Cooking for Consolatte

My aunt and I have gone to the Casting Crowns Concert every year they have been in Nacogdoches since I have been in school down here, and at each concert, they give a short but effective segment on World Vision. Now I have thought and thought and thought about sponsoring a child but I always talk myself out of it saying we can't afford it right now. Especially with one income and me a full time student. With my lent decision and cooking a lot more at home, I broke it down and the little $35 a month commitment that they ask for is usually less than we spend eating out one time at Chili's. Really? How many times a month do we eat out? Surely we can sacrifice one. So beginning now, I will be dedicating one meal a month as my Consolatte Meal. My money is automatically withdrawn from checking account on the 25th of each month so on this day ( or one really close) I will cook for Consolatte.
Consolatte is a young girl in Burundi Africa living with her parents, one brother and 3 sisters. Her parents both farmers struggle to make ends meet and struggle to feed their children. She is also my sponsored child. Consolatte and her family live in a post war country that is also highly influenced by the HIV virus. As I sit here on my laptop, watching TV and eating a sandwich,it is very hard for me to realize, how truly difficult survival is in a country like this. I mean things like not having clean water and food were things of the past right? Surely they don't still happen today? Thinking about my own life and how blessed I am it is hard to imagine a 6 year old, like Consolatte, carrying water 6 miles to support her family, or going to bed hungry because their family can't afford something to eat or draught has caused their crops to die. Again, I thought these were problems of the past and surely technology had caught up to them by now. Well this is not the case and World Vision takes these situations and teaches these families how with God's help they can rise above their circumstances and again become self sufficient. Implementing new farming techniques and installing clean water wells so that the children who drink the water do not become sick and infested with parasites. In Consolatte's village, World Vision provides a clean water well and education on how to stop the spread of the HIV virus. They also provide education both in academics, and how to be self sufficient. Well worth my $35 a month.
On my World Vision welcome video it says that " Everyday American's spend 1 Billion Dollars dining out" can you imagine the type of impact that could be made if everyone gave up just one meal eating out and donated that money to World Vision? I invite you to pray on it and see if your family too could dedicate one meal a month to a sponsored child.Trust me, I think you will find it well worth it!

It's over

Well Lent has come and gone and although we did not do as well as we had thought, which I am sure you can tell by the little ammount of entries I have written recently, we still did pretty well. We cut our eating out by over 80% and have seen both the weight loss and the money gain that we had hoped for. With this in mind, I have decided to keep up with the tradition, and keep things coming, as I find new recipes, I'll continue to post and pass on. With our lives as busy as they are things can get pretty hectic around here so we try and keep them easy and fast. I came upon an article in the Daily Sentinel, our local newspaper,that I thought I would share with you.The article is about using your iphone for mealtime. If you know me at all you know how it is relevent, but for those of you that don't I would say I have a down right addiction to the little contraption. I had never REALLY thought about it until I read this article and saw how many different aps there are and what a great source my iphone is for family meals. So, if you have an iphone, you might want to look up the following aps the next time you are looking for some new recipe ideas: AllRecipes dinner spinner,Big Oven, Betty Crocker Cookbook, Crockpot Dinners,epicurious,McCormick recipe finder,Whole Foods Recipes, and for after dinner, a personal favorite of mine, shakedrink which gives you yummy cocktails.



You can read the article here : http://dailysentinel.com/life_and_entertainment/article_8cedd676-3c57-11df-9bb0-001cc4c002e0.html

Marcotte, Michele. "Use your Iphone for Mealtime Assistance." Daily Sentinel 31 Mar. 2010 [Nacogdoches, TX] . Web. 8 Apr. 2010.

Regrets

I need some help here people!! I must say that these last few weeks have not been very interesting in the cooking department. I have kind of come to a rut when it comes to meal planning and making sure that I actually get everything I need at the grocery store and following through with my menu. It seems as though time goes faster on nights when I have a big menu planned thinking an hour and a half is a enough time to get a meal on the table and then head back out to rehearsal and then it never fails I have used one of the ingrediants for another meal forgetting that I need it for this one and here I am running to the grocery store to try and pick up the ingrediant. Getting home, I then realize I don't have time now to make it anyway and thus PB&J or Mac and Cheese.Or I have bought the ingrediants for a particular meal weeks ago and due to scheduling did not get it made so now the fresh ingrediants that I have bought have not kept so here again running to the grocery store. So although not intentionally, we have nevertheless been in a rut. Trying to avoid this tonight, I bought one of the Wanchai Ferry Kung Pao chicken Box dinners, you know those kind where you just have to cook it all the ingrediants are right there and boy did I regret it! The sauce was wangy and the rice, although cooked to the specifications on the box was mushy. SOOOO hopeing to avoid this in the future, I am calling on all my friends and family to help me out here and give me some good ideas for meal planning by answering the following questions. Please try and comment on the post or if it won't let you, e-mail me and I will post it for you. Thanks so much!!!

