Relaxing...Productive...Weekend? What is that???

The Holidays are here and there is something happening every weekend, almost every weekday, plus work, plus the everyday stuff, and it was beginning to be to much.  I needed a relaxing weekend to GET STUFF DONE and that is what I did.

I had the house to myself.  So it was pretty quiet, the TV was off most of the time, except for when I was watching Pretty Woman.

I achieved so much and now I can say I feel ready to take on all of our festivities.

Here are all of the items I checked off my To-Do List:

1. Went through my childhood boxes, consolidated 3 big tubs into one small shoe box of the best pictures. 

2. Dropped clothes, books, and toys off at the Good Will. 

3. Cleaned out my closet and rearranged my clothes in my drawer like they did here.

4. Made Home-Made Sausage and breakfast casserole for the week.

5. Ate Trade Joe's Joe-Joes and watched Pretty Woman.

6. Made Spaghetti Squash and Tomato sauce for the week. 

7. Cleaned my stove.  I placed the burners in ammonia.   I tried the all natural salt, vinegar, and baking soda for the stove top, but that didn't seem to work great, so I used 409 after.  It still isn't as clean as I would like on my main burner, but I will try again soon.  I need more vinegar and baking soda.

Ta da...

8. Cleaned my bath tub with Borax.  (The marks on the bottom are from a previous tenant and won't budge, any ideas?)

9. Made grain-free Pumpkin Pancakes and Apple Butter from Apple Hill.

African Night

Meet our African friend, Jack.  He likes elephants.  He spent a lot of his life in South Africa while his parents were working at an international school.  Now living in California, right down the street from us, he hasn't been able to enjoy some of his favorite African meals.  It was his night to cook and with the help of a small South African shop down in Orange County he was able to recreate an African meal for the rest of us.  

Our African meal consisted of Mieliepap, Sheba, Boerwors, and Kebabs.  

The mieliepap is a corn meal dish that is very similar to polenta, but a bit thicker and was topped with Sheba, an onion, tomato, and garlic sauce.  I think this was my favorite part of the meal.  The Boerwors is a very lean beef sausage with lots of spices and flavor.  It is a bit strange because the flavor doesn't come from the fat like most sausage I know topped with sautéed mushrooms.  And finally a kebab with chicken, peppers, and pineapple.  With the African music on in the background we enjoyed this great meal with out silverware, Jack said that is had the locals eat it.  

I hope we can make mieliepap and sheba more often, not just African Nights.  They were sooo good!  

Another great photo by Jack. 

Happy 16th Birthday Lauren: Apples, Apple Butters, Apple Pies and... Sushi?

First off, my little sister is SIXTEEN!!!! 

Crazy, I am 10 years older than her so that means I am almost 26... does that mean I am soon to be in my late 20s... OH NO! 

Anyways I can't believe she is now old enough to drive! I am so impressed with the young lady she has grown to be, but she will always be little Lo Lo to me. 

When asked what she wanted to do for her birthday she said, go midnight black friday shopping, then join us up to apple hill, and then sushi for dinner! And we did exactly that. 

No pictures from shopping, thank God. 

But after we "napped" we headed up to Apple Hill for some delicious treats, great scenery, and a brief visit with some Santa Barbara friends. 

  

THIS IS THE WINNER OF THE DAY: WALKING PIE! 

(below)

Who wouldn't want a pie that is completely surrounded by crispy, flaky, buttery crust? And free ice cream, we scored!

After we ate dessert for lunch we headed home for a bit to relax before we went to Mikuni for dinner. 

This has been my favorite sushi restaurant since I was about 16! And I couldn't pass up getting a picture with my little brother and my favorite dishes, Citrus Blossom and the Incredible Roll.  

So long for now Sacramento, watch out Lauren Craig is on the road! 

Happy Thanksgiving!

I am thankful for my life, my family, my friends, my boyfriend, my job, the food in front of us and the Craig sweet tooth still going strong and creative this Thanksgiving... I present to you Pum-ple Cake by Lauren and Kayla!

Leftover Remix: Pumpkin Pie

By the time dessert was served we were sooooo full at Friendsgiving, that barely any of the pumpkin pie was ate.  This was great because it gave me a lot of pie to work with.  I thought the combination of the pumpkin pie filling, whip cream and crust blended with eggs would be a great baked french toast mixture.  So I gave it a try and I would say it was quite the success.   

Pumpkin Pie Baked French Toast

1. Preheat the oven to 350.  

2. Take the leftover Pumpkin Pie and blend it in the bender until smooth. 

3. Chop up bread. 

4. Crack eggs to add to the blender (I do it in a separate bowl, just incase you loose a shell)

5. Add eggs to blender and keep on low speed just to evenly blend with the pumpkin pie puree. 

6. Pour the egg and pumpkin pie mixture over the bread.  Bake at 350 for 40 min. 

7. Serve and eat.  I wish I had extra whip cream to top it off with but I blended it with the pumpkin pie, but you can also top with syrup.  

Please note I did not include measurements because leftovers vary.  For this recipe I used 2/3 of the pumpkin pie. 

Leftover Remix: Garlic Mashed Potatoes

For some reason I thought it was necessary to cook an entire bag of potatoes for Garlic Mashed Potatoes at our Friendsgiving, but as you can see only about a third was actually ate! And you can only eat so much mashed potatoes, but the 2nd day of leftovers you get pretty tired of the same thing.  

One of my favorite soups is Potato Cheese soup from Silvergreens, but recently we ordered soup and it was watery and no longer the creamy cheesy soup I loved.  I was very dissapointed.  Last night, I thought I can recreate that Potato Cheese soup with my leftover mashed potatoes. 

This was probably the easiest dinner ever and I was sooo happy with the results! 

Creamy Garlic Mashed Potato Cheese Soup

1. Put 1 cans of veggie broth and the left over mashed potatoes in a stove top pan.  

2. As the mixture heats up use a hand blender and mix everything together. Add more veggie broth to get to the consistency you prefer.  

3. Add cheese and stir. 

4. Serve with pepper and top with more cheese. 

Please note I did not include measurements because leftovers vary.  For this recipe I used 4 cups of Garlic Mashed Potatoes.