Pork Lo Mein

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Tonight we opted for the Pork Lo Mein off of our Monthly Dinner Menu.  One of the handy features when you plan out a months worth of menu items is the ability to swap things around according to your needs, energy level, time, etc.

Having been under the weather lately, things were swapped around and skipped over in exchange for easy to fix and Lo Mein was the winner tonight.

This is a relatively easy recipe to fix and does not take very much time.

Recipe adapted from Pillsbury back in 2010.

Ingredients:

1/2 lb. Pork Boneless Loin

2 Cups fresh sugar snap pea pods

1 cup baby-cut carrots, cut lengthwise into 1/2-inch sticks (I used regular and just julienned them)

1/2 package (9-oz size) refrigerated linguine, cut into 2-inch pieces (I just cooked linguine pasta, did not buy any special type like they suggested)

1/3 cup Progresso chicken broth

1 T. soy sauce (I doubled this amount)

2 t. cornstarch

1 t. sugar

2 t. finely chopped ginger root

2 to 4 cloves garlic, finely chopped.

2 t. vegetable oil

1/2 cup thinly sliced red onion (I just finely diced mine)

Toasted sesame seed, if desired

DIRECTIONS:

Trim fat from pork.  Cut pork with grain into 2x1-inch strips; cut strips across grain into 1/8-inch slices (pork is easier to cut if partially frozen, about 1 1/2 hours).  Remove strings from pea pods.

In 3-quart saucepan, heat 2 quarts water to boiling.  Add pea pods, carrots and linguine; heat to boiling.  boil 2-3 minutes or just until linguine is tender; drain. ( I opted to cook my pasta separately, set aside and then add back in at the end after the broth, I did not cook it with the pea pods and carrots.)

In a small bowl, mix broth, soy sauce, cornstarch, sugar, ginger root and garlic.

In a 12-inch nonstick skillet or wok, heat oil over medium-high heat.  Add pork and onion; stir-fry about 2 minutes or until pork is no longer pink.  Stir broth mixture; stir into pork mixture.  Stir in pea pods, carrots and linguine. 

Cook 2 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Sprinkle with Sesame seed.

Enjoy and if you make it come on back and let me know!!

 

 

 

Homemade Shake and Bake Chicken

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I remember as a child growing up every once in a while we would get to have Shake and Bake chicken and it always seemed like a treat.  The chicken was always tasty but I think the fun part was being able to shake the chicken in the bag.

I have this great recipe book called 365 Ways To Cook Chicken.  I picked it up eons ago when I used to work at Williams Sonoma.  And while I think there may only be 20 palatable recipes worthy of eating, one of them is this Homemade Shake and Bake.  The recipe I use does not have the breadcrumbs to give the extra crunch however, the mixture of spices and seasonings gives the chicken great flavor.  I suppose if you are in desperate need of the crunch you could modify this recipe and add in the breadcrumbs if you desire.

So here ya go all of the spices:

1/2 cup flour

1 teaspoon paprika

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon dried thyme

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

4 chicken legs and thighs

1/2 cup milk

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees.  Combine flour, paprika, salt, garlic powder, thyme, and pepper in a plastic bag.

Dip chicken legs in milk; shake off excess.  Add to bag and shake to coat evenly.  place chicken on a greased baking sheet.  Bake 40 minutes, until chicken is tender and coating crisp.

Now as you can see in my picture, we use the boneless skinless chicken breasts.  I take these and then butterfly them in half so they are not as thick and I end up with two complete servings as well.  I also find that when I slice the chicken breasts in half it takes just a portion of the baking time.  So if you decide to go with my version, modify your baking time to only 15 minutes for a nice tender chicken breast.

I happened to have served this with sweet potatoes and fried russet potatoes last night. The sweet potatoes were more like sweet potato casserole and I was not thinking straight and had wanted to have fried potatoes.  It wasn’t until I had the potatoes peeled that I realized that I had two potatoes on the plate.  Normally it would be zucchini or broccoli.

Enjoy and if you happen to make it come back and let me know!!