What are some of your ideas that work for successful Meal Planning?
What are some kitchen staples that you keep on hand for dinner in a hurry?
Do you buy groceries per meal everyday or do you buy and stock up at one time?

No Worries!

Just wanted ya'll to know I am still cooking just nothing too interesting trying to get rid of some groceries and clean up some cabinet space! I'll let ya know once I get some interesting recipes I'll start posting again

Wednesday

With all these new dishes this week, my fridge has filled up pretty fast with left overs. In fact I had to go buy more gladware just so that I would be able to store the leftovers. So tonight we had leftovers. So here is little light reading on some cooking opinions since there are no new recipes for tonight.







Stuff a miniature marshmallow in the bottom of an ice cream cone to prevent ice cream drips.


Just suck the ice cream out of the bottom of the cone, for Pete's sake! You are probably lying on the couch with your feet up eating it, anyway!



To keep potatoes from budding, place an apple in the bag with the potatoes.



Buy Hungry Jack mashed potato mix. Keeps in the pantry for up to a year.


When a cake recipe calls for flouring the baking pan, use a bit of the dry cake mix instead and there won't be any white mess on the outside of the cake.



Go to the bakery! Hell, they'll even decorate it for you!


If you accidentally over-salt a dish while it's still cooking, drop in a peeled potato and it will absorb the excess salt for an instant 'fix-me-up.'



If you over-salt a dish while you are cooking, that's too bad. Please recite with me the real woman's motto: 'I made it, you will eat it and I don 't care how bad it tastes!'



Wrap celery in aluminum foil when putting in the refrigerator and it will keep for weeks.



Celery? Never heard of it!



Brush some beaten egg white over pie crust before baking to yield a beautiful glossy finish.



The Mrs. Smith frozen pie directions do not include brushing egg whites over the crust, so I don 't.



Cure for headaches: take a lime, cut it in half and rub it on your forehead. The throbbing will go away.



Take a lime, mix it with tequila, chill and drink! All your pains go away!



Don't throw out all that leftover wine. Freeze into ice cubes for future use in casseroles and sauces.




Leftover wine??????? HELLO!!!!!!

Day 13

I can't believe it is already day 13...granted we had a little time gone with SFASU choir tour, we are almost half way through lent and I think this will definately be a tradition once Lent is over. It really is fun doing this and is even more fun realizing how little effor it really takes and how much money we have already saved! With well thought out meal plans and grocery lists, the money we have saved not eating out is worth it in itself. Well with this week being family week, I went the Carollo Family Cook Book by Aunt Diane for tonights meal. One of her own recipes, these barbecued sandwiches were great! Fast, easy, delicious, what more could you want!


I took at 3 lb pork tenderloin and cut it in half. I froze half for another meal since it is was just the two of us. I then sprinkled some brisket rub on the pork roast, combined with some beef broth, it all went into the crock pot on low for about 6 hours. Once it was done and fully cooked, I took it out put it in a bowl and shredded it and mixed in about a cup of Stubbs barbecue sauce. Mix it all together throw it on a bun and WAHLAH great tasty barbecue sandwiches!

Thanks Aunt Diane!!!

A Little Late

We have recently gotten involved with the Nacogdoches Police Explorers Post. This program allows high school students in Nacogdoches who are interested in becoming law enforcement officers a chance to get involved with the local police department. It is basically like boyscouts for people who want to be police officers. They hold by monthly meetings and participate in yearly competitions. It is a really great program and we really enjoy working with the kids. Well, with our meetings on Monday night and with Opera rehearsals running until right at 5 it makes getting dinner on the table in time to leave for our meeting at 6 a real impossibility. This being the case, I try to put something in the crock pot that will be ready and we can snatch and grab and run out the door. Last night however, I forgot to finish the slide show, and we didn't have time to grab the fajitas out of the crock pot before leaving so we had a VERY late night dinner last night. This is the best thing about Crock Pot Cooking though, you can set the crock pot on warm and when you finally do get home, you still have a hot fresh meal. This recipe from my cousin Jill was GREAT and the meat worked great for fajita nachos for lunch today. Thanks Jill!!


Ingredients

•2 pounds skirt steak/Flank steak – I usually get like 1.5 lbs cause that is how the sell it
•2 packets (1.27-ounces each) fajita seasoning
•1 onion, thickly sliced
•2 green bell peppers, sliced into 1/2-inch strips
•1 red bell pepper, sliced into 1/2-inch strips
•1/2 cup beer or water
Directions

Slice steak into strips (cut against the grain). Season both sides of steaks with 1 packet of fajita seasoning (I usually just dump the strips into a pan and sprinkle packet on top and mix with my hands). Add vegetables to a 5-quart slow cooker. Toss with remaining packet of fajita seasoning. Add steak strips on top of vegetables. Pour in beer. Cover and cook on low setting for 8 to 10 hours.



I cut up and season the steak all at night and then throw everything in the crock pot in the morning.