel a little bad they spent that much money on me and Jy.
Stop! Grammar time!
I’m pretty sure it was my friend Jody who taught me this trick, remember it, it’s good!
If you are unsure whether to use I or me in a sentence, take out the name of the other person (or object) and see which sounds best. If you aren’t sure whether you should say, “The cashier gave Max and I a free cupcake” or “The cashier gave Max and me a free cupcake”, use the trick.
The cashier gave I a free cupcake.
The cashier gave me a free cupcake.
Bingo!
Now you know to say, “The cashier gave Max and me a free cupcake.”
Back to regular programming.
I found a nice See Jane Run gift card in my stocking. The hilarious errand of the day involves this gift. I’ll be taking my boys with me today to be fitted for a sports bra. Please, please pray for me.
My fridge and pantry are both stocked and I am ready to make 2013 my healthiest year yet. Not too late to DAMY with me!
Some Fresh & Easy Notes
If you can find this tea, you must buy.
It tastes like a wintery, magical Hallmark movie, that’s pretty much the only description I can come up with. Delicious find from Fresh & Easy. Oh! I almost forgot, I wanted to show you what F&E sent me!
The Fresh & Easy holiday party was on a weeknight and I wasn’t able to attend, so they sent me a goodie box instead! I had already made two boxes of the Ginger Bread Mix, which is super simple and totally yummy, the whole family loved it. When the box arrived, we were just about out of the Jolly Java Peppermint Coffee too, so the timing was perfect. This coffee doesn’t taste like overtly sweet, it just has a hint of pep to it, no pun intended. Jolly Java is great for bleak, rainy mornings. The caramel corn was new to our house, but quickly devoured. Can you see how 70% of the bag is gone?! And you KNOW I love me some coupons!
I am heartbroken about Fresh & Easy being bought and possibly resold by Tesco in the coming future. Hopefully, someone will figure out a way to keep the doors open with a bit of restructuring.
A Kick in the Pants
I’ve been able to drink some Peet’s Holiday Blend for the past couple days, as Jy scored it in our family’s White Elephant gift exchange. I love this stuff! It’s seriously the best. The best. Sorry Auntie Didi, I love you and I love Starbucks, but this stuff rules!
Now, I am off to spend my sports bra and Sephora gift cards (hand cream, woot-woot!). I’m strapping my BodyBugg back to my arm and saying adios to my tight jeans (which used to be my loose jeans). Shake off your latke hips, your egg nog bootie and poundcake thighs with me!
I hope you live no where near me, friendly readers. I’m learning how to run. Yeah, you read that right. It is NOT pretty! So much bouncing and hunching over. If you see me, pretend not to recognize me, ok?
Happy Thursday!
Kim
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