Apple Fritter Bread

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Well today is the second Tuesday of the month and that day is usually reserved for our Ladies brunch at church.  This is a ministry for the ladies to come together and pray for each other’s families and needs.  Sometimes the prayers may be requests that are not shared with the whole entire church and sometimes they are.  In any event, we come together each month to lift each lady up to the Lord.

We usually start off with fellowship over food/brunch and then have a devotional followed up by prayer time.

Today I made this Apple Fritter Bread that I had found on Pinterest.  The picture, of course, caught my attention.  As with most food items I proceed to make it is because my eyes have already dined and decided that was the next thing I need to make.

The page I followed for the recipe has some great step by step photo’s and I suggest keeping that page open as a reference.  I took my pictures and you will see them below as well. I always wonder why this happens when I copy someone’s recipe and they have step by step pictures, mine never look the same!!  Anyone else have this happen?

So anyhow, here ya go.

Apple Fritter Bread adapted from Flour Me With Love

Dough:

3 C flour

1 package yeast—2 ¼ teaspoons

1/4 tsp. salt

1/2 C brown sugar

1/4 C water

1 egg, beaten

3/4 C milk

1/4 C butter

Filling:

6 small apples, peeled & diced

1 Tbsp. lemon juice

1 C brown sugar

1 tsp. vanilla

2 Tbsp. butter

1 tsp. cinnamon

1 tbsp. cornstarch

Glaze:

1 Tbsp. butter, softened

1 tsp. vanilla

3/4 C powdered sugar

3 tsp. half & half (or milk)

 

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease a 9 x 5 bread pan.

In a skillet, cook apples, lemon juice, brown sugar, vanilla, butter, cinnamon & cornstarch until mixture is thickened.  Set aside to cool.

Heat the milk in a small saucepan until it bubbles; remove from heat. Add the butter and stir until melted; set aside.

Put flour, yeast, brown sugar and salt in a bowl, mix well. Add the water, egg and milk/butter mixture.

Mix until dough forms into a ball; knead for an additional five minutes. On a well floured surface, roll dough into a rectangle. (On the page I followed the recipe she has a picture here and she used a stand mixer, I mixed by hand and kneaded by hand as well)

Evenly spread apple mixture over dough. (This picture looks drastically different from hers…mine was soooo moist and I used the exact amounts called for….Its all in the apples…extra moisture I am convinced.)

Cut dough into even squares (she got 20 from her dough, I had 35 pieces  Go Figure!!!). So you are going to do something like 4 rows by 5 columns or slightly more.

Carefully stack pieces of dough onto each other forming four piles. (use a spatula, it makes stacking much easier!)  Place piles of dough into prepared pan.

Here is the picture that she does not have on her blog but necessary to show you….this is slightly messy to put together….Or at least in my case!!

Here it is all piled in the pan, I am not sure if it would have just been better to use a longer pan or leave part out since I had more pieces.

Bake 45-50 minutes; until golden brown.  Immediately remove from pan.

Mix butter, vanilla and powdered sugar into a bowl.  Add half & half; stir until you get a creamy consistency.  Pour on glaze and allow to setup for a few minutes. Pull some apart and enjoy!

So, because mine was so juicy, it took at least a half hour longer to bake.  This is where I am wondering if I had moved it to my longer bread pan it might have turned out even better.  The bread was very dense.  It had a sweet taste but it didn’t have the pull apart, monkey bread fluffy texture that I was expecting….so it was the first try and I will try again using a longer bread pan to give the bread a little more space.

Enjoy and if you make it come back and let me know!!!

Cheeseburger Soup

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This recipe I found on Pinterest and decided to give it a try.

