Miso Soup

It's been a long time since I've posted on this blog. I have tried some fantastic recipes that I wanted to share.

Miso Soup - Japanese Soup

2 tsp. dashi granules (I used chicken broth)

4 cups water

3 tablespoons Miso Paste
2 green onions, sliced 1/4 - 1/2 inch

boil dashi in water on medium high heat. reduce heat to medium. add miso paste. add onions. heat for 2-3 minutes. DO NOT BOIL the MISO. keep heat on medium or lower.

A few things things about this soup:

1. You can add whatever you want to Miso soup. most recipes call for tofu. I hate tofu, so I don't add it in. but if you ever get it at a restaurant, it will inevitably have tofu in it. so feel free to throw that in the pot.

2. there are different types of miso paste. WHITE and RED. I use white. Red is a little spiceier and I haven't tried it yet, but I'm sure it is good too.

3.A good way to mix the paste is to take out some of the hot water/dashi mixture into a bowl and whisk the paste in the bowl until it is fully mixed. Then you can add it into the main pot and it mixes together quite nicely.

4.i don't know what the heck DASHI is. After much research and visit to the Asian Market, I learned that you can use chicken broth, or whatever broth you prefer. When I made it, i made it with chicken broth. let me know if you discover what Dashi granules is.

5. i went to a japanese restaurant one time that the Miso soup had noodles of some sort in it. no recipe that I could find called for such a thing. And when I asked at the market, they didn't know either. So I tried some UDON noodles. I just chopped them up (so that they are bite size = minimal slurping involved) and threw them in the pot. Loved that. great sub for the regular tofu texture I dislike so much.

And that's it! Always give it a good stir before you dish it up, as everything tends to sink to the bottom except the green onions. ha. This is a great warm soup for these winter days. It is easy and fast and soup-er delish!

enjoy!

Trying New Recipes

I've been trying to cook. Pasta Roni and frozen pizzas were all that used to be on the menu, but now I am actually using cookbooks and tips, crockpots, and fresh vegetables. Here are the two new things I've made this week and they were mmmmm YUM!

Eggs Baked in Bacon Rings (from the Joy of Cooking)

Preheat oven to 325
Saute or broil lightly: strips of bacon
Grease the bottoms of muffin pans. Line the sides with the bacon. Place in each pan: 1 tablespoon chili sauce
Drop into it: 1 egg
Pour over the egg: 1 teaspoon melted butter
Sprinkle with: salt and paprika
Bake about 10 minutes or until the eggs are set. Turn them out onto: rounds of toast or warm slices of drained pineapple
Garnish with: parsley

My experience with this recipe is that 10 minutes was def. not a enough time. it took about 17 minutes, and i turned the heat up to 365 for the last 5 minutes of that. the eggs still looked so soft. but once we cut into them the yolks were totally cooked and it tasted great. so perhaps i didn't need to turn up the heat. I also didn't buy chili sauce because i couldn't find a small container, just a really big one. i used this mexican hot sauce, just a tad, on 3 of them, sprinkled chili powder on 2 of them, and did one with nothing. All were great. I think the point is to have a stronger flavor there. The plain one went to Grace. she liked it too. I also used french bread for the toast, and I actually put it into the pan of left over bacon grease (I drained most of it first, just left a little bit for flavor) and I buttered them. It was a perfect combo for the eggs.

Pepper Chicken (found in the back of the Family Circle magazine years ago)

2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts, but into 1-inch pieces
1/2 cup ketchup
3 tablespoons light soy sauce
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 large onion, halved and cut into thin slices
2 green peppers, seeded, cored, and cut into thin slices
1 can (4 oz) sliced mushrooms, drained
Cooked white rice for serving

1. Heat oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add chicken; cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.
2. In a medium-size bowl, whisk 1 cup water, ketchup, soy sauce, and pepper; gradually whisk in the flour
3. Remove chicken from skillet. Stir in the water-ketchup mixture and bring to a boil; add chicken and the onion. Reduce heat to a simmer and cook, covered for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.
4. Add peppers and mushrooms and simmer, covered, for 15 more minutes, stirring occassionally. Serve with rice.

