Welcome to Day 2 in Kristen’s Kitchen. You can read more about Kristen at her blog, The Unsinkable Kristen Chapman.
Monday, Day Two

Well, it’s been my first full day of not eating out in any way, shape or form in….no that’s too embarrassing.  I’ll not share that.  Regardless, I cooked each meal today and really enjoyed it.  I find that being in the kitchen with a plan for meals that sound fun and all the ingredients makes for a pretty nice time.  Added to that, it was raining and gorgeous here and Tot was still a little sick so she was super calm (hurray!) and only wanted to watch PBS all day, so I had a nice day puttering around the kitchen and cleaning up around the house and doing a little laundry - all without policing the kids to make sure no one was bleeding.  Good times.

For breakfast I made some pumpkin bread using the recipe in my Better Homes and Gardens red and white checkered cookbook that everyone gets as a wedding present.  It’s been my go-to cookbook for most things, so I saw no reason for it to fail me with pumpkin bread.  It had no white sugar (only brown) and I switched out shortening for real butter and made it half whole wheat flour and half white flour.

It turned out relatively dense and not quite sweet enough, but on the whole it was pretty good.  Dave loved it (with the addition of a little butter and sugar for topping) and while Tot wasn’t up to more than a bite or two, Little David ate two and a half grown up sized slices along with two entire bananas.  That kid can eat.

Lunch was a get-what-you-can affair, and I served the kids sandwiches, blue berries, and carrots with hummus.  I’m hoping to wean them off exclusively dipping everything in ranch, and also I just love hummus.  Hummus is yummus and I could eat it at everymeal.  But I’m holding back.  The kids like it okay and will eat it if there is no alternative, but they infinitely prefer ranch.  Baby steps, baby steps.

Dave had a couple Hot Pockets (I know, how gourmet of me.) and I had a left over Empanada (seriously, can’t get enough of those) and some sweet peas and some carrots and hummus.  Like I said, lunches here are anything but fancy.

After a very restful afternoon and a stellar nap out of Little David, it was soon time to be back in the kitchen.  On the menu:  Pasta with Roasted Cauliflower and Ham (from Everyday With Rachael Ray, December issue).  Dave’s sister, Laura Beth, came over to hang out for awhile and when I told her what I was making, it was unanimously decided that she should stay for dinner to see if roasted cauliflower proved to be more appetizing that it sounded.  Our back up choice was Quizno’s new Prime Rib sandwiches, which frankly, gave us all a lot of incentive to not like whatever I cooked.

But you know, it didn’t turn out that bad.  I tossed the chopped cauliflower in a bowl with some olive oil and salt and pepper and roasted it in the oven for about 20 minutes at 400 degrees.  While that roasted, I browned some butter on the stove and tossed in some fresh sage.  Note:  I had never cooked with fresh sage before and can I just say that it smells awesome while you are cutting it but it makes the final product so…sagey.  Definitely will hold back on that next time, I don’t care what Rachael Ray says.  When the buttery-sagey mix was done I started boiling the water for the penne pasta and by the time the cauliflower was done, so was the pasta.  I dumped it all in a giant bowl and shazaam - I perfectly nice tasting meal I had never tried before using fresh ingredients.

In the end, Dave decided to add a little Tony Chachere’s to the meal. I, of course, was offended that he thought my perfectly good meal needed any more seasoning.  However, upon tasting it I saw that he, of course, was right, as he always is.  The Tony Chachere’s didn’t impact the general taste very much, but it certainly toned down the overwhelming potency of the sage.  Good call, Dave.  Along with Laura Beth, we all decided that while not a bust, it wasn’t really our favorite meal or anything.  Just something a little different, which is always nice.

We followed up the meal with a little pumpkin bread for dessert, and it was just the ticket.  A little something sweet on top of all that savory.

So, Day 2 is now over and I’ve only had one bust of a meal - not too shabby for Kristen!  Maybe this whole foods/don’t eat out so much thing will keep going!

See you all tomorrow - Same Bat Time, Same Bat Channel.
Thank you for opening your kitchen to us all this week Kristen.

If you are interested in participating as a guest blogger for this 3 Moms feature, please leave us a comment or send us an email at 3moms@happytobeathome.net. We are looking for a variety of women willing to open their kitchens for one week to all of our readers. You do not even have to have your own blog in order to participate.

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