Recipe adapted from: The Recipe Critic

Ingredients:
1/2 pound ground beef (use 1 pound)
3/4 cup chopped onion
3/4 cup shredded carrots
3/4 cup diced celery
1 teaspoon dried basil
1 teaspoon dried parsley flakes
4 tablespoons butter, divided
3 cups chicken broth
4 cups peeled and diced potatoes
1/4 cup all purpose flour
2 cups of Velveeta processed cheese cubed (I used 20 oz on the markings of the Velveeta)
1 1/2 cups milk
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/4 cup sour cream

1.  Brown the ground beef in 3 quart saucepan.  Drain and set aside.
2. In the same saucepan add 1 T butter and add onion, shredded carrots, and celery, basil and parsley.  Sauté until tender.
3.  Add the broth, potatoes and beef and bring to a boil.  Reduce heat, cover and simmer 10-12 minutes or until potatoes are tender.
4.  In small skillet melt remaining butter (3 T) and add the flour.  Cook and stir for 3-5 minutes or until bubbly.  Add to the soup and bring to a boil.  Cook and stir for 2 minutes.  Reduce heat to low.
5. Stir in the cheese, milk, salt and pepper.  Cook and stir until cheese melts.  Remove from heat and blend in sour cream. 
Yield 8 servings

Ok here are my notes: Overall, I thought the flavor was really good.  I did change some things.  I used more than a pound of meat to serve our family and used more Velveeta. 

The second thing that occurred the potatoes seemed to me mushy, grainy???? I am not sure what could cause this except the extended time of the potatoes cooking with all the food and getting broken up trying to get softened.  I think when I make it next, I would make the potatoes in a separate pot and add in at the end, to retain firmness but doneness and not break up so much in the mix.  Perhaps that also adds to the thickening of the soup????

Lastly, I added an extra cup of stock because the amount of my potatoes were not covered by the liquid called for.

The soup made a bunch, partly because of the additions I made for our size of family, and we had some left over which is always a plus for lunch the next day.

Enjoy and if you make it come back and let me know!!

Dealing with Asthma….A lifestyle change for me.

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Figure A shows the location of the lungs and airways in the body. Figure B shows a cross-section of a normal airway. Figure C shows a cross-section of an airway during asthma symptoms.

The graphics in this post and brief synopsis below are from the National Heart, lung and blood Institute

Asthma (AZ-ma) is a chronic (long-term) lung disease that inflames and narrows the airways. Asthma causes recurring periods of wheezing (a whistling sound when you breathe), chest tightness, shortness of breath, and coughing. The coughing often occurs at night or early in the morning.

Asthma affects people of all ages, but it most often starts during childhood. In the United States, more than 25 million people are known to have asthma. About 7 million of these people are children.

Overview

To understand asthma, it helps to know how the airways work. The airways are tubes that carry air into and out of your lungs. People who have asthma have inflamed airways. This makes them swollen and very sensitive. They tend to react strongly to certain inhaled substances.

When the airways react, the muscles around them tighten. This narrows the airways, causing less air to flow into the lungs. The swelling also can worsen, making the airways even narrower. Cells in the airways might make more mucus than usual. Mucus is a sticky, thick liquid that can further narrow the airways.

This chain reaction can result in asthma symptoms. Symptoms can happen each time the airways are inflamed.

Sometimes asthma symptoms are mild and go away on their own or after minimal treatment with asthma medicine. Other times, symptoms continue to get worse.

When symptoms get more intense and/or more symptoms occur, you're having an asthma attack. Asthma attacks also are called flareups or exacerbations (eg-zas-er-BA-shuns).

Treating symptoms when you first notice them is important. This will help prevent the symptoms from worsening and causing a severe asthma attack. Severe asthma attacks may require emergency care, and they can be fatal.

Looking back over these last months I realize I have been dealing with this since October and possible even as early as August of this year and prior to that I am not sure.  And to say the least, I am on a terrible learning curve as to how to manage this disease.

While many Asthma attacks can be triggered by environmental triggers i.e. pets, smoking, dust, vacuuming, cold weather, the main culprit in my situation are bacterial infections—getting sick, and the cold weather…

My issue has been trying to figure out which is the cold symptom and which is the Asthma.  Both issues cause excess mucous to be produced and terrible chest coughing.

This past few days has been a roller-coaster and I am still trying to recover. I am running into a potential health hazard for me.  I will get sick, end up missing church services, get better, and then go back to helping out at church, get exposed once again and then end up getting sick.  My immune system is not strong enough to handle exposure to regular germs like most people.  It seems the slightest germ attacks me viciously.