My experience with this recipe is that I was totally unprepared. I bought all the stuff. But I take forever chopping up things apparently. The onion, peppers, and the chicken. It's time consuming. And as I cooked it, I forgot to put the flour in it. This just means the sauce was thinner than desired, but the flavor was still good. Or so that's what Jay and James say. I didn't actually eat any of it. I don't like rice. I don't like peppers. I don't like onions. I don't like soy sauce. The picture made it look delicious and I thought James would like it, so that's why I made it. I had a bowl of corn chex for dinner. Lame, I know. I don't like that I didn't even taste it because I have no idea if they were lying to me or what it really tasted like. SO from now on, even if it's something I don't think I will like, I will always taste it, just so I know for myself.

It smelled fantastic though. And the boys did seem to enjoy it. Even Grace ate some, though she took out her peppers. :o)

How I Love This Chick

I Don't know her. I've mentioned her before. But can I just tell you how much I LOOOVE Thrifty Decor Chick? Please check out her blog, and if you don't love her as much as I do, I don't know if we can still be friends. Seriously, her posts are amazing, she has FAB ideas and is super entertaining to read. Check out her blog. Seriously. You won't be disappointed, I promise.

Future Projects

These are the first things in my house I would like the change. I need to make them organized and cuter, more appeasing to the eye. Any ideas? I love the blog "Thrifty Decor Chick." She's pretty much my fave for inspiration. Here is her baby room post she did and for the two bookshelves I mention below, I would like to do something similar. She has such great ideas.

This first one is bothering me so much more now that I changed around my living room. I made the walls cuter, and the arrangement is nicer, and now this corner sticks out like a sore thumb. I want to organize it and maybe do something with the walls in the back of the shelf.

This is one of our current speaker stands. I have one on each side of the TV. These old stools were rickity and wouldn't hold hardly any weight, so my hub decided to saw off the legs a bunch, flip them over, put some wood on top for a make shift speaker stand. Yeh....we are awesome. So obviously this needs some paint at least if not more.

And here we are next to the desk. This plagues me. It seemed cute in my head, but I had wanted a wooden shelf, but decided not to spend the extra money for such. Now I wish I would have. That cheap shelf isn't stable, it's hard to set things on, and it's U.g.L.y. When something isn't cute I tend to not take very good care of it, hence how unorganized it is, things stacked on top of it in a heap. lovely. I must do something here...

In my daughter's room, there is this plain white bookshelf. At our old place it looked good because we had colored walls. I have yet to get the energy and expense to paint the walls of our current place. As a renter, we can paint, but we just have to make it white again before we move out. Nice...but also, a pain in the butt. So this white shelf has been bothering me. I need to do something with it. Her room decor is green and multiple shades of pink. So I have about 10 different ideas for this but I can'ts decide which one...it also needs some organization. That orange halloween bucket...storage until october! the orange throws me off in her room.


So there you have it. When I decide which one to start with, I will do a new post showing you what I plan to do with it. Hopefully it happens soon. I'm itching to get this taken care of. I hate these ugly, unorganized corners.

Allow Me to Introduce...

my new blog. Yes I know I have 3 already. A private family blog. A photography blog. A spiritual thoughts blog, but I hardly use that one, so it doesn't really count. HA.

I have had a new desire to make my house(apartment really, but it's where I live = my house.) lovely. I want a lovely home. But we don't have much monies. But we do have lots of love. And lots of blogs to follow and get ideas from. On the side of this you will find links to all my favorite creative blogs for home decor, thrifty-ness, make it yourself, type of things. I have found so many in the last few weeks and love all.of.them.

As I find a project to work on I will post it on here and show you my progress, where I got the idea from, and what I learned from it.

I am excited for this new journey of making things more beautiful and more organized for as cheap as possible. and please feel free to give any ideas or links to great websites. I love learning from others, because let's face it...I can't think of all that on my own. :o) Wish me luck!