On the 2nd of January, after having been healthy for about a week, I went back to church on a Wednesday to help out in our children’s program called Kings Kids.  I enjoy the program, we have on average about 80 students each week and then in my classroom we have about 10 students sometimes more sometimes less.  The class rooms are about 8’ by 10’ in my estimation.

By Friday myself and a few of my children were feeling sick and by Sunday we were a sinking ship.  Several children had fevers, one was throwing up.  Thankfully I had some medication left from a while back that my Dr. had given me to use in my Nebulizer breathing machine. I started taking some Monday and used two, Tuesday I used 3 and I had one dose left that I was going to use Wednesday evening.  I was having some difficulty breathing Wednesday evening, and took the dose that night after church.  That night sleeping was miserable.  So much coughing, having to try and stack up pillows to sit up and I was running out of my puffer inhaler.  In hindsight I see, based on having scoured the internet about Asthma episodes that my last dose of nebulizer was not having any effect because my Asthma had become so severe…I just didn’t know what was to come.

 Thursday was probably the worst day I have ever had.My breathing ability had gotten so bad that I couldn’t walk across the house without breathing heavily.  By heavily I mean like you see those people run the Boston Marathon and they cross the finish line and they bend over gasping for breath and collapse on the ground trying to get enough oxygen.  That would be me…..and then it became that way just sitting on the couch not doing anything.  I couldn’t talk to my children every word I would speak I had to stop afterwards and try and get enough air to say the next word. I have never been so scared that I was going to die as I was that day into night.

I had called my husband and told him I did not think I could make it through the weekend to get to the Dr.  I knew my situation was bad, I just didn’t know how bad…I didn’t know what the severe symptoms were to watch out for.  I am seeing an Intern Specialist(not that he is an intern…NO, he has been in practice for 25 years) not an Asthma specialist  He was able to get an appointment for Friday morning.  Now I just had to make it through Thursday evening.  I had my emergency inhaler, however, it is the only one that does not have a counter so I did not know how much was left.  The canister felt less than half full.   I was trying to not use it during the day because the night time is soooo much worse with all the coughing. I needed to go pick up pizza for the kids to eat about 3 min. from the house for dinner.  I made one of my son’s go with me and when we got in the car I told him how to call daddy on the phone in case something happened…this is how scared I was.

I used my inhaler once late in the evening prior to going to bed around 10pm.  You are supposed to use two puffs but I used one to save it for any attacks during the night.   I was able to sleep for two hours and then hit with a horrific cough attack.  I awoke at about midnight and Tim was still up working.  I went out and sat in our recliner hoping that sitting up would help and tried to lean on a pillow next to my head.  At about 2am I thought I would try again to lay down.  I had taken one more puff and the last puff from an older inhaler I had and was able to fall asleep until morning, praise the Lord.

Friday, yesterday, I went in and the nurse took my oxygen reading.  At rest the oxygen level was at 87% the normal, where it is supposed to be, is 94% minimum.  And my reading was at rest, it is only supposed to get low if you are active.  I can only imagine what my oxygen level must have been the day before when I could not breathe at all.  The Lord was truly watching over me. I should have been in the back of an ambulance heading to the  ER and them pumping me full of steroids and oxygen.

I was able to get prescriptions for my nebulizer which should last me easily two months, and prescriptions for two more inhalers.  Just in the nick of time if you ask me.  It just overwhelms me to know now how bad I was on Thursday night. It has me crying just thinking about it.  If you look at the picture below you will see this handy chart to help manage your Asthma.  You always want to be in green, that is ideal.

Then there is yellow caution, I guess if you will kind of like a traffic light.  Following next is red….you are in a serious state…and if you look below that is DANGER….this was me….If I had only seen this on Thursday, I would have done things a little differently. I can look at this now and see I have not been in the green zone yet and at least I now know what the symptoms are of the different zones and can take action immediately.  I think you only need to have one bad Asthma episode to know what a bad one is and never want to go there again.

So I am hoping I am on the way to actually managing my Asthma and in the meantime I need to make some decisions with my husband as to whether or not I should continue working in this capacity at my church and find other avenues to help minister to others.

If you would join me in praying that the Lord would continue to watch over me and keep me safe and turn this disease around so that I can have a healthy quality of life.  Thank you so much.